ABSTRACT
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam put together some so-called historical data about Hoang Sa and Truong Sa archipelagoes in the 1979 White Paper, claiming that they were de facto China's Xisha and Nansha Islands. This chapter presents some counterarguments by probing into the exact location of Hoang Sa and Truong Sa archipelagoes of Vietnam. It aims to uncover the real story concerning the ownership of Xisha Islands and Nansha Islands of China along with some offshore islands in the central coastal area of Vietnam. Surprisingly, some Vietnamese scholars seem to have ignored such basic facts. As a consequence, they misinterpreted a large amount of the historical resources related to “Pracel,” particularly those in Western history books before the 1820s. The fact is that Hoang Sa and Truong Sa of Vietnam can only be found among islands in the central coastal area of Vietnam and are in no way associated with the Xisha and Nansha Islands of China.
