Book contents
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Contributors to Volume II
- General Introduction
- Introduction
- Part I Battlefields
- Part II Homefronts
- Part III Global Vietnam
- 24 International Radicalism and Antiwar Protest
- 25 The Vietnam War and the Sino-Soviet Split
- 26 Western Europe and the Vietnam War
- 27 International Peace Initiatives
- 28 Japan and the Vietnam War
- 29 The Economics of the Vietnam War
- 30 Vietnam and the Global 1968
- Index
27 - International Peace Initiatives
from Part III - Global Vietnam
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2025
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Contributors to Volume II
- General Introduction
- Introduction
- Part I Battlefields
- Part II Homefronts
- Part III Global Vietnam
- 24 International Radicalism and Antiwar Protest
- 25 The Vietnam War and the Sino-Soviet Split
- 26 Western Europe and the Vietnam War
- 27 International Peace Initiatives
- 28 Japan and the Vietnam War
- 29 The Economics of the Vietnam War
- 30 Vietnam and the Global 1968
- Index
Summary
The escalation of US military involvement in Vietnam in 1965 sparked a surge in international diplomacy to broker peace, or at least open direct peace talks, between Washington and Hanoi. This chapter recounts some of the myriad (failed) attempts to make progress by third parties – from countries to groups of countries (e.g., the Non-Aligned Movement and the British Commonwealth) to multilateral institutions (e.g., the United Nations) to nonstate actors (organizations, individuals) – in the three or so years before direct US–DRV discussions finally began in Paris in May 1968. Perhaps the most intriguing of these initiatives involved the communist world (i.e., the Soviet bloc, since Mao Zedongs China strongly opposed peace talks), which had embassies in and fraternal interparty contacts with Hanoi that most noncommunist countries lacked. As the communist representative on the three-member International Control Commission, Poland had especially intimate involvement with several peace bids. The chapter examines this history and whether (or not) genuine diplomatic opportunities may have existed to end the Vietnam War, or at least start serious peace talks, earlier, potentially saving many lives. It also probes the concurrent interrelationship between this diplomacy and broader international factors such as the Cold War and Sino-Soviet split.
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- The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War , pp. 579 - 603Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2024