Cambodia and The Globalization

News of Cambodia N° 0653-E

CAMBODIA AND THE GLOBALIZATION

Khemara Jati
Montreal, Quebec
November 20, 2006

1/ Geostrategic interests of the United States since the Second World war.

During the Second World War, the decisive turning-point is the German defeat in front of Stalingrad. The German army arrives at Stalingrad on August 20th, 1942 and capitulates on February 2nd, 1943. This battle is of an incredible ferocity. Russians and Germans hide and fight in the slightest ruins of the city. One says that even animals: dog, cat even rat and mice died or fled the city, there are only men who kill each other during six months by a polar cold. The Germans lost 400 000 men among whom 150 000 prisoners.

For the United States, the landing of Normandy becomes a necessity to prevent Stalin from controlling all continental Europe. At the beginning of 1945, Hitler's end approaches. Roosevelt and Churchill meet Stalin at Yalta. For the Unite States, it is necessary to end the war most quickly in Europe to be able to arrive in Tokyo before Stalin. In this purpose, they did not hesitate to release their only two atomic bombs, which the United States has in possession, one on Hiroshima[1] and another one on Nagasaki[2]. Meanwhile Stalin declares the war in Japan on August 8th. On August 15th Hirohito announces on the radio the Japan’s surrender. On September 2nd Mac Arthur receives the Japan’s capitulation without any condition.

Russians were able to conquer only half the North of Korea and the part of the Kuril Islands.

Let us note that after Yalta, on the way back to the United States, Roosevelt meets the Arabia king Ibn Seoud on the US cruiser Quincy, anchored in a lake in the middle of the Suez Canal. Roosevelt wants to make sure of the petroleum sources security. Without petroleum no industrial and economic development is possible. Nothing runs on the ground and nothing flies in the airs. No war is possible. Nowadays 200 000 products are made from the petroleum. Nowadays, Russia is the only major power possessing very important petroleum reserves. The United States, China, Japan and Europe are obliged to take this situation into consideration. The United States and China are beating each other for their petroleum supply. For China, three quarters of petroleum needs are supplied by boat, then vulnerable in case of conflict with Taiwan. China is thus obliged to negotiate with Russia and other countries of Central Asia for the routing of its natural gas and petroleum requirements by pipelines. Then decreasing its energy dependence by sea.

How did the United States put the Soviet economy on knees by using judiciously discreetly the petroleum as weapon ? Read « The hidden face of petroleum » by Eric Laurent, Edition Plon, pages 189 - 201. Here is the conclusion:

« In May 1986, a secret report of CIA sent to the White House. It entitled « The USSR in a dilemma of the scarcities in hard currencies ». The report mentions that the « reduced prices of the petroleum, the decline of its own production and depreciated dollar » considerably reduced, till the end of decade, the Soviet capacity to import of the western equipment, farm products and the industrial material. This decline arises as Gorbatchev's coming to the power coincides with a fruitless attempt of economic revitalization.

« According to CIA, the net losses suffered by Moscow, resulting from the fall of the courses of petroleum, is up to 13 billion dollars and were not compensated with the weapons sales , because its main customers, Iraq, Iran and Libya, saw their oil incomes collapsing of 46 % in the first half of the year 1986. Furthermore, the war in Afghanistan costs every year 4 billion dollars to the Soviet economy. The USSR has no more means, or even the desire, to lead a policy of superpower. »

During its VIth Congresses of the Communist Party of Vietnam, Hanoi realizes the end of the Soviet assistances, then the meeting Sihanouk - Hun Sen on December 2nd, 1987 at Fère-en-Tardenois in France. Sihanouk ignored all these bottom lines of the games. In politic the ignorance is not an excuse and the mistake is not allowed. The world is mercilessly. It belongs to us Cambodians to learn from it.

After the proclamation of People's Republic of China on October 1st, 1949, the troops of Mao come at the border of Tonkin. France cannot overcome any more the vietnamese resistance. The American forces will undergo the same fate.

