Nixon’s confident pronouncements masked deep private chagrin. The Navarre Plan was sound and could succeed by 1955 as planned, he told the National Security Council a few weeks later, but the administration should not count on it. The Communists had a sense of history, they had determination and skill, and they believed time was on their side. Bao Dai and the non-Communist groups were weak entities, while in the French High Command there was legitimate fear that Paris would seek premature negotiations.
