Blinken visits Hanoi, pledges to take US-Vietnam relations to 'even higher level'
Hanoi: In order to offset China’s increasing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific, Secretary of State Antony Blinken sought Saturday to deepen ties with former adversaries in Hanoi, fifty years after the last US combat soldiers left South Vietnam. Just two weeks after the 50th anniversary of the US troop pullout that put an end to America’s direct military participation in Vietnam, Blinken and Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh made a commitment to elevate relations to new heights. “This has been a very comprehensive and effective relationship and going forward we will continue to deepen relations,” Chinh told the AP, adding, “We highly appreciate the role and responsibility of the US towards the Asia Pacific, or, in a larger scheme, the Indo-Pacific.” Earlier, Blinken broke ground on a sprawling new $1.2 billion US embassy compound in the Vietnamese capital, a project the Biden administration hopes will demonstrate its commitment to further improving ties less than 30 years after diplomatic relations were restored in 1995. “Washington and Hanoi are almost completely aligned on the kind of Indo-Pacific that we want to see and in which we want to reside: a region that’s free and open, where all countries large and small play by the same rules, where large countries don’t bully small ones, where countries trade freely but also fairly, and where disputes are resolved peacefully and in accordance with international law,” said Dan Kritenbrink, a former US ambassador to Vietnam who is currently the State Department’s top diplomat for East Asia.
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