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"Both sides should spend more effort in trust building,"Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung was quoted in a Vietnamese government statement as telling Panettaduring a meeting. Dung urged the United States to fully remove a ban on sales oflethal weapons to Vietnam. It should also play a greater role indealing with the consequences of the war, he said. On Sunday, Panetta became the most senior U.S. official since theend of the Vietnam War to visit Cam Ranh Bay in central Vietnam, aU.S. logistics hub during the conflict. He visited a U.S. Navy cargo ship that was undergoing repairs at the Vietnamese port. The Vietnamese decision to lift restrictions on three sites willhelp the Joint Prisoners of War, Missing in Action AccountingCommand's (JPAC) search for four missing servicemen. Ron Ward , a casualty resolution specialist at JPAC, said Vietnamoccasionally restricted access to suspected casualty sites. Oneplace where restrictions were lifted on Monday was the suspected1967 crash site of an F-4C Phantom in Quang Binh province in central Vietnam just north of the former demilitarizedzone, he said. "We located the site in 2008 but soon thereafter theVietnamese informed us that site was restricted for somereason," he said. "So we're pleased to find out thattoday ... the restriction on that site has been lifted." The second site where restrictions were lifted was the scene of a1968 firefight in Kon Tum province near the borders with Laos and Cambodia , and the final site was the scene of a crash of a Marine Corps F-4J in Quang Triprovince. Panetta's visit is part of a week-long trip to the Asia-Pacific toexplain Washington's new military strategy, which will see 60percent of U.S. warships deployed in the region by 2020, comparedwith 50 percent now. On Saturday, he attended the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore , an annual security conference that draws senior civilian andmilitary leaders from some 30 Asia-Pacific nations. Panetta has insisted the new U.S. strategy is not directed atcontaining China 's rise as a global power, despite concern among some Chineseofficials that the United States is trying to fence it in bybuilding up ties with countries that have competing territorialclaims in the South China Sea. SYMBOLIC EXCHANGE In a meeting on Monday that was heavy with Vietnam War symbolism,the U.S. and Vietnamese defence leaders exchanged letters and adiary taken from slain servicemen and now being returned more than40 years later as soldiers and families touched by the conflictseek to make peace with the past. The letters handed over by the Vietnamese side were taken from U.S. Army Sergeant Steve Flaherty , a member of the 101st Airborne Division who was killed in action in March 1969. Excerpts of the letterswere used in propaganda broadcasts during the war, the Pentagonsaid. "It has been trying days for me and my men," Flahertysaid in a letter to a girl named Betty. "We dragged morebodies of dead and wounded than I can ever want to forget." "This is a dirty and cruel war," he said in a note toanother friend, "but I'm sure people will understand thepurpose of this war even though many of us might not agree." Vietnamese Senior Colonel Nguyen Phu Dat kept the letters after theconflict while considering how to return them. He mentioned thepapers in an online article last year that came to the attention ofthe Pentagon, which asked for them. The document handed over by the United States was a small red diarytaken from the body of Vu Dinh Doan, who was killed in a firefightwith a Marine Corps platoon in March 1966. Marine Robert Frazure found the diary, with a family photo and somemoney, and kept it when he returned to the United States. He beganlooking for a way to return the diary in recent years, and it wasbrought to the attention the Pentagon, which helped facilitate thetransaction. Pentagon spokesman George Little said the document exchange reflected the progress in therelationship since ties were normalized 17 years ago. "It is a reflection of the priority the United States placeson people-to-people ties with Vietnam," he said. U.S.-Vietnamese teams started joint field work in September 1988looking for U.S. servicemen missing in action. They have sinceinvestigated more than 3,500 cases and excavated more than 500sites in their search for remains, officials said. A total of 980 Americans missing from the Vietnam War have beenidentified since 1973, including 687 inVietnam, according to JPACfigures. There are still 1,666 Americans unaccounted for from thewar, including 1,284 in Vietnam, JPAC said. (Additional reportingby Ho Binh Minh; Editing by Daniel Magnowski and Robert Birsel). The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as Taper Roller Bearing Manufacturer , China Pillow Block Ball Bearings, and more. For more , please visit Self-Aligning Ball Bearing today!
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