The Geneva Conference

By 15 June it already seemed hardly possible for the conference participants to reach any agreement due to their differences of principle over how to settle the Korean question peacefully. The DPRK, China and the Soviet Union made a final effort and made proposals in favor of a peaceful resolution of the Korean question so as to break the stalemate. The United States, however, took the lead in opposing the above-mentioned proposals. Countries whose troops formed the ?UN Forces? came up with a ?16-nation declaration? which drove the conference on to the verge of a breakdown.

In such circumstances, Foreign Minister Zhou Enlai made a final effort. He pointed out that the U.S. delegate deliberately obstructed the Geneva Conference from reaching any agreement on the question of maintaining and consolidating peace in Korea. Even so, the participating countries at the conference still had the obligations to reach some kind of agreement on the peaceful settlement of the Korean question. He proposed that ?the participating countries at the conference agree that they shall continue their efforts so as to reach an agreement on the question of the peaceful settlement of the Korean question on the basis of the establishment of a unified, independent and democratic Korean state; the question of proper time and site for the resumption of talks will be decided through discussions by the countries concerned?.

Though this declaration was accepted by the overwhelming majority of participants at the conference, it was not adopted by the conference due to refusal by U.S. delegate to express agreement. In this way, the discussion of the Korean question at the Geneva Conference ended without reaching any agreement. However, just as Foreign minister Zhou Enlai pointed out that it helped everyone to see how the U.S. delegate had obstructed the Geneva Conference and blocked the adoption of a minimum but conciliatory proposal.

Having wound up its discussions on the Korean question, the Geneva Conference turned to the question of Indo-China on 8 May. The participants included China, the USSR, the UK, France, the U.S., the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the Republic of Vietnam(i.e. South Vietnam), the Kingdom of Laos and the Kingdom of Cambodia. The conference mainly focussed its discussion on such questions as the delimitation of regrouping zones for the two belligerent parties in Vietnam (with DRVN on one side and France and South Vietnam on the other), the way to distinguish the questions of Laos and Cambodia from those of Vietnam, supervision of and guarantee for the cease-fire and the political future of Indo-China. The United States attempted to prolong and even expand the Indo-China War. Though it was compelled to participate in the conference, it never gave up its design of direct intervention in the Indo-China War. Confronted with such a situation, the Chinese Delegation adopted during the conference?s deliberations on the Indo-Chinese question an approach of trying as best it could to win over most of the countries including France, focussing on opposition to U.S. sabotage and vigorously pushing for progress at the conference.