At the beginning of the Korea War started on June 25th, 1950, the United States strengthen the economic potential of Japan, Taiwan and South Korea after the break of the hostilities on November 12th, 1951. The war of Korea saw, for the first time, the confrontation between the American army and the army of Mao. This war ends by a draw game. The Chinese lost 500 000 men, the American side 50 000 men.

To develop the economy of South Korea, Japan and Taiwan, the only solution is to invest massively in the education system from the maternal up to the universities in the national language with english as second language from a certain level. At the same time accelerate the agricultural production. In Taiwan, the United States impose the agrarian reform[3]. Under the communist regimes after the agrarian reform, the farmers are obliged to live in the cooperatives managed by cadres of the party. In Taiwan, lands are sold to the farmers and the power strengthens the property of the acquired land:

« These lands were estimated at 2,5 times the value of the main harvest, payable in ten years, in semiannual 20 payments. In any case the total of these payments and all the income taxes and taxes had to exceed 37,5 % of the main harvest: in the way that the sharecroppers (farmers) so became owners by paying every year little less than their previous rent.[4] »

The objective is that the farmer really feels owner of his lands, his real estates and his furniture. The private property of the land, the real estates and the furniture is the principle idea to concrete the form of nation. The private property extends then into the cultural property, concretized by the owner of the property. Similarly of the copyright for example. To defend the nation is also to defend her land, her real estates and her furniture, and by extension her family, her close relations, her friends and her way of living. On the other hand the defense of her private property, implies the respect for the private property of others, first step towards the individual freedom, the fundamental base of the Human Right. Inversely there is no personal freedom without the private property respect.

In Taiwan, the first manufactured goods are intended to help the new farmer owners. Then gradually the industry diversifies and commits to produce the strong added values as the industry and the advanced researches, with the arrival on the market of more high level engineers. Now Japan, with a population ten times less numerous than China, occupies the second place in the world economy. South Korea and Taiwan become now developed countries.

2/ Evolution of the geostrategic interests of the United States in East Asia and of the Southeast since 1972

For the record, let us call back the historic handshake Mao – Nixon, in Beijing, on February 21st, 1972. China was then in full Cultural Revolution. The United States needed to create a second front to face the Soviet military power of Brejnev's era. China also needed this handshake to avoid isolation facing the Soviet threats. Then this historic handshake come to reinforce both interests those of the United States and China. On the other hand China had been already equipped with the nuclear weapon (fission: in October 16th, 1964, fusion: in June 17th, 1967) and the first Chinese satellite was launched in April, 1970. This handshake also allowed the signature of the peace treaty between the USA and Vietnam of January 27th, 1973.

Japan was the first country to note the differences between China and Vietnam concerning the Nixon's visit in China. Then, the Nixon's visit in China was announced in public simultaneously in the United States and in China on July 15th, 1971 shortly before the arrival of Nixon in China:

« « In the evening of February 8th, 1972, a plane of the commission of surveillance of the UN, left Vientiane, in Laos, was settling in Hanoi. There were, Miyake Wasuke, director of the first service of Southeast Asia of the Japanese Foreign Office (the son-in-law of Foreign Secretary), and his second, Inoue Kichinosuke. In that time, Tokyo recognized the South Vietnamese government (Republic of Vietnam) and had no diplomatic relation with the Democratic Republic (Vietnam of the North). Miyake and Inoue, who were in charge of Vietnam in the ministry, came thus secretly in an enemy capital. Their mission was unofficial, but they acted on the instructions of the highest leaders: the Prime Minister Sato Eisaku, Foreign Secretary Fukuda Takeo and his administrative Vice Minister, Hogan Shinaku. The Japanese government saw coming the end of the Vietnamese conflict, and a political decision had been taken on the necessity of establishing quickly friendly relations with Hanoi. Such was the mission of the tandem Miyake-Inoue[5] ».

« The Japanese emissaries receive a very good reception in Hanoi. Their mission will be completed by the other one in April 1973 and the negotiations between both governments represented respectively by Nakayama Yoshihiro, ambassador of Japan in France and Vo Van Sung, the Vietnamese temporary charge d'affaires, will start more officially in Paris in July of the same year, to result in September (1973) in a diplomatic recognition.

