The Geneva Conference was intended to settle outstanding issues resulting from the Korean War and the First Indochina War and involved several nations. It took place in Geneva, Switzerland, from 26 April to 21 July 1954. The part of the conference on the Korean question ended without adopting any declarations or proposals and so is generally considered less relevant. On the other hand, the Geneva Accords that dealt with the dismantling of French Indochina proved to have long-lasting repercussions.
Diplomats from South Korea, North Korea, China, the Soviet Union, and the United States participated in the Korean side of the conference from April 26 to June 15. The conference dealt with the Indochina issue from May 8 to July 21, involving representatives from France, China, the Soviet Union, the United States, the United Kingdom, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV), the State of Vietnam, the Kingdom of Laos, and the Kingdom of Cambodia. Three binding ceasefire agreements about Indochina ended hostilities in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The Pathet Lao were confined to two provinces in northern Laos, and Khmer Issarak forces disbanded. Vietnam was partitioned at the 17th parallel, with troops and personnel of the DRV regrouping to the North, and those of the State of Vietnam regrouping to the South. Alongside them, a non‑legally binding Final Declaration called for international supervision (via the International Control Commission), prohibited the introduction of foreign troops and bases in Vietnam, affirmed that the 17th parallel was only a provisional border. Worsening relations between the North (communist) and the South (anti-communist) would eventually lead to the Vietnam War. As such, historians generally regard the Geneva Conference as failing to secure lasting peace in Indochina.
On 18 February 1954, at the Berlin Conference, participants agreed that "the problem of restoring peace in Indochina will also be discussed at the Conference [on the Korean question] to which representatives of the United States, France, the United Kingdom, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the Chinese People's Republic and other interested states will be invited."
The conference was held at the Palace of Nations in Geneva, commencing on 26 April 1954. The first agenda item was the Korean question to be followed by Indochina.
"China's belligerent policies in Korea and Indochina", coupled with their increasing diplomatic closeness to the Soviet Union, would actively make China's international presence rather isolated. Fearing further isolation from the emerging de-colonized world, and also a possible American intervention into Indochina, the PRC's Foreign Affairs Ministry (led by Zhou Enlai) would go into the conference with the key objective of breaking the US embargo of China and preventing American military intervention. Moreover, Zhou also stressed adopting a more "realistic" and moderate attitude which could deliver tangible results to the Indochina problem.
The armistice signed at the end of the Korean War required a political conference within three months—a timeline which was not met—"to settle through negotiation the questions of the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Korea, the peaceful settlement of the Korean question, etc."
Following World War II, with the overthrow of French colonial rule and the surrender of Japan, the French returned to reconquer Indochina; meanwhile, the Vietnamese were locked in a civil strife over the destiny of their postcolonial state. After the communist-led Viet Minh purge of rival political parties and the breakdown of negotiations, tensions between the Viet Minh and Vietnamese non-communist authorities erupted into full-scale war in December 1946. Initially weak, the Viet Minh pursued guerrilla warfare under the pretext of fighting against the French.
In 1950, communist China and the Soviet Union recognized the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV), while the United States and several other Western countries recognized the State of Vietnam (SVN). The colonial war and the civil war in Indochina became internationalized and intertwined with the global Cold War. The US provided substantial aid to the SVN through France, while China and, to a lesser extent, the Soviet Union aided the DRV. After a series of offensives, hostilities culminated in a decisive French defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, resulting in the convening of the Geneva Conference.
The South Korean representative proposed that the South Korean government was the only legal government in Korea, that UN-supervised elections should be held in the North, that Chinese forces should withdraw, and that UN forces, a belligerent party in the war, should remain as a police force. The North Korean representative suggested that elections be held throughout all of Korea, that all foreign forces leave beforehand, that the elections be run by an all-Korean Commission to be made up of equal parts from North and South Korea, and to increase general relations economically and culturally between the North and the South.
The Chinese delegation proposed an amendment to have a group of 'neutral' nations supervise the elections, which the North accepted. The U.S. supported the South Korean position, saying that the USSR wanted to turn North Korea into a puppet state. Most allies remained silent and at least one, Britain, thought that the South Korean–U.S. proposal would be deemed unreasonable.
The South Korean representative proposed that all-Korea elections, be held according to South Korean constitutional procedures and still under UN supervision. On June 15, the last day of the conference on the Korean question, the USSR and China both submitted declarations in support of a unified, democratic, independent Korea, saying that negotiations to that end should resume at an appropriate time. The Belgian and British delegations said that while they were not going to accept "the Soviet and Chinese proposals, that did not mean a rejection of the ideas they contained". In the end, however, the conference participants did not agree on any declaration.
While the delegates had begun to assemble in Geneva in late April, the discussions on Indochina did not begin until 8 May 1954. The Viet Minh had achieved their decisive victory over the French Union forces at Dien Bien Phu the previous day.
The Western allies did not have a unified position on what the Conference was to achieve in relation to Indochina. Anthony Eden, leading the British delegation, favored a negotiated settlement to the conflict. Georges Bidault, leading the French delegation, was keen to preserve something of France's position in Indochina to justify past sacrifices, even as the nation's military situation deteriorated. The US had been supporting the French in Indochina for many years and the Republican Eisenhower administration wanted to ensure that it could not be accused of another "Yalta" or of having "lost" Indochina to the Communists. Its leaders had previously accused the Democratic Truman administration of having "lost China" when the Communists were unexpectedly successful in securing control of virtually all of the country.
The Eisenhower administration had considered air strikes in support of the French at Dien Bien Phu through the Operation Vulture but was unable to obtain a commitment to united action from key allies such as the United Kingdom. Eisenhower was wary of becoming drawn into "another Korea" that would be deeply unpopular with the American public. US domestic policy considerations strongly influenced the country's position at Geneva. Columnist Walter Lippmann wrote on 29 April that "the American position at Geneva is an impossible one, so long as leading Republican senators have no terms for peace except unconditional surrender of the enemy and no terms for entering the war except as a collective action in which nobody is now willing to engage." At the time of the conference, the US did not recognize the People's Republic of China. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, an anticommunist, forbade any contact with the Chinese delegation, refusing to shake hands with Zhou Enlai, the lead Chinese negotiator.