Word: viets
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...might and numbers to penetrate as far as they chose. But could they extricate themselves from the historic quicksand with similar ease? The gravestones at Dien Bien Phu. The carcasses of Marine helicopters near Danang. Other place names, other landmarks testify to the tragic fortunes of outsiders who visited Viet Nam in the past and later wished they had never come. In meting out their "lesson," the Chinese?like the French and Americans before them?could find Viet Nam to be an unruly classroom...
Malnutrition and even hunger prevail throughout Viet Nam. Agricultural output declined 15% in 1978, while prospects for this year are so poor that Hanoi has already scaled down its crop estimates from the stated targets. Following widespread flooding of rice lands last September, the monthly ration of food per person was cut from 33 Ibs. to 29 Ibs. Of that, ordinary peasants and workers are allowed only a little over 2 Ibs. of rice, the staple of the Vietnamese diet...
Typhoons, droughts and other natural disasters have contributed to Viet Nam's agricultural problems, but government incompetence has been the principal cause. Bureaucratic foul-ups hindered the planting of new strains of rice that are more resistant to drought, and the distribution of pesticides in areas infested by plant pests has been delayed. Rice production is declining in the once prosperous Mekong Delta. Hanoi had announced that it was willing to trade consumer goods such as electric fans for rice, hoping to induce peasants to sell their crops to the government instead of on the black market. When...
...Viet Nam's economic problems were greatly aggravated by the expulsion of 200,000 ethnic Chinese in the past nine months. The Chinese were targeted because of their wide spread involvement in the black market; but they constituted Viet Nam's major entrepreneurial class. They managed the rice trade, the major ports, the distribution systems and several key industries-notably coal...
...refugees who have fled Viet Nam since the fall of the Thieu government in 1975 have also cut into the country's human resources. According to officials in Thailand and Hong Kong, where many of the refugees arrive, Vietnamese officials are privately profiting from the exodus of their citizens who are seeking food and freedom abroad. After interviewing refugees, investigators believe that as much as 50% of the money would-be refugees pay to leave Viet Nam ends up in the pockets of local Communists...