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60 PLACE 3 VIETNA nam, that the future political structure in South Vietnam should | determined by the South Vietnamese people themselves through dem cratic processes and that the question of the reunification of the tv Vietnams should be decided by the free decision of their two peoples. A close scrutiny of the points above reveals that starting fro mutually incompatible and apparently rigid negotiating position in the winter of 1964-65--each demanding from the other th equivalent of unconditional surrender—certain aspects of the n gotiating positions of both sides became more fiexible and the peace terms scemed to be converging significantly. 1. Geneva Agreements, Both sides claim that they want : negotiate on the basis of the 1954 Geneva Agreements, althoug North Vietnam emphasizes that this means United States wit) drawal and conducting the elections which the United Stati blocked in 1956; whcreas the United States has tended to en phasize that it means (1) North Vietnamese withdrawal, (2 acceptance of the political partition of Vietnam, authorized on. a@s a temporary military division in 1954, and (3) the acceptanc by the National Liberation Front of political conditions before came into existence. 2. Hanoi's Four Points and United States Withdrawal. Tt United States bas moved from adamant rejection of Hanoi’s Fot Points when they were put forth in April to an avowed willingne: so discuss them as part of the agenda for negotiations. A cruci, point is the question of withdrawal of American military force This is put as the first of the Four Points, and in every publ utterance from Hanoi it is the implied basis upon which any negr tiations must be started. There have been repeated hints, howeve from North Vietnamese and National Liberation Front officia in Algiers,* Prague,®° Paris,° and Moscow"? that the withdraw: of United States forces from South Vietnam may not be a prc condition for starting negotiations as long as withdrawal is unde stood to be a necessary result of a peace settlement. This was als “United States Mission to the United Nations, Press Release No. 478 January 5. 1966. ™ Sunford Gottlieb, Sane World, September 1965, * New York Times, Octabcr 28, 1965. ® Sanford Gottlieb, Sane World, September 1965, * Lord Fenner Brockway, New York Fimes, August 22, 1965.