Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3
NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
TOP SECRET – Sensitive
made no effort to hide the touch-and-go nature of French defensive capabilities during the rainy season already under way.16 The bleak picture darkened further after General Valluy reported in early June to U.S., British, Australian, and New Zealand Chiefs of Staff assembled in Washington that the Delta was in danger of falling to the communists, that neither Frenchmen nor Vietnamese would fight on in the south in that eventuality, and that only prompt allied intervention could save the situation.17
- h. Viet Minh Successes Merely Confirm U.S. Hard Line
Valluy's presentation merely reinforced what the U.S. already was aware of, namely, that while the communists put forth unacceptable proposals at Geneva, they were driving for important gains in the Delta that would thoroughly demoralize French Union soldiers and set the stage for French withdrawal to the south. Deterioration on the battlefield and pessimism at the negotiating table, therefore, worked hand-in-hand toward confirming to Washington not that its goals for an Indochina settlement were unrealistic, but rather that the only way to attain them was through decisive military victory in conformity with the original "united action" proposal of March 29.
