From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Thu Dec 12 2002 - 20:40:37 MST
Jeff writes
> Here:
>
> http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/genevacc.htm
>
> You will find the text of the
>
> AGREEMENT ON THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES IN VIET-NAM,
> JULY 20, 1954
>
> Here:
>
> http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1954-geneva-indochina.html
>
> You will find the text of
>
> The Final Declaration of The Geneva Conference:
> On Restoring Peace in Indochina, July 21, 1954
>
> And here:
>
> http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/vietnam.htm
>
> You will find
>
> Documents Relating to American Foreign Policy: Vietnam
>
> More detailed, authentic documentation than you ever
> wanted on the subject of 'the business' in Vietnam
You write this in the spirit of "if only everyone would
just read those documents, then we'd all see nearly eye
to eye, and my truth would be clear to all".
>From our earlier conversations, you don't appear to be
able to see that if deep ideological divisions could
be settled by having a few competent lawyers and judges
hash over all the relevant documents for a few days,
disputes would not linger on decade after decade,
generation after generation. But I give up trying to
persuade you of that.
You go on,
> (The Geneva Agreements theoretically ended the war
> between French Union forces and the Vietminh in Laos,
> Cambodia, and Vietnam. These states were to become
> fully independent countries, with the last-named
> partitioned near the 17th parallel into two states
> pending reunification through "free elections" to be
> held by July 20, 1956.
I doubt if you will be able to read that paragraph
without your own filters on, and of course you cannot
read it with anti-Communist filters on. Those of us
who are anti-Communists understand what kind of elections
happen in countries without long traditions of democratic
government. It's all about brutal power grabs, whether
by the left or the right.
> The United States and Vietnam are not signatories to these agreements.)
>
> Note the last: "The United States and Vietnam are not signatories
> to these agreements."
That's right, but it's irrelevant. In countries without
democratic traditions, a free press and other institutions,
the only choice is what kind of dictatorship it's to be.
> Neither the US nor the French-created Vietnamese Govt.
> signed onto the agreement. Thus by one arguable
> interpretation, neither was bound by the agreement.
> I leave it to the judgement of reasonable people to
> determine whether this was a 'valid loophole'
Listen, a Communist takeover is no laughing matter,
Jeff, whether it's in East Germany, North Korea,
South Korea, Vietnam, China, Russia, Cambodia,
Cuba, or any of ten other nations I could name.
People go to the wall. Lots of them.
Now then, it can be truthfully stated that takeovers
by *any* dictator, e.g. a right-wing one, are pretty
serious affairs too. Indeed, all opposition leaders
are rounded up and imprisoned or shot. But there is
a huge difference between the totalitarianism of the
left and the autocracy of the right, but it would
take a long time to explain to you why the concept
"totalitarian" exists.
> or a back door for international mass murderers.
What are you thinking about here? The U.S. or the
party it supported in Vietnam killing as many people
as the Communists did? That didn't happen, as you
should know.
Until you can internalize what Communist regimes were really
like---thank goodness only two prominent ones remain)---you
will continue to be reality-challenged on these issues, Jeff.
Lee
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