THE WAR: Talking Tough in Paris

Until recently, the only place that rivaled Saigon as a U.S. diplomatic hardship post was Paris—if one happened to be assigned to the Viet Nam peace talks. Inside or out of the velvet-curtained ballroom in the former Hotel Majestic, where the sessions are held, American negotiators have had little to do over the past three years beyond eating canapes and trying to keep their tempers while their Communist counterparts gleefully played to the grandstands. "For the first time anyone could remember," says one U.S. delegate, "Foreign Service types in Paris were requesting reassignment to places like Ouagadougou, where at...

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