Opinion – Can Vietnam-style hedging prevent all-out war in Ukraine?

When discussing the foreign policy strategies available to small and medium-sized states, international relations experts tend to focus on bandwagoning and balancing—concepts popularized by scholars such as Kenneth Waltz and Randall Schweller. Following the trend is considered a strategy of weak countries, whose hope of survival in a system dominated by great powers can be supported by close alliances with regional hegemons. Balance is seen as appropriate for those states in the middle who feel confident in joining forces with other like-minded status quo actors to confront rising or revisionist powers. However, a middle path has not received enough attention from academics and practitioners. This approach is called hedging, and it revolves around three core principles: avoid explicit association with and confrontation with great powers; be both deferential and provocative toward regional hegemons; and diversify diplomatic relations and economic cooperation with a wide range of regional and global actors to achieve is to avoid dependence on any single great power.

Vietnam is a good example of a successful hedging strategy. As a country with land and maritime borders with the People’s Republic of China – including ongoing territorial disputes in the South China Sea – Vietnam (along with the rest of Southeast Asia) is expected to join a US-led balancing alliance that would offset China’s rise, and ensuring a rules-based order in the broader Indo-Pacific region. According to prevailing neorealist thinking, this was a rational choice for Hanoi, which had ample historical evidence of Chinese invasion. However, there is no sign that Vietnam is pursuing an external balancing strategy against its large northern neighbor. The country’s leadership still firmly adheres to the “four no’s” defense policy. They are: 1. Not to participate in military alliances; 2. Not to support one country against another; 3. Not to establish foreign military bases in Vietnam or use Vietnam as leverage against other countries; 4. Not to use force or threats in international relations Use force. As long as the “four no’s” remain part of the Vietnamese Communist Party’s line, Hanoi cannot become a member of AUKUS, QUAD or any similar security partnership.

In terms of strengthening its own defense capabilities, Vietnam is doing everything it can to modernize its Soviet/Russian-based military systems and maintain a credible deterrent. According to GlobalData, Vietnam’s total defense budget is expected to increase from US$6.5 billion in 2020 to US$10.2 billion by the end of this century. While this represents significant growth, it is still a far cry from China’s 2024 defense budget of $231.4 billion. In addition, Hanoi’s increase in defense spending is in line with Vietnam’s overall economic growth and in line with Vietnam’s official foreign policy of independence, self-reliance, multilateralization and diversification; especially the first two points. In other words, the claim that Vietnam is investing in armaments to match China’s capabilities is far-fetched.

Contrary to Western, or more accurately American, expectations, Vietnam has clearly chosen not to counterbalance China. There are several reasons for this strategic decision. First, Vietnam does not view China as an existential threat; the long-standing dispute over territorial waters and exclusive economic zones in the South China Sea is simply not as serious as Western observers imagine or hope. Second, China has so far not given Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries a strong enough incentive to create or join an anti-China alliance. However, this could easily change if Beijing chooses to force unification with Taiwan. The third and fourth reasons have nothing to do with China at all, but with its main competitor, the United States. Hanoi is fed up with Washington’s constant narrative of democracy versus dictatorship and suspects “hostile forces” are considering regime change in Vietnam, if not in the short or medium term, then certainly in the long term. Furthermore, Vietnamese leaders do not believe in a strong U.S. presence in the Indo-Pacific region and fear that the U.S. may abandon the United States if it embarks on an isolationist path in the future under a re-elected Donald Trump or a like-minded presidential administration. Finally, on a purely theoretical basis, Hanoi realizes that balancing China will lead to the stabilization of a bipolar order that will inevitably lead to the creation of spheres of influence dominated by the respective great powers, leaving few, if any, spheres of influence left ). In short, Vietnam’s refusal to check and balance China is protecting its autonomy in international affairs.

Vietnam was too big (a country of 100 million people) and too confident (a country that had defeated Japanese, French, and American armies) to choose to go with the flow, so it chose a hedging strategy. As explained in the introduction, hedging involves equidistance from major centers of power. Furthermore, due to their Taoist and Confucian cultural foundations, Vietnamese do not view other countries as black or white, but as black and white (yin and yang). This means that great powers and all other international actors are simultaneously viewed as friends and foes, potential partners and possible threats. As a result, Hanoi is careful not to get too close to Washington for fear of angering Beijing, even as it deepens economic and cultural ties with the United States and other liberal democracies such as South Korea, Japan and Australia. Likewise, Vietnam’s leadership has tacitly acknowledged the United States’ commitment to keeping the Indo-Pacific region “free and open” while resisting U.S. proposals for greater security cooperation. Vietnam’s strategic ambiguity ensured that Hanoi was sought after by all and threatened by no one. At least not in the way that Ukraine’s survival is threatened by Russia.

Regarding the ongoing war in Eastern Europe, Vietnam remained neutral based on its policy of not openly opposing major powers. It abstained from voting on four U.N. General Assembly resolutions condemning Russia’s attack on Ukraine. Unsurprisingly, it also stopped short of recognizing Russia’s illegal annexation of Ukrainian territory. Hanoi was an ally of Moscow during the Cold War, and Russia remains Vietnam’s largest arms supplier. However, the similarities between China-Vietnam relations and Russia-Ukraine relations cannot be ignored. In both cases, there are huge power asymmetries and a long history of political dominance and cultural influence by the larger states. So why have China and Vietnam managed to avoid escalation in their protracted maritime dispute, while Russia and Ukraine have become embroiled in the worst armed conflict on European soil since the end of World War II?

From Vietnam’s perspective, it can be argued that Ukraine’s choice to ally with the West to counterbalance Russia after the 2004 Orange Revolution was a miscalculation (another reason why Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party is worried about regime change in Hanoi). Under Presidents Viktor Yushchenko and Petro Poroshenko, joining the EU and NATO is a clear signal that Ukraine wants to avoid the “Russian world” and join the “Western collective”. In other words, it is a zero-sum game in which Washington will gain an advantage (Brussels is a minor player) while Moscow will suffer equally. By contrast, Hanoi has always ensured that any rapprochement between Vietnam and the West or liberal democracies would not be seen as detrimental to Beijing. For example, a U.S. aircraft carrier can dock at the port of Da Nang, but the U.S. Navy should not expect permission to use it as a permanent base in the South China Sea. Every move Hanoi takes or does not take is to serve Vietnam’s national interests rather than damage the current regional situation.