Thoroughly grasping the Resolution of the 12^th National Party Congress, the Military Party Organization (hereafter MPO) has properly implemented the work of Party building politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally as a determinant to promoting its leadership capability and combat strength, accomplishing military-defence missions, protecting the Homeland, building the politically strong Army, and deserving to be a reliable and loyal political and fighting force of the Party, the State, and people.

Vietnamese People’s Army’s history of building, fighting, and maturing has always been closely associated with the Communist Party of Vietnam’s absolute and direct leadership on all fronts. The Party leadership determines fighting objectives, revolutionary nature, organizational structure, leadership mechanism, commanding regime, and principles of executing party and political work in the Army. Therefore, building strong MPO politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally is central to enhancing the Party leadership over the Army as a basis for fostering its overall quality and combat strength, accomplishing all tasks set by the Party and people.

Sr. Lt. Gen. Luong Cuong addresses the meeting of the Air Defence - Air Force Service’s Party Executive Committee in 2017 (photo: phongkhongkhongquan.vn)

Over the past years, due regard has been paid to the work of Party building within MPO via practical forms, content and solutions. The Central Military Commission, party executive committees and party organizations at all levels have fully comprehended and seriously performed resolutions, directions, and instructions by the Central Party Committee on the work of Party building, particularly Resolutions of the 4^th Plenum of the Central Party Committee (11^th and 12^th tenures) on Party building and rectification; Directives No. 3 and No. 5-CT/TW by the Politburo on accelerating the study and following of Uncle Ho’s thought, morality, and lifestyle through breakthrough schedules, action programs, and leadership and directive solutions with a focus on building pure and strong party organizations. In terms of leadership activities, ideological work is closely in tandem with organizational and personnel work with the former coming first; the principles of democratic centralism is seriously maintained; a system of regulations for key and sensitive fields has been drawn up and supplemented; leadership styles have been innovated in a practical scientific fashion; virtues and capabilities of a contingent of key cadres and all-level members of party executive committees have been regularly cultivated and upheld; internal unity has been strengthened via various solutions for enhancing leadership capability and combativeness; and the building of pure and strong party organizations is tightly aligned with that of comprehensively strong offices and units. Personnel work has been renovated, meeting the requirements for building a contingent of cadres quantitatively and qualitatively. The work of party inspection, supervision, and discipline management has been effectively and routinely conducted with emphasis placed on the work of party members’ management, education and training. As a result, a contingent of cadres and party members within MPO always have strong and steadfast political willpower, good virtues and capabilities, and play a core and leading role in fulfilling the Party’s resolutions and units’ political tasks.

Given recorded outcomes, MPO led the entire Army to accomplish all the missions set by Resolution of the 10^th Congress of MPO. The Army genuinely serves as a core force in building all-people national defence, and all-people defence posture in alignment with people’s security posture; firmly defending national independence, sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity; protecting the Party, the State, people and socialist regime, and contributing to safeguarding political stability and a peaceful environment for national construction and development. Yet, the work of party building within MPO still exposes limitations. Content and solutions of the work of political and ideological education are not convincing enough, and the rectification of shortcomings following the review of implementing Resolution of the 4^th Plenum of Central Party Committee (12^th tenure) coupled with Directive No. 05 by the Politburo is not timely as evidenced by some of cadres and party members with disciplinary violations and manifestations of mediocrity ; while personnel management and assessment are inadequate; and the inspection and supervision work is still limited.

The mainstream trend of peace, cooperation and development will prevail in the coming years, yet international and regional situation will incrementally see complicated developments, namely armed, ethnic and racial conflicts, and terrorism, cyber attacks, etc. Domestic situation has seen stable sociopolitical climate, robust economic growth, improved social securities, consolidated defence and security, expanded foreign relations, and Vietnam’s enhanced prestige and status in the international arena.  Yet, hostile forces continuously accelerate “peaceful evolution” strategy, military “depoliticalization”, and strategies of “self-evolution” and “self-transformation” via complex artifices in a bid to dilute the Party leadership over the State, society, the Army, and socialist regime. For MPO, high demands have been made for the task of building revolutionary, regular, elite, and gradually modernized People’s Army for the purpose of firmly safeguarding the Homeland of socialist Vietnam. In parallel with executing missions of training, combat readiness, and mass mobilization, etc, the Army must actively introduce and implement Conclusion No. 16-KL/TW, dated 07-7-2017 by the Politburo on the organization of Vietnamese People’s Army towards 2021, and Resolution No. 425/NQ-QUTW, dated 18-5-2017 by the Central Military Commission on continuously streamlining the Military-run enterprises towards 2020 and beyond” which impact greatly on ideological developments and daily lives of cadres, party members, the masses, and labourers. Against this backdrop, it is essential to continuously strengthen leadership capability and combativeness, and make MPO strong politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally via some of key measures as follows.

