Lê Khả Phiêu (; 27 December 1932 – 7 August 2020) was a Vietnamese politician who served as General Secretary of the

Communist Party of Vietnam The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) is the founding and sole legal party of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Founded in 1930 by Hồ Chí Minh, the CPV became the ruling party of North Vietnam in 1954 and then all of Vietnam after the col ...

from December 1997 to April 2001.Gainsborough 2010, p. 143 Lê Khả Phiêu served in the

Vietnam People's Army Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

during the

First First most commonly refers to: * First, the ordinal form of the number 1 First or 1st may also refer to: Acronyms * Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters, an astronomical survey carried out by the Very Large Array * Far Infrared a ...

and

Second Indochina War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...

s, join in the Cambodian war, and was Head of the General Political Department of the Vietnam People's Army.

Early life

Lê Khả Phiêu was born on 27 December 1932 in Thượng Phúc village in

Đông Sơn district Đông Sơn is a Districts of Vietnam, rural district of Thanh Hóa province in the North Central Coast region of Vietnam. the district had a population of 109,819. The district covers an area of 106 km². The district capital lies at Rừ ...

in Thanh Hoa Province. In 1945, he joined the local

Viet Minh The Việt Minh (, ) is the common and abbreviated name of the League for Independence of Vietnam ( or , ; ), which was a Communist Party of Vietnam, communist-led national independence coalition formed at Pác Bó by Hồ Chí Minh on 19 May 1 ...

movement and joined the Indochinese Communist Party on 19 June 1949. On 1 May 1950 he was sent by the Viet Minh to join the

army An army, ground force or land force is an armed force that fights primarily on land. In the broadest sense, it is the land-based military branch, service branch or armed service of a nation or country. It may also include aviation assets by ...

. He was promoted to second lieutenant, advancing to the position of Company Politician in the 66th Regiment of the 304th Division. From September 1953 to 1958, he held the post of Deputy Political Officer member of the battalion and then 66th Regimental Political Chair. He was elevated to the Politburo in the early 1990s.

General Secretaryship

Phiêu was a

protégé Mentorship is the patronage, influence, guidance, or direction given by a mentor. A mentor is someone who teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced and often younger person. In an organizational setting, a mentor influences the perso ...

of his predecessor,

Đỗ Mười Đỗ Mười (; 2 February 1917 – 1 October 2018) was a Vietnamese communist politician. He rose in the party hierarchy in the late 1940s, became Chairman of the Council of Ministers in 1988 and was elected General Secretary of the Central ...

. Lê Khả Phiêu has previously been viewed as a conservative. However, this categorization has been challenged by historian Martin Gainsborough, who notes that Lê Khả Phiêu made some remarkably outspoken comments about problems in the party before the Tenth Party Congress. Lê Khả Phiêu criticized what he called 'illness of partyization' (''bệnh đảng hoá''), meaning that the Party controls everything. In 1999, Phiêu visited

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

, where he met

General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party The general secretary of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party ( zh, s=中国共产党中央委员会总书记, p=Zhōngguó Gòngchǎndǎng Zhōngyāng Wěiyuánhuì Zǒngshūjì) is the leader of the Chinese Communist Part ...

Jiang Zemin Jiang Zemin (17 August 1926 – 30 November 2022) was a Chinese politician who served as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1989 to 2002, as Chairman of the Central Mil ...

and announced a joint

16 Word Guideline The ''16 Word Guideline,'' or the 16-letter Principle (; ) is a set of diplomatic principles acknowledged between the People's Republic of China and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in 1999 as the two countries sought to improve their strained rela ...

for improved bilateral relations; a Joint Statement for Comprehensive Cooperation was issued in 2000. In 2000, Vietnam and China successfully resolved longstanding disputes over their land border and maritime rights in the

Gulf of Tonkin The Gulf of Tonkin is a gulf at the northwestern portion of the South China Sea, located off the coasts of Tonkin ( northern Vietnam) and South China. It has a total surface area of . It is defined in the west and northwest by the northern co ...

, including the cession of land surrounding the

Friendship Pass Friendship Pass (), also commonly known by its older name Ải Nam Quan (), is a pass near the China-Vietnam border, between China's Guangxi and Vietnam's Lạng Sơn province. The pass itself lies just inside the Chinese side of the border ...

to China. Phiêu delayed the signing of Vietnam's first bilateral trade treaty with the United States because he was concerned about the potential Chinese response. Critics of Phiêu's foreign policy contended that he deferred too much to China.

Death

Lê Khả Phiêu died on 7 August 2020 in Hanoi, after suffering from serious illness, at the age of 88. The cause of death was listed as

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...

. A 2-day mourning period for his death was decreed nationwide in Vietnam from 14 to 15 August 2020. He was buried at Mai Dịch Cemetery in

Hanoi Hanoi ( ; ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Vietnam, second-most populous city of Vietnam. The name "Hanoi" translates to "inside the river" (Hanoi is bordered by the Red River (Asia), Red and Black River (Asia), Black Riv ...

Awards and honors

Source: Other decorations include: *65-year

Party A party is a gathering of people who have been invited by a Hospitality, host for the purposes of socializing, conversation, recreation, or as part of a festival or other commemoration or celebration of a special occasion. A party will oft ...

membership badge (2014)

References

;References * Bolton, Kent (1999): "Domestic Sources of Vietnam's Foreign Policy: Normalizing Relations with the United States". in Thayer, Carlyle A., Amer, Ramses (ed.): ''Vietnamese Foreign Policy in Transition''. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore * Gainsborough, Martin (2010): ''Vietnam – Rethinking the State''. Zed Books, London & New York

External links

*
Vietnam Entering the 21st Century
', a 2001 collection of his works in

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

format {{DEFAULTSORT:Le, Kha Phieu 1932 births 2020 deaths General secretaries of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the 7th Politburo of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the 8th Politburo of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the Standing Committee of the 8th Politburo of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the 7th Secretariat of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the 7th Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam Members of the 8th Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam People from Thanh Hóa province North Vietnamese military personnel of the Vietnam War