The provisional administration would negotiate with the Provisional Revolutionary Government to form a more broadly-based regime which would organize and undertake general elections. With the formation of such a broadly-based regime, a cease-fire would occur among the warring parties in South Vietnam.

Unlike past PRG proposals, Binh's July 1 plan fails to declare the nature of the broadly-based regime that would organize elections or that of the regime that would follow elections.

Prior to the formation of the broadly-based regime to organize elections, the parties will settle the question, of political prisoners and political rights. All persons held under duress will be free to return to their homes and to pursue their livelihoods.

There will be a stabilization of living conditions, in order "to create conditions allowing everyone to contribute his talents and efforts to heal the war wounds, to rebuild the country."

"The Vietnamese parties will settle the question of Vietnamese armed forces in South Vietnam in a spirit of national concord, equality, and mutual respect, without foreign interference, in accordance with the postwar situation and with a view to lightening the people's contribution."

As the "peoples' contributions" are quite heavy, Hanoi has every interest to see that the postwar situation and the withdrawal of "certain Vietnamese forces in South Vietnam" proceed smoothly enough not to tempt President Nixon to reinvolve the United States in Vietnam, directly or through Cambodia.

The July 1 plan never mentions the Laos and Cambodia problems which will become soluble after solution of the Vietnam problem.

A spirit of mutual respect among the Vietnamese parties will accelerate the process of Vietnam's reunification. Reunification will occur on the basis of negotiations among the Vietnamese, "without constraint and annexation from either party, and without foreign interference."

Neither zone will take advantage of the period before reunification to accumulate military strength, alliances and foreign troops with which to overwhelm the other. However, the July 1 plan does not rule out acceptance of foreign military and economic aid by either zone; that is, prior to final agreement on reunification none of the armies presently in combat--including President Thieu's army--would be cut off from its source of supply.

South Vietnam will accept foreign assistance to develop its mineral resources, if such assistance comes without political strings; it will participate in plans for Southeast Asian regional economic cooperation.

The United States will have to "bear full responsibility" for damages caused to both zones of Vietnam. Although the U.S. must accept that burden, Hanoi and the Provisional Revolutionary Government have not ruled out an international aid effort, as proposed by Sweden, to provide and required economic assistance.

As the former director of the Cornell Southeast Asian studies program, George McT. Kahin, has recently reported, Hanoi will agree to international supervision and guarantees for all phases of a negotiated settlement. An international supervisory role in Vietnam could begin as soon as the U.S. announces a withdrawal date.

It is possible that in the future, President Nixon will choose to ignore the negotiating position of Hanoi and the Provisional Revolutionary Government. He will take his "pleas for peace" to Peking and Moscow, and in the meantime he will soothe the American public with gentle reassurances that their boys will not be dying in Vietnam much longer. Saigon can fight its own war."

All will be calm and placid in the White House, but gallons of blood will continue to flow. The moans of the bereaved and of the maimed will not be silenced.