First, fully perceiving Party line and State policies and laws on defence-military missions and Homeland protection in the new situation as a basis for adequately conducting strategic research; proactively cooperating with other relevant forces in accurately grasping and predicting situations, and giving advice and recommendations to the Party and the State on military-defence policies, mechanism, and laws; properly executing Defence Strategy, Military Strategy, and Homeland Protection Strategy on cyberspace and other defence projects in strategic border, sea and island areas. Meanwhile, it is necessary to formulate tactful and flexible countermeasures to handle sensitive issues in international relations as well as complicated defence-security incidents in an effort to firmly maintain a stable environment for national development. Additionally, it is crucial to focus on building strong provincial and municipal defensive areas; on closely combining economic development with defence-security consolidation and foreign relation expansion in socioeconomic development policy and strategy. The role of the Army should be brought into play in carrying out the mass mobilization, contributing to consolidating great national unity block and boosting socioeconomic and cultural development in remote, isolated areas, revolutionary bases and ethnic minority areas; and building strong “people’s hearts and minds” posture in key strategic areas. It is important to continuously execute Resolution No. 06 by the Politburo (11^th tenure) on “Constructing and developing defence industry towards 2020 and beyond” with a focus on key programs and projects; on step by step building independent self-sufficient modern defence industry and stronger defence industry potential, satisfying the requirement for adequately supplying weapons and technical equipment in line with operational defensive plans in new conditions while actively and proactively promoting international integration  and defence diplomacy in accord with the Party line and policy, thereby creating a favourable international climate for Homeland construction and protection.

Second, fostering ideological work, firmly maintaining the Party’s ideological background within the Army. Ideological work is a matter of utmost importance to the work of Party building. Hence, party executive committees and key cadres at all levels need to focus their leadership and directions on well effecting ideological work in an attempt to educate cadres and soldiers to fully grasp Marxism-Leninism, Ho Chi Minh thought; to be steadfast in the goal of national independence and socialism; to express absolute confidence in the Party line and policies; and comprehend function, missions, and requirements for Homeland protection in the new situation.

The entire MPO must be a block of unity and unanimity in awareness and action, ensuring the Army’s absolute loyalty to the Party, the State, people and socialist regime under any circumstances. It is necessary to enhance the work of internal political protection, proactively and wisely deal with hostile misconceptions to tightly grip the Party’s ideological background, thereby contributing to foiling “peaceful evolution” strategy, military “depoliticalization”, and precluding manifestations of “self-evolution” and “self-transformation” from within. To this end, party executive committees, party organizations, and key cadres at diverse levels need to strengthen the work of political education and ideological management, combine ideological work with organizational work and measures of administrative management, Party rules and party members’ do’s and don’ts while prudently researching, predicting, and assessing ideological situation and developments and opportunely handling arising incidents pertaining to ideological issues amongst cadres, party members, and soldiers. In response to organizational adjustments and the equitization of Military-run enterprises, it is necessary to proactively grasp and firmly maintain ideological developments and situation within Army-wide units.

