US woos Japan with song in Vietnam
HANOI - US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who first came to Vietnam as a soldier and
returned this week as a diplomat, found himself in yet another role on Thursday, as a gun-toting
cowboy entranced by Japan's foreign minister.
After a week of high-level talks in Hanoi on global security, Powell donned a red bandana at the gala
dinner and - with senior State Department officials providing backing vocals and guitar - crooned a
tragic song about a doomed, lovesick cowboy. But in Powell's version of "El Paso", one of his
favourite songs when he fought in Vietnam more than three decades ago, the cowboy was in love, not
with a Mexican girl but with "a Vietnamese maiden" - played by Japanese Foreign Minister Makiko
Tanaka. "Blacker than night were the eyes of Makiko, wicked and evil while casting her spell," sang
Powell. "My love was deep for this Vietnamese maiden. I was in love, but in vain, I could tell."
The song tells the tale of a cowboy who kills a love rival in a Texas cantina and flees town. He returns
for another glimpse of his beloved, and is promptly shot dead by a posse of vigilantes. As Powell
acted out his death throes at the end of the song, Tanaka - in traditional Vietnamese dress - flung her
arms around his prostrate body and kissed him on the cheek.
The audience - according to a State Department official at the dinner - "just went wild". Cabaret
performances by foreign ministers have become a ritual at the end of the annual regional security
meeting of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and their global dialogue partners,
who include the United States, Japan, China and Russia.
This year's acts included a Beach Boys cover by Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer,
complete with surfboard, an ASEAN version of "Hotel California" by the Indian delegation, and a
song by Thailand's foreign minister accompanied by the minister from military-ruled Myanmar on an
electric keyboard.
The Russian delegation staged an elaborate show with Czarist-era costumes and a version of "Yellow
Submarine". Vietnam's foreign minister, more soberly, sang a traditional folk song. Officials said most
of the songs poked fun at the U.S., and in particular the controversial missile defence plans of
President George W. Bush, one of the points of contention at the summit.
Reuters - July 27, 2001.
Powell recalls war days
HANOI - As his plane neared Hanoi on Tuesday, Secretary of State Colin Powell moved up to the
cockpit for a better view of the country he left at the height of the Vietnam War. The plane passed
over what Americans call "Thunder Ridge," a range of mountains north of the Red River, then
descended over expanses of rice paddies.
"I just wanted to see," said Powell, who did two tours of duty here. "Just to see the paddies, the
beautiful green. And then to hear the voice of the air traffic controller in the tower, greeting our pilot
and giving him instructions. And to hear that voice, that accent again, brought back lots of memories
from years ago."
As a young Army captain, Powell spent seven months slogging through the rice paddies, hills and
jungles of Vietnam searching for Communist guerrillas. This week as America's top diplomat, Powell
made his first visit back in 32 years for meetings with leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN).
When Powell was last in Vietnam, Hanoi was the enemy capital and US soldiers were kept here as
prisoners of war in a jail nicknamed the Hanoi Hilton. By contrast, retired general Powell was greeted
with flowers, put up at a luxury hotel, and received by Vietnam's foreign minister, premier and
Communist Party chief. Today Hanoi boasts a real Hilton, and remnants of the demolished prison
have been kept as a tourist attraction.
"Two years of my life were spent fighting in Vietnam against that system, and I lost many of my
friends, some of my best friends from college, fraternity members, and a lot of people I was close to,"
Powell said before leaving Washington. But he said that "there are no ghosts within me that need
exorcism" and that in talks with Vietnam's leaders, he would be "not looking backward, but looking
forward, letting them know that we wish to be friends now."
In keeping with that pledge, Powell did not tour war monuments or landmarks, though he visited the
joint US-Vietnamese task force that is searching for remains of the 1,474 US service members still
listed as missing in action.
Yet even if Powell can lay aside his own war experience and cultivate a new relationship with the
Communist government here, the ghosts of Vietnam still haunt US foreign policy and Powell's world
view. Scarred by his tours here, Powell believes that the United States must avoid similar experiences
by making sure it fights wars only with overwhelming force, clear military objectives and broad
popular support at home.
By Steven Mufson - The Washington Post News Service - July 26, 2001.
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