The China Threat: Memories, Myths, and Realities in the 1950s 9780231528191

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THE CHINA THREAT

THE CHINA THREAT MEMORIES , MYTHS , AND REALITIES IN THE 1950 S

NANCY BERNKOPF TUCKER

Columbia University Press

New York

Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York Chichester, West Sussex cup.columbia.edu Copyright © 2012 Columbia University Press All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Tucker, Nancy Bernkopf. The China threat : memories, myths, and realities in the 1950s / Nancy Bernkopf Tucker. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-231-15924-1 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-231-52819-1 (ebook) 1. United States—Foreign relations—China. 2. China—Foreign relations— United States. 3. United States—Foreign relations—1953–1961. I. Title. E183.8.C5T8355 2012 327.73051—dc23 2011046987

Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper. This book is printed on paper with recycled content. Printed in the United States of America c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 References to Internet Web sites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared.

To Warren for everything

‘

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations

ix

Preface and Acknowledgments

xi

Introduction: The Myth 1

PART I. THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT 1. Eisenhower’s World 7 2. Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles 25 3. Constraints 41

PART II. THE PRACTICE 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Fear of Communism 55 No Inherent Worth 69 Diplomatic Complexities 89 In Moscow’s Shadow 103 “The Perils of Soya Sauce” 121 Back to the Strait 139 Waging Cold War 159 Conclusion: The Memory 179 Abbreviations Notes

187

189

Bibliography 253 Index

277

ILLUSTRATIONS Illus for Frontmatter: Map of Asia

xvi

figure 1.1

“China? Never Heard of It” which appeared in an Egyptian newspaper, Al-Goumhouria, in 1958. 8

figure 1.2

Map of China and Taiwan across the Taiwan Strait

figure 2.1

“Preparations for meeting China,” by David Low

figure 4.1

“The Red Piper of Peking,” by David Low

figure 5.1

“Fighting man vs. fighting mad!,” by James T. Berryman 70

figure 5.2

“Test for the Seventh Fleet,” by Scott Long

figure 6.1

“No man is an island, entire of itself,” by James Dobbins

figure 7.1

“Harmony Boys,” by John Stampone 104

figure 9.1

“Chinese Firecracker,” by Roy Justus 141

figure 9.2

“Lonely outpost,” by Ross A. Lewis

18 29

65

80

156

figure 10.1 “Oh, that obstacle again,” by Frits Behrendt 162

90

PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

T

his book argues that individuals matter. Although it is true that the Cold War framework and the nature of a constitutional democracy comprised broad parameters for policy in the United States in the 1950s, this study makes clear that the men who served as president, secretary of state, and their advisers determined decisions and directions. Their mindsets, values, emotions, and experience influenced their thoughts and actions, limiting or broadening what they understood about events, behavior, and potential outcomes. The institutional and systemic constraints, although extremely important, would have been the same had Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, or John F. Kennedy served in the 1950s, but these men would not have responded as did Dwight Eisenhower. Indeed, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles expended great effort not to be perceived as just another soft-on-Communism secretary like Dean Acheson.1 Accordingly, the volume has been organized to allow readers to see the players and their immediate environment as the author does—Introduction: The Myth, Part I: The Players and the Context, Part II: The Practice, Conclusion: The Memories—to explore the problems they confronted and the solutions they found. The extended analyses in part II highlight crucial dilemmas of the period explaining how policymakers understood and dealt with them. For instance, the emphasis placed on trade in chapter 7 reflects Dwight D. Eisenhower’s preoccupation with business, investment, and the economy. Furthermore, this study emphasizes the close interaction between domestic and foreign policies that troubled and constrained the president. Eisenhower struggled with confl icting priorities, international demands, and strident domestic politics throughout his tenure in the White House. He found, from day one, that connections between domestic and foreign issues would

xii | Preface and Acknowledgments

be problematic in security, economic, and cultural as well as political spheres. Communism posed a pernicious internal and external challenge as did racism. Politics did not stop at the water’s edge, and the president discovered he could not shield the home front from the crosscutting pressures of overseas developments. Obviously, this is also a book about U.S. relations with China, a subject to which I have devoted my career and one that is always fraught with controversy. The Cold War, the Soviet Union, and the Republic of China on Taiwan all play a critical role here, but the focus is U.S. policy and how the Chinese understood and responded to it. I argue that in the bleak, frozen Cold War decade of the 1950s, more went on than thought. To understand what followed, it is essential to see these years clearly. Primary source materials upon which this book was based are today abundant and yet incomplete. All but a small, highly classified portion of Eisenhower-era records in the United States are open for research. Since the members of the administration closely chronicled what they did and said, the official record is voluminous and detailed. Furthermore, researchers are fortunate to have new, and unprecedented, access to materials in China, Taiwan, Japan, the former Soviet Union, and East Europe, allowing for richer analysis and smarter conclusions. But selectivity is the hallmark of most record releases from these governments, allowing contemporary political concerns to narrow and decide what documents will be available. Similarly, the U.S. intelligence community, although more open than in the past , still closely guards its secrets, releasing but a trickle. Fifty years after the events discussed in this volume, learning from the past remains unnecessarily hard to do. This volume uses the pinyin form of transliteration to render Chinese characters into English. In the case of some well-known names, however, the common usage in English has been retained, for example, Chiang Kaishek. The reader should note that when the term Taiwanese is used, the text is referring to those people who resided on the island of Taiwan prior to the influx caused by the Chinese civil war. Finally, the author has preserved usage of the period that was often politically informed, for example, calling the capital of mainland China Peiping, meaning northern peace, rather than referring to the city as a capital, as in Peking or Beijing.

***

Preface and Acknowledgments | xiii

Thanks are due to a variety of those who supported this long and complex project. The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the United States Institute of Peace, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the National Endowment for the Humanities provided time to think and venues for intellectual exchange that fueled my conceptualization of the China problem faced by the United States in the 1950s. As all those writing in the post–World War II period know, research would be frustrating and often fruitless without the work being done by the talented and dedicated specialists at the Cold War International History Project and the National Security Archive. I benefited from the declassification of records in China, Taiwan, the former Soviet Union, and the United States that I could only have dreamed about in the early days of the endeavor. I also am grateful to the Eisenhower revisionists and post-revisionists who found the 1950s as thoughtprovoking as I have. They created a literature, often cited in this book, from which I learned and with which I could wrestle in coming to my own conclusions. As always, friends and colleagues gave generously of their talents. Warren I. Cohen read the manuscript more often than anyone—friend, colleague, or husband—should have been asked to do. His encouragement and wisdom have been irreplaceable. Mark Philip Bradley and an anonymous reviewer critiqued the manuscript for Columbia University Press and provided meticulous suggestions for sharpening my reasoning and framing my presentation. Richard Immerman and Matthew Jones generously alerted me to useful documents encountered in their own research. Jeffrey Y. Lin and Bruce R. Kressel, using their skills and experience, worked assiduously to give me the time to complete the task. Of course, there are dozens of others who helped build the intellectual capital that made this book possible, and though I cannot acknowledge them all here, their efforts are very much appreciated.

THE CHINA THREAT

Map of Asia Courtesy of the United States Federal Government.

INTRODUCTION

O

n January 19, 1961, as temperatures plummeted and snow fell steadily on the city of Washington, Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy met for the second and last briefing before Kennedy’s inauguration. Both sessions had been scheduled to allow the sitting president to school his young and inexperienced successor on the problems he would face and the powers he could exploit against threats and challenges. After a long private conversation and an intense exchange with members of the cabinet present, Eisenhower and Kennedy spent a few last minutes lingering next to the large conference table in the White House West Wing.1 During those moments, according to Clark Clifford—Kennedy’s lawyer, liaison with the Republican administration, and a veteran of the Truman administration— Eisenhower abandoned his otherwise gracious demeanor and warned that Kennedy’s actions on China, alone among the policies he might follow, could bring the former president out of retirement. Clifford later recalled “If Kennedy recognized communist China, as some liberal Democrats urged, Eisenhower said he would attack the decision and try to rally public opinion against it. Kennedy did not comment, but I had no doubt that Eisenhower’s warning had its desired effect.”2 Historians and policymakers have accepted and retold this story for decades. They used it to explain Kennedy’s unwillingness to change a China policy he allegedly did not believe made sense.3 Dean Rusk, Kennedy’s secretary of state, for instance, wrote in his memoir that to alter China policy “would have been one hell of a battle” because of Eisenhower’s opposition.4 Thus, however much Kennedy wanted to rectify the China situation, Eisenhower kept him from doing the right thing.5

2 | Introduction

The truth is that the incident, told and retold in the books about Eisenhower’s presidency, Kennedy’s Camelot, and U.S.-China relations, almost certainly never happened. The event cannot be definitively ruled out; the three men who spoke and listened that day are dead. But Eisenhower’s views on China belie this contention. That Eisenhower would have tried to coerce Kennedy regarding the Chinese contradicts—indeed is diametrically opposed to—Eisenhower’s ideas about China. In fact, as this study makes clear, Eisenhower believed the United States should, and eventually would, open diplomatic relations with Beijing, anticipated China’s entry into the United Nations, and thought that Washington’s efforts to smother a rising China had put it in an embarrassing position with allies and adversaries.6 Given the many issues on which Republicans and Democrats bitterly disagreed—most especially the adequacy of defense capabilities—China would not have merited Eisenhower’s remarkable vehemence. In fact, both men had other issues on their minds. As the snow accumulated outside, fighting in Laos seemed the most immediate problem. Eisenhower thought not about China but focused on the Soviet Union, Europe, and Cuba, just as the incoming president worried about Moscow and Berlin, not Beijing. The reported intimidation seemed plausible to historians and subsequent policymakers because of the tough anti-China rhetoric often heard during Eisenhower’s eight years, the Taiwan Strait crises, the assumptions about Kennedy’s flexibility on relations with Beijing, and the disappointment of those anticipating change that did not materialize. A threat by Eisenhower also appeared of a piece with the president’s actions in the third world: covert operations in Iran and Guatemala, exaggeration of crises in the Congo and Egypt, as well as a determination to undermine the government of Cuba. Furthermore, campaigning had revealed considerable friction between the president and senator. The frigid winds blowing outside the White House that January day reflected the frosty assessment each man had of the other. The previous summer Eisenhower had told a friend, “I will do almost anything to avoid turning my chair and the country over to Kennedy.”7 Eisenhower had disparaged Kennedy’s brashness, impertinence, and incompetence. He worried about the young man’s naiveté and resented Kennedy’s suggestion, however indirect, that Eisenhower had been asleep in the Oval Office. Kennedy did, in fact, believe that Eisenhower had squandered time and opportunity, occasionally referring to him as “that old asshole.”8 When

Introduction

| 3

the two finally met in December 1960, the oldest and, soon-to-be, youngest president approached each other warily. China did, of course, come up during the general exchange among those gathered at the White House. Eisenhower expressed his dismay regarding the unfolding tragedy in Laos, telling Kennedy, “you might have to go in there and fight it out” and do so “unilaterally.”9 Kennedy apparently responded with a question about how to keep the Chinese Communists out, but Eisenhower replied “that he did not think that the Chinese Communists wished to provoke a major war.”10 Eisenhower had delayed action not because of the Chinese but, he asserted, because intervention with its long-term consequences should be the new president’s decision. C. Douglas Dillon, under secretary of state, also thought that Eisenhower “got a certain inner satisfaction from laying a potentially intractable problem in Kennedy’s lap.”11 China per se did not constitute a significant issue in the briefings.12 As for the substance of relations with China, careful historical scrutiny establishes that Eisenhower harbored fewer misgivings about China than did Kennedy. Although both men found their options severely circumscribed when it came to Chinese affairs, Eisenhower disparaged much of what passed for China policy under his own administration. The president allowed himself simultaneously to be constrained and emboldened by domestic politics. He took risks during two China-Taiwan Strait crises that made war in Asia more, not less, possible. Eisenhower found these experiences frustrating. He did not want to revisit them or expose himself or his country to further danger at the hands of Taiwan’s difficult leadership. He understood that in reality two Chinas existed and that Washington had to deal with both. Kennedy, by contrast, personally as well as politically believed that he had to hold the line on China. Although often a risk taker, he proved especially cautious when confronting this Cold War dilemma. He feared that Republicans in general, not Eisenhower in particular, would pillory him for a new China policy as they had Harry Truman when he allegedly lost China. Altering the direction of U.S.-China relations did not seem worth the damage to the rest of his foreign and domestic agenda. Beyond all this, Kennedy did not trust the Chinese. He became obsessed by Beijing’s determination to acquire nuclear weapons and remained suspicious about the authenticity of the Sino-Soviet rift. “A dispute over how to bury the West is no grounds for Western rejoicing,” he warned.13

4 | Introduction

Ultimately, neither president changed the direction of Sino-American relations, damaging the nation’s reputation as well as laying the country open to repeated threats in Asia. Eisenhower openly complained about the folly of trying to isolate the Chinese. Kennedy only whispered to colleagues that he wished he could follow a different policy. History simply does not support the idea that Eisenhower would have sought to intimidate his successor on China, nor does it suggest that Kennedy could have been so easily unsettled had he genuinely wanted to reinvent China policy. The conclusion to be drawn is that the episode either did not happen, or misunderstanding and miscommunication made the exchange between Eisenhower and Kennedy something that it had not been. Perhaps Clark Clifford wanted to excuse Kennedy or blame Eisenhower for bad policy choices on China.14 As a result, false assumptions about China policy discussed on January 19, 1960, have colored interpretations of the Eisenhower years and Kennedy’s presidency. These are errors that this volume seeks to correct, using new sources from the Chinese and American sides as well as different perspectives on the people and events of the period.