Third, due attention is paid to building party organizations, especially pure and strong grassroots-level ones. Grassroots-level party organizations act as the Party’s foundation and political core at grassroots level. Thus, the building of pure and strong grassroots-level party organizations will contribute directly to that of strong MPO politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally. Great importance is attached to heightening the leadership capability and combativeness as well as operational quality of grassroots-level party organizations, particularly those in full-strength and combat readiness units, campaign-and-strategy-level offices, and equitized military-run enterprises; combining the building of clean and strong party organizations with that of comprehensively strong units; aligning the building of party executive committees with that of a contingent of key cadres. In addition, it is crucial to fully perceive and seriously implement Regulation No. 104-QĐ/QU, dated 16-02-2017 by the Central Military Commission on “Some fundamental issues about executing principles of democratic centralism amongst party organizations within Vietnamese People’s Army”; Decision No. 99-QĐ/TW, dated 03-10-2017 by the Secretariat on promulgating framework guidance on upholding the role of people in fighting and precluding manifestations of degeneracy, “self-evolution” and “self-transformation” regarding party executive committees and party organizations; Conclusion No. 18-KL/TW, dated 22-9-2017 by the Secretariat on “Improving the quality of party cells’ meetings in the new situation” whilst regularly streamlining party executive committees, and party organizations; well performing the work of party members’ management and education; and raising the quality of party building. Besides, special attention is paid to building the Party morally; continuously comprehending and effectively and synchronously carrying out action plans and programs on effecting Resolution of the 4^th Plenum of the Central Party Committee (12^th tenure) on promoting Party building and rectification in alignment with Directive No. 05 by the Politburo (12^th tenure) and Directive No. 87 by the Central Military Commission on “Accelerating the study and following of Uncle Ho’s thought, morality, and lifestyle” while strictly observing regulations on model role- setting responsibilities amongst cadres and party members; opportunely rectifying shortcomings via “self-correction” and self-criticism and criticism, thereby enhancing unity and unanimity and leadership role of party organizations as well as effectiveness of party and political work.

Fourth, focusing on building a contingent of capable cadres, meeting mission requirements. The set objectives are to build a quantitative and qualitative contingent of well-rounded cadres; properly execute personnel planning and adopt meritocratic policies, meeting the requirements for building the Army in the new situation. It is necessary to continuously comprehend and implement amended and supplemented Law on Vietnamese People’s Army officers; Resolution No. 769-NQ/QUTW, dated 21-12-2012 by the Central Military Commission on “Building a contingent of military cadres in the 2013-2020 period and beyond” whilst stringently effectuating principles and procedure of personnel work, and proactively formulating and maintaining personnel work-related schedules for the sake of cadres’ heightened capabilities and professionalism. Moreover, it is essential to thoroughly grasp regulations by the Politburo on personnel rotations, management, and assessment; to work out and issue a series of criteria for appraising a pool of cadres as well as procedure for personnel planning in line with the regulations by the Central Organization Commission as a basis for well executing personnel work and building a contingent of all-level cadres in a synchronous and uniform fashion. Simultaneously, it is necessary to well carry out policies on cadres in conformity with the Party line and the State and the Army’s policies, and offices and units’ particularities in a fair and transparent manner.

Fifth, enhancing the work of party inspection, supervision and discipline management. As the Party’s leadership function, the work of inspection and supervision is essential to the work of Party building politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally. According to President Ho Chi Minh, “proper inspection certainly leads to eliminated shortcomings” and “careful inspection and supervision results in all shortcomings exposed”. Fully perceiving those teachings, party executive committees and inspection committees at various levels need to proactively implement the work of inspection and supervision with a focus on party organizations and party members with signs of violations. Great importance is attached to inspecting and supervising the execution of political tasks and the work of party building under Resolution of the 4^th Plenum of the Central Party Committee (12^th tenure) and Directive No. 05 by the Politburo, and regulations on party members’ do’s and don’ts. The work of inspection and supervision must be conducted in an objective, strict fashion with emphasis devoted to combining inspection of party organizations with inspection and supervision of members of party executive committees and key cadres at the same level pertaining to the implementation of the Party line, the State laws and policies, higher echelons’ directions and resolutions as well as party members’ duties and responsibilities, thereby opportunely preventing and seriously handling incidents of disciplinary violations and manifestations of ideological political moral lifestyle degradation and “self-evolution” and “self-transformation”; procedurally dealing with letters of complaints and denunciations; and firmly maintaining Party discipline and order.

Regarded as the core task, building strong MPO politically, ideologically, organizationally and morally will lay a solid foundation for improving its leadership capabilities and combativeness, and enabling it to have sufficient willpower and brainpower to lead the whole Army to successfully implement the cause of building the Military and firmly safeguarding the Homeland of socialist Vietnam in the new situation.

Senior Lieutenant General Luong Cuong, Member of the Party Central Committee’s Secretariat, Member of the Central Military Commission Standing Committee

Head of the General Department of Politics, the Vietnamese People’s Army