U.S. President Donald Trump is meeting Sunday with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang to discuss trade and economic ties.
Trump arrived to a welcoming ceremony at the presidential palace in Hanoi, and was greeted by children waving U.S. and Vietnamese flags and a military band.
On Saturday, he had heaped praise on Vietnam, saying the southeast Asian nation is "one of the great miracles of the world."
Trump's remarks were made at a state banquet in Hanoi, one of the many events on his five-country Asian tour. Trump, who arrived in Hanoi on Saturday, told dignitaries he toured parts of the country, which he said "is really something to behold."
After the nearly 20-year Vietnam War that killed millions of people, the country’s economy has been among the world’s fastest growing since 1990. Its gross domestic product has grown nearly 6.5 percent annually in the 2000s, according to the World Bank.
Before his arrival in Hanoi, Trump was in the central Vietnamese city of Danang, where he attended the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.
Trade agreements
En route to Hanoi aboard Air Force One, Trump reiterated to reporters traveling with him that he had discussed with APEC leaders agreements that have resulted in trade imbalances he said were disadvantageous to the U.S.
“It’s disgraceful. And I don’t blame any of those countries. I blame the people we had representing us who didn’t know what they were doing, because they should have never let that happen,” he said.
At the close of the APEC meeting, the 21 member nations issued a statement expressing support for free trade and closer regional ties, without any mention of Trump’s “America First” doctrine.
WATCH: Leaders of US and China Offer Asia Business Leaders Divergent Paths
Contrasting trade views
On Friday, Trump and his Chinese counterpart, President Xi Jinping, offered starkly contrasting views of the direction for trade in Asia in separate speeches to regional business leaders.
Trump told the APEC CEO Summit that he was willing to make bilateral trade agreements with any country in the Indo-Pacific region, but he firmly rejected multinational deals such as the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, which was abandoned in the first days of his administration.
“I will make bilateral trade agreements with any Indo-Pacific nation that wants to be our partner and that will abide by the principles of fair and reciprocal trade,” Trump said. “What we will no longer do is enter into large agreements that tie our hands, surrender our sovereignty and make meaningful enforcement practically impossible.”
The U.S. president said that in the past when his country “lowered market barriers, other countries didn’t open their markets to us.”
From now on, however, Trump warned the United States will “expect that our partners will faithfully follow the rules. We expect that markets will be open to an equal degree on both sides and that private investment, not government planners, will direct investment.”
But making that happen is easier said than done.
China has shown that it has no intention of playing by the rules, said Fraser Howie, co-author of Red Capitalism: The Fragile Financial Foundation of China’s Extraordinary Rise.
“China has been in WTO [World Trade Organization] terms simply much sharper and smarter than the Americans,” Howie said. “While the Americans went in with good faith thinking the Chinese would change and whatever, the Chinese never had any intention of changing.”
Howie added that trade and access issues are difficult and sophisticated, and so far Trump has a poor track record when it comes to following through, be it his travel ban, the wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, health care or tax policy.
“Yes, you’re going to get tough on them, but how do get tough without penalizing them?” he said, adding, “How can China be penalized when Xi Jinping is your best mate? It doesn’t make any sense.”
Xi, whose country’s rise has been driven greatly by large-scale government planning, immediately followed Trump on the stage in Danang.
Xi embraced the multilateral concept, in particular calling for support for a Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), which would harmonize regional and bilateral economic pacts.
China was left out of the TPP, which was led by the United States and Japan and was meant in great part as a bulwark against China’s strategic ambitions.
Xi also termed globalization an irreversible trend, but said the world must work to make it more balanced and inclusive.
The speeches came just hours after Trump left China, where he and Xi met several times on Wednesday and Thursday.
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