PART I THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT

1 EISENHOWER’S WORLD

D

wight D. Eisenhower’s views on international relations and his attitude toward Asia make clear how implausible it is that Ike would threaten John F. Kennedy about opening diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Eisenhower gave precedence to Europe, and he saw his most serious challenge as coming from the Soviet Union. His time on the battlefield in World War II had reinforced his conviction that America’s critical disputes and opportunities would arise in Europe. The people he gathered around him—those with whom he argued and to whom he listened, both military and political—strongly agreed with that European bias. This was true of his personal circle and his key foreign policy adviser and executer John Foster Dulles. Christian Herter, who replaced Dulles when he was stricken by cancer, shared similar leanings. The rest of the world made up an arena for the struggle with Communism, but it was an arena of considerably less consequence. Eisenhower did, as president, face a daunting array of crises, including Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954, the Taiwan Strait in 1954–1955 and 1958, the Suez in 1956, Lebanon in 1958, Indonesia in 1958, and Berlin in 1959 as well as longer term conflict with Cuba and in Indochina. Some of these confrontations he imposed upon himself, but he managed them so as to minimize the potential of negative repercussions for his administration. Eisenhower intuitively understood risk management. He knew what could be done and what remained beyond reach. He became an enthusiastic advocate and practitioner of covert action, recognizing the benefits of secrecy and deniability. Much could be done without a major commitment of U.S. power.1 A man prudent about the relationship between means and ends, Eisenhower never seriously considered challenging Mao Zedong’s hold on power

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THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT

figure 1.1 “China? Never Heard of It” Courtesy of Al-Goumhouria, Cairo, Egypt.

in China. Although his most voluble Republican supporters wanted him to overthrow the Communist regime, and administration rhetoric sometimes suggested he was on the verge of doing so, the reality was much different. Eisenhower refused to divert his presidency into a long and treacherous confl ict that could produce a world war. Eisenhower was, after all, convinced that war with China would mean war with the Soviet Union. Moreover, he saw no viable alternatives to Communist rule in China, as he was persuaded of Mao’s absolute control on the mainland and disdainful of Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist Chinese forces in Taiwan. For decades analysts wondered how carefully Eisenhower’s views needed to be studied since he appeared to play a small role in his own administra-

Eisenhower’s World

| 9

tion. In fact, he was the ultimate arbiter of policy to whom Secretary of State Dulles and others provided recommendations. He reached the final decisions himself.2 That Eisenhower played his role forcefully and decisively has become clearer as declassified documents and fresh inquiries rescued the president’s reputation and clarified administration relationships.3 No longer seen as grandfatherly and inconsequential, Eisenhower has emerged as a reasonably sophisticated analyst of world affairs, better informed than many thought at the time.4 He recognized competing interests among Communist states and understood that United States policy could be effective only if flexible. Although he worked closely with his secretary of state, meeting with him daily, Ike had his own ideas and remained the source of his foreign policy. As Eisenhower later wrote, Dulles “never made a serious pronouncement, agreement or proposal without complete and exhaustive consultation with me in advance and, of course, my approval.”5 Growing up in a rural small town, by the time Eisenhower became president he had developed a relatively sophisticated appreciation of world affairs. Prolonged service in Europe during World War II and as commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) brought intense interaction with key European leaders and high-level American officials. Eisenhower was popular, exuding warmth, geniality, determination, and dedication. Successful military command and military diplomacy imbued him with self-confidence, and he radiated that assurance, effortlessly persuading others to rely on his decisions. What Eisenhower learned from history was far less significant than what he culled from personal experience and watching people. He wrote in one of several memoirs about reading history as a youth, and his high school classmates predicted he would have a career teaching history at Yale. But Ike’s reading in history had not been of the sort that prepared a young man to understand the complicated interplay of international forces. In fact, he never sought bold interpretations of events and complicated theories of causation. He preferred to surround himself with those who knew how to use power and find practical solutions—military men and high-level officials in Europe during the war, military and businessmen during his presidency. Eisenhower’s passage to international involvement led through West Point, where he enrolled in 1911. The Point similarly did not open his eyes to the world since it did not demand much of cadets. The curriculum had not yet been retooled—that would follow World War I—and although cadets

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THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT

studied history and mathematics, they spent more time on gunnery, horseback riding, and other military training. Instructors rarely inspired curiosity about international relations, and Eisenhower reserved his enthusiasm for athletic competition.6 His ingrained disinterest in intellectual pursuits survived his years as Columbia University’s president and his brother Milton’s university affi liations. He noted in his diary that Congress’s high hurdles for confirmation of administration nominees would drive away the truly talented so that “sooner or later we will be unable to get anybody to take jobs in Washington except business failures, college professors, and New Deal lawyers.” 7 As for his own intellectual curiosity, he told an erstwhile friend and sometime speech writer Emmet Hughes, “he had found through the years . . . only one particular pleasure in history: the mental exercise of memorizing majestic dates.”8 Upon assuming office, Eisenhower emphasized national security issues, including anti-Communism/containment, nuclear deterrence, collective security and opposition to revolution. Determined to protect the homeland from a new surprise attack, he believed that safety required stability in Europe, and he worked hard to advance European unity, promote free trade, and block Communist expansion. Was he, then, a rabid cold warrior? Recent studies of Eisenhower’s presidency have placed great weight upon the harsh and provocative rhetoric of the president and his administration.9 The record, however, is more nuanced and lends itself to confl icting interpretations. As supreme commander in Europe, Eisenhower had cooperated with the Soviets to achieve a rapid victory, but also to avoid differences that might produce renewed fighting. After the war’s end, he shared a widely held assumption that Americans and Soviets could continue to work together. During a visit to Moscow, he found Stalin “benign and fatherly” and told the press he could see “nothing in the future that would prevent Russia and the United States from being the closest possible friends.”10 His expectation that mutual understanding could endure dissipated slowly, and more because he realized his views did not accord with those of voters than because he had changed his mind about the need for a Grand Alliance. Similarly, in contrast to most conservatives, he sympathized with the idea of a multinational world governing body with its own military capability but abandoned that as his political ambitions grew.11

Eisenhower’s World

| 11

China, whether Communist or free, neither captured Eisenhower’s imagination nor struck him as an urgent problem compared with Europe. Even when stationed in Asia between 1933 and 1939, China did not occupy his mind. His post in the Philippines under General Douglas MacArthur involved management of an unpredictable, brilliant, and condescending superior rather than engagement with Asia. During World War II, he joined General George C. Marshall’s planning staff at the War Department, utilizing this Asian experience to lay out the immediate requirements for defeating Japan. He repeatedly urged greater effort to assist the Chinese.12 Quickly, however, he focused his energies on Atlantic rather than Pacific operations. His stated priorities for 1942 did not include objectives in Asia.13 By midJune, his dynamic career had catapulted him past senior officers to take command of the European theater, where he believed the most important battles would be joined. He visited China in 1946 on a tour through Asia, Latin America, and Europe, and he lamented publication of the 1949 China White Paper by the Truman administration, which sought to escape blame for the Communist takeover of China, but these were not significant commitments of his time or attention.14 As the Korean War raged, Eisenhower devoted his mind to Europe, not Asia, becoming commander of NATO. He had long urged that the Pentagon withdraw U.S. troops from the Korean peninsula and opposed introducing Chiang Kai-shek’s forces into the mix, convinced they could not fight effectively. During the campaign, he faced constant questions about ending the conflict and finally played to public emotion when he pledged to go to Korea, a declaration disparaged as “pure show-biz” by war hero General Omar Bradley. His actual feelings about Korea were captured by his frequent observation, “If there must be a war there let it be Asians against Asians.”15 China did provide a cautionary note. Eisenhower came to see its political hazards and its ability to bring out surprising irresponsibility from American civilian and military officials. He understood the potency of charges that Democratic incompetence and perfidy had compromised China’s future. As Republicans struggled to recapture the White House, the party saw no issue as too minor, no tactic too nasty. Thus China intruded into American domestic politics, carried into the 1952 presidential campaign by Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-WI), the China Lobby, and the Korean War. For the

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THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT

most part, the American people had no interest in Chinese affairs and knew little about Asia in general. But in the fierce contest for political control of the nation, Republicans employed accusation, innuendo, and deceit to prove to voters that the loss of China to Communism had been the work of leaders who acted in disregard of the common interest and the personal welfare of the American people. As part of a broader indictment of Democratic mismanagement, corruption, and vulnerability to Communist subversion, the China debate contributed to the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower. Eisenhower tried to remain judicious. He rebuffed ideas about using atomic weapons against an Asian people for the second time. He refused to sanction suggestions that the U.S. government bombard Chinese cities to punish Mao’s intervention in Korea. Nevertheless, as Eisenhower struggled to win voters, especially conservatives in his party, his accusations regarding China policy became harsher and more frequent. He insisted that “the loss of China to the Communists [had been] the greatest diplomatic defeat in the nation’s history” and stridently denounced inept Democratic Party decision making.16 That Eisenhower succumbed quickly to the combined force of conservative Republicans and China Lobby activists who pressed him to take a harder line toward Red China became further apparent at the start of his administration. In his State of the Union address on February 2, 1953, just days into his presidency, he deliberately gave the impression that he was reversing Truman’s policy on China. He declared that the U.S. 7th Fleet would no longer shield the mainland from Nationalist Chinese attack. American naval vessels would, however, remain in the Formosa Strait,17 providing a privileged sanctuary to the Kuomintang (KMT).18 Eisenhower anticipated mollifying Chiang Kai-shek’s American proponents and raising morale in Taiwan while disquieting China’s Communists, especially in Korea. Ike’s announcement regarding Chiang disturbed more than Beijing, raising complaints from Congress and American allies in Europe. All feared that the United States would be drawn into a new war when Nationalist troops got into trouble.19 To Eisenhower’s surprise, critics thought the president had become too deeply immersed in Asian affairs, having traveled to Korea as president-elect and ostensibly putting China issues at the top of his presidential agenda. Ike, however, had no such intention. He expressed his bewilderment to a close confidant just days after the State of the Union speech:

Eisenhower’s World

| 13

If any one of my European friends has ever found—in anything I have ever said or done—any reason to believe that my interest in Europe was not continuous, intense and sympathetic and inspired by the realization that America’s enlightened self-interest demands the closest cooperation in that region—then I should like to see such an individual point out to me the instance on which he bases his conclusion.20

The new policy of unleashing Chiang, as the press choose to call it, therefore, only appeared to signal that Eisenhower would be a firm supporter of Taiwan and a belligerent opponent of China. Eisenhower approached administration obligations from the point of view of a five-star general and a veteran risk manager as well as a politician and fiscal conservative: judging dangers and opportunities, understanding international situations and behavior through this mix of perspectives. On China the combination dictated moderation, not gambling. Eisenhower insisted that a war waged against Beijing would not only be dangerous and foolhardy but would consume massive resources better directed toward dealing with the primary antagonist in Moscow. Appointment of Charles E. Wilson as secretary of defense provided clear evidence of Eisenhower’s absolute confidence in his own military intuition and determination to be his own national security adviser. He found Wilson narrow and simplistic on strategic issues but needed the man’s organizational expertise, accrued as president of General Motors, to run the vast Defense Department bureaucracy.21 For decisions on the uses of military power, the president-general planned to rely on himself. When his new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Arthur W. Radford joined with Wilson to urge an Asia-first policy, Eisenhower rejected their advice, secure in his own conviction that Europe’s security took preeminence.22 Ike could not have been shocked by Radford’s position. The admiral’s appointment had more than a little to do with the protective coloration that his advocacy of China Lobby sentiment could provide for the Atlantic-directed president. Eisenhower would, however, frequently discount or rebuff Radford’s views on Asia. Radford’s aggressive recommendations regarding China, in particular, did not receive presidential support.23 The president similarly ignored the views of his vice president. Tethered to Richard Nixon because of domestic politics, Eisenhower did not trust him. The president tape-recorded their conversations in case Nixon later

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THE PLAYERS AND THE CONTEXT

misrepresented something said in the Oval Office.24 He did not consider Nixon an original thinker, finding his views on many issues predictable and unhelpful.25 He had no qualms about using Nixon to browbeat others so that his own positive message would not be sullied. It is not surprising that Nixon described Ike as “devious.”26 To Cyrus Eaton, banker and frequent critic of U.S. foreign policies, Ike would remark that he had repeatedly been forced to suppress Nixon’s enthusiasm for sending “American troops to every continent to destroy Communism by force.”27 Eisenhower on occasion ostentatiously ignored or harshly berated his vice president; one observer recalled of Nixon that “he came back from humiliating talks with Eisenhower almost in tears.”28 Indeed, Ike had become sufficiently disenchanted that by 1956 he almost pushed Nixon off the reelection ticket. Eisenhower’s presidency reflected his ideological crusade against Communism, and in that sense men like Wilson, Radford, and Nixon belonged in his administration. He eagerly grasped the tools of political and psychological warfare, which he wielded in places as diverse as Iran and Guatemala as well as the United States.29 Eisenhower, Dulles, Wilson, Radford, and Nixon saw the world as a dangerous place and wanted the American people and the nation’s allies to remain alert to ideological and security challenges. What some historians have emphasized as a relentless focus on apocalyptic visions of the future and a governing style in which apocalypse management substituted for reasoned analysis, however, exaggerates the importance of this one aspect of the Eisenhower administration’s attitudes and policies. 30 Much more must be understood about the policies and practices of the 1950s. The records of Eisenhower’s conversations, his memos, and his diary show another side of the president, as he repeatedly offered pragmatic responses to problems even when he knew that politics would prevent him from following through. These confidential fora did not gain him political advantage. He did not need to express flexible views or contemplate alternative directions. He often articulated harsh judgments that were of a piece with his public declarations, but more interesting are the times when he distanced himself from those views. Eisenhower did not prove to be a bold innovator, but he did allow himself to air the frustration of a man trapped by his times. Moreover, he complained that Dulles worried too much about enemies who might seek to undermine him and the White House as they had devastated Truman and Acheson.31

Eisenhower’s World

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China policy should be seen not simply as one among many cases of antiCommunist confrontation or American statesmen failing to understand the larger world around them. Rather, China policy reflected Eisenhower’s strengths and weaknesses as a president, diplomat, and military leader. The muddled approach to China, as this book demonstrates, provides the clearest picture of Ike’s logic, intentions, and disappointments. To begin with, Eisenhower never planned to unleash Chiang Kai-shek. He did not intend to allow the United States to be dragged into a war because of irresponsible initiatives by the Nationalists. He accepted small-scale raids on and reconnaissance against China, begun in the Truman period, but worried about more aggressive maneuvers like those encouraged by William C. Chase, chief of the U.S. Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) in Taipei, including interdiction of shipping and capture of mainlanders.32 As the administration became more familiar with the dynamics of the region and disturbed by Beijing’s behavior, Eisenhower stiffened his stance but never gave up his basic preference for a constructive policy. Concerned about morale in Taiwan, he opted to use American forces during two separate Strait crises to preserve a bastion for the Free Chinese. Conversely, at National Security Council (NSC) meetings, he suggested that China ought to be in the United Nations and that the United States should trade with the Chinese. He could and did, in private functions, detail good reasons to open diplomatic relations.33 He lamented that Americans since Woodrow Wilson’s presidency had considered diplomatic recognition equivalent to approval of a government, which made his recognition of China impossible.34 To India’s prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru he remarked in 1956 that “he would like to get our people over their currently very adverse attitude toward Red China.”35 Moreover, he worried about Chiang Kai-shek’s ability to plunge the United States into an unwanted war. He felt about relations with Chiang much as he did about dealings with the similarly difficult Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser: “we frequently find ourselves victims of the tyrannies of the weak” and “give to the little nations opportunities to embarrass us greatly.”36 Simultaneously, this political general could not have been more sensitive to the dynamics of democratic politics. He became the fi rst president to set up a congressional liaison staff in the White House, met often with members, and instructed his staff to be sensitive to the pulse of the legislative branch.37 Aware of the Republican position on China, he concluded that he must not defy those party prohibitions against a new approach. He

