What are your thoughts on USA and Vietnam getting closer these days?

I think it is about time and I hope it is not just a reaction, or counter-reaction to Chinese actions. Vietnam, as a country, has been a viable member of the world community for many years now and in terms of US/Vietnam relations have been ongoing for decades. We even signed a bilateral trade agreement about 2001.

China is not “an enemy”, any more than the USSR was “an enemy” during the height of the Cold War. Yes, China and the USA are economic and political rivals, but since we’re not fighting in a war – or likely to – then it’s not wise to think of each other as enemies.

For that matter, I’m surprised that it has taken as long as it has for us to grow closer to Vietnam. (And in business terms, we’ve been friendly with them for quite some time.) After the Allied victory in WW II it did not take a great deal of time to convert the Japanese, German and Italian governments (and people) to become allies of the West – and we had fought a war of apparent survival against those countries.

Kind of makes one wonder why we fought a war with them.

We have been working on reconciliation with them for 30 years. I have friends who are Vietnam vets that made tours in the late eighties to come to grips with the war and their own involvement.

I would not call it a response to China aggression. That discounts a lot of other efforts in the region that date back to the GHW Bush years,

I’m thrilled and hope it brings peace and good relations to everyone. The vietnamese I know are a wonderful, gentle fun loving people and the landscapes are gorgeous. I’d love to visit!

What took the US so long? Vietnam is a fabulous country with the most brilliant food, culture, golf and wonderful people.

I think what took so long is the Vietnamese haven’t marketed themselves as aggressively as other countries have/do.

I’m behind the wall looking at all of you ~

Actually I think one of the reasons why it took so long is because of our language barrier. Several years ago it was hard to find someone with enough English proficiency to talk naturally to a native speaker. Most of our language knowledge came from books and when we talked to a foreigner it sounded like we just swallowed a research thesis, and it took us a long time to respond to someone. The education system was a lot more rigid and academic-oriented so it didn’t help. Now as the world became smaller, people get to know more about English and find a better way to communicate with people across the world. It’s how we negociate and market our things.

Rather a cynical view of friendship @imrainmaker. Why not be friends with China too. The Chinese despite Trump hold America in high regard.

^Yeah..that’s right..)~

I didn’t know there was tension between the countries. They love KFC and, well, I am 40 years old and never thought a bad thing about Vietnam. The Amazing Race goes there all the time.

My dad killed some people over there in the early 70’s and I feel bad about that since it was a bullshit war. But other than that I was under the impression relations between us were good.

Allie just vacationed in Vietnam and loved it.

Please refer this article

When I was in college I met a guy who used to be Viet Cong. He was a nice guy, but the Viet Cong thing cared the crap out of me. He said he shot at US troops at the time. His beautiful girlfriend was hot on me. I had to shrug her off because I didn’t want to die. [probably was not likely, but I didn’t want to risk it]

@RocketGuy Just to be fair, I had a caving buddy that spent time in Vietnam (he got pissed off at his college and signed up for the Marines) He made it back in mostly one piece but you didn’t dare wake him up suddenly. We would stand back from his tent or truck, if he were sleeping in it, and yell or rock the truck. He was kinda scary too. He was always armed, even when sleeping.

Took several years for him to normalize again.