White House’s response to the Geneva Accords (1954)

On July 21st 1954, the White House released this statement in response to the Geneva Accords:

“The Government of the United States, being resolved to devote its efforts to the strengthening of peace in accordance with the principles and purposes of the United Nations, takes note of the agreements concluded at Geneva on July 20th and 21st 1954…

In connection with the statement in the declaration concerning free elections in Viet-Nam, my government wishes to make clear its position, which it has expressed in a declaration made in Washington on June 29th 1954, as follows:

In the case of nations now divided against their will, we shall continue to seek to achieve unity through free elections supervised by the United Nations to insure that they are conducted fairly. With respect to the statement made by the representative of the State of Viet-Nam, the United States reiterates its traditional position: that peoples are entitled to determine their own future and that it will not join in an arrangement which would hinder this. Nothing in its declaration just made is intended to or does indicate any departure from this traditional position.

We share the hope that the agreements will permit Cambodia, Laos and Viet-Nam to play their part, in full independence and sovereignty, in the peaceful community of nations, and will enable the peoples of that area to determine their own future.”