Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3
NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
TOP SECRET – Sensitive
the point that U.S. military assistance would be profitable, and after seeing the futility of organizing united action, Dulles withdrew the option (Tab 2).
As the negotiations at the conference progressed, Washington shifted its weight away from intervention through united action and instead concentrated on unifying the West into a regional military pact and creating a united diplomatic front at the conference to obtain the best possible settlement for the West. The implied threat of U.S. intervention, however, was allowed to remain. Throughout July of 1954, then, united action took on a futuristic bent — as a Free World Regional Defense Organization (ultimately to become SEATO) to secure Laos, Cambodia, and a "retained Vietnam" — after the conference completed, its work. Diplomatically, the U.S. took the initiative in forming a seven-point negotiating position with the British, a position which was, in large part, ultimately accepted by France. Except for a provision admitting the inescapability of a partitioned Vietnam, the seven-point program was a maximum western position. Yet, even as we urged our desires on France, we made clear that we would not be able to sign, guarantee, or associate ourselves with any accord. The U.S. role was to be passive and formal and firmly against co-signing any document with the communists. In effect, the U.S. delegation attempted to forward its ideas on a proper settlement to the "active negotiators" representing western interests. The U.S. would do nothing to impair its future flexibility with respect to Indochina. As matters turned out at the conference, the final terms of the settlement came close to meeting seven Anglo–American conditions (Tab 3).
DISCUSSION
| III. A. Tab | 1 – U.S. Pre-conference Maneuvers – January–April 1954 |
| 2 – U.S. and French on United Action, May–Mid June 1954 | |
| 3 – U.S. Negotiating Position During the Conference |
