By Jonathan London & Vu Quang Viet The chaos and violence that erupted in Vietnam in early May diverted the world’s attention from the fundamental causes of tensions between China and Vietnam and, indeed, China and the region. These stem…
By Jonathan London Last weekend’s Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore provided the clearest evidence yet that the East Asian social order is in the midst of momentous change. The status quo of uneasy stability which prevailed in the region for decades has now…
By Nguyen Manh Hung Vietnam’s deputy prime minister Pham Binh Minh, who also serves as foreign minister, made a widely-publicized telephone call to Secretary of State John Kerry on May 21, 2014, to discuss the crisis caused by China’s deployment…
By Zachary Abuza Though often described as “battle-tested,” the Vietnam People’s Army’s last combat was in 1989 in Cambodia. Since the mid-1990s, Vietnam has developed maritime and air capabilities in order to defend its maritime domain; Vietnamese military expenditures climbed…
By Bill Hayton Should ASEAN declare war on China? The question is ludicrous but if you had spent the past 10 days reading commentaries on ASEAN’s summit in Myanmar, you might be forgiven for thinking it was a viable policy…
By Jonathan London The deadly riots in Vietnam last week, while harmful to the country’s image and stability, is of secondary importance to Hanoi’s main challenge: its enduring political stalemate. As Adam Fforde, a longtime Vietnam expert, has observed, Vietnam…
Who is he? Theodore (Ted) Osius has served in the U.S. Foreign Service for over 25 years. He began his career in the Philippines and has served in India, Thailand, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, and Hanoi and…
By Phuong Nguyen China’s deployment of a drilling rig in Vietnam’s claimed exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea – which Vietnamese unanimously view as a violation of their sovereignty – has struck some dangerous chords in Vietnam. If…
By Huy Duong A dangerous clash has flared up between Vietnam and China over the latter’s deployment of an oil rig near the disputed Paracels. One option for Vietnam is to submit the dispute to the UN Convention on the…
By Jonathan London Beijing’s recent actions in the South China Sea toward Vietnam are disappointing and alarming. That China is an emerging power gives it no right to impose outsized sovereignty claims on its neighbors. Yet this is precisely what…