SAN JOSE, Calif. — For the first time since his regime collapsed 18 years ago, former South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu has publicly extended an olive branch to Vietnam's Communist leaders, calling on the government and opposition factions at home and abroad to begin talks aimed at national reconciliation.
"We have to reconstruct the country with no more bloodshed, no more hatred," said Thieu, 68, a resident of suburban Boston who flew to San Jose this past weekend to reveal his proposal for negotiations in an interview with the San Jose Mercury News.
"We do not require any precondition other than a sincere and official offer (to negotiate) and the good will of Hanoi," he said.
Thieu's overture is perhaps the most dramatic sign yet of the growing desire of overseas Vietnamese for reconciliation with their homeland, once considered an untenable recourse to anti-Communists pushing for the overthrow of the Hanoi government.
With the end of the Cold War, however, Vietnamese who have lived in exile since Saigon fell in April 1975 generally have moderated their strident tone toward the Communists, believing that they will win a democratic Vietnam through political persuasion rather than armed struggle.
For the past several months, rumors have been rife in the overseas Vietnamese community that Hanoi has been sending out feelers to determine whether a political settlement can be reached that would allow well-educated overseas Vietnamese to return to their homeland to take part in Vietnam's economic development.
Thieu said he had "no official contact" with Communist leaders but had been assured through intermediaries that individual members of the 13-member ruling Politburo were sympathetic to the idea of talks. A controversial figure in Vietnamese communities overseas for running an allegedly corrupt regime that lost the war, Thieu said he had no ambition to return to Vietnam as a leader but would be happy to meet with Communists leaders along with representatives of other anti-communist factions.
During the interview, Thieu also extended an olive branch to his critics, asking his fellow anti-Communist Vietnamese to put aside their differences to work for a democratic and prosperous homeland. "Any talk for reconciliation must include all Vietnamese factions living in the country as well as overseas," Thieu said.
Many Vietnamese activists in San Jose were skeptical that Thieu could act as a credible spokesman for the anti-Communist cause. Still, they seemed intrigued by the possibility, however remote, of Hanoi agreeing to negotiate with a cross-section of anti-Communist groups.
"If Hanoi says yes, everybody is ready to go negotiate, although I don't know for sure whether they will sit beside Thieu or not," said one Vietnamese activist.
Ngo Duc Diem, vice-chairman of the anti-communist Vietnam Restoration Party, said his group would send a representative to negotiate only if Hanoi sent a "clear signal" that its leaders were willing to "move beyond one-party control of the country."
A spokeswoman for Le Van Bang, Vietnam's ambassador to the United Nations, said Bang was traveling in Kentucky and could not be reached for comment on Thieu's initiative. But Thieu said it would be to the government's advantage to negotiate because "Vietnamese inside and outside the country are losing their patience." He pointed to the recent arrest of about 18 people accused of trying to plant bombs in downtown Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) to create instability.
During the interview, Thieu also proposed that the U.S. help push Vietnam to the negotiating table by pledging to end a punishing trade embargo and normalize diplomatic ties only if the government moves toward freeing political prisoners and guarantees citizens the right to vote in free elections.
He said he had sent letters to President Clinton and UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali urging stronger pressure on Vietnam to improve human rights and allow the Vietnamese people to elect their own government.
He said he disagreed strongly with former President George Bush's proclamation after the Persian Gulf War that the U.S. was finally over its "Vietnam syndrome."
Only when the Vietnamese people are granted the democratic liberties for which 58,000 American soldiers died "can the Vietnam syndrome be permanently eradicated," Thieu said.
Creating a democratic Vietnam, he said, is the only way to ensure that U.S. service personnel still missing from the Vietnam War are fully accounted for, the primary U.S. condition for ending the embargo.
"I believe if there is a free regime in Vietnam, the whole POW-MIA issue would be solved in a matter of months," Thieu said.
Thieu's proposal for reconciliation came two weeks after five charter members of a new Bay Area organization of Vietnamese-American seniors, the Elderly Suicide Group for National Salvation, pledged to take their lives if Hanoi rejected their proposal for a transitional coalition government.
"I admire their patriotism," Thieu said of the elders. But unlike the elders' proposal, Thieu's plan wouldn't require the Communist government to step down as a condition first.