Vietnam and the U.S. established diplomatic relations on July 12^th, 1995, exchanged their first Ambassadors in July 1997, opened the U.S. Consulate General in Hochiminh City and Vietnam Consulate General in San Francisco in November 1997.

Political relations: The two countries exchanged a number of high-level visits. On Vietnamese side, these include the visits by Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Manh Cam (1998, 2000), Standing Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung (2001), Deputy Prime Minister Vu Khoan (2003) and many Ministers. On the U.S. side, these include the visits by Secretaries of State W. Christopher (1995), M. Albright (1997), C. Powell (2001), National Security Advisor A. Lake (1996), former President G. Bush (1995) and particularly President Bill Clinton (November 2000). In addition, leaders of the two countries also had meetings at multilateral forum.

Economic and trade relations: The two countries reached a number of economic agreements such as Agreement on the Establishment of Copyright Relations (June 27^th, 1997), Agreement regarding the Overseas Private Investment Corporation in Vietnam (March 26^th 1998), Framework Guarantee Agreement and Project Incentive Agreement between State Bank of Vietnam and the Export-Import Bank of the U.S. (December 9^th, 1999), Bilateral Trade Agreement (signed on July 13^th, 2000, entered into force from December 10^th 2001), Agreement on Scientific and Technological Cooperation (effective on March 26^th 2001), Textiles Agreement (effective on May 1^st 2003), Bilateral Civil Aviation Agreement (effective on January 14^th 2004), Letter of Agreement on Counter-narcotics Cooperation (effective on February 26^th 2004). Both sides are now negotiating the Framework Agreement on Economic and Technical Cooperation, Agreement on Maritime Transport, MOU on Agricultural Cooperation.

Since the entry into force of the Bilateral Trade Agreement, commercial ties between the two countries have sharply grown: the 2-way trade value reached nearly 6 billion USD in 2003, a double increase compared to 2002 (2.878 billion USD) and a four-time increase compared to 2001 (1.5 billion USD). The U.S. investment in Vietnam, to October 2004, reached over USD 1.25 billion USD (not including the US investments through other countries) with 206 projects, ranking 11^th among the largest investors in Vietnam. At present, there are over 800 American enterprises in Vietnam. However, along with the grow of economic ties, there emgeres a number of disputes relating to issues such as Catfish, Shrimps, textiles...due to American protectionism.

Vietnam and the U.S. have signed a number of ministry-level MOUs, namely Joint Communiqué on Healthcare Cooperation between two Ministries of Health (December 1997), Agreement on Sport and Physical Training Cooperation (March 1999), MOU on Meteorological and Hydrologic Cooperation (January 2001), MOU on Human Resource Training in Aquiculture (March 11^th, 2003), MOU on Labour Cooperation (November 17^th 2000)... In 2003, Vietnam and the U.S. signed the Statement of Principles of Cooperation for the Implementation of Vietnam Education Fund (VEF) program, which has granted a number of scholarships for Vietnamese students to study in the U.S. On June 23^rd, 2004, U.S. President George W. Bush announced to include Vietnam in the list of 15 partner- countries of the Emergency Plan for AIDS-HIV Relief.

With the humanitarian tradition and policy, Vietnam has closely cooperated with the U.S. in dealing with the MIA issue. The two countries are carrying out the 79^th Joint Field Activities. Vietnam has handed-over 827 sets of remains to the US. The U.S. side has also gradually cooperated with Vietnam to solve consequences of the war, for instance, providing information relating to the searching of Vietnamese missing in action. Both sides co-organised several Conferences on the research of the effect of Agent Orange. Since 2000, through NGOs (Peace Trees, VNAH, HealthEd...), USAID has funded several programs such as landmine clearing, green covering, victims’ assistance... On February 25^th, 2004, the Ministry of Defense’s Technology Centre for Bomb and Mine Disposal (BOMICO) and Vietnam Veteran Association Foundation (VVAF) signed on Project of "Vietnam UXO/Landmine Impact Assessment and Technical Survey".

The two countries have appointed their military attaché in their respective countries (the U.S. since 1995 and Vietnam since 1997), exchanged a number of delegations, including the visits at the level of Deputy Minister and Minister of Defense. In reciprocating the visit to Vietnam by U.S. Secretary of Defense Cohen in March 2000, Vietnamese Minister of Defense Pham Van Tra visited the U.S. in November 2003. The U.S. Commander in Pacific region has also visited Vietnam. The U.S. Navy ships paid friendly visits to Vietnam in November 2003 and July 2004.

Vietnam has been cooperating with the U.S. in several specific areas. At the same time, Vietnam has also urged the U.S. Government to prevent and severely punish individuals and organisations that conduct terrorist acts against Vietnam.