« With the new context which announces in the approach of the end of the conflict, the Japanese authorities consider that it becomes urgent to establish good relations with Vietnam of the North evident « leader of three Indo-Chinese countries (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), region indispensable to the prosperity and the stability of east Asia and the Southeast”[6]"[7].

Let us remind that Moscow accepts the leadership of Vietnam on Laos and Cambodia since the creation of the Indochina Communist Party on February 3rd, 1930 contrary to the China communist. Naturally this Japanese position is welcomed with opened arm by Hanoi.

Regarding the United States, the turning in 180° is made after the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9th, 1989. The USSR is not any more the main enemy of the United States. The real enemy is China. As regards Cambodia, the policy of the United States becomes identified with that of Japan.

« On September 5th, 1990 : the State Secretary James Baker announces that the United States will discuss henceforth directly with the State of Cambodia (that is with Hun Sen); Hanoi is satisfied by the American decision.[8] ».

From which the signature of the Paris Agreements of October 23rd, 1991. By ignorance, did not Sihanouk and Khieu Samphan sign their political death sentence? To rely on the major power's advices is it not agreed to confide blindly their fate to the chances of the interests of these major powers? Is the Sirik Matak's letter to the ambassador of the United States already forgotten[9] ?

The admiral Richard Macke, the commander of the American Navy Forces in Pacific, during his visit in Hanoi, declared, according to the Thai newspaper Bangkok Post of November 1st, 1994 :

« During a visit in Hanoi at the beginning of the last week, the admiral Richard Macke, declared that he envisaged the cooperation of the American Forces with Vietnam, once the relations between our two countries normalized. »

Macke declared that he had not excluded a future American military presence in Vietnam and indicated that he was interested in the ancient American base of Cam Ranh Bay, in the South of Vietnam, now a Vietnamese base, where there is a Russian's presence.

« I think that when the economic and political collaboration will begin, then a military collaboration could also begin » he added.
« The United States and Vietnam were enemy in the conflict which came to an end in April 1975, when the armored cars of the Vietnamese communists entered Saigon (in April 30th, 1975) and overturned the South Vietnamese Government supported for more than ten years by the American forces.

« The American troops withdrew and Vietnam released (Americans) prisoners war, after the peace agreements signed in Paris in 1973 (in January 27th). Macke declared that neither the military cooperation nor Cam Ranh Bay had been evoked during her meeting of October 25th with the Vietnamese Ministers. But he added: « I am a naval officer and the naval officers are always in search of good ports ».

Since American warships cast anchor to Saigon. Bill Clinton, just before the end of his second mandate, paid a visit in Vietnam in December, 2000.

In Vietnam, from the day after the proclamation of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam on August 18th, 1945, Ho Chi Minh decides of using the Vietnamese language in the education from the maternal uo to the universities. The professors have difficulties during the first two years. Later almost all the problems are resolved. Since 1986, Hanoi invests massively in the education: schooling of the whole population and extending universities in vietnamese language with a foreign language, mainly English, from a certain level. Nowadays Vietnam forms 30 000 high-level engineers a year.

The United States now sees its interests of transforming most quickly Vietnam into developed country. So the United States can count on South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and now Vietnam to surround China in the East and in the Southeast. Let us remind that Japan elaborated this strategy since 1972. After the signature of the Paris Agreements, by financing as high as two billions of US dollars the UNTAC's operation with as leader the Japanese Akashi, Japan makes everything to integrate economically Cambodia into the Vietnamese economy, as the construction of roads and bridges to facilitate the goods's transportation towards Saigon and by qualifying of racist any opposition against the Vietnamese even verbal.

