They have spent a lot of time in vietnam i believe in the 90s or earlier than that as journalists for Eastern Economic review. And they both speak perfect vietnamese. I hope they dont start speaking that here. So todays topic is to discuss vietnams relations with both United States and china. Because of the flareup of the South China Sea dispute in recent years there have been a lot of questions and a lot of skepticism about vietnams alignment choices, external Foreign Policy choices. And china and vietnam apparently theyre both governed by communist party and its oneparty rule. Although could you argue that the political reform in two countries have taken different speed. So we are also eager to hear from the experts how the vietnamese domestic politics evolution also affects their Foreign Policy choices between the United States and china and how do we understand the future of these two bilateral relations. Thats enough talking from me. Ill invite dr. Pun to share with us her perspective. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for everybody maybe for my english is very poor so i would like to read the paper. I wrote it yesterday. So actually today is the first lunar first day of Chinese Lunar new year, so i would like to stay [ speaking Foreign Language ] to everybody here and hope they have a very happy Chinese New Year. Actually, you know the Chinese New Year todays the Chinese New Year actually is also the vietnamese new year, so actually maybe there are several countries share the common festival in the world, china, vietnam and might be korea. But maybe in korea the spring festival is a little bit different to the festival of china and vietnam. So actually apart from the spring festival, china and vietnam share many common customs. Now lets go to the topic i am discussing today which is the China Vietnam relations. I think it has some specialty in this modern, bilateral relations in general. Actually, this statement was made in speech delivered to the vietnamese conquest by president s of china xi jinping during his research in 2015. He said china and vietnam have the same political system, share the same identity and belief, have common strategy interests. We should be good comrads of mutual trust and assistance. The relations between china and vietnam are common bilateral relations which are of more strategy significance. Actually, just a few days ago, on february 8th, they exchanged letters of congratulations on the new year with the general secretary of the communist party of vietnam. They express greetings and best wishes to the people in each others country. The two leaders both express their satisfaction over the developments of the bilateral relations in the past year. In 2018, china and vietnam celebrate the anniversary of signing the partnership of comprehensive strategy. Which is the most important of bilateral relations that vietnam has signed with only two countries in the world, thats china and russia. Then, how should we understand xi jinpings statement in the vietnam conquest and the interaction of the two leaders of viet knack and china . I think it could be embodied in the following three points. The first point is xi jinping atrachd great importance to the relations between china and vietnam. This indicates a good prospects for the sign of vietnam relations in the following years. Usually the Senior Leaders visits is a clear indicator for the house of the bilateral ties, that is why vee yet nietnam an leads have reaches consensus of annual mutual visits. History shows that chinese leaders attitude play an Important Role in the bilateral relations of vietnam and china. From 1991 to 2016, the mutual visits of the two country leaders put ford contribute a good 50 years in the history of the bilateral relations. But after that, before xi jinpings visits to vietnam in 2015, chinese top leaders have suspended visits to vietnam for a decade. At that period, the bilateral relations appeared to apparently decline. Any way, from the first researchtor vietnam, as the Vice President of china, xi jinping visits vietnam again in november of 2015 as the top leader of china and only after one year in november, 2017, he again pay visits to vietnam. So xi has officially visit the three times in the past six years. Which is in the bilateral relations and at the same time we also have seen visits to chi china from the vooe vietnam as well. Between the visits between the two countries they sign a number of cooperation agreements. For example, when president xi jinping visited vietnam in november of 2017, the two countries signed 18 cooperation documents. Thanks to the active promotion of the top leaders, the economy and trade relations between china and vietnam rapidly grows. China has been vietnams largest trading partner for 13 consecutive years and by 1927. The total volume of bilateral trade has exceeded 100 billion u. S. Dollars. Accounting for about 25 of vietnams total trade volume. Its annual growth rate is about 20 . Vietnam has become chinas largest trade partner in the world as well as the largest trading partner in asia. This year in chinas trade volume is also rice. In terms of investment, china has invested over 50 billion u. S. Dollars in vietnam. Which is rapid growth in the recent year. In 1970 in 2017, vietnam hosted more than 12 million foreign tourists, among them about 4 million 4 million from china. An increase of nearly fist over the same period of the previous year. And more than 10 million mutual visits between the two countries. All this reflects echo operation as well as the personnel exchanges between the two countries. The elements of economy and trade relations and civilian relations between china and vietnam have helped the functional stabilization between the two countries. The second point is the sign of vietnam relations are crucial to that the relevance of vietnam. Vietnam