ipsec.conf sane defaults - one line defines a tunnel! ike esp from 10.1.1.0/24 to 10.1.2.0/24 peer 192.168.1.2 really means: ike esp from 10.1.1.0/24 to 10.1.2.0/24 peer 192.168.1.2 main auth hmac-sha1 enc aes group modp1024 quick auth hmac-sha2-256 enc aes group modp1024 srcid 192.168.1.1 dstid 192.168.1.2 it makes your life much simpler: [puffy] # wc -l /etc/isakmpd/isakmpd.conf.old 1008 /etc/isakmpd/isakmpd.conf [puffy] # wc -l /etc/ipsec.conf 134 /etc/ipsec.conf