So it's a bit of a stretch to claim that South Korea became today's South Korea because it survived the war in 1953. One could equally say that Vietnam's economic development in 2000s validates North Vietnam's victory.
Have fun if you're Christian:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_religion_in_Vietnam
For the record, China and Vietnam is not what I would call communist. That is more North Korea or Cuba. In Vietnam even foreigners can buy property already nowadays. I do not recall the exact conditions but I know people who did it. It is a capitalist system, actually. With a lot of control sometimes, but with market rules.
It is not about the sanctions. It is the system chosen. Everyone that has intellectual honesty knows that. There is a lot of literature about the problem of economic calculation in socialism systems proved by how russians did theirs, for example (black markets and copying countries budgets, the U.S. army compared to the russian one is an example of such a thing).
And do not make me started on the repression, that is the worst part. But all go hand in hand at the end.
Vietnam is developing, and I am glad it is. But what they are doing is not communism at all, do not sell us that. I have been living there for almost 10 years and I hope I can come back. It is a lovely country.
If we are into intellectual honesty, then North Korea does not match any features of Socialism or Communism I've ever read or heard of.
Tt is a totalitarian absolute monarchy bordering on "worship god emperror"
Vietnam, on the other hand, only really began to reform its economy after the collapse of the soviet union. If anything, North Vietnam's victory emboldened communist leaders in the aftermath of the war.
In fact there were strong parallels to the Soviet economic plans, see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_of_South_Korea
vs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-year_plans_of_the_Soviet_...
Of course, a country can always be competitive by keeping wages low (probably artificially low in south korea) but I think south korea and the other asian tigers got a lot of things right that aren't comparable to how mainland china approached economic reform.
Besides being of a duration of five years there isn't a lot in common the economic planning of the soviet union and south korea in the aftermath of the Korean war. The soviet union's plans controlled the allocation of almost every resource and good in the economy and its ultimate price. South Korea's planning was mostly limited to guiding government investment and lacked the policy levers available to Gosplan.