The City of Lost Causes

Geneva is the only city in the world to have gained fame and prosperity from successive failures. This placid, tidy town lying on the shores of Lac Leman and beneath Mont Blanc, the tallest of the Alps, has been the scene of some of humanity's most trying moments. It is a place where great ideas turn to dust in the archives, and where nations exhausted by war come to end their fighting.

Last week, like every week, Geneva resounded with the din of wrangling delegations. In another wearying round of the nuclear test ban negotiations, the West refused to scale down further its demands for on-site inspections, which stood at 20 annually three years ago, eight this winter, and seven last week. The Russians, who originally refused to permit any inspections, three years ago agreed to "two or three," and last week would not go higher.

A newsman who has covered Geneva since 1947 says that habitual attendance at East-West conferences results in a tendency to accept the arguments of both sides: "You come to think that the Russians object to controls because they want to cheat, and the West insists on controls because they want to spy in Russia. You reach the conclusion that everybody is equally wrong."

Imposed Deadline. A city of 182,000 and the birthplace of Jean Jacques Rousseau, as well as of the Red Cross, Geneva got into the conference business early. During the 16th century, under Reformer John Calvin, Geneva was the Protestant Rome. In 1872 Geneva's city hall was the headquarters of a five-man commission that arbitrated a dispute between Britain and the U.S. over the damages caused by the British-built Confederate raider Alabama. The luckless League of Nations was established in Geneva in 1920. After the League was erased by World War II, the United Nations took over the vast Palais des Nations as its European base.

Geneva is to diplomats what Niagara Falls is to honeymooners. Every meeting of every conference is filled to the brim with endless, multilingual talk. Only rarely does the Palais, one of the world's largest office buildings, come to life with such dramatic moments as Emperor Haile Selassie's moving speech against Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia, or the sight of French Premier Pierre Mendes-France, watch in hand, signing at 4 a.m. the accord ending the Indo-China war to meet the deadline he had set himself on taking office.

15% Jump. Most conference activity revolves around such annual fixtures as the World Health Organization and the U.N. Economic and Social Council. Over 170 organizations have headquarters in Geneva, ranging from the International Bureau of Education to the World Alliance of the Y.M.C.A. Through much of February, 1,600 delegates from all corners of the earth sat happily through long sessions of the United Nations Conference on the Application of Science and Technology for the Benefit of the Less Developed Areas, a group known as UNCSCAT for short.

Meetings most often occur during the good weather months, and usually afford sufficient time off for delegates to enjoy the delight of mountain and beach. The permanent U.N. employees in Geneva lead a quiet, incestuous life made up of intimate cocktail parties, small dinners and casual meetings in the Palais bar, which serves sandwiches so dismal that they are alleged to be rejects from commercial airlines. The citizens of Geneva, who are mostly French-speaking Swiss, ignore the permanent U.N. staff, the delegates and the tourists, and devote themselves to making watches, precision tools and, especially, money. An 18th-century French Foreign Minister once advised a friend, "If you see a Genevese jump out of a window, jump right after him. There's 15% to be gained."

But as Swiss cities go, which is slowly, Geneva has a reputation for wildness. In Bern and Zurich the sidewalks are rolled up at midnight, but Geneva's night spots can stay open until 4 a.m. Police cannot break into Geneva hotel rooms and ask to see marriage licenses as they can in most German Swiss cities. Geneva has only a few licensed prostitutes but no susceptible visitor has ever been known to complain of a lack of complaisant women. Occasionally, there are criminal activities. During the 1960 Disarmament Conference, Sir Michael Wright, chief British delegate, found a thief under his bed. And Cameroon's pro-Communist politician, Felix-Roland Moumie, died suddenly after drinking four glasses of Pernod that someone had spiked with rat poison.

Poetic Chef. The proprietors of Geneva's 300 bars and 18 nightclubs, reoort that Arab, South American and African delegates live it up the most. Communist bloc delegates usually remain dourly behind the high stone walls of suburban villas. One popular bar, the Navy Club, was founded by U.S. naval officers detailed to the 1954 Indo-China peace conference. Most restaurants are French and very good; delegates who can afford it happily drive 30 miles to the fabulous--and expensive--Le Pere Bise, just across the frontier in France itself. In Geneva there are three Chinese restaurants (one Nationalist and two Red Chinese), a Vietnamese one whose chef is a poet, and even an Arab eating house, known fondly as Chez Farouk. For the athletic, Geneva boasts an American-run twelve-lane bowling alley, and for gamblers, two casinos; and for the prurient, there is a striptease joint called the Ba-Ta-Clan, whose huge red neon sign winks wickedly across from St. Pierre Cathedral, where Calvin delivered sermons laced with fire and brimstone. For roues who want to keep going even after 4 a.m., a second-floor establishment named the U.N. Bridge Club serves drinks till dawn and Polish love songs rendered by an Italian barmaid.

Unsigned Treaty. Despite the seeming aimlessness of most Geneva negotiations, there is a residue of idealism and optimism. Last week the British gave a farewell party for Sir Michael Wright upon his retirement as Britain's chief nuclear-talks representative. There was an element of sadness, since Sir Michael had plainly hoped to end his career by signing the East-West treaty. Newsmen applauded warmly when Sir Michael turned to his guest, Senator Hubert Humphrey, and said, "I hope your signature will be on the treaty." If the treaty is ever signed, Geneva will have lost its present unwanted title of the "city of lost causes."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.