Dear Ambassador Lodge,

After reading the other side's remarks at the recent sessions in Paris, I have come to believe that there may be an alternative for the U.S. in our approach to the negotiations.

The North Vietnamese representatives and their southern counterparts insist that we not give any preconditions (i.e., the mutual withdrawal of troops from the South) which, in their view, would compromise Vietnamese sovereignty. But the other side(s?) has never stated opposition to the discussion of problems involved in holding elections and ensuring their validity or to the determining of how all the parties in the South can be kept from taking advantage of an American withdrawal to impose their rule on the people of South Vietnam.

My point is that sections four and five of the program Mr. Tran Buu Kiem presented to you on May 8, which are basically contained in my last paragraph are in themselves preconditions. But they are preconditions placed by the other side, which cannot, for that very reason, disavow or refuse to discuss them. Therefore, I urge you to consider what effects American emphasis on points four and five would have on the talks.

AUGUST 4, 1969

Dear Ambassador Lodge,

In his speech of July 31, Ambassador Thuy said that the N.L.F. and the Provisional Revolutionary Government "only insist on the formation of a provisional coalition government including all political forces representing various strata in the population. This provisional coalition government shall organize and control the free general elections so as to form an official coalition government."

In point five of the May 8 N.L.F. peace plan, Mr. Kiem stated: "The political forces representing the various social strata and political tendencies in Vietnam, that stand for peace, independence and neutrality, including those persons who, for political reasons, have to live abroad, will enter into talks to set up a provisional coalition government based on the principle of equality, democracy and mutual respect with a view to achieving a peaceful, independent, democratic and neutral South Vietnam."

There appear to be two main differences between point five and Ambassador Thuy's July 31 statement: (1) the July 31 statement doesn't specify that only those who stand for what the N.L.F. calls (in the May 8 speech) peace, independence and neutrality may participate in the provisional coalition, and (2) the July 31 statement specifies that the result of the elections would be a coalition government and does not stipulate, as the May 8 statement does, exactly what this government would or would not stand for