always assert that china is in the top priority of its foreign relations. I think this is a very wise choice. Not only from the consideration of the security experts, but also from the Economy Developments requirement, Cultural Exchange needs as well as the ruling partys security. History shows a strong, positive coalition between chinas and vietnam economy performers. From 19751986 the relations between the two countries got worse. Vietnam ran into economy dipts difficulties and almost slipped into crisis by the mid1980s. On the contrary, the relation between the two countries have developed in all experts from 1991 to be 2006. Then vietnam has the best 50 years of Economy Development from 1986. Meanwhile, ran the relations between the two countries ran downhill from the 2007 to 2015, the economy of vietnam turned in turmoil. Its economy growth rates dropped from an average of about 7. 5 in the previous past 15 years to about 5 to 6 in the last eight years. However, China Vietnams relation recover all aflound 2017. Then recent the vietnams economy grows 6. 8 , which is the largest increase in the past ten years. The third point i want to put here is the sign of vietnam relations are the bilateral relations specialty. So what vehicletors contributes to the specialties of the two countries . I think it could be reflected in several aspects as follow. First, a summation about china and vietnam have the same culture regions. In the history, north part of vietnam was one part of chinas dynasty from the 111 b. C. To the year of 19 986 a. D. The dynasties of china exercise the administration in the area. Open schools to educate the local people about chinese civilization. Therefore, before the 19 14th century, chinese was the vietnamese official language. That is why now adays some chinese traditional culture philosophers are respected in vietnam. In the year of 19 968, they established the dynasty and named the country as then it began a new era of vietnams history. However, in order to retain the dynasties of china, vietnam became one of the states of tri 973 to 1885. During that time, all vietnams emperors sent diplomatic envoys every one or two years to show respect to the central kingdoms authority. Vietnam was a part of asias contributory system, an order centered on china in the old days. So in 1885, the chin dynasty signed a treaty with france, transferring vietnams sovereignty to france. After that, vietnam became a french colony and the relations between china and vietnam changed to state to state relations. So the second factor shows that a specialty of the of the relations between china and vietnam is the geography. As neighbors, china and vietnam have more than 1,400 kilometers of land bordering. In the meantime, they share a large water area from the gulf to the South China Sea. As you know, a common border could provide both countries opportunities for a cooperation as well as conflicts, even wars. At the boundary area for the recent of no Clear Division in the history, there were many disputes and even some wars sometimes, and the biggest conflicts, as you know, is the war of 1979, but shortly after the two countries resumed their norm normal relations in 1991, the border negotiation recovered and by the end of 1999, a clear border line settled down between the two countries. And about the common waters surface of the two countries, the creation of the gulf was completed on december 25, 2010, through bilateral negotiations. This is the only case in which china has accomplished the division of water lines. This shows that china and vietnam can solve very difficult issues through bilateral negotiations. The it is hoped that the same approach will be applied to the South China Sea dispute settlement. Which is yet to take place, but both sides have agreed to that approach and negotiated more than ten runs by different level of official dedications. By now, vietnam and china agree to solve the dispute in South China Sea by the principle of shared differences and develop jointly. Both sides hope to solve the problem by negotiation. The sharing between the two countries is that both china and vietnam are socialist countries administrated by one political party, the communist party. The constitution of china as well as vietnam defines that communist party is the leading power of the country and society. The party will not will not only set directions for all the developments of the whole country in general, but also can chill the countrys diplomatic policy and economic policies so when the governments relations of the two countries have some problems, the bilateral relations can be repaired through the partys channel. Therefore, despite some problems happen between the two countries in the past few years, the economic relations between the two countries continue to maintain rapid growth. Well, just just nnow, i examine relationship two china and vietnam, but how about the external factors. In fact, i think the relations between china and vietnam are constantly affected by the external factors. History in history, the adjustments of the relations between france, the soviet union, and the United States has directly affected the choice of the vietnams Foreign Policy and at present, the United States policy to the vietnam is not so clear. So it has some uncertainty about the relations. In the past few years, president s obama made great efforts to build a tpp to involve the vietnam, but it has been abandoned by President Trump. However, President Trump sent u. S. Actually, i think the different attitude of the u. S. Governments to vietnam has a great impact on the political situation in vietnam. As well as the chinavietnam relations. At present, the impact is being dynamically adjusted so im going to hear how he will see the adjustments. Well, in summary, the relations between china and vietnam held disputes and