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accepted these strictures even though he deplored China Lobby efforts to manipulate the U.S. government. About William Knowland (R-CA), the so-called senator from Formosa, Eisenhower confided in his diary that he found the Senator extraordinarily “stupid” and told his close friend General Alfred M. Gruenther that the Republican majority leader lacked an independent foreign policy position other than “‘to develop high blood pressure’ whenever he says ‘Red China.’”38 In fact, Eisenhower’s contempt extended to the entire right wing of the Grand Old Party, whose members he disparaged as “the most ignorant people now living in the United States.” Through most of his presidency, both houses of Congress were under Democratic Party control, and Eisenhower found himself working quite smoothly with Democrats and moderate Republicans Sam Rayburn (D-TX), Lyndon Johnson (D-TX), Charles Halleck (R-IN), and Everett Dirksen (R-IL) rather than the Republican right. Eisenhower saw Halleck as a useful “team player” and felt that Dirksen shared his own “middle-of-the-road philosophy.” The House and Senate Democratic leaders were welcomed at the White House for more practical reasons. Eisenhower actually did not trust Rayburn and Johnson, disliking the latter as “superficial and opportunistic,” a “small man . . . [lacking] depth of mind . . . [and] breadth of vision,” but their power on the Senate floor commanded presidential respect.39 The president enjoyed policy debate and often looked to advisors other than John Foster and Allen Dulles in formulating his foreign policies. In fact, the Dulles brothers were, most often, likely to confirm Eisenhower’s preexisting views rather than challenge him. Eisenhower was, however, less bellicose, less moralistic, and more judicious than his secretary of state. Not always a patient man, Ike thought Foster Dulles boring, his briefings “frequently too long and in too much [historical] detail.” Emmet Hughes, presidential speech writer, observed Ike’s impatience with Dulles, noting “the slow glaze across the blue eyes, signaling the end of all mental contact” when Dulles spoke.40 As for Allen, the intelligence chief who provided regular briefings, Ike found his remarks “too philosophical, laborious and tedious.” 41 Neither of the pedantic Dulles brothers, with whom Ike often grew irritated, built a personal rapport with the president.42 Ike used their obvious talents, often having Foster deliver the strident ideological defenses of policy that the times demanded, but rarely relied exclusively on their advice. Instead Eisenhower turned to people who had experience in the business world or the military that made them no-nonsense problem solvers. He re-

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laxed with individuals who shared his moderate view of international affairs rather than the rabid right-wing philosophy he had to wrestle with in the public arena. They were virtually all Atlanticists who saw China through the lens of European, not regional, priorities. General Lucius Clay, for instance, spent much of his military career wrestling with German problems. He worked as Eisenhower’s deputy heading American occupation forces there and oversaw the Berlin airlift. A private citizen and successful businessman during Eisenhower’s presidency, and unwilling to become Ike’s “Colonel House . . . or . . . Harry Hopkins,” Clay nevertheless could exercise considerable influence. “Ike and Lucius were very, very close. They understood each other instinctively . . . were on the same wavelength,” according to the chairman of the Republican Party Leonard Hall.43 Eisenhower turned over choice of his cabinet to Clay, relying implicitly on his judgment. Clay engaged Ike on policy and did not hesitate to argue with the president. He persuaded Ike to take seriously the threat from the Bricker Amendment, which sought to circumscribe presidential authority by increasing that of Congress. Under its provisions, Congress would have been able to annul executive agreements and refuse to activate treaties. Clay did not play any significant role on China policy but informally could say more to the president than many others since he had had more contact with the Chinese. His memories were not happy ones. He recalled wartime China vividly and with distaste. Responsible in 1943 for arranging payment for seven airbases slated for construction in China, Clay was angered when the Nationalist Chinese pressed Washington to pay $2 billion for airfields that Clay valued at $200 million.44 When Nationalist leaders refused to revalue their currency from 20:1 closer to the street price of 120:1, Clay advocated curtailing U.S. military operations on the mainland. He later dismissed Republican attacks on the Truman administration for losing China, convinced as he was that “the clear answer was Chiang Kai-shek.” 45 Treasury Secretary George Humphrey, who joined the administration a stranger to Ike on Lucius Clay’s recommendation, quickly became a central figure in the cabinet. Charming and candid, Humphrey frequently played golf and bridge with the president. Eisenhower sought Humphrey’s advice about sound fiscal policies and made the treasury secretary a permanent member of the National Security Council even though he was more stridently anti-Communist and decidedly more isolationist than Eisenhower.

figure 1.2 Map of China and Taiwan across the Taiwan Strait Courtesy of the United States Federal Government.

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Explaining Humphrey’s usefulness, the president’s brother Milton Eisenhower noted that the treasury secretary was “an isolationist who is learning that isolationist policies won’t work.” 46 On China, Humphrey’s proved a voice of caution. For instance, in late 1954 he joined Defense Secretary Wilson and National Security Advisor Robert Cutler in opposing a commitment to defending the offshore islands, worrying that such peripheral commitments unnecessarily unbalanced the budget.47 General Walter Bedell Smith had been Ike’s chief of staff, “Eisenhower’s son-of-a-bitch,” during World War II. Subsequently Smith put his skills as “a specialist in psychological bullying” to work as Truman’s director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the wake of the intelligence community’s inability to predict the Soviet atomic bomb test and the start of the Korean War. 48 In the weeks after his October 7, 1950, assumption of the helm at CIA, events in Korea blindsided him when, contrary to intelligence analysis, the Chinese entered the war. Smith was further dismayed by the CIA loss of hundreds of would-be spies sent into Communist China after 1951 and false reports of a third force just waiting for CIA support to rise up against Mao Zedong.49 How much Smith intervened in Dulles’s decisions after Eisenhower made him under secretary of state is unclear, but he monitored the secretary and department for the president. He could, according to Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson, get access to the president at any time, and diplomat Robert Murphy believed that Smith could offer criticism and suggestions on policy more freely than Dulles.50 Smith came to State already wary of one Dulles— Allen had been an unruly figure working for Smith at the CIA—and found that he neither liked nor respected the other Dulles brother, Foster, for whom he now worked. Moreover, Dulles used him primarily to carry out decisions rather than help originate policies or coordinate decision making. Accordingly, Smith’s stay at State proved short. Until he left, however, Smith and Eisenhower shared views on pending decisions by telephone several times a day. Eisenhower and Smith remained in regular contact when Smith headed the U.S. delegation at the 1954 Geneva conference on Korea and Indochina, where he wrestled with the Soviet and Communist Chinese delegations. Eisenhower trusted Smith’s judgment, values, moderation, and diplomatic skills and wanted to be kept apprised of conference developments. Thus he read about Smith’s unhappiness with Chinese lack of “restraint” and “intransigence.”

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He similarly knew that Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov had sympathized with Smith’s complaint, observing “you must . . . remember that China is always going to be China, she is never going to be European.”51 This mattered to the Russian, and it mattered to Ike. Al Gruenther, also a Europeanist, had been one of Eisenhower’s key planners during World War II and served as the head of NATO in the 1950s. Eisenhower had come to see Gruenther as brilliant, loyal, discreet, and effective, recording that he was an “indispensable” man.52 They frequently exchanged letters, and after 1956, when Gruenther returned to Washington, D.C., they regularly played bridge. Ike again thought of him as indispensable, noting “a talk with him after a hard day’s work never failed to give me a lift.”53 Gruenther, however, knew little about China; his limited exposure had involved discussions with Douglas MacArthur’s about efforts to prevent the fall of Taiwan, and in contrast to Eisenhower, Gruenther became an admirer of the general.54 John J. McCloy has less often been labeled an Eisenhower intimate and has denied that he served a significant role in advising the president. A lawyer, onetime assistant defense secretary, banker, and businessman who chaired the Ford Foundation and the Council on Foreign Relations, McCloy fit the profile of wealthy and influential friends who populated Eisenhower’s informal cabinet. Several times he was close to becoming secretary of state: in 1952, when Eisenhower preferred him over Dulles; in 1958, when Philip Graham, publisher of the Washington Post, along with Lucius Clay and Milton Eisenhower tried to convince Eisenhower to dump Dulles and put McCloy in his place; and in 1959, upon Dulles’s resignation, when Al Gruenther promoted McCloy instead of Herter for the job.55 Although a Europeanist like Eisenhower’s other confidants, McCloy had definite opinions on Chinese affairs, which he frankly imparted to Eisenhower and Dulles. These views had been shaped by McCloy’s natural pragmatism, his negative wartime China-aid experiences, and his exposure to a bitter George C. Marshall after the general’s failed mediation attempt in China in 1945–1947. Marshall, McCloy recalled, thought that the idea of “ostracizing China” just because it was Communist was senseless and harmful. McCloy agreed and believed Eisenhower’s China policy to be mistaken. Thus, when during the 1958 Strait crisis Dulles consulted McCloy and sought to have him persuade Chiang Kai-shek to leave the offshore islands, McCloy faced a dilemma. He wanted to rationalize policy and felt that the adminis-

Eisenhower’s World

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tration should push for more than simple evacuation but concluded that Dulles already held fi xed ideas, Chiang could not be moved, and that he, McCloy, did not want to become a target of the China Lobby.56 Finally, Andrew J. Goodpaster served as Eisenhower’s most essential aide, performing daily national security and intelligence briefings, handling paper flow, taking notes, acting as liaison to the military and intelligence community, and providing advice. Ike included Goodpaster in virtually every conversation, consultation, and deliberation whether with the cabinet, NSC, or ad hoc groups and at all levels of classification. Goodpaster recalled, “many times the specific things that I would take up to the president would be matters of discussion between us.”57 He never acted as a passive facilitator, noting “I talked with him often in very broad terms about what kind of an effort should the United States project in the world and what should be our relationship with Russia . . . rising problems such as out in the Far East.” For the president he fi lled “the role of a confidential adviser,” Goodpaster asserted, “and he, I think, looked to me to, sort of, understand the problems and put them together in some way that we could come to grips with them. And often . . . when he had a question, I would suggest how that might be handled by the government.”58 Goodpaster knew no more about Asia than did most others in Eisenhower’s inner circle. Like Ike, he was from the Midwest and West Point; he later obtained master’s degrees in civil engineering and politics as well as an international relations doctorate at Princeton University after serving in North Africa and Italy during the war. He had been a favorite of Eisenhower’s at Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers in Europe and at NATO, the general thinking the younger man brilliant and enjoying his loyalty and admiration. Goodpaster’s exposure to Asia began with service on the planning team for the occupation of Japan. In 1955 as the Taiwan Strait crisis unfolded, Eisenhower dispatched Goodpaster to the Pacific commander in chief, Admiral Felix Stump, to interrogate him on the defensibility of the offshore islands, Nationalist and Communist capabilities, and possible U.S. strategy. Goodpaster shared Eisenhower’s impression that the Chinese “were extremely cautious” so as not to provoke Washington.59 Eisenhower, of course, turned to others as well, but they would have had less reason or opportunity to talk with Ike about Asia. His brother Milton spent the 8 years of the administration traveling in Latin America as the president’s personal representative, conveying administration views on developments

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there as well as seeking to inform the White House about policy changes that would promote prosperity, democracy, and cooperation.60 William Robinson, the publisher of the New York Herald Tribune who became president of Coca-Cola during Ike’s first term, seemed ever present but was mostly a sounding board for domestic issues and politics. Diplomat Robert Murphy had no personal relationship with the president but repeatedly served him as a special envoy. Murphy met Chiang Kai-shek in 1943 and admired him, seeing his Taiwan regime as a crucial Cold War outpost against Red China for which Washington should show sympathy and support. By 1959, however, he urged a flexible policy on the offshore islands regarding the degree to which the United States would render Chiang support.61 Beyond these relationships, three other factors shaped Eisenhower’s judgments about China. First, Eisenhower entered office under great pressure to end combat on the Korean peninsula. The war continued to take lives, jeopardize regional stability, frighten Japan and Taiwan, complicate the French colonial campaign in Indochina, and drain resources available for the defense of Europe. To bring peace, Eisenhower visited Korea as president-elect and once inaugurated threatened Beijing with nuclear attack and a Nationalist Chinese assault on, or blockade of, China’s coast. Eisenhower privately thought the use of atomic bombs in China, as advocated by General Douglas MacArthur, among others, horrifying, but though he could not imagine dropping them, especially in Asia, he saw making nuclear threats as an effective tactic in pursuit of negotiations.62 The fact that the threats were not successful, that Beijing did not agree to talk as a result of nuclear coercion, is irrelevant.63 Second, domestic politics played a formative as well as limiting role. Eisenhower pursued policies toward China that he did not believe in wholeheartedly because he thought public opinion demanded a hard-line stance toward Beijing. He did not explore the depth or breadth of opinion on China, and rather than educate Americans, Eisenhower allowed the right wing to sweep away reasoned public discussion and debate. In part this reflected his effort to protect his legislative agenda and in part to shield his Republican Party. But it also revealed the minimal emphasis he placed on China, which meant he had no interest in sacrificing a lot to change the relationship. Finally, his Atlantic orientation sometimes led Ike to misread the power of nationalism in Asia.64 He could write to Treasury Secretary Humphrey that “few individuals understand the intensity and force of the spirit of

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nationalism that is gripping all peoples of the world today. . . . It is my personal conviction that almost any one of the new-born states of the world would far rather embrace Communism . . . than to acknowledge the political domination of another government even though that brought to each citizen a far higher standard of living.”65 He also recognized diversity within the Communist world and appreciated the importance of independence to people, such as the Chinese, who had been exploited by imperialist powers. Therefore, he believed that Mao maintained some freedom from strict Kremlin control. Nevertheless, when elites crossed the line to follow Communist precepts, Eisenhower thought they had abandoned their people. In the case of China, he could imagine conditions under which he might work with the leadership, and he sympathized with their anti-imperialism. At the same time, he failed to see why Beijing found his support for Chiang Kai-shek’s remnant regime intolerable. He would also fail to see why the Chinese Nationalists grew increasingly unhappy with him. Chiang and his advisers took unleashing seriously. Their expectations of support from Eisenhower substantially exceeded what the new administration proposed to provide. They were puzzled when the parameters of Republican assistance proved more restrictive than Truman’s. Chiang found that a consensus existed in Washington that a free Chinese government must survive as an alternative to Beijing’s Communism and as affirmation of U.S. credibility. But many in the U.S. government had a jaundiced view of the Kuomintang and were divided on basic issues, such as the nature of Sino-Soviet relations and the durability of a trade embargo. In some of these contradictions, Eisenhower took positions that would have made the Chinese Nationalists very unhappy had they known the truth.

CONCLUSION Dwight D. Eisenhower embarked upon his years in office in possession of a clear foreign affairs agenda regarding the fight against Communism. Americans had to be more aware and better prepared to battle that threatening ideology. The first priority would be Europe; the second, Europe’s colonial empire, whose disintegration endangered allied governments like those in London and Paris. The third comprised states whose politics had veered off

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course and might plunge into a Communist abyss. Thus the president involved his administration in places across the globe where vital interests such as natural resources and strategic waterways compelled defense against instability. The problems that excited and absorbed the president did not, however, include China. Eisenhower felt trapped by the immensity of the China problem, the intractability of its continuing civil war, the inflexibility of its ideological positions, and the seductiveness of its economy. He had inherited a policy with which he did not agree and which had ensured even greater dogmatism through his presidential campaign. A pragmatic thinker, Eisenhower disliked the extent to which U.S. policies isolated the nation from friends and allies who sought better relations with the Chinese. But what was he to do? He believed in the malleability of opinion. And yet if he tried to alter existing prohibitions on recognition, trade and UN admission, he risked jeopardizing more important objectives. Instead he spent 8 indecisive years wondering how the public would react if China policy changed. How much would the United States, the Republican Party, and Dwight Eisenhower benefit or lose if relations with China improved?

