The arrival of the USS Ronald Reagan in the port of Danang coincides with the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the “comprehensive partnership” between the two countries by the United States and Vietnam, in light of the strengthening of trade relations between them and their convergence against the backdrop of concerns about the increasing influence of China in the region, according to AFP correspondents.
A Chinese survey boat, several coast guard vessels and fishing boats worked for weeks in Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea, prompting the Vietnamese Foreign Ministry to order them to leave immediately. The boats finally left in early June.
China claims most of the resource-rich waterway, despite parallel claims from other countries in Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia.
“The visit sends a message that Vietnam continues to strike a balance against China by improving its security relationship with the United States and other outside powers,” Nguyen Thi Phuong, a maritime security specialist at the University of New South Wales Canberra, told AFP.
The US aircraft carrier’s visit follows the arrival of Indian navy ships in Danang last month and the docking of Japan’s largest warship in Cam Ranh earlier this week.
Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Pham Thue Hang said earlier this week that the docking of foreign boats in the country’s ports is an “ordinary friendly expression of peace, stability, cooperation and development in the region and the world,” according to AFP.
Strong bilateral relations between the United States and Vietnam are of great importance to Washington if it seeks to remain a dominant power in the region, according to Phung.
He stressed that “the United States hopes, by sending one of its most prominent naval vessels, to establish a partnership in Vietnam that can be trusted and relied upon.”
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken made a brief visit to Hanoi last April and did not hide his desire to develop diplomatic relations.
It is the third visit of an American aircraft carrier to Vietnam after the docking of the USS Carl Vinson in 2018, which was the first of its kind since the end of the war. The visit included several cultural and social activities.
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