negatives, but there are more commonalities between the two countries, so i believe the deep and close affection of the two people will not be easily disjoined by any single dispute. I remember a few years ago when i saw when i was in the talk with the former vice minister of Foreign Affairs of vietnam, he said, quote, we are comrades and brothers. We should solve problems by emotional and principled manner. In other words, the problems between the two countries should not necessarily to be solved through illegal means, which may disjoin our affinity. Instead, we should trust each other, understand each other, sit down and talk in a way thats not hurt each others feeling and find a good solution to the problem. The result of this solution to the problem may better than a legal solution. Actually, i am very much agreed with song, and by now, in general, im optimistic about the development of the two countries. Well, all i said just now is my own personal opinion. Thank you, and welcome for helpful suggestions. Thank you. Thank you, dr. Pan. That was very informative, especially its amazing to hear how confident that china appears to be because the relationship is based on the party and party to party solidarity, so even when the two countries have problems, the party can basically navigate through the turbulence. So, is u. S. Policy towards vietnam really unclear . Well, one thing thats certainly very different is that u. S. Relations with vietnam are much shorter than chinas relations with vietnam. Big distance. Yeah and u. S. Is also much further away than china. You know, if you look at how far u. S. Vietnam relations have come since 1975, since 1995, its rather stunning how rapidly relations have changed, have improved at all levels. You know, economic to people to people, military, security, political ties. Since the u. S. Lifted the sanctions in 1994, vietnam has become the 16th largest trading partner of the United States with twoway trade topping 52 million in 2016. Politically, theres a lot of cooperation, even in very difficult issues like human rights dialogues. The two countries have dramatically stepped up defense cooperation since particularly since china moved the oil rig off the coast of danang in 2014. The u. S. Moved to lift the ban on lethal sale of weapons, and it announced that it would provide 18 million in aid to vietnam to help boost maritime domain awareness. In 2015, the u. S. And Vietnamese Defense ministers signed a joint statement which will it is really defining, governing defense ties in about a dozen different areas. And under the agreement, the u. S. Transferred hamilton class coast guard cutter to vietnam that arrived just before trump arrived in vietnam in november. We had secretary mattis visited vietnam in january, and in march, the uss carl vincent, an Aircraft Carrier, is going to visit vietnam, be the first u. S. Aircraft carrier to visit vietnam, maybe ever. I dont remember if any visited during the vietnam war. I didnt look. You know, so we had and then during the vietnamese Prime Minister visited here last may, and President Trump visited there in november. And one of the things interesting things they talked about was in stepping up intel sharing between the two countries. And theres also been an effort by the u. S. And vietnam to tackle legacy issues. Weve all hear about the search for missing in action soldiers. We hear about the cleanup of unexploded ordinance, and theres also an attempt by the u. S. To remediate areas that have been damaged by agent orange, dioxin. So the airport in danang was basically completed last year, and theyre now the two sides are now talking about the airport northeast of ho chi minh city. Funding is an issue. Its a much bigger project than danang was. And then people to people cooperation, as i alluded to, is really stepped up. This year, there about 22,000 vietnamese students studying in the United States, some with government scholarships, a loft th a lot of them funded privately. And the Fulbright University is going to be opening in ho chi minh city. Its sort of opened already but its had a soft opening, but theyre in the process of building a new campus. And then that will be a university thats basically funded a little bit by congress and a lot by the u. S. And vietnamese private sector kicked in millions of dollars. So, despite, you know, i alluded to a bunch of different areas in which the u. S. And vietnam are cooperating militarily, its pretty clear vietnam only goes so far. It might be for some of the reasons that she was talking about, but the on terms of buying equipment, vietnam has come to window shop, but it really hasnt purchased anything. If you ask the vietnamese, well, you asked for years for this thing to be lift, why arent you buyi buying anything. They have two or three explanations. One is, u. S. Equipment is very expensive, buying in the u. S. Is very complicated and three, integrating with our basically russian equipment is also very complicated. Beyond equipment, purchasing equipment, vietnam still does largely limit u. S. Ship visits. They can have several ships in one visit, but basically limits visits to one. One exercise per year, which is what it holds other countries to as well. Sorry, just lost my place. So is question is really, why is Vietnam Holding back . Its very anxious about china in the South China Sea, so why hold back . I think theres several reasons. One is the vietnamese military is really very conservative. It is, you know, there are people in the United States that still suffer from, quote, unquote, the vietnam syndrome. There are people in vietnam that still suffer from the america syndrome. Thats one issue. Another issue is that the military is probably one of the closest institutions to china, and so there are some officers that are quite prochinese, and theres also a general anxiety that vietnam does