Islet disputes

When you cannot fight the giant, it is wise for Vietnam to go to the world court. I hope they will settle the dispute. It is quite hard. Two main arguments are: proximity of the disputed islet and the historical context.

The proximity is harder to measure as there are uninhabited islets belonged to both countries that would shorten the proximity.

China has the advantage on the historical context. Chinese have historical context more than 2,000 years ago in written form and official recording. Every emperor had an officer to record history since then. They are in a good form (first in bamboo and later in the discovered paper) without being damaged by weather. The language in traditional Chinese can be read easily with some names of places, official jobs... interpreted.

The better way is to let both countries explore the oil and gas resources and hopefully we'll not participate in the disputes. It would lead to secular bear market that the current government does not plan for long-term. Imagine what happens to the economy when China withdraws all the loans.

In the mean time, Vietnam is suffering from FDI (mostly from China and Taiwan), tourists (most are Chinese) and farm products (most to China). In the next 3 years or till they settle, do not buy an stocks and/or ETFs in SE Asia and Philippine. Indonesia looks good but be careful (just remember their riots against Chinese leading to bad economy).

The riots in Vietnam seems to be organized by opposite political party. The government is corrupt and stupid but not that stupid to bite the hands that feed them. It seems it is backed up by the US.