2 FIRE, BRIMSTONE, AND JOHN FOSTER DULLES

J

ohn Foster Dulles and Dwight Eisenhower made U.S. foreign policy together for seven years, during which time they established an effective working relationship. Dulles as secretary of state was, without doubt, the president’s key foreign policy ally, implementer, and emissary. Although Ike did not particularly like the secretary personally, he appreciated the man’s talents, experience, and status in the Republican Party. It would have been astonishing had Eisenhower appointed anyone else.1 As secretary, Dulles courted Ike, aware of the great importance of good relations with the president, learned in part from the difficulties that had developed between his uncle Secretary of State Robert Lansing and President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. Dulles deliberately contacted Eisenhower daily to review events and policies, but even more to remain vital to Ike’s decision making. Eisenhower would write that he and Dulles generally agreed on tactics and goals. By 1957, however, Eisenhower realized that most people who dealt with Dulles at home and abroad saw him as “legalistic, arrogant, sanctimonious, and arbitrary.” He was not, as one interlocutor remarked, “a likeable or well-balanced personality.”2 Some of this was personal style, and Eisenhower shared complaints about Dulles as aloof, austere, judgmental, and overzealous. On the other hand, Ike aggravated the tension surrounding Dulles by intentionally using him to deliver unpleasant messages and oversee execution of some of the least popular administration decisions. Accordingly, the usual picture of Dulles has been unflattering, highlighting the bombastic gambler whose fire-and-brimstone oratory mirrored an inner compulsion to fight Communism because of his uncompromising religious principles. Dulles became the emblem of the toughest administration

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initiatives. The doctrine of massive retaliation was firmly identified with him, for instance, even though he and Eisenhower had begun discussing the idea not long after meeting in 1948. Privately Dulles could be better appreciated as an effective statesman. Konrad Adenauer, president of West Germany, for one, saw Dulles as “a very sober, coolly deliberating person, a logical thinker, willing to listen to the arguments of others.”3 Those who would give Dulles so much credit were few. Even Dulles remarked, “I prefer being respected to being liked.” 4 In reality, for Dulles, and for Eisenhower, the rhetorical excesses repeated year after year sought to create a public safety zone within which they could operate with greater freedom. Both Eisenhower and Dulles publicly threatened and berated China, declaring intentions to crush a sworn enemy, throw the Communists out, and liberate the citizenry. They wanted conservatives and critics to be persuaded of their toughness, they wanted Communist governments to reconsider undesirable policies, and they wanted friends and allies to believe they were alert to threats. The problem proved to be the line between rhetoric and reality, between a purposefully created illusion and an unintentionally insurmountable barrier to rationale policymaking. Public discourse came to dominate confidential deliberations. The secretary and president frequently characterized China as repugnant and dastardly, leaving no room for the moderate views that the two policymakers shared and expressed privately. Like Eisenhower, Dulles approached his tenure in the Department of State as a bargain with ruthless political forces whose deference he could not take for granted and whose expectations made him cautious and defensive. An idealistic Wilsonian and a willing bipartisan in his youth, he became increasingly conservative to further his political ambitions in an environment of escalating anti-Communism. By the 1950s, he had emerged as a strident advocate of rolling back Communists and defending the Free World. Conversely, as historian H. W. Brands, Jr. notes, when Dulles was given opportunities for splitting the bloc at Joseph Stalin’s death, for instance, he “back[ed] away from the campaign promises of liberation,” warning instead that such efforts would expedite regime consolidation and spark war.5 Sounding quite different from the rabid public Dulles, in 1958 he told Under Secretary of State Christian Herter and Assistant Secretary for East Asia Walter Robertson, “I suspect that the determining cause of change in both Communist

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 27

China and Eastern Europe will be natural forces within rather than stimulants from without.”6 Descended from a family of diplomats, Dulles had amassed extensive international experience, particularly by representing the United States at countless multilateral conferences. Admirers considered him a broad gauged expert, so adept that he commanded Asian as well as European issues. His service as secretary to the Chinese delegation at the Second Hague Conference on Peace in 1907 and his travels to China and Japan in 1938 (when he met Chiang Kai-shek) unwisely led him to share this view of his expertise.7 Harry Truman appointed him to negotiate the Japanese peace treaty signed in 1951 and sought unsuccessfully to name him ambassador to Japan. Dulles preferred to stay in the heart of the action, not to be exiled to “the end of the transmission line.” 8 Dulles’s 1950 book War and Peace was a partisan effort to distance him from Democratic policies, reflecting his disillusionment with containment and attacking Truman’s decisions on Asia as dangerously unsuited to fighting Moscow.9 However, like his president and his predecessor as secretary of state, Dean Acheson, Dulles is more accurately classified as an Atlanticist. Europe took precedence, its adversaries and dependencies worthy of greater concern because of their role in European affairs. He worried mostly about Soviet threats to Europe and protecting the economic prosperity and political stability of France, Germany, and Great Britain. Asia seemed significant largely as its resources and markets served European interests or as an arena for thwarting Soviet ambitions. The people held little interest for him, and he demonstrated the widespread prejudice against “the Oriental mind,” which he regarded as “always more devious.”10 Even his appearance with the Chinese at the Hague taught him more about Europe than China.11 To Dulles the U.S. fight in Korea meant thwarting Stalin, an effort to “paralyze the slimy, octopus-like tentacles that reach out from Moscow to suck our blood.” The Koreans seemed almost irrelevant.12 He understood little about the internal dynamics of the region and proved slow to appreciate either the force of decolonization or third world nationalism.13 McCarthyite condemnation of the Department of State bolstered Dulles’s European orientation and defensiveness. From his perch as advisor to the Truman administration, where he advocated and sought to demonstrate bipartisanship, he saw Acheson denounced for curtailing aid to Chiang

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Kai-shek. Attacks on Acheson demonstrated the brute force of antiCommunist politics in America. Determined not to suffer Acheson’s fate, Dulles cultivated the China Lobby, joining with it to insure financing for the Nationalist Chinese and to stabilize Chiang’s international support. In charge of producing a peace treaty to end the Pacific war, he engineered a separate, parallel agreement between Tokyo and Taipei so that he could exclude Communist Chinese authorities from peacemaking and prevent relations with Japan.14 As secretary, he launched harsh rhetorical attacks on Beijing to appease the Republican right, hoping to distract them from his past record as a friend of Alger Hiss, a supporter of moderate, internationalist Republicans like Thomas Dewey, and his service in the Truman administration.15 Dulles knew that his international experience and enthusiasm for dealing with with foreigners made him suspect to conservatives. His refusal to shake Zhou Enlai’s extended hand at the Geneva Conference of 1954 reflected his willingness to sacrifice an informal exchange on neutral territory rather than risk headlines alleging that he was soft on Communism.16 Dulles, however, also was a pragmatic statesman who recognized that dealing with China was a complex problem with no obvious solutions. He understood that the Communist world should not be considered monolithic. During the 1930s, he had held onto the idea that Mao Zedong and his followers were “agrarian reformers.” At the end of the 1940s, although troubled by Moscow’s influence over Beijing, he wrote about the need to admit Chinese Communists into the United Nations.17 In 1950 he even penned a letter to Representative Walter Judd (R-MN), a powerful member of the congressional China bloc, to argue that the People’s Republic should not be isolated and barred from the UN for ideological reasons so long as it demonstrated that it could effectively rule its people.18 Until the Korean War, he hoped that Mao like Tito would follow an independent path.19 At his 1953 confirmation hearings, he suggested that it might be in American interests to open relations with Beijing if the Chinese Communists ever renounced their allegiance to the Soviets, knowing such remarks would produce howls of protest from Taiwan and the China bloc.20 Moreover, Dulles viewed Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang skeptically despite his self-protective endorsement of the Generalissimo. Early on he became convinced that Chiang did not provide effective leadership for the anti-Communist Chinese, and in 1950 he collaborated with Dean Rusk to try to drive the Generalissimo from power. Their plan, which substituted UN

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 29

figure 2.1 “Preparations for meeting China,” by David Low Courtesy of Solo Syndication Limited, United Kingdom.

trusteeship for a KMT government, did not win Acheson’s approval and Chiang survived to tighten his grip on Taiwan.21 Dulles’s hostility toward the Communist Chinese did not erase his visceral objection to the manipulative and opportunistic nature of the Nationalist government. When Eisenhower unleashed Chiang in 1953, Dulles followed with an admonition to the National Security Council that the Nationalist leader must not be allowed to see the new policy as license to attack China. Therefore he could not be allowed to purchase jet bombers until he had pledged not to use them recklessly in a manner inimical to U.S. interests. 22 In a world of great instability and danger, Dulles believed that Chiang would not hesitate to incite World War III if such a confl ict would promise to return him to the mainland. Over time—though few have noticed—Dulles’s dislike for the KMT grew, and his animosity toward the Chinese Communists abated. Although his determination to preserve a Free Chinese government on the island of Taiwan remained, he resisted Chiang’s efforts to shape American policy. He

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continued to see the KMT regime as unstable and doubted its durability, suggesting to the British Foreign Secretary Harold Macmillan in 1955 that, like the white Russian forces of the 1920s, the KMT regime did not understand developments at home and could disappear overnight.23 He found his efforts to collaborate with Taipei frustrating and ineffective. He struggled for many months to avoid an entangling alliance with Chiang that would restrict his freedom of action, relenting only in order to secure cooperation with a diplomatic initiative at the UN to try to end the Taiwan Strait crisis. More successfully, he blunted Nationalist efforts to provoke Beijing. Dulles, the alleged champion of Nationalist China, ignored Taipei’s protests against American interaction with the mainland. Those contacts took place primarily through ambassadorial talks held at Geneva and Warsaw, which Dulles agreed to reluctantly but came to appreciate. He saw the sessions as a way to enmesh China in aimless, stultifying chatter and urged his negotiator U. Alexis Johnson to do whatever he could to keep the conversation going.24 As long as the Chinese were talking, they would, he believed, refrain from shooting. Further, the talks shielded the administration from criticism that it refused to moderate tension in the Strait. But Dulles monitored the cable traffic from the U.S. representative carefully, often writing Johnson’s instructions himself, since the talks were the only point of contact and an opportunity perhaps to educate the Chinese.25 The consequence of his complex view of the China problem was a commitment to a policy of Two Chinas. Dulles insisted that a Free China must exist, but he also recognized that a Communist China did exist. Ignoring it long-term would not be productive. The Eisenhower administration might be compelled to behave irrationally on the subject, but he, and the president, hoped the period of insisting that Chiang Kai-shek represented the whole of China’s people would be short. He had, in fact, concluded that a Two Chinas solution was probably the only solution as early as 1950.26 Dulles accepted that Beijing’s suspicion of the United States and the Nationalists might be justified. He favored efforts to split China and the Soviet Union. And he had little hesitation, as he told the NSC, about “dealing with . . . [the PRC] on a de facto basis when circumstances make this useful.”27 The secretary’s convictions regarding China and Taiwan reflected more than a private intellectual journey. Dulles shaped his ideas based in part on interaction with a small group of men in the State Department whose views he trusted. Like other secretaries of state, Dulles created an inner and outer

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 31

department. Unlike most of his predecessors and successors, he not only gathered friends and allies into a tight circle of advisers, he used the outer array of officials to pretend fidelity to a particular political position, in this case China Lobby principles. Behind this protective shell, his inner circle disparaged Chiang Kai-shek and sought moderate approaches to handling the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The public face of Dulles’s State Department embodied a fervently antiCommunist China policy that staunchly supported Chiang Kai-shek. Dulles’s outer-ring appointments almost uncritically endorsed KMT priorities and interests. At times, the advocacy by Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs Walter Robertson, Director of the Office of Chinese Affairs Walter McConaughy, and Dulles’s two ambassadors to Taiwan, Karl Rankin and Everett Drumright, seemed so vociferous that colleagues questioned not just their judgment but also their loyalties. Since their appointments had been designed to deflect the “primitives” who had ruthlessly pursued Dean Acheson on China, however, they met Dulles’s requirements and expectations. Dulles could use their convictions and ignore their advice. Walter S. Robertson’s designation came at the direct suggestion of Walter Judd. Robertson had served in China as charge d’affaires ad interim between the ambassadorships of Patrick Hurley and John Leighton Stuart in the 1940s, as economic counselor in the embassy, and as U.S. commissioner at the Peiping Executive Headquarters during the civil war. 28 But what recommended him to Judd was his rigid anti-Communism and contempt for the Chinese followers of Marx and Lenin.29 Robertson believed so completely in the perversity of the Communist system that, although he possessed a degree of financial expertise from his banking career and had earlier been an economic advisor to the State Department, he rejected evidence of economic successes on the mainland and advised the secretary that U.S. pressures could force a collapse.30 If Roberston’s judgment sometimes failed, and his effort to enforce a pro-Chiang policy grated, the courtly Virginian was personally well liked. Robert H. Scott of the British Embassy considered it “impossible to doubt that [Robertson] is a man of honour and integrity” despite his “obstinacy and blindness.”31 Moreover, his political affi liation as a Democrat and his frustration with some of Dulles’s policies did not lessen his loyalty to the secretary. He was tougher on subordinates, who recalled he “was quite a desk-banger” and “had absolutely no use for the more balanced view that some of us took with regard to Chinese issues.”32

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Working in tandem with Robertson, Walter McConaughy imposed an equally inflexible view of Communist China upon his subordinates. McConaughy had actually been a critic of the Nationalists during his years as consul general in Shanghai in the late 1940s. He had favored trying to encourage Titoism among the Chinese Communists and warned Washington against provoking irredentist feelings regarding Taiwan. Repeatedly he told his superiors that Shanghai American businessmen and missionaries favored recognition of and trade with the Chinese Communists, hoping to lure China away from the Soviet Union.33 But McConaughy’s cautious sympathy for the new regime diminished with the harsh attacks on Foreign Service colleagues who had not condemned the Communist Chinese strongly enough. His sympathy disappeared entirely with the outbreak of the Korean War. Mao, he later said, “contemptuously rejected opportunities for friendship and normal relations” with the United States. All that could be done was “pressure and diplomatic isolation.”34 Neither Robertson nor McConaughy had to convince Washington’s representatives in Taipei of the rectitude of Chiang Kai-shek’s cause. Both ambassadors, Karl Rankin and Everett Drumright, agreed that the United States had no choice but to support Free China. Rankin admired Chiang’s honesty, intelligence, and determination to fight Communism as well as his willingness to cooperate with American officials and to bring Americantrained bureaucrats and officers into his government and his military. So convinced did Rankin become of Chiang’s centrality to the protection of U.S. interests that he knowingly wrote cables to Washington that exaggerated threats to Taiwan and drafted Nationalist government letters and cables to Washington.35 Hoping to strengthen the hand of those in Washington fighting for aid to Chiang, Rankin convinced others that he could not be trusted to represent the United States should its goals diverge from those of Nationalist China.36 Rankin actively opposed Dulles’s pursuit of a Two Chinas policy, which he dismissed as a London plot designed to rescue British investments at the cost of American principles. 37 Any thought that Mao could be weaned from the Soviets by being nice to him Rankin considered ludicrous. 38 Admitting Red China to the United Nations would be dangerous as it increased China’s prestige, signaled acceptance of permanent Communist control, encouraged accommodation of Asian states to Beijing, and weakened the coherence and authority of the UN.39 Rankin went so far as to declare American

