Over the past few decades, various external and internal challenges have increasingly required Vietnam to build up its capacity in the era of globalization by improving the English language competences of both learners and language teachers. Vietnam has responded to these challenges through a number of reforms, most recently the ambitious National Foreign Language Project (NFLP-2020). Overall, the project aims to replace the traditional approach to English language learning and teaching with a more communicative approach and to introduce international standards in English language teacher education (ELTE). Much as these attempts are necessary and effective in certain ways, this chapter argues that they might be too ambitious and counterproductive as they fail to take into account the sociocultural, economic and political contexts of Vietnam. The chapter therefore calls for a critical perspective on these current reforms of ELTE in Vietnam.