Can the Negotiations Bring Peace to Vietnam?

...THE REALITIES of the Vietnam War, long dis regarded by Washington, are at last begin ning to assert themselves...

...they will know how to save themselves in good time...

...It is safe to assume that even under the worst of circumstances a Communist victory will claim fewer victims than a single month of continued war...

...This readiness has now removed the obstacle which, even if talks had started, would have doomed them in advance...

...The Communists can safely COMMENTS AND OPINIONS rely on their own strength to gain power, as well as on the political deficiencies of their opponents...

...At no time since U.S...

...soldiers to Vietnam, that created the basis for the beginning of talks...

...The coalition government issue therefore will not be an obstacle to meaningful negotiations...

...From statements by delegates of the Front and Hanoi made earlier this year at a conference at Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, it is clear that they accept a gradual withdrawal of U.S...

...See the article by the Vietnamese journalist Tran Van Ky in the March 1968 issue of War/Peace Report...

...There really never was any good reason why the U.S...

...Unless we believe that the President's steps to bring about negotiations, and his announced retirement, are merely the first moves of a colo3sal political fraud, then we must speak of a new situation...

...The prospect of achieving this aim brought the Hanoi delegation to Paris, and unless Hanoi's expectation is fulfilled, no serious negotiations can take place...

...The aim of the United States, pursued long before there was any kind of "aggression" against South Vietnam, was to determine the character of the South Vietnamese government and to prevent, in disregard of the letter and spirit of the Geneva agreements, the unification of the country...

...has achieved its purpose, since it has forced the Communists to abandon their attempt to impose themselves on the people of South Vietnam by force...

...It was up to Johnson, as it had always been, whet:.er peace talks would come about...

...In all these respects, the position of the Front is stronger than that of its opponents, since it can make concessions without compromising its ultimate aims...

...The NLF cannot and will not insist that a coalition government conduct the negotiations for South Vietnam, let alone on its being the "sole representative" of the South Vietnamese people in such negotiations...

...What came to one's mind when Johnson's new proposal for negotiations was accepted by Hanoi was the question of responsibility for the failure of all previous attempts to reach this point...

...The attraction of Vietnamese anti-Communism, identified with foreign intervention against national unity, will continue to decline...

...Its demand is to be represented in Paris together with spokesmen of a non-Communist Saigon government that no longer stands for a military solution and for a total denial of NLF representation in any f uture government...

...and are thought to be in danger once the Americans withdraw...

...If the President's speech of March 31 marked a turn from the policy of military victory to one of political compromise, then the present Saigon regime must be regarded as doomed...

...It was Johnson's change of pol icy, foreshadowed in his refusal to send another 200,000 U.S...

...Time was once on the side of the latter, but time was wasted and finally became an ally of their enemies, who will know how to use it as soon as the contest of arms ends and peaceful competition for support of the people begins...

...It can come about only after the armed forces of the present regime cease to be controlled by a government determined to deny legal existence to the NLF, and instead will be controlled by a government with NLF representation...

...It could be said that there is only one question for which the proper answer has to be found in negotiations: What kind of South Vietnam should emerge from the conflict...

...The truth is that on this and other issues the NLF and Hanoi are both more able and willing to compromise than Washington...

...Unless Johnson fully realizes this, the talks are bound to fail...

...Once serious negotiations begin, there will be a chance of producing a settlement only if Washington realizes that the U.S., although militarily undefeated, has suffered an irreparable political defeat which peace, whenever it comes, will have to sanction...

...The means at their disposal, and the conditions of the country, make it possible for them to dispense with a technique necessary only where conditions doom Communists to remain a minority, and possible only under the shield of a friendly occupation army...

...They will probably not break up soon...

...The NLF cannot and will not accept elections organized by a government in which it is not represented, a government determined to prevent the Front from gaining what it has fought for—a share in power...

...military intervention began has the enemy been in a stronger position than today...

...This means that sooner or later, but cer tainly in the course of any serious negotiations, the Thieu-Ky government, even in its new "broadened" form, will have to be dropped...

...military intervention attempted to prevent...

...that the loss of this war by France, and the Geneva agreements, reconfirmed the victory of Communism...

...responsibility for all previous failures to bring about talks will soon come to light...

...Far less difficult should be an agreement on the issue of reunification...