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 33

ideals wrong for Taiwan: “We are trying to develop strength on this island, and the introduction of reforms or Western democratic ideas should be pushed only as they promise to increase the sum-total of that strength.” 40 Everett Drumright championed the Nationalist cause almost as vociferously as Rankin. He brought to the ambassadorship years of China experience dating back to 1931, but like Robertson, it was Drumright’s conservative political credentials that facilitated his confi rmation by the congressional China bloc.41 Less than six months after he arrived in Taiwan during the 1958 Straits crisis, he urged Washington to approve Nationalist attacks on mainland artillery batteries and called for the defense of Jinmen.42 Finally, to Dulles’s chagrin, Henry Cabot Lodge made his post as the United States representative at the United Nations an independent power base, trading on his ties with Eisenhower, which dated from World War II, and blossomed as Lodge enthusiastically participated in efforts to draft Eisenhower to run for president.43 An old-fashioned aristocrat who has been caustically described as “a collection of fine qualities in search of a personality,” Lodge represented moderate Republicanism. Dulles objected to Lodge’s strong opinions on a variety of issues, including China. Lodge was not just too outspoken in support of the Nationalists; he also demanded to be given discretion to veto Red China’s admission to the UN.44 The views of these men suggested a secretary of state seeking likeminded officials to staff his department. But Dulles did not rely on any of these people when he made China policies. Dulles saw them as biased and their advice hazardous.45 At the same time, Dulles, despite his notorious aloofness and selfconfidence, did have advisers he trusted. The secretary depended upon a small collection of intimates with whom he could review and argue about options and who would not leak information to pro-Chiang media or members of Congress. The precise composition of this “kitchen cabinet” fluctuated, but key figures included Robert Bowie, Douglas MacArthur II, Herman Phleger, and Livingston Merchant.46 During some periods, he met with them daily, early in the morning. All were European-oriented generalists lacking China expertise to bring to deliberations, but all distrusted Chiang Kai-shek, resented the China Lobby, and favored a more constructive approach toward Beijing. Robert Bowie as director of the Policy Planning Staff, although originally appointed by Bedell Smith, rapidly impressed Dulles with his sharp

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intellect and blunt advice. According to biographer Townsend Hoopes, “Dulles relished a real argument when he respected his opponent,” making Bowie “an important catalyst on a range of major issues.” 47 Bowie opposed uncritical support for Chiang Kai-shek and sustaining “the total illusion about Chiang’s real role.” He reflected years later about his differences with Walter Robertson, noting that “Robertson was too decent a person to be a real zealot. . . . He knew that from time to time I’d taken a different view about China. Not that I had illusions about China, I didn’t think we were going to have a friendship,” but Bowie urged reexamination of American policy toward the People’s Republic.48 During his 1956 confirmation hearings, he advocated granting Beijing a United Nations seat, adding that China would have to moderate its behavior to qualify.49 Efforts to isolate China could not, he believed, be sustained, and when that wall crumbled, Washington’s prestige and influence in Asia would be damaged. Instead, the United States should embrace the pariah state, allowing journalists to travel to China and including Beijing in arms control talks. He supported Dulles’s Two Chinas policy, which, as Bowie summarized it, would accept the permanency of both Chinas, embark upon a long, slow process of bringing the PRC into international organizations and “call for eventual recognition of both countries by most states (but not necessarily by [the] US).”50 Douglas MacArthur II also entered the State Department with connections to Eisenhower rather than Dulles. As with Smith, Eisenhower may have sought to use MacArthur as a means of keeping the pugnacious secretary contained and monitoring his contacts with the isolationist Taft wing of the Republican Party. A shrewd and urbane diplomat, MacArthur served in Europe before World War II and was interned by the Nazis. Subsequently, he joined Eisenhower’s staff in London and Normandy, despite past familial friction with Ike. He headed the Western Europe Bureau at the State Department and played an important role in the establishment of NATO. Between 1951 and 1953, he served as international affairs adviser to the Supreme Command in Europe, resuming a productive and warm relationship with Eisenhower. At Ike’s behest, in 1953 he became State Department counselor, giving up a stint as ambassador to Vietnam, and Dulles made him the department’s liaison with the NSC and subsequently coordinator of plans and policies. MacArthur routinely accompanied Dulles to meetings with Eisenhower at the White House and traveled around the world with him as well. Quite early he overcame whatever suspicions Dulles might have entertained

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 35

about his loyalties, and they collaborated easily.51 As he told MacArthur, Dulles needed someone who would tell him when he was wrong.52 Like the others, MacArthur saw the third world through the lens of Europe’s needs and interests. Nevertheless, he recognized the power of decolonization movements and believed that Asian nationalism would have to be accommodated. For expressing those sentiments among State Department Europeanists, “some of them sort of put their fingers to the side of their eyes and made slant eyes at me, as if I’d suddenly changed my nationality and I’d committed a heresy by talking this way.”53 MacArthur proved instrumental in establishing the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), although he thought it irredeemably flawed given the membership of colonial powers. He also became ambassador to Japan in 1957 and negotiated a new Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the United States and Japan. He saw himself as a “EUR boy” but more than most took a hand in Asia policy. Regarding the future of China and Taiwan, MacArthur worried that “If Taiwan ever fell into unfriendly hands, then there would be the capacity . . . to interdict communication between the north and the south, our positions . . . in the Philippines and in Japan, and we would, in effect, have to have two Seventh Fleets . . . and it would be an intolerable position.”54 Nevertheless, he did not urge strong support for the Kuomintang government in Taiwan, believing as did Dulles that it would not be returning to the mainland. Thus he reinforced the secretary’s determination to avoid closer ties with the Kuomintang. Aversion to the KMT also colored Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Livingston Merchant’s recommendations regarding America’s China policy. Merchant, a brilliant, lively, and funny addition to Dulles’s circle, spoke consistently for the primacy of European interests and disparaged the less important, less effective, and less reliable Nationalist Chinese.55 He had originally encountered KMT corruption and incompetence during his tour of duty in Nanjing during the civil war years and wrestled with the resulting problems when he rose to be assistant secretary for Far Eastern affairs. In 1949, Acheson sent him on a special mission to Taiwan, hoping that Merchant could find a viable independence movement that would allow the Truman administration to jettison Chiang Kai-shek. Merchant reluctantly concluded that no effective movement existed and Chiang remained too strong to overthrow. But he also advised against giving the Generalissimo further American assistance.56 It was while Merchant

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struggled with the decline of Kuomintang fortunes that he first worked with Dulles, collaborating on the Japanese peace treaty.57 Herman Phleger, a distinguished lawyer and judge who signed on as the State Department’s legal adviser, had known Dulles since 1945 and probably became his closest confidant. Sharing the secretary’s lawyerly approach to international issues, Phleger possessed the same pragmatic attitudes, combative style, and facile mind. But where Dulles seemed prone to exaggeration and simplification, Phleger emphasized precision and caution. Even when the Chinese Communists provided grounds for retaliation, as in the detention of American military personnel, Phleger urged restraint.58 Dulles demonstrated his absolute trust in Phleger’s views by placing him in charge of the difficult and politically dangerous talks convened in 1955 between Washington and Beijing (known as the Ambassadorial or Warsaw Talks), trusting him to coordinate information and help draft instructions to the American delegation.59 Perhaps the most critical support Foster Dulles got in formulating his ideas and department policies, however, came from Allen W. Dulles, director of the CIA. The Dulles brothers joined the overt and covert resources of foreign policymaking in a uniquely intimate embrace. Although Allen and Foster could hardly have been more different in personality—the CIA chief amiable, gracious, and humorous, liked by all, and the secretary aloof, austere, and everyone’s least favorite person—together they proved a formidable force on a range of issues vital to the nation. As Allen Dulles biographer Peter Grose noted, “Allen was ever imaginative in devising intelligence operations that by their very nature determined the shape of national policy.”60 Or, as Allen himself joked, he served as the secretary of state “for unfriendly countries.”61 Allen, however, had shied away from Asian affairs, sharing his brother’s conviction that countries in Asia were not as important as those in Europe. Further, he maintained that he did not understand the region, a conclusion possibly confi rmed by months of travel in India, China, and Korea during the year following his graduation from Princeton (1915). In 1926 he resigned from the Foreign Service rather than accept an appointment as counselor to the American embassy in Beijing. His uncle Robert Lansing, speaking as secretary of state, urged him not to go, saying “that problem will not be solved in your lifetime.”62 Allen did plan a brief foray to China in 1946 to negotiate an aviation treaty, but Sullivan and Cromwell’s senior legal partner refused

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 37

to let him go. By 1950, he had left both diplomacy and law behind to become the head of covert operations, the deputy director of plans, at the CIA. Apart from official interest or disinterest in China, CIA activities proved ineffective in Asia during the Truman years. Efforts to spark an uprising against Mao went nowhere, and operations in Korea and Burma similarly failed. Two CIA agents, Richard Fecteau and Jack Downey, were even lured into a trap and imprisoned for decades in China. Allen Dulles had not been part of that dismal history, but it did not make involvement in China issues more appealing when he returned to clandestine duties and collaboration with his brother. During the Eisenhower administration, the agency worked erratically in Asia. Just four months after taking office, Eisenhower sent intelligence veteran “Wild Bill” Donovan as ambassador to Thailand, where he spent the next eighteen months plotting covert actions against the Communist Chinese. He was followed by John Peurifoy, fresh from overthrowing the Guatemalan government of Jacobo Arbenz in Operation Success, who continued Donovan’s efforts. Meanwhile in Indochina, Allen Dulles opted to rely on France for information. After the defeat at Dien Bien Phu, Allen sent Edward Landsdale , a bold operative who had been assisting Ramon Magsaysay of the Philippines, to Vietnam to promote the fortunes of Ngo Dinh Diem.63 Allen Dulles’s disinterest in China, however, did not deter him from making the CIA a haven for China specialists whom he chose to protect even when Foster was sacrificing them to Senator Joseph McCarthy’s antiCommunist crusade. Allen himself, however, remained an activist, not an analyst. Allen’s more usual indifference to China strongly suggests that he never pushed Foster to implement any particular China policies. Rather, Allen acted as confidant and sounding board for the difficult decisions his brother had to make despite increasingly divergent views.64 Finally, there were the members of Congress. Dulles did not rely on them for advice, but he believed that an intimate embrace would protect him personally as well as the policies of the administration. Not the least, talking to Congress before launching initiatives co-opted the leadership and spread responsibility if things went badly. Some, such as William Knowland, he regularly spoke to by phone and met frequently over breakfasts, working hard to defuse his harsh critiques especially regarding China. Others he found he could cooperate with even on China, such as Senator Walter George (D-GA), with

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whom he met at least biweekly.65 Throughout, Dulles took the time out of a heavy schedule to court key individuals and neutralize them. As historian Richard Immerman has observed, “Dulles paid inordinate, indeed obsessive attention to coalition building and protecting his bases of power,” having learned from the past that “pandering” would pay. Thus “Dulles appeared more prone to appease than to lead.”66

CONCLUSION John Foster Dulles was neither the fanatic that detractors have suggested nor the sole architect of American foreign policy in the 1950s as admirers have insisted. Dulles functioned as Dwight Eisenhower’s partner, advisor, front man, and subordinate. He shaped Eisenhower’s policies but never made decisions without consulting the president. He consulted a small coterie of intimates on his decisions but otherwise ignored proffered advice. As the president trusted his own judgment in military affairs, so Dulles believed he understood diplomacy better than most anyone else. Dulles, however, shared Eisenhower’s disinterest in Asia and dismay at having to pay so much attention to Chinese affairs. He probably knew somewhat more about the region than the president—negotiating the Japanese peace treaty having been a better learning opportunity than serving with MacArthur in the Philippines. Even more than Eisenhower, Dulles feared the Republican right and the China Lobby, feeling the constraint of partisan politics and public opinion to a degree that most secretaries of state have not. Thus, in seeking to understand why so little happened to resolve the China problem, one need only to look at the menacing atmosphere of the time and the higher priority accorded other goals. Joined with ignorance about and indifference to Chinese realities, the ominous environment made it far easier and less painful to go along with the existing flow of anti-China rhetoric and action than to behave responsibly and change things. It is not surprising that Dulles and Eisenhower accomplished little. Moreover, abandonment of Taiwan never became an option. As much as Dulles and Eisenhower might deplore its leaders, they considered the existence of a Free China vital for inspiring the Asian region and ensuring

Fire, Brimstone, and John Foster Dulles | 39

confidence in American pledges of support. This was not yet a time to rearrange the structure of the Cold War. Eisenhower and Dulles worried about and were possessed by the burden of ideology and security. They intended to fight Communism everywhere and waged a vigorous struggle around the world. Still, China was not Guatemala. However committed to saving the Free World, Eisenhower and Dulles were simultaneously pragmatic statesmen and politicians.

3 CONSTRAINTS

E

isenhower won the presidency in 1952 after a Republican campaign indicting the Truman administration and Democratic Party for failing to protect national security, containing Communism rather than liberating its victims, and engaging in reckless spending. The Truman administration’s internal security program, it was said, had not rooted out Communists at home. Abroad Truman had plunged the nation into war in Korea, blundered into a wider contest with China, and proved unable to win, or even end, the fighting. In one of the rare presidential races that focused on foreign affairs, Eisenhower capitalized on his World War II reputation as a bold leader who had surmounted enormous obstacles in pursuit of victory. He told the American electorate to trust him to go to Korea, bring the boys home, and prevent any new wars from erupting. Upon entering the White House, Eisenhower dedicated himself to developing capabilities to wage a more potent Cold War. Thus his administration reexamined security policies in a long, complex exercise code-named Solarium and produced a “New Look” defense policy in 1953 that relied on nuclear arms as a more effective, and cheaper, deterrent than conventional forces. During his tenure, a reduced emphasis on ground troops nevertheless placed soldiers in forty-two countries while the U.S. nuclear arsenal swelled from 1,200 to more than 22,000 warheads.1 Growing military power encouraged his secretary of state belligerently to describe U.S. strategy as brinksmanship—that is, going to the threshold of war to force the enemy to capitulate—based on a willingness to meet provocation with massive atomic retaliation. Eisenhower’s administration expanded NATO, pursued a European Defense Community, and launched SEATO and the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO).

