REMEMBERING VIETNAM

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The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour -- April 30, 1990 HEALING THE WOUNDS Elizabeth Farnsworth looks at the state of Vietnamese society 15 years after its war with the U.S. Since its war with the U.S. ended 15 years before, Vietnam had become one of the world's poorest nations. Millions had fled, many of those as boat people. According to those left to carry on after the war, the process of rebuilding lives in Vietnam has been full of harsh realities. "The losses in this area are uncountable," a Vietnamese citizen told The NewsHour's Elizabeth Farnsworth. "Everyone just tried to save their lives by fleeing. Everything was destroyed. ... We left with empty hands and came back with empty hands and started rebuilding." In 1986, the government in Hanoi began reforms known as doi moi, or renewal. But by 1990, villagers in the Vietnamese countryside were still recovering from the war's devastation. Vietnam's leaders had recently begun to move away from Marxism and toward a free-market economy. With doi moi, private enterprise made a dramatic comeback. But the U.S. embargo on trade with Vietnam still stood, making American companies conspicuously absent from the list of corporations seeking to do business in a changing Vietnam.