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Kerry's Vietnam liability

ANTI-WAR STANCE DRAWS IRE; FUNDRAISER SET IN S.J.

By Laura Kurtzman

Mercury News

With his bid for the White House, John Kerry, a decorated Navy veteran who fought to save old South Vietnam, is stirring passions among Vietnamese-Americans.

But not the way his campaign would like.

In newspapers, on the Internet and at the dinner table, the generation that fought and lived through that war is lecturing the younger one about this year's presumed Democratic nominee for president, who will be campaigning for labor support in the Bay Area on Wednesday. Kerry protested the war, they say, and as a U.S. senator he coddled the communist government that eventually triumphed. Vote Republican, they urge.

Though young Vietnamese-Americans often do not share their parents' fierce anti-communism and are less loyal to the Republican Party, this year's election has put them in an especially tough spot. To embrace a Democrat they must not only stray from the party their parents hold dear but accept a man accused of betraying their community.

``Some people have said to me, `Why can't we have another candidate?' '' said Hung Nguyen, 32, a Kerry supporter with ties to San Jose who worked for President Bush when he was governor of Texas. Some normally staunch Democrats have told him they cannot vote for Kerry and are boycotting his fundraiser Wednesday in San Jose.

Campaigning for Kerry is brutal, said Dang Pham of San Jose, who worked in the Clinton White House and says Kerry helped his father, a former political prisoner, get out of Vietnam. ``It's much harder for me to send the message out,'' he said. ``The Vietnamese who are Republican want to use this issue to swing votes to their party.''

Kerry has drawn the ire of anti-communists for years. Many Vietnamese-Americans knew of him from scathing accounts in the Vietnamese-language press that he helped block legislation to prevent the United States from giving non-humanitarian aid until Hanoi began releasing political and religious prisoners and respecting the rights of ethnic minorities.

Kerry said the bill was counterproductive and would only worsen human rights. Republican colleagues who served in the war agreed, including Sens. John McCain of Arizona -- a former POW -- and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.

But as a Democrat who played a leading role in the anti-war movement after he returned home, Kerry got the blame. Mention Kerry and the image that pops up for many Vietnamese-Americans is of the angry young veteran who threw away his war medals, although Kerry says he threw away only the ribbons.

Ho Quang Nhut, 64, who is working for Bush in San Jose, tells that story as if to invalidate Kerry's war service, then blames Kerry for holding up the Vietnam Human Rights Act, which was pushed by Rep. Chris Smith, a Republican from New Jersey.

``He did not want the Vietnamese government to accept or give human rights to the Vietnamese people,'' said Ho, who ignores Kerry's war record. ``I think it's very hard for the Vietnamese community to vote for John Kerry. Very hard.''

Liberals find this view disturbing. Nguyen Huu Liem, a 50-year-old philosophy professor at San Jose City College, said Kerry ``has earned the right'' to advocate diplomacy instead of sanctions toward Vietnam, because he served in the war. ``I think his heart and his actions are in the right place.''

Kerry's defenders also point out that Republicans have not delivered any better on the human rights issue. Although they control both houses of Congress, Smith has been unable to pass his bill.

Nancy Stetson, Kerry's longtime foreign policy adviser, said Kerry supports Smith's goal of improving human rights in Vietnam but doesn't like the way it's being done.

Kerry has nurtured his ties to the Hanoi government for years. Through back channel ties, he helped refugees bring over family members and helped persuade the Vietnam government to cooperate in resolving the fate of missing U.S. servicemen.

``He has been the voice of reason,'' said Zachary Abuza, a professor at Simmons College in Boston. ``For years, when there were no formal diplomatic relations, he was probably the most important, single conduit between Hanoi and Washington.''

Kerry's work, with McCain and others, paved the way for former President Clinton to re-establish full diplomatic and economic ties with Vietnam in 1995, 20 years after the end of the war. Kerry calls it the proudest accomplishment of his Senate career.

The Bush administration has continued the Clinton policy of free trade and diplomacy.

``They're reluctant to attach conditions to a relationship that is basically headed in the right direction, if slowly,'' said Fred Brown, a professor at Johns Hopkins University.

But none of this matters to the hard-liners, who hope the controversy will deter younger Vietnamese from moving to the Democratic Party.

``There is a very strong sense within the community that the younger generation will forget and slip away, and the older generation's responsibility is to teach and remind them and never let them forget,'' said Christian Collet, a pollster in Orange County who has studied the Vietnamese-American community.

Many in the younger generation have identified with the more liberal positions of most ethnic minorities. Once overwhelmingly Republican, Vietnamese-Americans are now evenly split between Democrats, Republicans and independents.

There are an estimated 175,000 Vietnamese-American voters in California, almost a quarter of whom live in Santa Clara County, home to the second-largest overseas Vietnamese community.

Some young voters say they admire Kerry for his work on Vietnam. ``I think it's great. I think advancement of trade is good for the country,'' said Madison Nguyen, 29, who sits on the Franklin-McKinley school board.
Linda Nguyen, 27, said the war in Iraq will be more of a factor in deciding her vote than what is happening in Vietnam. For her mother, Lan Hai Nguyen, 47, Vietnam is still paramount, although it will not be the only issue shaping her decision.

For Bryan Do, 30, whose father fought in the South Vietnamese army and is adamantly opposed to Kerry, the election has caused some friction. But Do, whose family was among the thousands of ``boat people'' who fled Vietnam, is keeping an open mind.

``I may not be Mr. Kerry's biggest fan,'' he said. But ``I'm not willing to believe he's a communist because he was anti-war.''

Do, an independent who is on the San Jose Library Commission, says he will base his decision on health care and education.

``If we want to go against our family, what does Mr. Kerry offer to the Asian community that is different from what Mr. Bush offers?'' Do asks.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/8981994.htm?1c
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