UNLIKE the Philippines which formally claimed part of the Spratlys only in 1978 through Marcos' Presidential Decree 1596, the Vietnamese, like the Chinese, assert that their sovereignty was actually established from centuries back, in the case of Vietnam by its Nguyen emperors (1558-1775).

Thus, as in the case of the Chinese, the Vietnamese see their loss of sovereignty over the Spratlys and the Paracels to foreign powers as part of their 'century of humiliation,' as the former put it, when the West invaded and grabbed their territories.