TOKYO -- Vietnam celebrated the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War on April 30. Of the world's five remaining communist countries, Vietnam has been the second-fastest growing economy after China.

According to the International Monetary Fund, Vietnam's gross domestic product, in local currency terms, was 51 times larger in 2024 than in 1994, the highest growth rate among ASEAN members.

It is generally recognized that Vietnam's economic success is mainly due to the "Doi Moi" policies proposed at the Communist Party Congress in 1986. However, it was not until the second half of the 1990s that these efforts began to bear fruit.

At a ceremony in Ho Chi Minh City on April 30, the current top leader, Communist Party General Secretary To Lam, said, "Let us build upon the spirit of the great victory in the spring of 1975, and the values and triumphs over the past 40 years under Doi Moi."

This policy, which literally means "renovation" or "innovation," was modeled on the reform and opening-up policy promoted by China's Deng Xiaoping starting in 1978. Vo Van Kiet, who served as prime minister from 1991 to 1997, came to embody the spirit of the reform.

Alongside Doi Moi, Vietnam has witnessed several other key events over the past decades: the lifting of U.S. economic sanctions in 1994, which opened the door to increased trade and investment from Western countries; joining ASEAN in 1995; its accession to the World Trade Organization in 2007; and the opening of Samsung's giant mobile phone factory in 2009.

According to Samsung, it has invested $23.2 billion in Vietnam, making it the largest foreign investor in the country. In 2024, Samsung Vietnam logged revenue of $62.5 billion, including $54.4 billion in export income. This amounted to 13.4% of Vietnam's total exports.

Since the 2010s, supply chains have shifted from China due to rising wages for Chinese workers, and Vietnam has reaped the benefits as the leader of the "China Plus 1" trend.

A symbol of this is Apple. According to a list the tech company began publishing in 2012, its number of suppliers in Vietnam grew from 12 in 2015 to 35 in 2024, the largest in Southeast Asia. Thailand came in second with 24 suppliers.

A cluster of related industries has emerged, and electronic components now lead Vietnam's exports.

Vietnam's trade is linked to the U.S. and China. With a shift in supply chains, imports from China have increased significantly since 2010. Imports from China were almost four times higher in 2024 than in 2012. This growth rate has been much greater than that of Thailand or Malaysia.

Meanwhile, exports to the U.S. have risen sharply, and were six times higher in 2024 compared with 2012. This is due to an improvement in U.S.-Vietnam relations under the administration of President Barack Obama (2009-2017) and the policy of Vietnam’s former General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong to emphasize ties with the U.S. The trade war that began in 2017 during Trump’s first term has also made Vietnam a diversion point for exports from China, and has also been a factor in the increase in exports to the U.S.

As a result, Vietnam's trade surplus with the U.S. is the fourth largest in the world after China, the EU and Mexico, making it a target for Trump. So-called reciprocal tariffs on Vietnam are 46%, the third highest in Southeast Asia after Cambodia and Laos.

Trinh Nguyen, senior emerging Asia economist at Natixis in Hong Kong, noted that Vietnam risks becoming the biggest loser under the Trump administration, saying, "the ASEAN and China supply chains are integrated and difficult to fully detangle."

The IMF in April revised its 2025 growth forecast for Vietnam to 5.2%, down from 6.1% in October. This is better than Thailand, for which the agency cut its forecast by 1.2 percentage points, but still far from Vietnam's target of 8% for 2025.

However, Vietnam is undoubtedly getting richer in the medium to long term. According to the IMF, GDP per capita, which is an indication of living standards, was $4,535 in 2024. GDP per capita exceeded $3,000 in 2018, which is considered a milestone indicator for increased purchases of cars, houses and other big-ticket items. In 2020, Vietnam’s GDP per capita surpassed that of the Philippines.

The Vietnamese government has set a goal of achieving a GDP per capita of more than $7,500 by 2030 and becoming a high-income country by 2045.

Having overcome its painful history of war, Vietnam is learning the lessons of the past and looking ahead.

At the commemoration on April 30, To Lam called for "closing the past, respecting differences, and looking forward to the future."