Cố Tổng bí thư Lê Khả Phiêu 'để lại di sản nhiều mặt'

-----

Le Kha Phieu, a career military man whose tenure (nhiệm kỳ) as a hardline (dứt khoát, kiên quyết, không khoan nhượng) leader (nhà lãnh đạo) of Vietnam ended ignominiously (nhục nhã, đê tiện) when he was removed from office amid unusually public infighting (sự đấu tranh bí mật nội bộ), died on Aug. 7 in Hanoi. He was 88.

...An ideological conservative (bảo thủ ý thức hệ), he was considered a compromise selection (lựa chọn mang tính thỏa hiệp). But he immediately faced constant (liên tục) factional strife (đấu tranh phe phái) with party reformers (người cải cách trong đảng) and, with his ouster (sự đuổi, sự trục xuất; sự hất cẳng) in 2001, wound up serving less than four years of his five-year term.

Mr. Phieu was criticized (bị chỉ trích) for ineffective leadership, failure to revive Vietnam’s stagnant economy (nền kinh tế đình trệ), inability to root out corruption (trị nạn tham nhũng), subservience (sự phụ thuộc, sự khúm núm, sự quỵ luỵ) to China, and “anti-democratic” (phi dân chủ) behavior in seeking to expand his power.

In what Carlyle A. Thayer, a Vietnam specialist at the Australian Defense Force Academy in Canberra, called a “battle royal” over his removal, he was also accused of (bị kết án/bị buộc tội) misusing (sử dụng sai mục đích) military intelligence (tình báo quân đội) services to conduct wiretaps (nghe lén) on his fellow Politburo members (ủy viên bộ chính trị).

When he was chosen general secretary, the three members of the incumbent (giữ một chức vụ chính thức cụ thể; hiện thời; đương nhiệm; đương kim) ruling troika (bộ ba cai trị) were named as advisers (cố vấn), a role that enabled them to cast a shadow over (che bóng/phủ bóng) his leadership. During Mr. Phieu’s first year in office, one of the three, Do Muoi, the previous general secretary, not only attended meetings of the Politburo but also continued to sit at the head of the table.

...Just before President Bill Clinton visited the country in 2001, Mr. Phieu warned that the battle against the West, to which he had dedicated his life as a soldier (dành cả cuộc đời như một người lính), had not ended with Vietnam’s wartime victory.

“They continue to seek ways to completely wipe out the remaining socialist countries,” he said. “We should never relax our vigilance (cảnh giác) for a minute.”

He ordered party officials to accord Mr. Clinton only a low-key (không quá sôi nổi, không quá gây xúc động) welcome and then berated (mắng mỏ, nhiếc móc) the president about American imperialism (chủ nghĩa đế quốc).