Vietnam prepares for Trump-Kim summit

/

On Feb. 14, 2019, I wrote a small thing about how Trump (and the American government in general) would like Kim to see Vietnam as a potential model of opening up. Now of course there are a ton of articles talking about the same thing (WSJ here, Washington Post here). God, I am prescient.

In all of the coverage, I saw this headline from TPM, which I generally like: Trump Is Basically The Only One Excited About The U.S.-North Korea Summit. But that’s totally not true. Vietnam is extremely excited! Let me count the ways:

  • Bars have gone all in. These are the drinks they are serving: Kim Jong Ale, Rock It, Man, Peace Negroniations. That’s all according to this Reuters article.

  • And a barber is offering free Trump and Kim haircuts. Video here (warning: this hair is really bad). Hat tip to Mai Nguyen. I first saw her tweet.

  • Lots of t-shirts are being sold too. At least 300 were sold with Kim’s face on them and “Roket Man” underneath. Not sure why Rocket is misspelled. I wouldn’t have put it past Trump to have misspelled it first, but he didn’t.

  • One painter is making 60 paintings of the two of them. I kind of like them.

  • Lookalikes are getting more business after the Singapore round. I would say that the Kim impersonator looks more “authentic" (?) than the Trump one.

But in all seriousness, it looks like Vietnam is trying to take advantage of this as much as possible. Singapore is a good example of what can happen. According to an Aljazeera report quoting communications special, Jason Tan:

"With the summit, we received a week of global coverage, positive brand halo, and genuine interest in Singapore as a country," Tan told Al Jazeera.

Also,

Greater than positive media exposure was the boost to Singapore's strategic importance on the world stage, said Vu Minh Khuong, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.

"The host enhances its strategic position as the place of choice for highly important events and showcases to the world it is a meaningful player in making the world a better place," he told Al Jazeera.

I think this really is a masterplay by Vietnam. It gets the halo benefits of having an important summit and it keeps Vietnam in the conversation. Plus, there is going to be tons of stories about Vietnam, its economy, its place as a tourist destination, and the openness of the people. And it will surely cost less than it did Singapore.