Vietnam announces three railway lines connected to China, the next "world factory" that Westerners are optimistic about, why is it still unable to build a single railway?

Recently, China and Vietnam held the first joint committee meeting on railway cooperation in Beijing, marking a key step forward in traffic connectivity between the two countries.

Vietnam announced that it will focus on promoting three new standard gauge railways connecting China: Hanoi - Lao Cai - Hanoi - Hai Phong, Pingxiang - Dong Dang - Hanoi, and Dongxing - Mong Cai - Ha Long - Hai Phong.

The railway connecting to Yunnan Province, Lao Cai - Hanoi - Hai Phong, is planned to start construction by the end of 2025, with an estimated completion and operation before 2030;

Another railway leading to the Dongxing border, Mong Cai - Ha Long - Hai Phong (about 187 kilometers long, with an estimated investment of about 7 billion USD), is planned to start construction only after 2030.

The key railway to Guangxi, Hanoi - Dong Dang standard gauge railway (about 156 kilometers long, with an estimated investment of about 6 billion USD), has a more delayed schedule and no time plan.

As for the North-South High Speed Railway, which is 1541 kilometers long, connecting Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, it is even more remote. The project is costly and far beyond the financial capacity of the South.

From both technical and financial perspectives, this high-speed rail line would be nothing but an illusion without China's intervention.

This means that Vietnam's current pace of railway construction is — building one cross-border railway every five years. This is even under the premise of Chinese technical support.

In contrast, China has already achieved a dense layout of its "eight vertical and eight horizontal" high-speed railway network, forming the most developed high-speed railway system in the world. Meanwhile, Vietnam is still struggling to discuss when it can start the first truly modern railway.

More ironically, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh personally oversees the project, demanding "everything must be implemented, have priorities, and have plans," even setting a "deadline" of December 19, 2025, to ensure the commencement of a 460-kilometer railway. Such high-level promotion is only to guarantee the start of a single railway, revealing the weakness of Vietnam's domestic infrastructure execution capability.

In 2024, Vietnam's per capita GDP reached about $4,700. This number seems comparable to China's level in 2011 (about $4,550), but the gap in infrastructure development between the two countries is a world apart.

Looking back, at the end of 2010, China's high-speed railway operating mileage exceeded 7,400 kilometers, ranking first in the world. That year, China started over 4,800 kilometers of new high-speed railway projects.

By the end of 2015, China's high-speed railway total mileage exceeded 19,000 kilometers, nearly doubling in five years, completing the main framework of "four vertical and four horizontal".

What about Vietnam today? The total length of the country's railway is about 3,000 kilometers, and most of them are still the narrow-gauge railways left from the French colonial era (track gauge of 1000 mm), with low capacity, slow speed, and frequent accidents.

Even the newly built standard gauge projects have design speeds of 160 km/h for passenger trains and 120 km/h for freight trains.

In other words, when China was already extensively building high-speed railways with speeds above 300 km/h twenty years ago, Vietnam is now discussing how to build a general standard railway equivalent to China's level in the 1990s.

This generational gap is not just a technological issue, but also reflects the country's governance capabilities and industrialization level.

The planning of two routes leading to Guangxi has been delayed until after 2030, while Vietnam is actively pushing forward the railway connection with Yunnan.

According to the plan, the Lao Cai - Hanoi - Hai Phong railway will be connected to the Yu-Meng railway and the Kun-Yi River railway within China, eventually forming an international corridor from Kunming through Hekou to Hai Phong port.

Currently, the Chinese side's Yuhe (Yuxi-Hekou) railway has been fully opened for operation since 2022 and is capable of running freight trains.

However, the Lao Cai - Hanoi section on the Vietnamese side is still in the preliminary preparation stage, with land expropriation, financing, and feasibility reports not yet fully completed. Although China and Vietnam have signed a technical assistance agreement, Vietnam lacks independent construction capabilities and heavily relies on external support.

More embarrassing is that although this channel is defined as the "new route from Yunnan to the sea," due to the slow progress of the Vietnamese side, a large amount of cargo still needs to be transported via sea or road, failing to achieve real efficient direct transportation. The so-called "Kunming-Hai Phong" economic corridor remains on the map.

Over recent years, Vietnam's economic growth has been rapid, and it is seen as the "next world factory." However, its economic development is facing a fatal bottleneck — seriously lagging infrastructure.

Not only railways, but power supply is also frequently in crisis. Since 2023, large-scale power outages have occurred in many areas of Vietnam, severely affecting industrial production.

In terms of power plant construction, Vietnam has also made slow progress, with complex approvals, restricted foreign investment, and insufficient local manufacturing capabilities, requiring a large amount of electricity imports from Guangxi, China.

A "manufacturing superpower" without a strong power grid and modern transportation network is destined to be an illusion. Imagine: if goods cannot be transported, factories shut down due to power shortages, and parts depend on Chinese supplies but cannot be quickly cleared through customs, what competitiveness can the so-called "industry transfer recipient country" have?

Vietnam wants to leverage China to develop its own infrastructure, which is a wise move. However, from the current progress, its execution ability, funding mobilization capability, technical reserves, and industrial system are all difficult to support large-scale modernization.

A country can only build 400 kilometers of railway in five years, and it must rely entirely on Chinese assistance, which exposes its deep-seated development shortcomings.

History does not give much time to the lagging ones. While China's high-speed rail has moved towards intelligence, greenness, and internationalization, Vietnam is still mobilizing the whole country to discuss when the first standard gauge railway will start construction.

This contrast is regrettable, and it reminds us: true rise is not just about the growth of GDP numbers, but also about whether one can establish hard strength that supports long-term development — including steel tracks, high-voltage grids, and strong national engineering capabilities.

Otherwise, no matter how beautiful the blueprint is, it is just a piece of paper.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7555772097897742887/

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