Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume IX, Vietnam, October 1972–January 1973

272. Memorandum of Conversation¹

Paris, January 12, 1973, 8:10–9:35 p.m.

PARTICIPANTS

• Tran Van Lam, RVN Foreign Minister
  Bui Diem, former RVN Ambassador to the US
  Tran Van Do, former RVN Foreign Minister
  Vuong Van Bac, RVN Ambassador to the UK
  Nguyen Xuan Phong, Deputy Chief of RVN Delegation to Paris Conference on Vietnam
• Dr. Henry A. Kissinger, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs
  Ambassador William H. Sullivan, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs
  Minister Hayward Isham, Acting Chief of US Delegation to Paris Conference on Vietnam
  Peter W. Rodman, NSC Staff

Kissinger: I see my friend Mr. Nha has been promoted?²

Diem: Yesterday.

Kissinger: So now he has no excuse at all if they compose nasty stories about me.

Do: He is very active.

Kissinger: I know! [Laughter] Time had a horrendous exchange between me and your President. I asked where it came from. They said Nha. It’s fiction.

I promised Diem and Do I would bring you up to date.

Where we stand is not much different from where we were yesterday. Ambassador Sullivan explained yesterday on the Demilitarized Zone. Our minds are not so subtle as Vietnamese—we thought we had a clear statement of respect for the DMZ, plus a ban on military movement across it from the word “civilian”. And it doesn’t mean any civilian movement yet because it has to be negotiated.

On the method of signing, we have held until we heard your views. Your suggestion is helpful, and is a solution to the problem. We are grateful. On the other one, we will wait for your judgment on “in concert with” as against “with the concurrence of.”

Lam: We would prefer one document.

Kissinger: I know, but that is not possible. The only way we can get a four-party agreement without mention of the PRG was to agree to the meaningless two-party one. But you are not bound by it. The four-party one contains no reference to the two-party, so it has no significance for you.

When are you leaving? We are eager for you to get home. Seriously, you have talked to so many Americans, you can give a feel that no message can. I am sure you will report accuately.

Do: Yes, we spoke to Aiken, Javits, Humphrey.

Kissinger: What do you see? You see the pressures we are under.

Do: I said to Humphrey that I would not like to be in Kissinger’s shoes.

Kissinger: That is our dilemma. I told you this would happen in January. You remember, Mr. Ambassador. What did Aiken say?

Do: A little less. But that we absolutely must finish.

Kissinger: That is our dilemma. We wanted the agreement, to create an obligation for continued support. If Congress cuts us off, there is no obligation for continued support.

You must have realized in Washington that it is the White House that is keeping the lid on the pressures.

Do: We said to Javits and Humphrey “It is easy to have the agreement on the date you want. But I must tell you it is the responsibility of you as Senators to obtain the best possible terms…”

Kissinger: I agree absolutely.

Do: “… to provide the means for us to defend our independence and our liberty. With North Vietnamese troops within our frontiers. We have a responsibility to defend our independence, and also to defend the free world. If we have this obligation, so do you as the USA have an obligation to aid us.” I asked Humphrey and Javits, as I did last year with Mansfield—they said they had an obligation to aid us economically.

Kissinger: He must have thought he was talking with Northerners! Mansfield has a tortured mind.

Do: With the International Commission, guerrillas and subversion are hard to control. Can we count on you to help us?

Kissinger: We can give aid. On this issue we can mobilize Congress—if the agreement comes about in a way that doesn’t cause strain between Saigon and the US. The clauses are less important now than whether the American people feel you and we together accomplished something and they can defend it. If in the final phase Saigon acts as if we betrayed you and sold you out, the American people will be sick of it. We can control the doves if we end it in a decent way.

Since November I have been in an impossible situation. I knew what Congress would do, but had to pretend to the North Vietnamese that we were not under any time pressure. You knew what the situation was. But all this time you were making impossible demands.

Do: Will it be concluded?

Kissinger: We are at this point in the negotiations: They have substantially agreed to the two points I said to you in Washington—the DMZ and the signing. They agreed to drop the PRG entirely.³ You know the other changes: “administrative structure,” “three” Indochinese countries. We have made good progress on the protocols. I have a few questions on the protocols and sent them to Saigon.

We have sent this evening to Ambassador Bunker a current English text. We don’t have a Vietnamese text, current, but we assume it is the same.

On the International Commission, we have made good progress. You know they want a four-party and a two-party commission. They have agreed that the two-party commission should be negotiated between you and the NLF. We agreed only that it should be set up, and that in the meantime the two South Vietnamese members of the four-party commission can exercise those functions. But it is for you to negotiate.

We have one question on the ceasefire. In the protocol we had a long paragraph that all units should be identified by designation. They had a paragraph emphasizing areas of control. They now propose that local Commanders and the parties themselves determine who controls what. We would like to add a clause that this depends on the military disposition. The basic question is this: We are inclined to think the vaguer it is the better. The less one creates a precedent for claims. That way there is a minimum of political connotations. Is this a fair statement of the issue?

Sullivan: They are trying to establish what they used to call “zones of control,” along political criteria.

Lam: You spoke about that.

