Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3
NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
TOP SECRET – Sensitive
| Diem a while longer on the grounds that he will broaden the government and call for elections. Faure agreed — against his own wishes and against strong popular pressure and on several conditions (most of which required action from Diem and which Dulles could not guarantee). Dulles then suggested France and the US apprise each other of policy and actions but pursue them more independently than in the past. The days of joint policy — of togetherness in Vietnam — were over. | ||
| July 1955 | Diem refuses to meet with the DRV about elections | France and Britain urged Diem to hold consultations with Hanoi for all-Vietnam elections, as stipulated in the Geneva Accords. The US suggested consultations but also suggested Diem request firm guarantees (for secret ballot, UN or international supervision) which the DRV was expected to reject. But Diem refused to meet with the North Vietnamese. He had not signed the Geneva accords and denied being bound by them in any way. |
| 24 Oct 55 | National Referendum | With 98 percent of the vote, Diem became President of the Republic of Vietnam—and Bao Dai was dethroned. |
| Aug–Dec 1955 | Franco–Vietnam Conferences | Diem wanted renegotiation of economic and financial accords reached in 1954; transfer of Vietnamese affairs from the ministry of the associated states to the Foreign Office; abolition of Ely's former post of High Commissioner; termination of the military High Command and Vietnamese authority over remaining French troops in Vietnam. (The FEC now numbered about 35,000 — vice the 150,000-man force which France spoke of retaining in Viet- |
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