...The progress of negotiations, however, does not require that the Thieu-Ky government be immediately replaced by one composed of representatives of the present regime and some members of the NLF—the so-called coalition that strikes such terror into the hearts of the men in Washington who claim that the presence of even a few NLF members (who are said to lack popular support) in such a government would quickly lead to a Communist takeover...

...Can the Negotiations Bring Peace to Vietn am...

...But it cannot be denied that more than 20 years of war and civil war have created hatreds and desires for revenge that are likely to claim numerous victims, even if the victors, as is to be hoped, will see their political advantages in curbing further bloodshed...

...His longing for peace has no doubt always been genuine, as was his desire to bring it about through negotiations...

...Ho Chi Minh must have become convinced that Johnson is finally ready to compromise...

...Reduced to its simplest terms, the NLF's only war aim has been participation in political power—precisely what U.S...

...that the war waged by France to reestablish her colonial regime in Indochina must be regarded as the first attempt to undo the fact of Communist supremacy in Vietnam...

...IF THESE are the prospects, how can we expect Johnson, even if we believe that he would like to end the war before leaving office, to ratify a peace that will lead to "another victory of Communism...

...This government was the political instrument of the U.S...

...The condition of peace, therefore, is acceptance by Washington of this demand...

...can no longer hope to attain this unrealistic goal...

...as long as Washington pursued a policy of military victory and of the exclusion of the NLF from power...

...It may be years before a government of national union will be replaced by one under Communist con trol: years during which the desire to gain the support of former opponents will militate against the wish to settle old political accounts, and probably also years before the international police force needed to supervise the cease-fire will be withdrawn...

...has ceased its military operations: their troops would never have been needed if the war had not been "Americanized" in 1965...

...For this reason it is correct to assume, as quite a few people in Washington do, that the President, in announcing his new readiness to seek peace through negotiations, had some "foreknowledge" that this time Hanoi would agree...

...The latitude for concessions enjoyed by the Communists in regard to this issue will make it easy for them to compromise...

...forces, as well as supervision of the cease-fire by an international police force supplied "by a number of powers...

...The number of dedicated people in their ranks far surpasses those willing to work selflessly for the groups behind the present Saigon regime...

...That the other side —the NLF and Hanoi—could not achieve a military victory has long been clear...

...Even excessive caution, well advised in judging this man, would allow the conclusion that Johnson is now at least considering the abandonment of the course he has pursued in Vietnam since the summer of 1964...

...Since the Vietcong cannot be defeated, and since Hanoi cannot be forced to desert the Vietcong, the U.S...

...Such a rereading would show that Vietnam was already lost to Communism at the end of World War II, four years before China became Communist, and without the presence of a single soldier of the Red Army...

...The withdrawal of the North Vietnamese soldiers fighting in the South can proceed without damage to the position of the Front once the U.S...

...It is possible that these negotiations will succeed...

...The sur prising strength displayed by the enemy in the Tet offensive, and the military, political, and psychological advantages gained through it, have not altered this fact...

...The fusion of nationalism and Communism in Vietnam, which could perhaps have been dissolved by a genuine social revolution in the South, continues to operate to the detriment of the anti-Communist forces...

...Not only insurrection but also "aggression from abroad" was defeated: Hanoi has to withdraw its troops and let the people of South Vietnam decide for themselves whether and when they want to be united with the North...

...But this does not mean that these talks will necessarily produce results...

...Elections, of course, can be held only after negotiations have produced a cease-fire and agreement on the four issues that have to be settled if peace is to come to Vietnam: the withdrawal of all foreign troops, the demobilization of the Vietcong military forces, the right of the NLF parties to participate freely in the political life of South Vietnam, and the terms under which South and North will eventually be reunified...

...There are also many in the government, the army, and the strange business community of South Vietnam who liked the war because it made them rich, and who already now have begun to gravitate toward their fat bank accounts abroad...

...I am convinced that the evidence of U.S...

...Neither the NLF nor Hanoi insists any longer on an immediate and complete withdrawal of the U.S...

...If he obtains the compromise that I believe Hanoi and the NLF can afford, I hold the President capable of "proving" that the U.S...

...But the Tet offen sive has once more demonstrated that the war cannot be won by the "allies" either...

...It is the political trump card of the NLF that it COMMENTS AND OPINIONS can quite easily agree to cease the armed struggle in favor of free elections, but it will agree to elections only if they are conducted under a government of national union...

