Vietnam-US cooperation is strategic, considering economic, security and defense aspects and bringing peace and stability to the region, experts said.

"Compared with the cooperation of Vietnam and the official strategic partners, the Vietnam - US cooperation is generally equivalent. Therefore, this relationship can be considered to be essentially at the level of the strategic partnership, despite the current name.

After July 11, 1995, when US President Bill Clinton announced the normalization of relations with Vietnam, ending decades of hostility, relations between the two sides made remarkable progress in many fields.

Economically, the US has become the largest export market of Vietnam, while Vietnam is one of the export markets with the highest growth rate of the US.

Security and defense cooperation, between the two countries, especially in the field of maritime security, has developed strongly over the past 25 years.

The United States has also increased manpower training for Vietnam with its pilot training program.

The USS Carl Vinson carrier combat group in 2018 docked at Tien Sa port, Da Nang, marking the first time a US aircraft carrier visited Vietnam in more than 40 years.

Professor Vuving said the agreement to send aircraft carriers to Vietnam was made during the Obama administration and has been maintained and respected in the Trump era, showing the huge symbolic significance of the increased cooperation.

"If US warships and aircraft can regularly access some strategic positions along the East Sea of Vietnam and the Philippines, China will gradually lose the advantage of artificial islands that Beijing illegally accrues in the region.

China has over the years renovated, illegally militarized artificial islands in the South China Sea and strengthened international illegal claims to the area.

Another outstanding point in the Vietnam-US relationship is the bustling high-level visits over the past five years, which not only meant meaningful bilateral cooperation but also brought a big message to the region.

In May 2017, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc became the first Southeast Asian leader to visit the United States after President Donald Trump took office.

According to Professor Vuving, the greatest achievement in Vietnam - US relations over the past 25 years has been the transformation from enemy to friend.

"Interestingly, in the US, many people in the political circle are treating Vietnam as an important strategic ally in Asia. This is in contrast to the situation 25 years ago, when many American politicians considered Vietnam to be

A long-term Vietnam-US cooperation observer, Professor Carl Thayer, Australian Defense Academy, University of New South Wales, said that the greatest achievement of the two countries so far is the establishment of the Comprehensive Partnership framework.

"This framework covers nine areas of cooperation and opens an annual foreign minister meeting mechanism to evaluate progress and set new goals," Thayer said.

Vietnam - US solved the question of the Americans missing after the war (MIA), which was a "bottleneck" in the process of normalizing bilateral relations.

Thayer said that on a larger scale, key defense-security documents are approved by the Trump administration such as the US National Security Strategy, the US National Defense Strategy and the Indian Ocean Strategy -

"It is China's actions that have made the strategic interests of the countries similar in maintaining stability and peace at sea in Southeast Asia," said Thayer.

In the context that the US and China are increasing their strategic competition, Professor Vuving said that the pressure of "choosing sides" for countries in the region will be increasing.

"Due to the characteristics of geopolitical position and historical experience, some ASEAN countries will lean toward China, some lean toward America, others will twist like bamboo, depending on the time and situation.

Professor Thayer said that Vietnam has made efforts to avoid choosing sides by 4 main ways.

In the context of the world reeling from Covid-19, Mr. Vuving said that some countries, especially the US, UK, France, Japan, India, Australia, have clearly seen the "deadly dependence" on the market.

The United States has launched the Regional Economic Prosperity Network initiative to cut China's dependence on trade.

In terms of geopolitics, when China increased aggression in Asia, Mr. Vuving said that the United States had made stronger opposition moves than before, showing solidarity with the bullied countries.

Professor Vuving said that Vietnam-US cooperation in the coming time will have strong steps in changing the supply chain of goods and security and defense in the East Sea.

Referring to the future of Vietnam-US relations, Thayer expects the two countries to resume discussion to reach the Strategic Partnership framework by 2021. This may be feasible after the US presidential election.

According to Thayer, whether the next US President is Trump or Democratic candidate Joe Biden, the US will continue to see Vietnam as an important strategic partner in the Indo-Pacific region, in the context of

Agreeing with this judgment, Professor Vuving assessed that any representative of the party, Democratic or Republican, won, and the relationship between the United States and Vietnam will also be strongly promoted.

"Vietnam's importance for the US has been a bipartisan consensus. The two countries should have upgraded their relationship to a Strategic Partner by the end of 2019, and this may be realized after Covid-