To the government and the people of Vietnam, thank you

for this very warm welcome and the hospitality that you

And thank all of you for being here today.

We have Vietnamese from across this great country,

including so many young people who represent the

dynamism, and the talent and the hope of Vietnam.

On this visit, my heart has been touched by the kindness

for which the Vietnamese people are known.

In the many people who have been lining the streets,

smiling and waving, I feel the friendship

Last night, I visited the Old Quarter here in Hanoi

and enjoyed some outstanding Vietnamese food.

But I have to say, the busy streets of this city, I&#39;ve

never seen so many motorbikes in my life.

So I haven&#39;t had to try to cross the street so far, but

maybe when I come back and visit you can tell me how.

I am not the first American President to come to Vietnam

But I am the first, like so many of you, who came of age

forces left Vietnam, I was just 13 years old.

So my first exposure to Vietnam and the Vietnamese

people came when I was growing up in Hawaii, with

its proud Vietnamese American community there.

At the same time, many people in this country are

Like my two daughters, many of you have lived your whole

lives knowing only one thing -- and that is peace and

normalized relations between Vietnam and the United States.

So I come here mindful of the past, mindful of our

difficult history, but focused on the future -- the

I also come here with a deep respect for Vietnam&#39;s

For millennia, farmers have tended these lands -- a

At this bend in the river, Hanoi has endured for more

The world came to treasure Vietnamese silks and

paintings, and a great Temple of Literature stands

as a testament to your pursuit of knowledge.

And yet, over the centuries, your fate was too often

Your beloved land was not always your own.

But like bamboo, the unbroken spirit of the

Vietnamese people was captured by Ly Thuong Kiet

-- &quot;the Southern emperor rules the Southern land.

Our destiny is writ in Heaven&#39;s Book.&quot;

Today, we also remember the longer history between

Vietnamese and Americans that is too often overlooked.

More than 200 years ago, when our Founding Father,

Thomas Jefferson, sought rice for his farm, he looked

to the rice of Vietnam, which he said had &quot;the

reputation of being whitest to the eye, best flavored to

Soon after, American trade ships arrived in your ports

During the Second World War, Americans came here to

support your struggle against occupation.

When American pilots were shot down, the Vietnamese

And on the day that Vietnam declared its independence,

crowds took to the streets of this city, and Ho Chi

Minh evoked the American Declaration of Independence.

He said, &quot;All people are created equal.

The Creator has endowed them with inviolable rights.

Among these rights are the right to life, the right to

liberty, and the right to the pursuit of happiness.&quot;

In another time, the profession of these shared

ideals and our common story of throwing off colonialism

might have brought us closer together sooner.

But instead, Cold War rivalries and fears of

Like other conflicts throughout human history, we

learned once more a bitter truth -- that war, no matter

what our intentions may be, brings suffering

At your war memorial not far from here, and with family

altars across this country, you remember some 3 million

Vietnamese, soldiers and civilians, on both sides,

At our memorial wall in Washington, we can touch the

names of 58,315 Americans who gave their lives

In both our countries, our veterans and families of the

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