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In the election, Eisenhower triumphed not only over the Democrats but also over the isolationist wing of his own party. He relished the challenge. Dedicated to internationalism and alliance building, Eisenhower continued Truman’s struggle to get Europeans to arm themselves and to strengthen NATO. He worried about nuclear weapons and arms control, mindful of the increased likelihood of proliferation after Moscow exploded its first atomic device late in 1949, well ahead of U.S. expectations. He sought to use his popularity to reassure Americans that their engagement with the world was necessary and desirable. To mount his initiatives, Eisenhower reshaped various government institutions. He refurbished the National Security Council (NSC), which, having been created in the 1947 National Security Act, had languished under Truman’s disinterested leadership. Eisenhower added members, convened the group regularly, multiplied the number and responsibilities of the staff, recast the post of presidential national security advisor, and heralded its ability to help him make decisions. His concern about security and efficiency led him to rely more on the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to implement foreign policy than had his predecessor, carrying out covert and semicovert operations and using psychological warfare, subversion, bribery, and assassination. Eisenhower toughened Truman’s loyalty and security programs, emphasizing threats that could come from information leakers, sinister “pinkos,” and potential targets of blackmail, like homosexuals. At the State Department, foreign service officers who had warned of the growing power of Communism in Asia were fired, as though their alerts about a Communist future suggested advocacy of the same.2 Eisenhower and Dulles had publicly and with considerable vitriol deplored the direction of American foreign policy under Harry Truman. In additional to inadequate zealousness in pursuit of Cold War goals and an inconclusive hot war in Korea, the Truman administration, they complained, left them other unresolved crises. Problems festered in Germany and Eastern Europe over tightening Communist control—in Egypt, Iran, Morocco, and Tunisia owing to agitation against faltering colonial rule; in Cuba, Guatemala, and Indochina due to weak governments vulnerable to Communist infiltration; and in Africa because of inadequate guarantees of access to vital resources such as uranium in the Congo. Consequently, Eisenhower and Dulles faced upheaval in a decolonizing Congo; Moscow’s repression in Hungary and Germany; instability in Lebanon and Iraq; the Suez crisis;

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war in Indochina; and the advent of Fidel Castro’s control of Cuba. There would be another category of thorny dilemmas, including the launch of Moscow’s Sputnik spacecraft and its shooting down of a U-2 spy plane. In each of these arenas, Eisenhower and Dulles felt Communism hovering, quick to exploit any misstep. Eisenhower and Dulles shared, but also cultivated, the 1950s national obsession with Communism. Vibrant anti-Communism won elections, ensured broad media exposure, and shielded politicians from critics. No one lost popularity for demonstrating anti-Communist fervor, but denunciation and disgrace hounded those insufficiently critical of leftist ideas and ideals. Presenting the Communist threat as monolithic, moreover, was simple and safe. Movies, television, literature, art, and the churches highlighted and exaggerated concerns about vulnerability to enemies at home manipulated by enemies abroad. Ordinary Americans waged patriotic crusades to uncover insidious subversives fouling the fabric of American life. Indeed, the highly popular 1956 science fiction thriller Invasion of the Body Snatchers told Americans that neighbors, friends, and lovers could be Communists in disguise. A majority of angry and frightened Americans in 1954 told pollsters that Communists should be jailed (52 percent) and deprived of their citizenship (80 percent). The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), under J. Edgar Hoover, spent the decade chasing Reds and ignoring organized crime.3 And then there was Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-WI), a self-proclaimed Communist hunter, whose vicious attacks Eisenhower refused to confront directly but whose baleful influence on the president’s behavior was undeniable. Eisenhower recoiled from a fight with McCarthy, despite hostility toward the senator, because of McCarthy’s renown among millions of Americans and his sway in Congress. McCarthy neither shrank from destroying lives, nor from contorting American foreign relations, imbuing Republican campaigning with an ugliness that his more sober colleagues did little to dissipate. Beginning in February 1950, having been sensitized to the utility of the Chinese revolution, he tirelessly charged that Communist sympathizers in the U.S. government had facilitated Mao Zedong’s victory. The help McCarthy received from members of the China Lobby, and its congressional China bloc, reflected frustration with a Democratic Party that, they believed, had humiliated and abandoned Chiang in 1949. Ignorant of Chinese conditions, McCarthy nevertheless responded eagerly to suggestions that condemning the Communist triumph would invigorate

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his political career. In the process, he served the interests of China Lobbyists who sought, at all costs, to ensure future aid for and support of Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese Nationalist cause. The China Lobby’s adherents comprised a loose coalition of businessmen, labor leaders, journalists, scholars, missionaries, and politicians. They supported Chiang because of investments—material and spiritual—as well as anti-Communist sentiment—real or politically driven. During the 1940s, they attempted to shape policy but generally fell short, not yet able to wield much political power.4 With the outbreak of the war in Korea and McCarthy’s opportunism, their influence grew. During the 1950s, they would become a daunting constraint in SinoAmerican relations. Even after McCarthy’s influence waned, Eisenhower and Dulles continued to temporize on China as they worried about the repercussions of change, inaction being far easier than reconsideration of mistaken policies. That China could engender alarm among voters came as an abrupt departure from the past. A legacy of missionary work and World War II efforts to rescue Chinese victims from Japanese aggression cast the Chinese as impotent—sometimes contemptible, sometimes piteous, always weak and dependent. Americans since the middle of the nineteenth century pictured themselves as benefactors in China, caring for the sick, illiterate, and poverty-stricken masses whose government chronically proved too ineffective to provide for its own people. They might see Chinese rulers as venal and ruthless, but incompetence meant that China posed no challenge to the United States. Even the rapid Communist triumph in the Chinese civil war seemed to be as much a case of Chiang Kai-shek’s collapse as the emergence of a significant military force. The Korean War, however, changed earlier assessments and made a China threat tangible. Americans assumed Chinese connivance in launching the war, sustaining North Korean forces fighting the war and resisting negotiation to prolong the war. They found, to their astonishment, that Chinese troops fought formidably. Americans quickly fell back on stereotypes and prejudice. Chinese who had seemed hopelessly inept became frightening amalgams of yellow peril and red fascism.5 Chinese soldiers were not brave on the battlefield; they demonstrated “mass lunacy.”6 The United States had, of course, only just emerged from the brutal racism of the Pacific War, in which Japanese and Americans had come to see each other as subhuman and had infl icted ap-

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palling brutalities upon soldiers and civilians alike.7 The United States bore a history of discrimination at home against Asians that had produced an avid anti-immigration movement, exclusion laws, and repeated episodes of violence. In Korea, again, the cultural and racial clash paralleling the political agenda led to barbarity. “I couldn’t get over how cruel we were to the prisoners we captured,” Private Mario Scarselleta of the Thirty-Fifth Infantry told journalist Max Hastings.8 Charges of U.S. bacteriological warfare in Korea— use of plague, cholera, encephalitis, and meningitis—gained currency because of the known racism of Americans.9 Eisenhower displayed this same bigotry. A southerner born in the nineteenth century, Ike saw nonwhites as underlings, not equals. He was content to live in a segregated nation and had no compunctions in telling “nigger jokes” in the White House. He insisted that change in discriminatory policies at home and abroad could only come slowly through “moderation.”10 In 1948 he had testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee that the U.S. military should not be desegregated. During the 1957 Little Rock crisis over school integration, Eisenhower insisted, “you cannot change people’s hearts merely by laws.”11 As president he met with black leaders just once, in 1958, perceiving them as ungrateful for the concessions he thought he had made to them.12 Members of Eisenhower’s administration at all levels shared his bias. Assistant Secretary for East Asia Walter Robertson, with southern roots as deep as Ike’s, dismissed peaceful coexistence with the Chinese as a “siren song” and likened the People’s Republic of China to Nazi Germany.13 Dillon Anderson, who advised Eisenhower on national security, defended the idea of dropping nuclear weapons on the Chinese because “they can breed them faster in the zone of the interior than you can kill them in the combat zone.” John Foster Dulles believed and thoughtlessly told V. K. Wellington Koo, the Republic of China’s ambassador, that “the Oriental mind . . . was always more devious than the Occidental mind.”14 He and brother Allen, descended from South Carolina slaveholders, ignored discrimination. U.S. diplomats, who refused to join segregated social clubs, were disparaged by embassy coworkers for having “gone Asiatic.” The FBI’s head J. Edgar Hoover “viewed the mere advocacy of racial equality as a subversive act.”15 Other officials rejected Chinese calls for peace as “Asian trickery.”16 This broad-based racism had a chilling effect on U.S. foreign policy and America’s international image. It stirred anti-American sentiment abroad,

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providing fuel for Cold War attacks. Moscow struck out at the United States for touting freedom and equality but practicing discrimination and repression. China publicized acts of racism in the United States to nonwhite peoples of Africa and Asia. But administration leaders were not embarrassed enough to exert effective pressure for even-handed policies.17 Their reticence reinforced suspicions that Washington’s position on decolonization owed a lot to racial intolerance. In the aftermath of World War II, agitation for self-rule swept the globe. Americans subscribed to the idealism of anti-imperialism and self-determination but doubted its wisdom in practice. Emergent nationalism appeared dangerously vulnerable to Communist exploitation. The stability and sobriety of colonial powers was by contrast reassuring and seemed to strengthen Washington—since these were also U.S. allies—in its struggle with Communists both in the rising third world and in Europe. Furthermore, it seemed critical to avoid upheaval that could threaten access to raw materials for U.S. business and potential military bases in the event of war.18 Racism magnified the political problem as Americans were easily persuaded that new nonwhite governments lacked the education or acumen to run their nations effectively. Accordingly, Eisenhower and Dulles sympathized with aspirants to independence but identified with the imperialists, disregarding the fact that across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, nationalism moved people far more often than did Communism. China benefited from the U.S. predicament. Its racial makeup provided a link to third world societies, its revolutionary experience provided a model for liberation struggles, its mid-1950s foreign policy moderation broadened its appeal, and its economic progress served as an inspirational exemplar. The Chinese understood the humiliation of exploitation by the West, having endured a century of semicolonialism and near national extinction. Beijing could authoritatively deploy anti-imperialist rhetoric to condemn Washington. Washington tried to portray Communism as a new, virulent colonialism but failed. Eisenhower complained to the British ambassador that in Asia “colonialism is not colonialism unless it is a matter of white domination over colored people.”19 Having approved, or acquiesced in, the efforts by imperial powers to resist loss of empire, moreover, Washington’s credibility on the subject vanished. U.S. officials found that “despite our massive economic aid and military assistance . . . our anti-colonial record [for instance, the United States had granted independence to the Philippines in 1947], our recognized good

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intentions, our free and diverse society, we seem to be becoming more identified with the negative aspects of the past and the status quo.”20 To undo the damage, Washington counted on psychological warfare, employing a broad range of tactics from public relations to subversion to influence opinions, ideas, emotions, and behavior as well as the policies of friend and foe.21 Dwight Eisenhower welcomed the challenge. Some of his zeal stemmed from successful propaganda work during World War II, the rest from his enthusiasm for adapting the marketing techniques of a thriving business enterprise.22 The overseas campaign focused on telling the world’s people that U.S. goals were their goals. The administration established the United States Information Agency (USIA) in 1953, reassembling and reinvigorating Truman-era outreach. It replaced the Psychological Strategy Board with a more muscular Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) to organize clandestine warfare, plan covert political actions, and sharpen weapons of cultural, economic, and political pressure. Eisenhower appointed a special assistant for psychological warfare. To enhance its persuasiveness, the administration used catchy, upbeat packages, such as “Atoms for Peace,” a program to deliver civilian energy generation without proliferation. Like Open Skies, which promised greater transparency regarding nuclear installations, Atoms for Peace portrayed the United States as candid and eager to alleviate simmering nuclear nightmares that one staff member described as “bang-bang, no hope, no way out.”23 Voice of America (VOA), for its part, energetically publicized developments like the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision on desegregating U.S. schools to counter denunciations of racism and government inaction. It did so even though Eisenhower made clear he disliked the court ruling, which he believed ignored the feelings of white southerners.24 Simultaneously, at home the administration crafted initiatives to sell its message. Eisenhower created the fi rst congressional liaison staff and met routinely with congressional leaders. Dulles testified often on Capitol Hill. Both the president and the secretary held frequent press conferences (Ike’s tally for 8 years was an exhausting 193) and cultivated individual reporters notwithstanding Eisenhower’s complaint to his diary that journalists were humorless, vain, arrogant, and destructive.25 Eisenhower held the fi rst televised White House news conference. There were even efforts to cooperate

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with the still fledgling television industry in producing educational broadcasts inspired by the Defense Department.26 Shaping opinion took priority, but understanding popular thinking on foreign affairs from polls, news media, and Congress aided decision making. Government operations, such as the Public Studies Division at the State Department, continuously scrutinized radio, television, periodicals, and press commentary, distributing reports to various agencies on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Polling on foreign affairs questions, available to officials since the 1930s, and after 1945 secretly supported by the State Department through a contract with the National Opinion Research Center (NORC), also reduced dependence on Congress and the press.27 Other less formal mechanisms alerted the White House to public opinion. The president benefited from evaluations of opinion analyst George Gallup, a protégé of Sigurd Larmon, the latter a close friend of Ike’s. Similarly, Hadley Cantril, who had helped Franklin Roosevelt wrestle with polling data, served as a consultant to the Eisenhower White House. Further, the Republican National Committee contracted with the world’s second largest advertising agency, Batten, Barton, Durstine, and Osborn, two of whose executives knew Eisenhower from his Columbia University days, to conduct spot-checks of public views and deliver them to the White House every Monday.28 Press secretary James Hagerty regularly sought out polling data and occasionally suggested questions for surveys.29 Overall, according to H. Schuyler Foster, longtime head of the Public Studies Division, feedback to his office emphasized the usefulness of the data “as a corrective of individual impressions.”30 Polling citizens, of course, did not make them better informed about international relations, cognizant of the biases inherent in poll questions, or willing to admit ignorance. Nevertheless, in the most general sense, what polls, newspapers, and the Congress showed was that, like the president and his secretary of state, ordinary Americans—across regions, religions, gender, and income levels—and their representatives thought about Europe, not Asia, and wanted the government to dedicate its attention to European rather than Asian problems.31 During the decade, polling also suggested that the citizenry gradually became less frenzied anti-Communists, although opinion remained changeable. Their skepticism about peaceful coexistence with the Communist bloc, for instance, subsided so that by mid-1959, 66 percent of respondents thought

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it possible.32 Trade with the Soviet Union, which only 40 percent supported in 1953, received 55 percent approval by the end of the decade. People welcomed the 1955 Geneva summit conference, which helped push Ike’s popularity to 79 percent, and Nikita Khrushchev’s visit to the United States. Regarding China, fierce hostility persisted longer and was easily intensified, but a key analyst of opinion on China has argued that “as policy slowly moderated in the 1950s, so also did opinion.”33 In essence, whatever Eisenhower and Dulles expected to see on China they could find.

