At the time of the signing, it was widely thought that Ho Chi Minh had given many concessions to the French. By allowing the continued presence of the French army, Ho allowed for a continuation of the French colonial control of the past. The Communist newspaper "Les Temps modernes" criticized the signing of the deal, calling the agreement "the lamentable surrender of all our [Communists] ideological and political plans". On the French side, Thierry d'Argenlieu illustrated French optimism regarding the treaty in a communiqué he wrote to the Parisian government: "On the French level, the armed forces are assured of a friendly reception and we are pre-empting any reproach for opening hostilities ... We are fully safeguarding French economic and cultural interests now and for the future." Vietnamese worries in regards to the agreement soon came to fruition as France began to exert the same colonial authority it had formally denounced in the treaty. France created a virtual naval blockade of Haiphong by continuing to have a strong naval presence in the Gulf of Tonkin. That led the Vietnamese to reach out for peace talks to curb French influence in the region. These peace talks came in the form of the Fontainebleau Agreements, which occurred at the Palace of Fontainebleau and were led by Phạm Văn Đồng for the Vietnamese and Max André on the side of the French, beginning on July 6, 1946. The conference at the palace was held to discuss the provisions of the Ho-Sainteny Agreement. At the conference, the French refused to revise the original treaty in any way. The Vietnamese leadership, led by Ho Chi Minh, settled to sign a modus vivendi, postponing talks to a later date. These talks never occurred due to the outbreak of violence in November.