Basic HTML Version
About the only
difference resolved
in the dramatic
three- year París
Peace Talks has
been the shape of
the debating table.
by
Michael Allard
Asthe
París
PeaceTálks
Goon...and
on...andon...
I
N CASE
you haven't noticed, the
137th meeting of the París Peace
Talks recently ended. But after
more than three and one-half years of
peare talks
in París, there is still no
peace in Vietnam. The progress that
has been made toward peace has cer–
tainly not resulted from the talks. The
París talks are a poignant examplc of
man's inept attempts to arrive at a just
and Jasting peace.
The París Peace Talks began on May
13, 1968. At that time on ly the North
Vietnamese and the United States dele–
gations were present. Simply getting to
the bargaining table was a months-long
chore.
America Sends Out Peace Feelers
On September 29, 1967, in San
Antonio, Texas, President Johnson
declared, "I am ready to send a trusted
representative ... to
an)' spot
on this
earth to talk in public or prívate with a
spokesman of Hanoi."
Henry K issinger, President Nixon's
advisor on national-security affairs,
added that President Johnson was "ready
to negotiate,
tmconditionally,
at any
moment, anywhere."
In March, 1968 - almost six months
later - President Johnson suggested
Geneva as a possible meeting place.
Hanoi countered with the suggestion
of Phnom Penh, the capital of Cam–
bodia. The United States rejected
Phnom Penh as an acceptable site on
the basis that the United States did not
have diplomatic relations with Cam–
bodia.
The U. S. President then suggested
alternate locations such as New Delhi,
Rangoon, Jakarta or Vientiane. Hanoi
dutifully responded by suggesting a lo–
cation of its own - Warsaw, Poland.
The White House immediately rejccted
the offer, contending that Poland was
not neutral, but was a communist
nation. In April, seven months after
President Johnson's San Antonio an–
nouocement, the United States of–
fered ten
other
possible sites. Four of
the cities were in Europe; the other six
were in Asia. Finally, París, France, was
accepted. But only after five weeks of
further haggling.
The selection of París was, of course,
quite ironic. París ís the capital of the
nation that fought the same North Viet–
namese Communists in Indochina a dec–
adc and a half ago.
But being at París did not mean an