The Department of State Announces the Release of Foreign Relations, 1964-1968, volume VII, Vietnam, September 1968-January 1969

The major foreign policy decisions and problems relating to Vietnam faced by President Lyndon Johnson and his key foreign policy advisers during the last 4 ½ months of his administration are the main issues covered in Foreign Relations, 1964–1968, volume VII, Vietnam, September 1968–January 1969, released by the Department of State on July 16, 2003. The volume is part of the Department’s ongoing program to make available the official documentary record of American foreign policy in the Foreign Relations series. Volume VII completes the coverage of the Johnson administration’s policies on the war; previous documentation on the 1964–August 1968 period was published in volumes I–VI in the 1964–1968 subseries.

The documents highlight the Johnson administration's slow and agonizing internal deliberations over how to arrange formal four-party peace negotiations on Vietnam at Paris. A good part of this search for peace was carried out during the 1968 Presidential election amid suspicions by the Democratic and Republican candidates, and President Lyndon Johnson himself, that the respective Presidential candidates were using the peace process to influence the election. In addition, both the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) and the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) had their own demands regarding the procedures and modalities of the formal peace process, all of which had to be reconciled. This volume is the account of how the Johnson administration achieved the opening of formal, four-party peace talks at Paris.

President Johnson and his principal foreign policy advisers, Secretary of State Rusk, Secretary of Defense Clifford, Assistant to the President Rostow, and other official and unofficial advisers became almost exclusively concerned with the goal of starting the formal peace negotiations at Paris. The administration was split between hard liners, including the President himself, and so-called doves. The hard liners refused to stop U.S. bombing of North Vietnam without a promise from Hanoi that it would withdraw from the Demilitarized Zone, cease its attacks on South Vietnamese cities, and accept South Vietnamese representatives at the peace table. The doves, Secretary of Defense Clifford and Chief Paris negotiator Averell Harriman, favored stopping the bombing in the hope of moving the peace process forward.

A main theme of the volume is how the doves eventually convinced the President that North Vietnam, under heavy pressure from the Soviet Union, would agree to his demands.

A second major theme of the volume is the interaction between the peace negotiations and the Presidential election. Vietnam was a major campaign issue debated strenuously by Republican candidate Richard Nixon, Democratic candidate Vice President Hubert Humphrey, and independent candidate Governor George Wallace. The prospect of imminent peace talks had the potential to influence the elections. This theme is developed principally through the extensive use of transcripts of Johnson’s phone calls, as the President sought to convince the three candidates to support his conditions for a bombing halt and for opening the formal peace talks.

The volume’s third major theme is how the Johnson administration had to persuade, cajole, and coerce the Republic of Vietnam and President Thieu to accept the deal that the United States and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, with the help of the Soviet Union, essentially worked out at the end of October 1968. Much to Johnson’s dismay, South Vietnam refused to agree to terms before the Presidential election. Not until January 16, 1969, did all four parties agree to the modalities of the talks—shape of the table, use of flags or nameplates, speaking order, etc. On January 18, 1969, just 2 days before the Johnson administration left office, the peace talks officially began.

The Office of the Historian has prepared a summary of the volume. For further information, contact Edward C. Keefer, General Editor of the Foreign Relations series, at (202) 663-1131; fax: (202) 663-1289; e-mail: history@state.gov. The texts of the volume, the summary, and this press release will soon be available on the Office’s Web site: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus. Copies of volume VII can be purchased from the Government Printing Office at http://bookstore.gpo.gov/.