« In December 2000, about 290 Japanese investors implanted in Vietnam, with a capital recorded by 4 billion dollars, placing Japan in the third rank of foreign investors in Vietnam, behind Singapore and Taiwan. In term of realization, that is actual payments of capital, Japan is situated in the first rank of countries investors. »[10]

« It was naturally necessary to use equipments. The market of these decades quickly developed, overlaping of 710 million dollars in 1997 to 1 200 in 1999. In this domain, as in the others, Vietnam practised a policy of systematic diversification of its supplies. Some of these last ones is made on the spot, within the joint ventures framework . Goldstar produces cables of optical fibres and digital switches, Daesung (Korea) insures the cable's productions, Alcatel (France) the digital switches assembling and Newtel (a group supported by Goldman Sachs (USA) and Nikko Securities (Japan)) makes phone equipments in partnership. From his part, Siemens produces cables in optical fibre and digital switches.»[11]

Now on the eve of Bush's visit in Vietnam, the first world producer of chips, Intel, announces to go and invest a billion dollars to build a factory to produce chips in Saigon.
3. Conclusion.

Vietnam is now becoming another South Korea, the most powerful industrial nation of Southeast Asia, before Malaysia and Thailand. This situation is the result of the using of the vietnamese language in universities since 1945, that is for more than 60 years. Now Vietnam forms 30 000 high-level engineers a year. Bill Gates is forming 15 000 high-level Vietnamese computer engineers. The high-level technological companies, the strong added values find easily the technical necessary staff soon like Intel for example.

On the other hand, one find in Vietnam books, in vietnamese, in any kind and translations into vietnamese of the fundamental works of the world culture. The vietnamese bookshops in Europe and in North America are prosperous.

Is it necessary to draw a conclusion for us Cambodians? Now with the globalization, it is the merciless economic world war. In this war, the engineers and the managers of high levels are officers and generals ?

By forming, a year, 25 of low level engineers, in foreign language, is Cambodia capable of answering it undid mortal? How to attract advanced companies with strong added values without big number of high-level engineers ? Are the Cambodians condemned to be eternally proletarians of our neighbours? With eventually the disappearance of Cambodia ?

Monday, November 20th, 2006

Notes : Cet article est disponible en français sur demande.

[1] August 6th, 1945.
[2] August 9th, 1945.
[3] «Taiwan the price of success » Taiwan le prix de la réussite by René Dumont, Ed. La Découverte, Paris 1986, page 23.
[4] «Taiwan the price of success » Taiwan le prix de la réussite by René Dumont, Ed. La Découverte, Paris 1986, page 25.
[5] Yoshiharu Tsuboi, « The Japanese’s Diplomatie and Vietnam (1972 – 1998) », in Revue d’Etudes internationales, N°1, march 1999, p. 85 – 86.
[6] Yoshiharu Tsuboi, « The Japanese’s Diplomatie and Vietnam (1972 – 1998) », in Revue d’Etudes internationales, N°1, march 1999, page 86.
[7] « Japon – Vietnam, history of under-influence’s relation » by Guy Faure and Laurent Schwab, Ed. IRASEC, Paris, Bangkok 2004, p. 56.
[8] « Japon – Vietnam, history of under-influence’s relation » by Guy Faure and Laurent Schwab, Ed. IRASEC, Paris, Bangkok 2004, page XIV.
[9] The American ambassador Dean receives a Sirik Matak's letter, councillor of the Government:
Excellence and dear friend,
I thank you very sincerely for your letter and for your offer to leading us towards the freedom. Regrettably! I may not leave in a so cowardly way.
As for you and your big country, I would never believed a single moment that you would abandon people who chose freedom. You refused us your protection; we cannot do anything. You leave and I wish that you and your country find the happiness under the sky.
But, remind that, if I die here, in my country which I love, to bad indeed, because we were all born and we have to die one day. I committed only one mistake, it was to believe you and to believe the Americans.
Please accept, Excellence, my dear friend, my loyal and friendly feelings.
Sirik Matak
[10] « Japon – Vietnam, history of under-influence’s relation » by Guy Faure and Laurent Schwab, Ed. IRASEC, Paris, Bangkok 2004, p. 79.
[11] « Japon – Vietnam, history of under-influence’s relation » by Guy Faure and Laurent Schwab, Ed. IRASEC, Paris, Bangkok 2004, p. 87-88.