US carrier George Washington arrives in Vietnam on five-day visit

HANOI: The US ‌Navy’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington arrived in Vietnam’s Danang on Thursday for a five-day visit, the latest sign of growing ties between Washington and Hanoi.
The port call comes nearly three years after the United States and Vietnam upgraded relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in September 2023.
The visit is ‌the fourth by ‌a US aircraft carrier ‌since ⁠the end of the ⁠Vietnam War and the first since USS Ronald Reagan called at Danang in June 2023.
“The visit by the US Navy carrier strike group contributes to maintaining and developing Vietnam-US relations,” Vietnam’s defense ⁠ministry said in a statement.
The ‌ministry said ‌the visit also reflected Vietnam’s policy of supporting ‌logistics and technical services for foreign ‌naval vessels making port calls in the country.
The visit reinforces the US Navy’s “commitment to a shared vision for a free and ‌open Indo-Pacific,” the US Consulate General in Ho Chi Minh City ⁠said ⁠in a separate statement. Vietnamese Defense Minister Phan Van Giang and US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore in June to discuss expanding defense cooperation, including defense trade, information sharing and efforts to address war legacies.
The USS George Washington was accompanied by the guided-missile cruiser USS Robert Smalls (CG-62) and the destroyer USS Shoup (DDG-86).