Why Vietnam is elevating foreign affairs to a ‘core, frequent’ mission
The Communist Party’s upcoming 14th National Congress is set to mark an important change in the country’s approach to foreign policy.
Vietnam’s draft political report for the upcoming 14th National Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) signals a major change in how the country will advance its interests both at home and abroad. In the report, the CPV identifies great power rivalry as one of the most pressing issues that Vietnam must overcome to realize its target of 10 percent GDP growth in 2026. Hence, it has elevated foreign affairs to the status of a “core, frequent” mission (“trọng yếu, thường xuyên”) of the party-state, putting it on par with national defense and internal security.
The CPV’s draft political report tasks its foreign service with two key tasks: addressing threats early and from afar; and elevating Vietnam’s international profile and strengthening its strategic autonomy through active engagement with international bodies and partners. In the past, Vietnam’s diplomacy was more reactive, taking cues from the international environment and then adjusting its domestic policies. Now, the country wants to play a more active role by having diplomacy shape the international environment in ways conducive to its domestic interests. This change reflects the ambitions of Vietnam’s new “era of national rise.”
Underneath the language change lies a new strategic thinking. Vietnam is updating its playbook on how to deal with international polarization. This is not the first time that Vietnam has had to cope with international polarization. Throughout the three Indochina Wars, the country had to navigate the U.S.-Soviet and Sino-Soviet rivalries to realize its three goals of independence, unification, and border security. Its means at the time was different. Hanoi primarily relied on the use of force to defeat France and the United States and their respective Vietnamese collaborators between 1946 and 1975. During the Third Indochina War, Hanoi again used its military to overthrow Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge and fight a border war with China, and Vietnamese troops were present throughout all of Indochina. Diplomacy was relegated to the back seat, as Hanoi adopted the “talking while fighting” strategy. How much Hanoi could negotiate depended on how much territory it held or the military advantage it enjoyed on the ground.
Although the reliance on the use or threat of use of force was effective, it was costly. At the end of almost five decades of warfare in 1991, Vietnam was one of the poorest countries in the world. A command economy and a rigid bureaucratic structure were useful for mobilization during wartime, but they soon became a burden on growth in peacetime. Hanoi well understood the cost of the use of force. As such, it adopted the “Three Nos” non-aligned foreign policy (no military alliances, no siding with one country against another, no foreign military bases, no using Vietnamese territory to oppose other countries) in the early 1990s to complement its domestic reform and to reassure China of Hanoi’s peaceful intentions. Hanoi reinforced its commitment to renounce the use of force in 2019 with the addition of a fourth “no”: no using force or threatening to use force in international relations. It is no coincidence that Vietnam’s economy took off as the country demobilized its military and restricted the use of force abroad, most importantly in Laos and Cambodia.
Hanoi’s adoption of the “Three Nos” took place within a non-competitive international environment. The United States was enjoying its unipolar moment, Russia was dealing with internal turmoil, and China was still hiding its capability and biding its time. Laos and Cambodia were firmly under Hanoi’s tutelage. This environment has changed in the past three decades, as the United States is no longer enjoying relative strength vis-à-vis China and Russia, while China has signaled its ambition to assume a bigger role in regional affairs. Vietnam’s western flank is being threatened by China’s growing influence in Laos and Cambodia. However, Hanoi understands that it cannot return to the use of force to navigate international polarization as it did throughout the Cold War. At the same time, being dragged into a great-power conflict is anathema to Vietnam’s strategic autonomy. The country’s demographic decline, coupled with the painful lessons of war, has necessitated a cost-effective and non-kinetic way to thrive in an unkind environment.
Diplomacy is the most viable substitute for the use of force. This explains why Vietnam is set to elevate foreign service to a “core, frequent” mission level on par with the military and public security. Instead of sending the military abroad as it did in the three Indochina Wars, foreign affairs will now constitute the first line of defense beyond the country’s physical border. Hanoi visualizes diplomacy as a comprehensive ecosystem consisting of Party diplomacy, state diplomacy, and people-to-people diplomacy. Each of the three branches will target a different audience depending on their respective political systems, and on whether they are a state or non-state actor, but together they will communicate Vietnam’s Four Nos to the international community to avoid unnecessary arms races or complicate territorial disputes. A case in point is Vietnam’s military modernization program. Hanoi does not want its neighbors to misperceive the program as an aggressive move, and by emphasizing its peaceful intentions, Hanoi can carry on with the modernization necessary to protect its territorial integrity in case diplomacy fails. Shunning the use of force will also lessen the need for an ally, as it was during the Cold War, and thereby it could augment Vietnam’s strategic autonomy.
And as offense is often the best defense, Hanoi will also go on a charm offensive by emphasizing its “soft power” to win more support for its domestic political programs in international bodies. Hanoi will look to leverage Vietnam’s culture, language, and national narrative to win the global competition for cultural influence, and by extension, gain support for its own stance on international issues.
One of the most referenced principles of Vietnam’s diplomacy is the 15th-century work, “Great proclamation upon the pacification of the Wu” (Bình Ngô đại cáo in Vietnamese, 平吳大誥 in Chinese) by the UNESCO-recognized scholar Nguyen Trai. In the treatise, Trai guided Vietnamese kings on how to conduct diplomacy, “Using great righteousness to overcome brutality/Using benevolence to replace violence.” Vietnam’s leaders have many times referred to the dictum as the guideline for Vietnam’s modern diplomacy, especially the use of international laws to settle disputes and the use of force only as a last resort. Appealing to a sense of shared culture will also be vital to winning hearts and minds of overseas Vietnamese.
The CPV has also made clear that diplomacy should not be restricted to just the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). This again drives home the point that foreign affairs is a comprehensive ecosystem. The Ministry of National Defense (MND) and Ministry of Public Security (MPS) will also double down on their own foreign service missions in order to strengthen Vietnam’s “Four Nos” and support national modernization.
This shift in diplomatic thinking is reflected in Vietnam’s decision for the first time to welcome military delegations from Laos, China, Cambodia, and Russia to march in the parade marking its 80th anniversary of independence in September. The MND and MPS continue engaging with their Western counterparts, too. From a comprehensive perspective, the MFA, MND, and MPS missions are complementary, not competitive. The MFA’s ability to communicate Vietnam’s intentions clearly will prevent the MND and MPS from having to use force, while the MND’s and MPS’ ability to conduct diplomacy will strengthen the MFA’s message to its international partners.
Hanoi’s elevation of “soft power” to the same level as “hard power” in defending its interests in a more polarized world represents a shift in tactics but not in principles. Unlike hard power, soft power is cheaper to deploy and less prone to the logic of arms racing. A “core, frequent” mission simply means that Vietnam will emphasize inter-agency cooperation to send a consistent message of Vietnam’s intention to the world. The CPV’s 14th National Congress will be an occasion for Vietnam to remind its partners that it remains committed to its peaceful and non-aligned foreign policy, in order to avoid being engulfed by another great power war and to shape an international environment conducive to its domestic flourishing.
By Khang Vu – The diplomat – November 27, 2025