CONCLUSION Eisenhower and Dulles pursued a foreign policy seemingly of extremes. They pledged that they would strengthen the free world and stop Communist expansion. Theirs would be an era of liberation rather than passive containment. They would support states willing to declare fealty to the right side in the Cold War and undermine those that might possibly join Moscow. If that meant working with an apartheid South Africa and a fascist Spain while overthrowing wayward governments on the left, so be it. They would welcome nationalism rhetorically but would not back decolonization. They would operate an executive branch, and especially a State Department, purged of Communist infiltrators and sympathizers. Theirs would be an administration outfitted with new people and institutions prepared to wage a more efficient and effective Cold War. But things were not always what they seemed. The reality of the Eisenhower years did not necessarily match administration intentions or the picture that historians have drawn. On a number of fronts, the two diverged significantly. To begin, although Eisenhower campaigned against the Democratic Party’s passive strategy of containment, the Truman administration had, as Ike knew, pursued rollback. And even as Eisenhower insisted on the necessity and rightness of liberation, operationally he adopted containment, recognizing that he could not push the Soviets out of closely held and inaccessible places. 34 Eisenhower also railed against Truman’s Europe-first policy. He called “the defense of freedom . . . indivisible” and insisted that “all continents and

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peoples [would be held] in equal regard.”35 In fact, as the profi le of Ike in chapter one makes clear, he had a slim knowledge and cared minimally about countries outside Europe. He, too, placed the concerns of U.S. allies in Europe well ahead of problems in Asia. Eisenhower and Dulles publicly condemned the Communist bloc as voracious and monolithic. Privately, however, they subscribed to the notion that states could be Communist and yet not part of an international conspiracy. The image of a unified red menace made Americans more cohesive and rallied foreign friends and allies. To Winston Churchill Eisenhower wrote that the perils of not fighting Communism everywhere and at all times were that “we would create the impression that we are slinking along in the shadows, hoping that the beast will finally be satiated and cease his predatory tactics before he finally devours us.”36 The United States must appear, as well as be, invincible. Eisenhower’s praise of a decisive NSC was for show. The president deliberated on and decided policy in the Oval Office alone or with a close circle of advisers. He almost always came to discussions such as those convened in the NSC with his views set, simply allowing participants in these spirited debates to think they were shaping his choices. Most often he used the NSC as a vehicle to educate members of his administration regarding his views and priorities. That he spoke disparagingly of his administration’s China policies, therefore, did not mean he sought action and was thwarted. He assumed even before he aired his frustration that he was trapped by the Cold War, right-leaning politics, and the public.37 As many scholars have shown, Eisenhower believed passionately in psychological warfare and the use of the presidential podium to instruct citizens. It is also evident that he abdicated his responsibility to do so on critical issues including race, anti-Communist extremism, and China. The amusing side of his failure was his “jumbled syntax, his confessions that he ‘did not know’ about this or that issue, and his often inappropriate or impossibly confusing answers,” which baffled the press.38 But although Ike never could be characterized as an exciting speaker, he could have expressed his thoughts clearly had he wanted to, and he could have used his broad popularity to address controversial questions. Actually, Eisenhower and Dulles had complicated views about public opinion. It worried them and they saw it as a constraint. As is true of most high-level officials, they denied being unduly influenced by the public.

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Dulles told the press in 1958 that “you cannot allow your foreign policy to be dictated by public opinion” because it might not be “sound.”39 Eisenhower confided in his diary his dismay with civilian leaders who viewed the attitudes of their citizens as immutable, similar to “a thunderstorm or a cold winter.” He believed as a military commander that public opinion could be altered through dynamic leadership and education. But his reality diverged significantly from his self-image. On race, on Joseph McCarthy, and on China, he refused to speak out, hoarding his influence for things that mattered more to him.40 It should not be surprising, given these contradictions, to find that the president’s articulated policy on China and his convictions about China differed. As he went forward to engage with the decisions, problems, and crises of his tenure, he knew what he should do about China but not how to do it. He recognized the need for leadership and his own abilities to spur action, but he rarely reached the point, and then not on the most critical questions, where China mattered enough to him to take risks.

PART II THE PRACTICE

4 FEAR OF COMMUNISM

A

s Dwight Eisenhower and John Foster Dulles sought to make policy toward China, they balanced public opinion against flexibility and pragmatism. History suggested that in that contest, listening to opinion—whether of the congressional China bloc, the broader China Lobby, the Republican right, the Nationalist Chinese, or the general public—would be vital. Many serious dilemmas remained unresolved, from the lingering Chinese civil war, to the deadlocked Korean confl ict, to the trade embargo and travel restrictions. The new leaders in Washington had to settle or find ways to manage political, security, economic, and cultural problems. In almost every instance, the administration pursued a tough policy. But Eisenhower and Dulles were careful not to cast the Chinese as unredeemable with nothing to offer the West. Not only was this view unpopular abroad, it did not comport with reality, it did not promise commercial benefits for Americans, nor did it provide opportunities for deescalating confrontation through diplomacy. A careful review of the new—and old—sources regarding policymaking in the 1950s shows that the Eisenhower-Dulles team pursued a more interesting and nuanced approach than historians have accorded to the administration. Although the political trends of the period comprised formidable barriers, Eisenhower and Dulles sought alternatives and complained privately about a persistent lack of maneuvering room. China, though it had a detestable government, was not just a potentially Communist Iran or a more chaotic Guatemala that merited covert action to topple an undesirable regime. China was entirely different in both the type and scale of the problem as well as the importance of a resolution to the world community.

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By the time that Eisenhower and Dulles entered office, they understood that the Chinese Communist regime, however loathsome to Americans, would endure. Dulles spoke often about the disintegration of Communism in China, but neither he nor others in positions of authority actually expected a change of government on the mainland. Intelligence and national security papers consistently affirmed Mao’s control and spoke of China’s growing prosperity, industrialization, and military modernization, which ensured stability and popular support for the regime.1 The U.S. government accordingly never sought to overthrow the Communist Chinese. Contrary to the usual image of Eisenhower and Dulles as dedicated proponents of liberation, they abandoned the most belligerent features of Republican doctrine on China, such as regime change and rollback, in the presidentially approved paper NSC 5429/5 (December 1954).2 In fact, the NSC deliberately left out a key point of the earlier NSC 166/1 directing the United States to render assistance to Taiwan for raids and “other offensive operations” against China. 3 Instead, the Eisenhower administration readjusted its image of Asia and its regional goals. With a hostile government at the center, Washington worried about the defense needs and trade potential of Asia in an entirely new context. Japan, Korea, Indochina, and Taiwan all comprised potential targets for Chinese intimidation and/or subversion. Fresh from Korean War battlefields, Americans, perhaps unavoidably, emphasized containment and isolation. And yet, recognizing that the People’s Republic of China would survive, Eisenhower and Dulles knew there were benefits to dealing with the Chinese as well as potential hazards in ignoring them. It would be this struggle between approaches to China that would characterize the thinking of the president, his secretary of state, and many officials around them. Even though Eisenhower and Dulles understood they could not disregard China, a broad consensus in the country made engagement impossible. The State Department office responsible for public opinion research told the new administration in January 1953 that “the overwhelming weight of opinion in the United States holds that the Chinese Communist regime is a willing and subservient tool of the Kremlin and opposes any steps toward [a] relationship with the regime.” 4 Korea posed a formidable barrier to improving U.S.-China relations from the moment Chinese crossed the Yalu River and engaged U.S. troops. As promised in his campaign, Eisenhower searched for a way to end the war,

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but his options were few. Intensifying the fighting as the Joint Chiefs of Staff proposed meant air and naval attacks on China as well as use of tactical atomic weapons and so was unacceptable to Ike. On the other hand, the persistence of war in Korea led 60 percent of Americans polled in a March 1953 canvas to call for arming the Chinese Nationalists to blockade and bomb the China coast.5 The China Lobby cultivated this sentiment and utilized it to pressure the administration. Confronting such strong negative views, Eisenhower believed that U.S. trade with Beijing would be unacceptable and relations anathema. Conversely, Eisenhower began his presidency with an unexpectedly fluid situation internationally. Shortly after his inauguration, Joseph Stalin died and at the funeral on March 9, 1953, the new prime minister, Georgii Malenkov, announced a “peace offensive” aimed at ending the Cold War. Charles Bohlen, U.S. ambassador in Moscow, and members of the NSC called for cautious but friendly policies as Soviet leaders withdrew territorial claims against Turkey, offered to reestablish diplomatic relations with Israel, Yugoslavia, and Greece, and made substantial military budget cuts. China, much like the Soviet Union, emerged from the Korean struggle seeking better relations with Washington. Like Moscow it wanted to facilitate domestic development, which required a peaceful and stable international environment and integration into the world community. A policy of peace would allow Beijing to improve relations with the United States even as it facilitated efforts to alienate Washington from Taipei and from its European allies. A policy of peace might also render China’s markets more appealing and accessible. Thus China developed its own version of peaceful coexistence in 1952 that, historian Chen Jian has noted, was seen by the Chinese as “fundamentally different from the dominant codes and norms created by Western powers.”6 It entailed mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, nonaggression, noninterference in internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence. Zhou presented the principles in 1953 to Jawaharlal Nehru—with whom the so-called Pancha Shila are most often identified—and to the Geneva conference in 1954, where China highlighted mutual benefit and tolerance.7 Mao was no less determined to pursue China’s core objectives, such as recovering Taiwan, reforming the economy, and cooperating with the Soviet Union, but believed that the threat from the United States had diminished.8 “‘The law of imperialist war’, Zhou said in June 1953, ‘is that the

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weakest will be the first target of attack.’ As long as China continued to build up its strength and influence, it was highly likely that ‘the US may not dare to attack China.’”9 Furthermore, Eisenhower had too many problems, too many worldwide obligations, and too many disputes with allies to desire a confrontation with China. Indeed, Eisenhower issued his own call for peaceful coexistence in April 1953 in his “Chance for Peace” speech urging the new Soviet leadership to demonstrate its break from the Stalin era.10 Eisenhower rejected the somber predictions that basic Communist policies would not change. Although he suspected that they might be duplicitous in their peace feelers, he sought to grasp the potential opening and, in any case, ensure that peace not be perceived as a Soviet idea .11 Nevertheless, Beijing and Moscow encountered resistance from Washington. Despite Ike’s potentially positive approach and the encouragement of allied powers, such as Britain and France, the United States failed to formulate an effective policy of conciliation, instead devoting its energies to building positions of strength. John Foster Dulles scoffed at the tentative initiatives from Moscow and Beijing, insisting that the Communists simply sought to fracture the Western alliance. By 1955, his view would shift and he would caution against “rebuff [ing] a change which might be that for which the world longs,” but in 1953 he asserted that Eisenhower’s “Chance for Peace” did not mean any softening of U.S. policy.12 The president’s entreaties would not end parallel efforts to cultivate power and stockpile arms.13 As though anti-Communism was not enough to discourage accommodation, racism played a significant part in China policy, reflecting the contemporary ethos in America as well as Eisenhower’s personal biases. As noted previously, the president had few reservations about segregation, ignoring the plight of minorities. A prominent Japanese observer wondered “If Americans can regard Negroes as inferior, how do they really regard Asians?”14 He and others would have been appalled had they known that privately the president thought of them in stereotypically bigoted ways. When trying to understand Jawaharlal Nehru’s neutralist policies, for instance, Eisenhower concluded that India’s leader would overlook more Communist violence than would a Westerner because “life . . . is cheaper in the Orient.”15 Accordingly, toward the Chinese Eisenhower brought a paternalistic and patronizing attitude to bear. He told advisers that “we are always wrong when we believe that Orientals think logically as we do.” He characterized

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his adversaries in Beijing at various times as “hysterical” and “fanatical,” taking Mao’s rhetoric about atomic bombs being “paper tigers,” for example, as evidence of depravity, not self-protection. Even the Soviets seemed more civilized and approachable than the Chinese since, Eisenhower asserted, they “were human beings, and they wanted to remain alive.”16 In fact, Eisenhower did not see China as seriously menacing the United States and used such rhetoric to prove to China’s enemies in America that he was aware of, and alert to, the China threat. Although Eisenhower and Dulles understood that they could not topple the Communist government in China, they did not hesitate to try to destabilize it. A CIA operation (Project Paper) along the China-Burma border that had been launched in 1950 to force Beijing to move troops away from the Korean theater endured throughout the 1950s, consolidating under the leadership of Nationalist Chinese General Li Mi. The force of several thousand soldiers who had fled defeat in mainland China set up a base in Burma’s unruly minority Shan state and plotted attacks on the Chinese. Two major thrusts occurred in 1950 and 1952 and smaller forays in 1953 and 1954, but all failed abysmally. Meanwhile, the troops began trading in opium and arms and attacking local villagers. Fearing internal unrest and potential Chinese intervention, the helpless Burmese authorities appealed to Washington to terminate the feckless venture. Given mounting international criticism, the Eisenhower administration pretended to end it. In fact, the alleged evacuation of 1954 was a sham, with weapons left behind and soldiers resuming their insurgency after training in Taiwan.17 As late as May 1959, the effort continued, although intelligence agents were forced to admit to Eisenhower that Project Paper had been ineffective.18 Eisenhower similarly built on CIA involvement in Tibet that had begun in the Truman years. In 1951, with Chinese occupation imminent, the U.S. ambassador in India offered the Dalai Lama asylum in the United States, where he could be an international symbol of the struggle against Communist tyranny. In exchange, the United States would provide his followers with immediate financial and military aid and future support for an autonomous Tibet.19 The Dalai Lama, however, chose to stay in Tibet and tried to accommodate to Chinese rule until authorities launched a vigorous atheist indoctrination campaign. The subsequent violence gave U.S. intelligence new opportunities. In 1956, the CIA created a Tibetan affairs unit in the Division of Operations in response to Dulles’s desire for a more active Tibet

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policy. The secretary had little real interest in Tibet but thought it a useful platform for disrupting Chinese Communist governance. Eisenhower personally approached India’s Prime Minister Nehru regarding schemes to support the Tibetans. Nehru, who had been shocked by Soviet intervention in Hungary and pleased with U.S. handling of the Suez crisis, agreed to ignore airspace violations as the CIA supplied Tibetan resisters. 20 Operation Circus created enough turmoil to necessitate, and provide cover for, the escape of the Dalai Lama in 1959. U-2 flights assisted in pinpointing rebels and People’s Liberation Army (PLA) columns while transport aircraft dropped supplies and weapons. But Washington sought to harass Chinese Communist forces, not to promote political change. The administration did not favor independence, preferring continuing turmoil. In February 1960, Eisenhower acknowledged this reality, speculating that “the net result of these operations would . . . be more brutal repressive reprisals by the Chinese Communists.” 21 Eisenhower nevertheless approved further involvement and passed the effort along to John F. Kennedy upon leaving office.22 The administration conducted additional covert efforts to overthrow or cripple unreliable Asian governments. In Cambodia the CIA mounted an anti-Sihanouk rebel movement and supported efforts by an indigenous force, with help from Thailand and South Vietnam, to detach the province of Siem Riep. The Laotian struggle aimed at thwarting neutralism by flooding the country with economic and military aid and ended up driving moderate Laotians to side with the Communist Pathet Lao in opposing an Americansponsored government. Eisenhower allowed his intelligence, diplomatic, and military representatives to become even more deeply involved in Vietnam, taking over from France after the 1954 rout at Dien Bien Phu, dividing the country at the Seventeenth Parallel and creating a pro-U.S. regime thoroughly dependent on Washington. Finally, the administration waded into Indonesian politics to stem what it saw as growing Chinese influence by using the CIA and the Seventh Fleet as well as assistance from Taiwan, the Philippines, Britain, and Australia to oust President Sukarno. 23 For Washington it was simpler to justify covert interference in Indonesian politics if Sukarno could be portrayed as a Communist dupe rather than a nationalist. 24 The main impetus to all these interventions was the Eisenhower-Dulles fear of Communism’s rapid spread. China, although poor and backward, could wreck havoc across the region, surpassing others with its “coherence,

