The inaugural Manila Dialogue on the South China Sea was just held in the Philippines. I attended the conference at the invitation of @kasphilippines (🙏@braun_daniela). Here are some of my takeaways. /1 - Several countries are committed to a rules-based order in the maritime domain but they do not always agree on whether and how to punish transgressors.
(I'll comment on the term "rules-based order" at the bottom of this thread.) /2

🧵Some asked me to comment on what Vietnam’s politics and future will look like under the new leader, To Lam. To answer this question, we must look at the tendencies of Vietnam’s new leadership and the trends and potential changes ...

https://twitter.com/hostedbyjustin/status/1814641176231673960

... in the domestic and international environments, then assess their interactions. This is hugely complex, so I will only talk about some broad contours.
I've addressed some tendencies of the new leadership in a previous thread (below). /2

https://twitter.com/Alex_Vuving/status/1814479188554141790

🧵For more than 13 years (2011-2024), Nguyen Phu Trong was Vietnam's Communist Party chief and the country's top leader. His era has ended & the country now faces an uncertain future.
What are Trong's legacies? Will they outlive him? What is Vietnam's post-Trong direction? Future generations will remember Trong for his two famous metaphors: a "blazing furnace" and a "bamboo diplomacy." The two signify Trong's major fingerprints in the country's domestic and foreign policies. /2

🧵Notes on Vietnam's domestic politics & foreign policy. Vietnam has been experiencing an unprecedented political turmoil that is intertwined with an anti-corruption campaign. It started in 2022 with the investigations of major corruption cases related to the procurement ... /1 of COVID-19 test kits and repatriation flights during the pandemic, which led to the forced resignations of President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh in Jan 2023. Intriguingly, Phuc and Minh were among the 7 Communist Party Politburo members who ... /2

🧵Vietnam has agreed to build a "community with a shared future" with China. It was the 8th and possibly the last country in Southeast Asia (after Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Brunei, Malaysia, and Indonesia) to join the China-led community. Singapore and the Philippines are unlikely to take China's side anytime soon in this respect.
With 8/10 members within China's "community with a shared future," ASEAN is shrinking deeper into irrelevance, as demonstrated in the ongoing South China Sea conflict. /2

🧵Interesting to see how Vietnam is dancing between the giants.
Vietnam and Japan just elevated their ties from an "extensive strategic partnership" (announced in 2014) to a "comprehensive strategic partnership" at a visit of President Vo Van Thuong to Japan. /1 This "half upgrade" is, arithmetically speaking, 4 times easier than the "double upgrade," also to a comprehensive strategic partnership, of US-VN ties in Sep (from a mere "comprehensive partnership"). /2

🧵Between the 11th and the 12th hour, Vietnam moved from agreeing to a mere "strategic partnership" to a full "comprehensive strategic partnership" with the US, which will be announced next weekend by President Joe Biden & Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong in Hanoi. This will elevate the US to the same level as China & Russia in Vietnam's formal hierarchy of foreign relations. This "balance" is unprecedented in the history of Communist Vietnam. China is the ultimate author of this feat, in two major ways, one short, the other much longer.

🧵President Biden is expected to visit Vietnam in early Sep to upgrade bilat ties. But nothing is certain. The US wants a "comprehensive strategic partnership" - same level w/ RU, CN, IN & SK in Vietnam's foreign relations. But Hanoi wants a mere "strategic partnership". /1 The idea of a US-VN strategic partnership became policy after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's declaration of US national interest in freedom of navigation and respect for int'l law in the South China Sea at an Asean Regional Forum meeting in July 2010. /2

🧵This database gives you a good sense of who helps whom in Southeast Asia with development finance. It also helps you to understand the geopolitical alignment of these countries. Some take-aways: /1

https://twitter.com/LowyInstitute/status/1665340721245614081

China is the largest provider of development aid to Southeast Asia overall, but it's insignificant as a donor for Vietnam and the Philippines--and only for these two countries. /2

🧵Another nail in the coffin of neorealism.
foreignpolicy.com/2023/05/31/sto… Walt argues that worrying about Chinese hegemony in Asia is irrational because "regional hegemony is (nearly) impossible to achieve" and that China's bid for hegemony in Asia today would fail because other Asian countries would successfully counterbalance it. /2

🧵It's always interesting to compare the Chinese & Vietnamese readouts of their bilateral events.
Truong Thi Mai, No. 2 in the Vietnam Communist Party apparatus, just visited China and met President Xi Jinping.
The Chinese readout emphasizes ... /1 The Chinese readout emphasizes Xi's urge for Vietnam to joint a "community of common destiny" with China & the Vietnamese leader's expression of support of China's global initiatives (GSI, GDI), especially the BRI. /2
fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/zxxx_6…

🧵1⃣ What is GRAND STRATEGY?
This questions boils down to two other questions:
- What is STRATEGY?
- What is GRAND in "grand strategy"? 2⃣ The common definition of strategy in most dictionaries is that it is a PLAN. E.g., strategy is defined as a “carefully developed plan or method for achieving a goal” (Merriam-Webster) or a “plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim” (Oxford).