...A final and deep concern of all Americans who are ready to accept a compromise settlement, even if it leads to an eventual victory of Hanoi, is the fate of those who have sided with the U.S...

...They can easily risk the verdict of elections, even if they should know that they cannot hope to win them...

...But not because the Communists and their allies will try to take power in a coup...

...If international supervision and a balance of power in the government between proCommunist, anti-Communist, and neutralist forces lead to truly free elections, the NLF can be sure of a strong representation in a new parliament and claim its rightful share in a government established through democratic process...

...I do not doubt that they will agree, as will Hanoi, to postpone a decision on this issue for at least five years, provided the United States pledges not to interfere with the results of a referendum, if, as seems likely, this should lead to a reunified Vietnam dominated by Hanoi and its allies in the South...

...No one doubts their superior organizational ability, nor that the prospect of achieving the dream of national unity will continue to be identified with their movement...

...It is then that the specter of a united Vietnam under Communist leadership will arise...

...The settlement, Johnson will say, that we achieved through our intervention will oblige the Communists henceforth to pursue their aims by peaceful means, in democratic competition with all other political groups and parties of the South...

...The force of nationalism, generally recognized as prevailing over all others in contemporary power struggles, is on the side of the NLF and Hanoi...

...In a more sophisticated vein, a new Administration in Washington could base its acceptance of a compromise that sanctions America's political defeat on a realistic rereading of recent Vietnamese history...

...It depends now on America, much more than on Hanoi and the NLF, whether the war will be brought to an end in the Paris negotiations...

...This, so it seems, President Johnson has at last begun to realize...

...should want to control the political evolution of South Vietnam...

...The leaders of the Front, for obvious propagandistic reasons, stress their independence from Hanoi—which in this context means that unification must come about through a decision of the people of South Vietnam without outside (Hanoi) interference, and that in the meantime a separate state of South Vietnam is acceptable to them...

...This, they now say, cannot be done overnight...

...During these years, it will be more important for the Communists to win the political support of the Catholics (for instance) than to antagonize them by threatening COMMENTS AND OPINIONS the lives of their leaders...

...One hopes no need will arise to discuss the consequence that would result from their failure...

...Because these are the true prospects for the political evolution of South Vietnam, the Communists and their allies can go far in offering democratic safeguards that lessen the fear of an early take-over by a pro-Hanoi regime...

...Washington will have to agree to an unconditional cessation of all bombing of North Vietnam...

...but unless Washington moves toward political compromise, it will certainly be the major obstacle to any meaningful agreement...

...Why, then, is he now ready to talk, after his alleged rejection of so many previous offers...

...forces as a condition for a settlement...

...Indeed, the very conditions of a compromise settlement make it most unlikely that the assumption of power by the NLF, if and when it occurs, would lead to a bloodbath...

...Without better assurances than those contained in all previous "peace" offers, Hanoi would undoubt edly not have gone to Paris...

...The talks could open only after a long, secret struggle over procedures and even perhaps over substantial matters, matters that had to be settled if the feeble prospect of success was to survive the expected initial barrage of propaganda and recriminations...

...But until very recently his idea of peace was a political settlement based on a military victory...

...and that it would have been wise for America to recognize this historical fact instead of making another attempt to undo it...

...It would be absurd to conclude that the Hanoi government has finally been brought to its knees...

...A MORE DIFFICULT problem will be the demobilization of the Vietcong military units...

...In the meantime, we can safely base our belief that it was Johnson who kept Hanoi from coming to the conference table on the fact that Hanoi came as soon as Johnson no longer made it impossible for them to do so—as soon as he indicated that he no longer expected them to negotiate the conditions of their surrender...

...Corruption and political disarray will increase under the present Saigon regime, up to the moment when less discredited yet hardly more capable spokesmen of anti-Communism will be called upon to represent Saigon at the conference table, in a predictable mood of defeatism—a mood that has been taking hold of broad circles of South Vietnamese anti-Communists ever since President Johnson's historic speech of March 31...

...ALTHOUGH THE SUCCESS Of the talks will Iequire a willingness to compromise by both sides, the prospects for peace will in the end depend almost entirely on the attitude of the United States...

...In short, American intervention has led to the triumph of the principle of self-determination, which has always been America's only aim...

...There should be no question that some people have a right to expect American assistance in seeking asylum...