International Negotiations Quotes
President Johnson was trying to organize peace talks in Paris. Nixon didn’t want a public announcement to occur before election day when he was running against Hubert Humphrey. Knowing the South Vietnamese President was reluctant to go to Paris but was under pressure from America to do so, he sent a message through Chennault that he should not accept and “hang on” as Nixon would shortly win. The South Vietnam president refused to go to Paris, Nixon won the election, and then had to cope with the continuation of the war that might well have ended before he took office. Nixon believed that he could get Russia and China to pressure Ho Chi Min to make peace. Nixon's private overtures to the South Vietnam president, violated the Logan Act which prohiited private citizens negoatioating with foreign governments. President Johnson was aware of Nixon's commission of this felony want wanted to prosecute him, but the evicence had been obtained from secret intelligene agency bugging and wiretapping both the South Vietnam Embassay in Wishington and the Presidential Palace in Vietnam the public knowledge of which would have caused a scandal. Instead, he called Nixon and warned him to stop, but the damage had already been done, and the South Vitenamese government would not go to Pariis where they would have to agree to a coalition government with the Communists. THey waited for Nixon to deliver a peace treaty which would leave them in charge of South Vietnam. In the final analysis, the South Vietnamese ended up with nothing and no participation in anything when the U. S. Withdrew and the Communists took over.
The “bozos” beat him and won the Presidency. And then conducted a very successful foreign policy for 8 years.
The ambassador had received a public hearing under the assumption that the meeting would be perfunctory. Instead he used the occasion to protest the Queen's quarrels with the Spanish as it was affecting Polish merchants. Such a public complaint to a sovereign was a breach of diplomatic etiquette at the time.
One major problem at the time was that the Soviet Union was supporting and instigating revolutions in many parts of the world. When most nations of the UN wanted to provide peace keeping troops to quell the conflict, the Russians would veto and block the effort, Vandenberg wanted the UN to change the rules regarding the veto. The right of veto for the major nations was originally included in the UN Charter at the insistence of the United States, and many Americans did not want to give it up or have any exceptions lest there be more in the future. The Russians at that time also did not want to give up any of their veto powers. Another method that Vandenberg wanted to solve the Russian peacekeeping blockage problem was for America to engage in more collective security pacts so that action could be taken without UN Security Council unanimity by going around the UN.
There have been times in democracies where a foreign ministry (State Department) is isolated from the elected politicians and implements a foreign policy that is at odds with the wishes of the elected officials and the majority of the nation. A good American example of this was in 1948 where America had to decide whether to support the creation of the State of Israel in the United Nations and through diplomatic recognition. The professional diplomats in the State Department had developed very close relations with Arab States, and many State Department employees were anti-Semitic. In addition, they thought the most important thing for America was not to risk the Arab oil supply. Meanwhile, the people, Congress, and President Truman were on the other side and Truman had to finally order The Secretary of State to stop his professional diplomats from pursuing their own foreign policy preferences. Even then some did not.
It was only since Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency that the public received very much information about what the nation’s foreign policy was or was even desired except in time of war.
Secretary of State Jefferson wrote to the French foreign minister, Edmond Genet:
