HÀ NỘI — The upcoming 40th anniversary of the brief but devastating border clash between China and Việt Nam in 1979 offers a chance to reflect on history and draw lessons to consolidate bilateral ties, not to deepen hatred.

This was the consensus amongst history experts and researchers at a national conference entitled “The fight to protect the northern border – looking back, 40 years on,” held yesterday in Hà Nội by the Việt Nam Academy of Social Sciences and the Việt Nam Historical Science Association.

In his opening speech, Associate Professor Trần Đức Cường, President of Việt Nam Historical Science Association and lead author of the definitive 15-book collection Việt Nam’s History, said the conference would be a discussion of the real history of the border war, fought valiantly by the Vietnamese people and soldiers to defend the country’s territory.

The studies to be presented at the conference would also corroborate the Party’s and State’s policy on seeking friendly relations with China, promoting activities that nourish bilateral ties and denouncing activities that attempt to cause discord – including those that take advantage of the border war to stage reactionary tactics to undermine the Party and the State – said Cường.

Professor Vũ Dương Ninh from the Việt Nam National University in Hà Nội said that, based on historical texts and analysis from multiple sources, one of the underlying factors behind China’s attack on Việt Nam’s northern border were the shifting dynamics between the US, China and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

Ninh said China’s offensive on February 17, 1979 – starting with a series of armed attacks on the six northern provinces along Việt Nam’s 1,400km border with China – was an invasion waged with expansionist intent against a sovereign and independent State, despite China’s claims that the offensive was a “counter-strike” in retaliation to Việt Nam’s hostility.

China announced a withdrawal on March 14, 1979, but Chinese military forces still illegally occupied several sites in Lạng Sơn, Cao Bằng and Hà Tuyên provinces and continued to provoke border clashes that would fester for another decade, culminating in the bloody battle of Vị Xuyên in Hà Giang Province in the summer of 1984.

Cường said Việt Nam, shortly after painstaking efforts to reunify the country in 1975 after 30 years of struggle, only wanted peace and stability to rebuild the war-ravaged country. But this dream had to be set aside, as Việt Nam faced the threat of border violations from both the Khmer Rouge in the southwest and the Chinese in the north.

The China-Việt Nam border war caused significant damage and psychological trauma to both sides and left “deep scars” in the traditional ties between the two neighbouring countries, which share the same political ideologies, Ninh said.