Attending the conference included, in the US side, there were appearances of Mr. Ted Osius, the current United States Ambassador to Vietnam and Mr. Frank Jannuzi, President and CEO of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation. In the Vietnam side, there were Assoc. Prof. Dr. Pham Van Duc, Vice President of Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (VASS), Assoc. Prof. Dr. Cu Chi Loi, Director of Vietnam Institute of American Studies together with representatives from several organisations (Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of National Defence, Ministry of Industry and Trade and so on) and researchers from the two countries.
The US and Vietnam used to have a complicated and tough relationship in the past. However, thanks to several extraordinary efforts of both nations, the bilateral relation between the US and Vietnam has gained noticeable achievements. Among these significant achievements, one the most important milestones is that the comprehensive partnership between the two sides was set up in 2013 in an official visit of Mr. Truong Tan Sang, the President of Vietnam. Since then, the bilateral relationship has increasingly developed.
In the context of economic difficulties in both countries, bilateral relationships in trade and investment have still developed significantly. The US and Vietnam together with the other 12 partners signed in The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) at the end of 2015, which will bring a promising new stage of development in bilateral relationships in trade and investment. Vietnam has become the leading exporter among South East Asian countries to the US market currently. In terms of education, it is Vietnam that has the most overseas students studying in the US among countries in South East Asia.
The cooperation between Vietnam and the US in national defence and security started having important progresses to resolve the consequences of war, support and enhance maritime capacity, train peacekeeping forces and other fields.
In the opening speech in the conference, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Pham Van Duc highly appreciated current achievements in the bilateral relationship between Vietnam and the US as well as emphasised that the relationship was not only bilateral but also important in both regional and international perspectives. The development of the relationship between Vietnam and the US will contribute to prosperity for residents of both countries as well as peace, stability and development of the whole region. Therefore, it is essential to do research on the achievements and challenges of Vietnam in order to enhance the bilateral relationship between Vietnam and the US
In the speech on the theme “Building Trust”, the US Ambassador Ted Osius appreciated continual efforts of Vietnam and the US in the past 20 years, especially to together overcome difficulties and head to a bright future. After that, the ambassador clearly analysed two methods of building trust during that period, which were (1) together achieving common progress and (2) solving the issues in human rights. The main purposes were to orient towards a more democratic and fairer society in the future on the basis of deep understanding and honesty about the differences between the two sides. Also, he expressed his desire to collaborate and support Vietnam in terms of security in parallel with regional regulations as well as the security issues in the region.
The conference was divided into 2 sessions which focused on main contents as following:
Session 1: The speakers including Assoc. Prof. Dr Cu Chi Loi, Mr Frank Jannuzi and Assoc. Prof. Dr Le Van Cuong, Former head of the Strategy and Science Institute under the Ministry of Public Security discussed points of view about progress in the US – Vietnam relation: Challenges and Recommendations. The contents of speeches aimed to discuss about achievements and issues and to make recommendations and propose solutions for the US to support Vietnam on several aspects including economics, technological transfer, human resource development, security and national defence in order to create momentum for Vietnam’s development in response to current international volatilities, ensure peace and stability in the region and strengthen firm belief between the two nations.
 |
|
|
|
 |
Session 2: The speakers including experts in the US – Vietnam relationship in terms of security and national defence and external relations (Colonel Le The Mau and Dr Nguyen Dinh Luan) and Mr Frank Jannuzi made presentations about issues and future development directions. All of the speeches concentrated on describing an overview of the bilateral relationship between the two sides through clarifying specific problems (security – national defence, citizenship, the US – Vietnam relationship in the situation of TPP) with an aim to a more effective development. Through doing so, the researchers also proposed directions for further development in the US – Vietnam bilateral relationship, which were (1) boosting economic relationship; (2) focusing on residents’ relations besides exchanging channel with Party and the Government; (3) academic exchanges and exchanging scholars in all fields to serve policy recommendations; (4) continuing concentrating on tackling to consequences of the war; (5) exchanging between young generations of the two countries and so on.
Not only does the conference have both significant academic and empirical meanings, it is also a helpful forum for external and internal researchers and scholars to exchange ideas in order to strengthen the bilateral relationship between the two nations with common consensus, through which to build trust, contribute to the development of comprehensive relationship between Vietnam and the US towards prosperity and independence in the future.
Nguyen Thu Trang