Kissinger: On prisoners, they have made many demands for international inspection of civilian detainee camps. We rejected it, because inspection can cover only what is in the agreement. But we thought we might put into the protocol a reference to common Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and a sentence referring to the obligations of all parties to this Article 3 and to the safeguards provided in there—which is the ICRC—if the two parties agree to it.

Sullivan: So each party has a veto.

Kissinger: There are other protocols that don’t concern you, such as the procedure for the removal of mines. But I can tell you.

Diem: You think these changes constitute a substantive improvement over October?

Kissinger: Here are the changes since October which I consider significant:

• —Dropping “three” Indochinese countries;
• —Dropping the PRG in the text;
• —Dropping the phrase “administrative structure”;
• —Respect for the DMZ, referring to Article 6, and the respect for the DMZ on both sides of the provisional military demarcation line.

Other improvements are:

• —“destroyed, used up”—and since then we have given you an additional $1 billion in military equipment.
• —On Laos and Cambodia, very substantive improvements. It said “respect their fundamental national rights.” Now it says “respect the Geneva Agreements and the fundamental national rights. Secondly, it has the phrase you wanted: “against the territory of one another.”
• —The ceasefire in Laos, which was to come in thirty days, now comes in fifteen days maximum.

So I think you have brought about considerable improvements. In addition, the protocols for International Supervision strengthen the DMZ further because they provide for stationing teams along the DMZ. Four teams.

Sullivan: It is not fully worked out but I think we can get four.

Kissinger: And the international provisions really are quite good. They agreed to over 1,000, about 1,200.

Diem: May I ask one question? Because you know very well. In our meeting you raised again and again the question of the North Vietnamese troops.

Kissinger: I raised it for three hours. Again it is impossible.

Sullivan: We almost got it in 3(a).

Kissinger: 3(a)—They wanted the RVN out, but it worked towards “foreign countries” so they changed their minds.

Diem: You know the position our President is in. But are there any words or ingenious formulas to cover this problem? Any imagination?

Kissinger: My view is always—with respect for the DMZ, Laos and Cambodia, and a ban on infiltration, there is no legal way they can legally keep them in there. I don’t believe they will keep the agreement—you don’t either. But adding new provisions they won’t keep won’t help.

The political provisions talk about the independence of South Vietnam; they even refer to the sovereignty of South Vietnam. If you think about it positively. Not yet though—restrain Nha!

I think your President has to go along with this. He has achieved $1 billion in aid, good protocols, and three months to prepare his country. There are very great advantages that he has gained.

If it now fails again—I think it is a sign of North Vietnamese weakness that they are not waiting, given our domestic pressure.

If you are confident and aggressive, you can use it to your advantage. I would link the political provisions to demobilization—it is in the same chapter.

You think it over. Our choice is this agreement or to be cut off by Congress.

Diem: Very soon now our President has to make a decision. Is it a matter of days?

Kissinger: It depends on what happens here in the next few days.

Sullivan: We have learned a new expression “tuy ong” [“up to you”].

Lam: If Saigon accepts this signing formula, what is left? If two issues mentioned in our President’s letter of December 20 are satisfactorily resolved. President Thieu estimates that you can do more.

Kissinger: Impossible. We can’t play games with you. We have to decide. After all, if we wanted just to play a game, we could have settled in November. We have come three times here in difficult circumstances—bombed Hanoi—and made an effort to get the maximum concessions. My sincere conviction is that we can’t get more within the time frame.

To answer your question [Diem]—it is very possible that within the next week your President will have to make up his mind. That is why I want you to go home and explain the situation in America.

Do: Ambassador Bunker will give a text to President Thieu tomorrow?

Kissinger: Certainly.

Do: I have the impression that you can’t do more, and have tried to do the impossible. But it is for President Thieu to make the decision himself.

Kissinger: I think it is important—we will not publicly present you with a fait accompli. We will go through the process of consultations.

Diem: Yes.

Kissinger: There will be no announcement here. But after a reasonable time, we have no choice. We want to announce that together with our allies we have reached an agreement.

Diem: President Thieu said they want “sourire se lève parmis les larmes.”⁴

Kissinger: Yes, that is right. And our President will say he recognizes only the GVN as the Government of South Vietnam.

Sullivan: And a ceasefire in-place always means only de facto, and concedes no legal right for them to keep their troops there. From the provisions Henry cited, you can stipulate that there is no right. You have endorsed a ceasefire in-place for three years.

Diem: So you conceded this point of legality is safe.

Sullivan, Kissinger: Unless you defeat yourself.

Kissinger: My view is this: They claim they have no troops there. It is a lie—but it is no claim of right. Therefore there is no legal right. It is unfair that they stay—but nothing in this agreement gives them this right, and there are many clauses that say the opposite.

Lam: Is there nothing in there about the retreat of the North Vietnamese troops?

Kissinger: But there is nothing in there about the right to remain.

Their legal position is not that they have the legal right to be there. I can give you the protocols with their stuff about only southerners and the sons of southerners. It is all nonsense. But as a practical point, if they try to reinforce, they can’t do it without violating the DMZ, Laos and Cambodia, and the ban on infiltration. There is no legal way they can use their troops against South Vietnam. Or maintain them in South Vietnam.

