Escaping Washington, But Not Escaping Iraq

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Although Bush plans to visit the thriving stock exchange in Ho Chi Minh City--formerly Saigon--this country is still officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. As protocol demanded, he met with the General Secretary of the Communist Party and was photographed with a massive bust of the revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh. The President said one of the most poignant moments of the trip was passing the lake that Senator John McCain, as a Navy pilot, was pulled from after his plane was hit while on a bombing run. "He suffered a lot as a result of his imprisonment," Bush said, "and yet we passed the place where he was, literally, saved, in one way, by the people pulling him out." In fact, McCain was met onshore by a large, hostile crowd, which hit, kicked and even bayoneted him. Aides admitted later that the President's telling, although accurate, was incomplete.

Behind the scenes, Bush mused to aides that he loved what he was seeing and regretted he would never be able to come to a place like this as a normal tourist. Instead he pursued a fairly restricted itinerary, visiting the U.S. military's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and skipping the Turtle Temple and the stir-fried camel. Asked at a briefing why the President wasn't out more among the people, National Security Adviser Steve Hadley said the motorcade routes through the heart of the city meant that the President was "in the midst of the Vietnamese people all the time" and added that Bush "has been doing a lot of waving." His hosts seemed to want to reciprocate. When CNN International began airing a taped package using footage from the Vietnam War to suggest similarities between Iraq and Vietnam, the local feed was obscured by an overlay of music and a Vietnamese flag. For at least a few days, a graying President could enjoy Vietnam instead of wrestling its ghost.