Vietnam’s sea and island are of special importance to the politics, social-economy, environment, defence and security of the country as well as to the peaceful environment, security and safety of navigation and aviation to the countries of the region and of the world.

Young officers talk about the mission of Fatherland protection (Photo: qdnd.vn)

For thousands of years, our people have been sticking and living on the sea. They have both explored huge resources for “national welfare and the people’s livelihood” and affirmed our sovereignty, fought  against foreign invaders from the sea. In our present cause of building and safeguarding the Fatherland, sea is still of strategic importance. Our Party has issued the Resolution on Vietnam’s sea strategy up to 2020 and a vision to 2030 in order to speed up marine-based  economy associated with defence and security in the cause of building and safeguarding the Fatherland. On 21 June 2012, the National Assembly passed the Law of the Sea of Vietnam in accordance with the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and international practices. However, due to historical and geographical traits, between Vietnam and some other countries surrounding the East Sea, there remain overlaps on the sea and continental shelf  and some disputes unsolved. Living in harmony for peaceful environment and security in the East Sea so that countries in the regions all benefit from the sea, developing their economy, Vietnam has signed with concerned parties a number of agreements, rules and codes of conduct in the East Sea, such as: The Sino – Vietnamese Agreement on Maritime Boundary Delimitation in the Gulf of Tonkin; Sino – Vietnam Fishery Agreement in the Gulf of Tonkin; Vietnam – Cambodia Agreement on historic waters; The Vietnam – Thailand Agreement on Maritime Boundary; Vietnam – Malaysia Agreement on Joint Exploration and Exploitation in the overlapping continental shelves; the Vietnam – Indonesia Agreement on the delimitation of continental shelf boundary. These are historical, practical and legal evidence on the Vietnam’s sovereignty, sovereign rights, jurisdiction in the East Sea.

For the past years, the Central Military Party Committee, the Ministry of National Defence, and the General Political Department have always paid attention to leading, directing, and guiding their inferiors on carrying out propagation, raising awareness of cadres and troops and of people of the  role and position and sea and islands to the cause of building and safeguarding the Fatherland; incorporated this work into the resolutions, action program and plan of the commanders. At the same time, coordination is made with governments, authorities, ministries, branches, unions and social-political organization to promote propagation, education for people of all strata about sea and islands, the Party’s viewpoint and guidelines, State’s laws and policies, historical and legal evidence…affirming Vietnam’s sovereignty over its seas and islands. Thereby, sense of responsibility, determination to study, to train and to overcome difficulty are built; training quality, combat readiness status are improved, successfully carrying out the mission of firmly defending the country’s sovereignty over seas and islands.

The struggle to protect the sovereignty and safety in the border areas, seas and islands is posing harder requirements and missions. Hence, the propagation of which need to be focused on:

Continuing to closely coordinate with organizations and forces in the political system to strengthen propagation to raise awareness of troops and people of the role and position of seas and islands in the cause of building and safeguarding the Fatherland;  actively making plans, renewing contents, models and methods of propagating suitable with particular reality and mission.

Effectively combining propagation domestically with extensive and intensive propagation abroad through state and people external activities and defence cooperation between VPA and its counterparts.

Combining propagation with studying, suggesting and implementing mechanism, policies on sea and island development both in the short and long term, especially sea-economic development projects associated with defence and security, special economic zones, … which help strengthening defence-security posture.

By Colonel Duong Dinh Thong

Director of the Department of Mass Mobilization.