Diem: They are on record as saying there are no troops.

Kissinger: Yes. Why don’t we give you a note—not to them, they will try to rebut—but quoting Le Duc Tho. That they claim no right, that we recognize no such right, and that we interpret the Agreement as inconsistent with any such claim.⁵

I thought if we gave them a note, they would reject it. But we can give it to you. It is between us.

Lam: Is there anything about partial withdrawal?

Kissinger: Frankly, I might have tried if you hadn’t always said you wanted the principle. I spent all my time on the principle.

Diem: As for my President, he said to me the other day if you could find some “modalité pour leur effacement progressif” …⁶

Sullivan: There is a demobilization provision, in Chapter IV. So all sorts of opportunities are open in that connection.

Kissinger: Again we will come now soon to the moment of truth. We have to weigh at every step now the advantages of—well, no changes are possible—any argument against what you lose in America if it becomes, instead of a contest between Washington and Hanoi, a contest between Washington and Saigon. I believe you have achieved a great deal in three months.

It is a tragedy in terms of the pressure on us. I am not saying you are wrong from your point of view.

Diem: Yes, I told you I hoped you understand your own basic requirements.

Kissinger: We do understand, but your own overwhelming requirement now is your popular support in America. That is what you must have, and now you can have it only if you now join ranks with us.

For three months, you made us no concessions because you thought we would just take it and ask another. It turned out to be a pretty good tactic. But now—I told you in Washington—what do the doves want? If they can show you cannot survive, they prove the President was right all along. It is essential to our credibility and to our whole foreign policy that your government and your people survive in freedom. It is not true we will withdraw totally. We will keep the Air Force in Thailand. People say we will never use it. But people said we would never resume bombing, mine North Vietnam, or use B–52’s. We always do what people say we would never do.

Diem: On the signing formula, we gave it to you and you said you were grateful. They will accept it.

Kissinger: They will accept it, I think—but they still want the other document. It is for Madame Binh. It is a historic piece. The obligations are in the documents the four parties will sign. Then the US and DRV sign a document with the other preamble.

Diem: Do we need it?

Kissinger: Only in order to get the four-party document the way we want it.

Phong: How much did they insist on the first?

Kissinger: Absolute. Because at first they wanted only the first document, signed by all four parties, with the PRG in it. Only after endless discussion we got the four parties signing what we got.

Diem: Do you consider this settled?

Kissinger: Yes, and we also consider you are bound only by the one you sign.

Lam: It is possible to consider the single document reflects the Kleber situation—our side, your side.

Kissinger: I will make an attempt tomorrow.

Diem: Is there any way to convince them that the second document, with the signature name of the PRG—which is all right—is sufficient?

Kissinger: It is a very difficult process to get the two signatory pages.

Sullivan: Do you think Ambassador Phuong in Washington could explain to any press or Congressmen in Washington why this is “raison valable”⁷ to refuse to sign the agreement?

Diem: But we are Vietnamese fighting for our survival.

Kissinger: How is your survival affected by a document the US and DRV sign that you don’t sign?

Sullivan: This is an esoteric basis. If you were talking about a coalition government being imposed on you, or the opening of the DMZ to troops, I could understand.

Phuong: It seems a small thing but why should we concede it?

Lam: There are the protocols. I am informed from Saigon that our experts and MACV are in the course of discussing.

Sullivan: Finally.

Lam: Saigon wants the Vietnamese texts.

Sullivan: We will see if we have them.

1. Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, Kissinger Office Files, Box 104, Country Files, Far East, Vietnam, South Vietnam, GVN Memcons, November 20, 1972–April 3, 1973 [1 of 3]. Top Secret; Sensitive; Exclusively Eyes Only. The meeting was held in the library of the Ambassador’s residence. Brackets are in the original.
2. It is not clear to what promotion Kissinger was referring. Hoang Duc Nha, a relation of Thieu, was also his press secretary and, more importantly, close confidant. Sometime in early 1973 Thieu appointed him Minister of Civilian Proselytizing. On occasion, he was also known as Commissioner or Minister of Information.
3. I.e., from being mentioned in the agreement. However, the Provisional Revolutionary Government would sign the agreement, although not on the same page as the South Vietnamese. (Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 1464–1465)
4. The French phrase means “a smile breaks through (literally “rises up among”) the tears.”
5. Bui Diem later gave his reaction to Kissinger’s answer and to the entire discussion about the problem of North Vietnamese troops remaining in the South: “Kissinger’s reply might have had some meaning in the civilized world of courts and lawyers, but when applied to a war between implacable enemies, it seemed to all of us little more than metaphysical nonsense…. It was, in my view, a disgraceful answer. One could only imagine what the American reaction would be to a third party’s insistence on negotiating a peace treaty for the United States which left an enemy army spread out from California to New York, and then, through a series of deductions, concluding that the enemy had as good as admitted that it had no legal right to be there.” (Bui Diem, In the Jaws of History, p. 315)
6. The French phrase can be translated as “means of reducing their presence in stages.”
7. A “valid reason.”