Trump will highlight Vietnam as a model for Kim
A second summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un looks set to take place in Vietnam
Vietnam last week said it had not been told about the timing or location of a possible second summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un but that it was confident it could host such an event. Washington earlier in January announced that a summit would be held in February, following landmark talks between Trump and Kim in Singapore last year.
What next
If Vietnam hosts a Trump-Kim summit, it will enhance the country’s relations with the United States, North Korea and South Korea, burnishing Hanoi’s regional reputation. The US government will aim to highlight Vietnam as a suitable model of economic reform for North Korea.
Subsidiary Impacts
- A summit in Vietnam would provide Trump with a distraction from investigations into his alleged links with Russia.
- The summit would bolster ASEAN’s claims to be crucial to promoting peace and security in the ‘Indo-Pacific’.
- A successful Trump-Kim meeting would be welcomed by Beijing but would not influence US-China trade talks.
- Trump would be unlikely to travel to South-east Asia for a second time this year to attend the East Asia Summit in Thailand in November.
Analysis
The White House on January 18 said that Trump would meet Kim towards the end of February, following a summit between the two leaders in Singapore last June (see SINGAPORE: Trump-Kim summit would boost reputation - May 24, 2018).
Though the exact timing or location has not been announced, speculation has been mounting that a second Trump-Kim summit could take place in Vietnam. Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc on January 17 said his country was willing to host the summit. Separately, the foreign ministry said that Vietnam supported efforts to resolve disputes through dialogue.
Mark Lambert, the senior US State Department official responsible for Washington's Korea policy, and North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho visited Hanoi in December. Though there has been no official confirmation, it is likely that Lambert and Ri met to discuss a prospective Trump-Kim summit.
Possible venues for a summit besides Vietnam include Hawaii and Singapore, but these appear to have been ruled out. North Korea does not have a diplomatic mission in Hawaii, and holding the summit in a US state may be perceived as advantaging Trump. Though Singapore successfully executed the first Trump-Kim summit, Washington and Pyongyang feel that a different host should be chosen.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on January 30 said the summit will be somewhere in Asia.
Vietnam has likely been chosen and, as with Singapore last year, practical considerations and geopolitical factors are likely to have prompted such a decision.
Practical considerations
The United States and North Korea each have embassies in Hanoi and therefore have diplomats on the ground to prepare for a summit.
Vietnam is a four-hour flight from Pyongyang, and most of this journey is over China, North Korea's nominal ally. Vietnam is within range of Kim's Soviet-built Ilyushin-62 aircraft. Kim may choose to fly on a Chinese aircraft, as he did to Singapore last June.
Vietnam has a good track record of holding large international meetings, a recent example being the APEC Summit in the coastal city of Da Nang in November 2017. Da Nang is currently the front runner to host a Trump-Kim summit because of its picturesque tropical location and large number of five-star hotels and resorts.
The summit could take place in Da Nang
Hanoi and the financial capital Ho Chi Minh City have also been suggested as possible locations.
The authoritarian Community Party of Vietnam government can provide tight security and ensure the meeting is not disrupted by protests.
Vietnam would accrue financial benefits from hosting a Trump-Kim summit. Though last year's summit required the Singapore government to spend 12 million dollars on security, media facilities and hotel accommodation for the North Korean delegation, it generated an estimated 563 million dollars for the city-state in tourism, retail and media exposure.
Geopolitical factors
Vietnam expects that holding the meeting will strengthen its image as an emerging middle power committed to regional peace and stability within a rules-based international order.
Vietnam is viewed by both Washington and Pyongyang as a neutral party to the dispute on the Korean peninsula.
At the same time, Vietnam has strong bilateral ties with North Korea, South Korea and the United States.
During the Vietnam War, Pyongyang provided political support for the North Vietnamese regime in its struggle to defeat the United States and reunite with South Vietnam.
Vietnam's relations with North Korea were briefly set back after North Korean operatives used a Vietnamese national to administer a fatal nerve agent to Kim's half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, at Kuala Lumpur airport in February 2017. Ties have improved after Ri apologised to the Vietnamese government during his visit to Hanoi last December.
Vietnam has excellent relations with South Korea. The country is attractive to South Korean tourists, who are especially drawn to Da Nang, and investors, such as Samsung.
Hanoi's relations with Washington have improved considerably since the two countries normalised economic and diplomatic relations in 1994 and 1995 respectively. By 2017, bilateral trade was worth 55 billion dollars.
Vietnam and the United States over the past decade have improved defence ties as China has become more aggressive in the South China Sea, where Hanoi and Beijing have unresolved territorial and maritime jurisdictional claims (see US-VIETNAM: Security likely to outweigh trade ties - May 9, 2018). Vietnam is one of the few South-east Asian countries to support publicly US 'freedom of navigation' operations in the disputed waters.
'Vietnam model'
The United States, and to some extent China, view Vietnam as an exemplar for North Korea. The parallels between North Korea today and Vietnam during the Cold War are striking.
Vietnam was a divided country until 1975. The Korean peninsula remains divided.
During its military occupation of Cambodia between 1978 and 1989, Vietnam was an international pariah whose only supporters were the Soviet Union and its allies. North Korea is today shunned by the international community because of its nuclear weapons programme, with Pyongyang having strained relations with all major powers including China.
Following its withdrawal from Cambodia, Vietnam moved quickly and successfully to repair relations with major powers and neighbouring states. Vietnam in 1995 became a member of ASEAN, which was formed in 1967 as a club of anti-communist South-east Asian countries and which had vigorously opposed Vietnam's occupation of Cambodia.
As with North Korea today, Vietnam was an impoverished state on the verge of famine until the introduction of economic reforms in the mid-1980s. Since then, Vietnam has had one of the fastest growing economies in Asia.
Beijing, like Washington, will want Kim to take inspiration from Vietnam
The United States and China hope that North Korea will learn from the 'Vietnam model'. Both countries want Pyongyang to end its pariah status by denuclearising and introducing economic reforms that will improve North Korean citizens' living standards.
Vietnam demonstrates that a communist state can maintain one-party rule and grow its economy at the same time.
