MISSED OPPORTUNITIES TO END VIETNAM WAR Thi

This research paper discusses whether opportunities existed to end the Vietnam War, the reasons for the failure of various peace initiatives and the implications for the avoidance of future conflicts.

From late 1946 and until the Fall of Saigon in the spring of 1975, Vietnam was almost continuously embroiled in a war of fearsome destructive power and fateful consequences for its principal participants. Except for the Geneva Agreement of 1954 which produced a fitful armed truce which lasted several years, all other peace initiatives failed before the Paris Peace Accords were signed in early 1973. At various junctures decisions were taken by the principal decision makers involved which affected the character, intensity and scope of the war. They failed to bring peace to Vietnam because at least one side and often both sides to the struggle saw more advantage from the vantage point of their interests and perspectives on the struggle in continuing the war than in ending it. With the benefit of hindsight, a persuasive argument can be made that the war did not serve the interests of the vast majority of the persons actually engaged in or directly affected by it, Vietnamese, French and American, who became its principal victims. The perspectives and considerations of national interest which prevented peace initiatives from having much of a chance were sometimes flawed by misjudgments and misperceptions of reality, especially in 1946,

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oncommunist government in Southern Vietnam was a vital strategic imperative for the United States." Although the DRV was unpleasantly surprised by Diem's initial success in the South, the June 1997 discussions indicated that Diem's refusal to participate in the elections came as no surprise to the North Vietnamese who welcomed the propaganda advantage it conferred. Until about 1957, it appeared that Diem might succeed at his herculean nation-building endeavor, then his regime took on a decidedly mandarin, authoritarian cast, which alienated many elements of South Vietnamese society. Meanwhile, communist party functionary in the South, Le Duan, published a pamphlet in 1956 in which he threatened that "with the cruel repression and exploitation of U.S.-Diem, the people's revolutionary movement will definitely rise up." In 1958, McNamara et al. said Le Duan reported to Hanoi that many Party organizations had nearly been destroyed by Diem's security forces. Mutual Escalation and New Opportunities for Peace 1959-1963. During 1959-1963, both the communist and non-communist sides took steps to raise the level of violence in South Vietnam which made later attempts to reach an accommodation more difficult. In doing so, they both
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Approximate Word count = 6162
Approximate Pages = 25 (250 words per page)