On Thu, 26 Nov 2009, SA wrote:
>> Here I'm intrigued. I can see how the split ultimately leads to the
>> idea of playing off one against the other 10 years later. But I don't
>> see how at this period it changes the basic fear that every country
>> "we" lose "they" gain, and that when one country leaves it encourages
>> five others. At first sight it would just seem that we've got 2
>> opponents rather than one: no real gain.
>
> Why does anything change 10 years later? The same logic applies.
I believe you're missing a step. The appearance of two where there used to be one makes divide et impera logically possible. But for it to be a real possibility, you have to find a ground on which they differ and you share interests with one of them.
And there was no such ground in Vietnam or anywhere else at the world at that moment in time so far as I can see. China was our main fear in Vietnam, since our most recent experience was Korea, where we went too far and found ourselves fighting the million man army. So to counter them, we would have had to have found common ground with Kruschev's Russia, which AFAIK was unthinkable to the elite at that time. So I don't see how the division could have reframed their thought at all at that moment. (And that's for the few advanced figures who even registered these events in the beginning. IMHO most cold warriors simply blinked it off at the time, like they did so many other events that didn't fit their filters.)
On other side, strategically it's not a given that a division weakens the little countries opposing us. They could benefit from the split by playing them off against each other.
Lastly, I think you are leaving out both the trust issues and the murk.
On the former, we still haven't gotten over the the trust issues 50 years later. AFAICT, the China/Russia card was never actually played. Neither ever sided with us against the other and they aren't now.
As for murk, there was a reason they called it Krelinology. And Russia was considered transparent compared to China or Vietnam.
Have you ever read _Vietnam Triangle: Moscow, Peking, Hanoi_ by David Zagoria? He tries to interpret the meaning of the Sino-Soviet split for Vietnam and IMHO it's (very inadvertantly) a perfect display of just how literally unthinkable it was. Nothing was clear or certain about any of these regimes' intentions nor was there any way it ever would be before whole new working relationships were were established. (FWIW, he thought Russia's strategic goal was that neither China nor the US should win in Vietnam, which, if true, wasn't exactly a help.)
Michael