Human Rights Politics in Postwar US-Vietnamese Relations

After the last American helicopter left Saigon on April 30, 1975, U.S.-Vietnamese
relations remained suspended for twenty years. Despite the appearance of a two-decade
impasse, however, the United States remained intimately involved in Vietnam from 1975
to 1995. American concerns about U.S. servicemen listed as missing in action/prisoner of
war (MIA/POW), the “boat people,” Amerasians (or children of American men and
Vietnamese women), and former American allies Hanoi incarcerated in so-called “reeducation
camps” all prompted U.S. policymakers to remain invested in Vietnam after
1975. This paper explores the least studied of these issues, American re-education camp
policy, and argues that non-state actors and U.S. officials used the language of human
rights to elevate the issue to a major concern in U.S.-Vietnamese relations.

Although Hanoi implemented its “re-education” policy in 1975, the issue
remained underreported, overshadowed, and unable to demand U.S. policymakers’
attention until the early 1980s. I argue that two small yet formidable organizations made
the release and resettlement of re-education camp detainees a major pillar of Reagan’s
Indochina policy: the Aurora Foundation and the Families of Vietnamese Political
Prisoners Association (FVPPA). Refugees founded both NGOs and both organizations
utilized transnational networks to compile impressive information that convinced U.S.
policymakers that the release and resettlement of re-education camp detainees was a
human rights issue. This paper thus challenges the notion of refugees as mere pawns in a
larger Cold War struggle.

Additionally, while scholars do not typically regard President Ronald Reagan as a
champion of human rights, his administration demanded that Hanoi address
“humanitarian” concerns before “political” questions. While such framing helped Reagan
recast the Vietnam War as a “noble cause” by highlighting American beneficence and
Vietnamese perfidy, Reagan’s emphasis on “humanitarian” issues, including re-education
camp prisoners, also required U.S.-Vietnamese cooperation and thus ultimately helped
foster postwar reconciliation.