ABSTRACT
On January 21, 2001, Chinese Ambassador Qi Jianguo and his Defense Attaché, Senior Colonel Han Yujia, visited Vietnamese Defense Minister Senior Lieutenant General Pham Van Tra at the Vietnamese Ministry of Defense reception hall at 33 Pham Ngu Lao Street in Hanoi. Although much of the meeting was taken up with pleasantries and exchanges of best wishes for the upcoming Lunar New Year festival, Qi had one important mission. Amid the compliments and small talk, Qi drew Tra’s attention to a message that Qi had delivered to other Vietnamese ministries in recent weeks. Qi’s message, which had been delivered on direct orders from Beijing, had explained to the Vietnamese that China found offensive the fact that Vietnamese textbooks still discussed the Sino-Vietnamese hostilities of the Third Indochina War, the Chinese attacks on Vietnam, and Chinese support for the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. The message in particular objected to the portrayal of the Chinese leaders as a “united block . . . intent on actions to harm the feelings of the peoples of the two countries” (“zhongguo lingdao ceng yixie ren . . . shanghai yue zhong liang guo renmin ganqing de xingdong”).1 Tra noted Qi’s views, and the meeting ended amicably. At a time when China and Vietnam were working to mend their frayed relationship by increasing trade between the two countries, exchanging state visits, and negotiating border treaties, the Chinese had introduced another obstacle to friendship.
