The Geneva Accords of 1954

The Geneva Conference brought together France, the Viet Minh, Britain, the Soviet Union, China, the United States, and representatives of Laos, Cambodia and the State of Vietnam. In July 1954 it produced agreements ending the fighting. Vietnam was temporarily divided at the 17th parallel, with Viet Minh forces regrouping to the north and French Union forces to the south, and nationwide elections were to be held in 1956 to reunify the country.

People were allowed to move between zones for a limited period, and roughly 800,000 to one million northerners, many of them Catholic, moved south. The Viet Minh accepted less than its military position seemed to justify, partly under pressure from China and the USSR. The United States and the State of Vietnam did not sign the final declaration, and the promised elections were never held. Geneva ended French rule but created the division that led to the next war.