A violent attack on a Vietnamese fishing boat tests Hanoi’s muted but resolute approach to China’s aggression in the South China Sea.
By Damien Cave
Photographs and Video by Linh Pham
Damien Cave, who recently established The Times’s first bureau in Vietnam since the Vietnam War, reported this article from the south-central part of the country.
- Oct. 28, 2024Updated 9:42 a.m. ET
“Nguyen Thanh Bien winced as he rubbed his side, turning toward a portrait of Ho Chi Minh in a living room filled with conch shells. He said he was still dealing with internal injuries two weeks after the Chinese authorities boarded his fishing boat and bashed him with iron pipes in a patch of the South China Sea claimed by both China and Vietnam.
“I got hit first in the head from behind — I was running to the front of the boat,” he said, sitting beside his father, who taught him to fish near their home on Vietnam’s south-central coast. “With the second blow, I lost consciousness.”
When he awoke, his catch, worth nearly $8,000, was gone. His ribs were broken. And three other crew members were injured.
China’s aggressive policing of disputed territory has produced the latest clash in a long, complex relationship. China ruled Vietnam for a millennium, leaving an indelible cultural mark, but Vietnam’s national identity and fierce independence spring from its resistance to Chinese empire-building, as its school students learn from a young age.” . . . . .
Murio
Ontario4h ago
If the west could only break its addiction to cheap Chinese products we could create such internal pressure in China that their focus would turn inward. We need to do without cheap electronics, electric cars, and dollar store items – not being preferred customers would shift the power dynamic.1 Reply82 RecommendedShareFlag
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David Lindsay Jr.
Hamden, CT NYT Comment:
@Murio If only it were easy. The Chinese hold a great deal of our huge debt, and we will have to stop needing their money also, which seems doable, but requires discipline. Viet blog at TheTaysonRebellion.com