Fear of Communism | 61

discipline, mobilizing power, and sense of purpose.”25 While in places like Guatemala or Iran, the president and secretary had to guess at Communist affi liation and intentions, in China they knew that Communists were in charge and dedicated to extending Communist influence. In 1957, Mao even sought to reconcile his peace policy (Pancha Shila) with support for Communist insurgencies by asserting the higher calling of world revolution.26 Th roughout the region and beyond, moreover, there appeared to be evidence not just of turmoil but of Chinese penetration. Overseas Chinese populations remained scattered everywhere with unclear loyalties and the potential to subvert weak governments. According to the Taipei Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, thirteen million Chinese lived overseas, with the largest concentration in Thailand and populations exceeding one million in Malaya, Indonesia, Hong Kong, and Vietnam.27 Washington monitored overseas Chinese communities at home and abroad. Until 1954, both Taipei and Beijing unabashedly attempted to seduce these communities and secure their substantial remittances. Beijing found that although it was more successful than Taipei, it was also more feared and resented.28 Southeast Asian governments saw “recruitment” activities as destabilizing and considered the overseas Chinese increasingly as outsiders to be discriminated against. In many cases, anti-Communism melded with longstanding resentment that under colonial rule, Chinese had come to dominate local economies.29 Increasingly, Beijing worried not just about discrimination against overseas Chinese but also about the alienation of governments whose good will and support Beijing desired.30 Thus, the People’s Republic retreated in 1954, recommending that Chinese minorities pledge allegiance to local authorities, declaring that it would no longer welcome dual citizenship, and denying that revolution could be exported.31 Nevertheless, the contest between Beijing and Taipei persisted, 32 as did American efforts to influence overseas Chinese.33 Washington tried to persuade Taipei to welcome the overseas Chinese to Taiwan even though inside the United States, the FBI suspected Chinese Americans of harboring sympathies for the Red Chinese.34 Chiang’s government resisted, fearing that it might import Communist agents, and competitors for local businessmen and intellectuals.35 Taipei also wanted to maintain communities of sympathizers in Southeast Asia who would fight the Red Chinese and champion the Republic of China (ROC) cause. Washington might be caught between supporting local governments and assisting

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Chiang Kai-shek, but Chiang’s motives were not divided and Taipei cooperated only grudgingly. 36 Eisenhower and Dulles deplored Chiang Kai-shek’s shortsightedness on this and other issues. Dulles, in fact, had a history of wrestling with the “Chiang problem.” In 1950, having been recruited by the Truman administration to work on the Japanese peace treaty, he lent his weight to a scheme of then Assistant Secretary Dean Rusk to neutralize Taiwan. Agreeing with Rusk that Chiang’s leadership was dismal and deploring Kuomintang avarice, he supported the idea of eliminating the Generalissimo and making Taiwan a UN trusteeship. As secretary, he did not seek to oust Chiang but continued to complain of the Generalissimo’s misguided policies. Dulles and Eisenhower lamented Chiang’s resistance to local investment, a policy the latter distained because, he believed, it squandered military resources and made his people content to remain in Taiwan.37 They objected to a military budget that consumed roughly 15 percent of Taiwan’s gross national product and made up some 85 percent of the government’s expenditures— roughly double that of the United States. But although Taiwan had become one of the most militarized societies in the world (its equivalent in the United States would have yielded eleven million soldiers), they believed a return to the mainland far exceeded KMT capabilities. Moreover, it would not be welcomed by the Chinese people.38 Chiang, however, argued that a return to the mainland would be neither as difficult nor as costly as Eisenhower and Dulles imagined. Aware that he could not hope to sustain an offensive without American assistance, Chiang assiduously sought U.S. equipment, training, and logistical support but with minimal U.S. oversight.39 He followed the traditional path for small countries that manipulated their large power protectors by using one part of the U.S. government against other segments of the administration.40 In this he had an ally in the U.S. ambassador whom Dulles recognized as a Chiang partisan. Karl Rankin argued to Washington that a retrained, disciplined, and properly armed Nationalist military might be able to provoke rebellion in China and topple the Communists. He undermined Dulles by advising Chiang to ignore assertions that there would be no U.S.-assisted attack; eventually the United States would have to help him.41 Admiral Arthur Radford furthered that illusion by asking Chiang in July 1953 whether he would be willing to let Americans command an assault.42

Fear of Communism | 63

Initially thrilled by Eisenhower’s election victory, Chiang had come to see the president as lacking “common sense.” Dulles he dismissed as “a purely opportunistic politician.” 43 He resisted efforts to reorganize his forces, eliminate political indoctrination, and modernize command and control. He had no compunctions about attempting to circumvent administration “interference” through sympathizers in Congress and the executive branch.44 Chiang’s dedication to the enterprise of mainland recovery disturbed Eisenhower and Dulles most of all because it threatened to plunge the United States into an unwanted war. Even refusing to support an invasion would not immunize Washington if Nationalist forces became trapped on a collapsing beachhead. This possibility seemed magnified as the Nationalists began, in March 1953, to lobby for a mutual defense treaty. Eisenhower had elevated the concept of alliance diplomacy to a core strategy in fighting the Cold War. Washington concluded a security pact with the Philippines, launched talks with South Korea, and undertook planning for SEATO, which was loosely modeled upon NATO. Taipei wanted equal guarantees as well as public confirmation of Washington’s commitment to the Nationalist cause.45 Kuomintang entreaties grew strident during the winter of 1954 as the French position in Indochina crumbled and Communist expansion appeared increasingly likely to engulf Taiwan. Eisenhower and Dulles, however, resisted a treaty. The president believed that an alliance agreement would be an unduly large and hazardous commitment. Dulles considered a formal tie to the Nationalists undesirable, necessitating consultation and dictating types and levels of support that he preferred to determine unilaterally. Moreover, the secretary believed he could better restrain Beijing if China’s leaders did not know the extent of Washington’s obligations for Taiwan’s security. Most particularly, Dulles preferred to keep the status of a scattering of Nationalist-held islands off China’s coast nebulous.46 Eisenhower worried about staking U.S. prestige on retention of indefensible island chains, remarking later that on military grounds, “in any struggle involving only the territory of those islands, we would see no reason for American intervention.” 47 Early 1954 also looked like a singularly ill-chosen moment to discuss treaty relations. France had grown weary of its costly and ineffective war to save its Indochina colonies and opted for an international conference to seek a negotiated peace. The United States preferred that the French fight on to

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prevent Communist domination of the area but would not provide the aid required to forestall the Geneva conference scheduled for spring 1954. Movement toward a security pact with Taiwan would, therefore, be perceived as a deceitful attempt to derail the proceedings. Dulles, who often incurred criticism from allied governments for rash or belligerent acts, in this case saw no reason to antagonize them.48 Indeed, he had a clear incentive not to irritate the French as they approached a decision that Dulles considered crucial, on whether to approve creation of a European Defense Community that would arm and integrate Germans into the defense of Western Europe. Pointing to this critical juncture, the State Department’s European and United Nations bureaus as well as the Policy Planning Staff opposed an accord with Taipei. To Chiang, by contrast, the impending Geneva meetings provided still more reason to demand a treaty. Once the great powers convened at an East Asian conference dealing with Indochina and Korea, there were no assurances that Taiwan would not be discussed. Only if the United States aligned itself unambiguously with the Kuomintang through a mutual security pact could Chiang have confidence that adverse action would be deterred.49 Chiang called upon the U.S. Congress and Vice President Richard Nixon to press his case.50 Probably the strongest opposition to a treaty came from Beijing, which saw it as a security threat and a barrier to consummation of the Chinese civil war. Mao had grown increasingly dismayed that there had been no progress on the Taiwan issue and that the Chinese people and the world community either ignored or accepted the status quo.51 Already menaced by American military units based in Japan and the routine patrolling of the Seventh Fleet, Beijing now confronted the possibility that U.S. forces would be permanently stationed just 100 miles from the Chinese coast. To deter Washington, Chinese leaders looked first to diplomacy and then, when thwarted, turned to military means. The diplomatic opening came with the conference in Geneva. China joined with the United States, Britain, France, and the Soviet Union to address problems in Korea and Indochina. China’s international standing immediately rose even though Washington firmly declared that the invitation to Beijing carried with it no implications of recognition.52 Indeed, Dulles objected to sitting at the same table with Zhou and refused to shake the premier’s extended hand lest he be condemned by Republican hard-liners

Fear of Communism | 65

figure 4.1 “The Red Piper of Peking,” by David Low Courtesy of Solo Syndication Limited, United Kingdom.

who had denounced the inclusion of China at Geneva and warned Dulles against contact with Chinese representatives.53 The Chinese, however, grasped the opportunities provided by Geneva. Mao decided that “the door can no longer and should not be kept closed,” that China had to engage the world. China’s strength had reached the point that his injunction to “have the house swept first and then invite guests in” had been honored.54 Beijing fielded a large and skillful delegation, including two master chefs to captivate delegates through food diplomacy.55 Furthermore, Beijing used Geneva as a vehicle for initiating future diplomatic interaction with Washington. Declaring that China would facilitate the release of U.S. citizens if direct discussions began, Beijing made talks with the United States inescapable. The Chinese understood that some Americans in the government and specifically in the U.S. delegation supported a fresh approach toward Beijing.56 Mao asserted that divisions placed Eisenhower in a moderate camp arrayed against Dulles over how much risk to take in Sino-American relations.57 And, late in May, American diplomats told Soviet and British authorities that elements of their own policy were

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“unrealistic” and that changes might be possible.58 Zhou responded with alacrity. The talks, which occurred on four occasions during June 1954, focused narrowly on the repatriation issue, eschewing any broader agenda. Eisenhower would not permit dialogue over improved Sino-American relations, Taiwan’s future, a Taiwan treaty, or the impending SEATO alliance. But Chinese leaders hoped that simply talking would improve relations, convincing Washington not to sign a defense treaty with Taipei.59 After the Geneva meeting ended, the two sides agreed to continue exchanging views at the consular level.60 Thus, the fact of direct contact between Washington and Beijing had been established even if there had been no breakthrough on specific issues in dispute.

CONCLUSION Dwight D. Eisenhower and John Foster Dulles believed that U.S. security depended on opposing the Soviet Union and protecting Europe. They found that Asia demanded much more of their time than anticipated or desired. Both the pressure of events and the demands of opinion groups forced them to try to understand Chinese affairs and wrestle with the dilemma of China’s influence in the region. They came quickly to understand that the Communist regime would remain in power in Beijing and would challenge them politically and militarily in places like Geneva, Southeast Asia, and the Taiwan Strait. They mounted clandestine efforts to destabilize the Chinese government—it was not in U.S. interests to watch Chinese power grow— but never seriously considered trying to oust the Communist regime. Given the need to deal with a China that challenged U.S. interests, the president and secretary of state searched for policies that facilitated interaction without angering the public, the Congress, or the Republican right. For Dulles, working with two Chinas was the obvious solution: a China in exile and a China that ruled the vast preponderance of the Chinese people. He tried to maintain his freedom of action, avoiding as long as possible a mutual defense treaty that tied Washington to Taipei. And he worried about the possibility of war triggered by Chiang Kai-shek but destined to be fought largely by Americans. Eisenhower similarly suspected Chiang’s motives, lack-

Fear of Communism | 67

ing sympathy for his policies and actions. Nevertheless, neither man could imagine abandoning Chiang and the so-called Free China government in Taiwan. Caught between complaints from allies about the unreasonableness of their China policy and demands from the domestic China Lobby and the Republican right to be even more rigid, they did not promulgate a coherent plan for handling Chinese affairs. That would become especially vexing when the situation in the Taiwan Strait exploded in 1954.

5 NO INHERENT WORTH

J

ust one week before Eisenhower’s inauguration, Beijing shot down an American plane dropping leaflets over Manchuria and took eleven American servicemen captive. Three others died in the wreckage. Demands swept the United States for a naval blockade of China. Among others, Senator William Knowland, future Senate majority leader, wanted immediate action. The call to arms grew louder when, during the Taiwan Strait crisis of 1954–1955, Chinese courts sentenced the eleven soldiers and two CIA agents to prison terms of 4 years to life for espionage. Again members of Congress and Ike’s own military advocated a prompt response. At both junctures, however, the president rebuffed talk of a blockade.1 Reflecting the broader trajectory of his China policy, the president ignored provocation from Beijing and domestic pressure, determined to avoid a clash with the Chinese. Beijing had not been nearly as judicious. Although Chinese leaders delighted in the direct diplomatic contacts with the United States in 1954, they quickly realized that progress on recovering Taiwan would not result from a few cordial conversations in Geneva or elsewhere. They knew that they lacked the capabilities to attack Taiwan but worried that the international community might conclude that Beijing had accepted national disunity. Not only had talks failed, but the United States continued to arm Taiwan, and a mutual security treaty between Washington and Taipei seemed imminent. Accordingly, Mao decided to use force rather than words to demonstrate that the status quo was not viable and that closer U.S.-Taiwan relations and any broader U.S. effort at encirclement of China entailed high costs and risks.2 Beginning just two days after the Geneva conference ended, Chinese leaders launched a campaign calling for the liberation of Taiwan. On September 3,

figure 5.1 “Fighting man vs. fighting mad!,” by James T. Berryman With assistance from the Center for Legislative Archives, National Archives and Records Administration.

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as delegates convened in Manila to inaugurate SEATO, Beijing followed threats with bombardment of Jinmen island, which was located in the Taiwan Strait but just two miles from the major Chinese port city of Xiamen. The chain of offshore islands, of which Jinmen was a part, had been occupied by Nationalist troops fleeing the mainland in 1949. People’s Liberation Army efforts to capture them had failed, and the KMT had gradually fortified and garrisoned them. Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee feared that American imperialists, defeated in Korea and unable to sustain the French war in Indochina, would now use Taiwan and the islands as staging areas to overthrow the PRC.3 According to new Chinese sources, Mao did not seek to start a war with the United States and apparently did not believe the shelling would spark a crisis. From the Chinese perspective, the bombardment, although more sensational, was just another confrontation in a long civil war. Later testimony of Chinese military commanders and the contemporary assessments of the CIA contend that China never mobilized to seize Jinmen, nor did it have the ability to attack Taiwan.4 Instead, Mao intended to reinforce his claim to Taiwan, appeal to world opinion, and coerce Washington into abandoning Chiang. He wanted to forestall the signing of a defense treaty, but, at the very least, deter any coverage of the offshore islands.5 Mao, however, drastically miscalculated Eisenhower’s perceptions and reactions. Rather than consider the Chinese Communists measured and modest in their actions, Ike concluded that they were “completely reckless, arrogant . . . and completely indifferent to human losses.”6 The July 1954 downing of a British passenger plane by a PRC fighter aircraft causing the death of ten, among them three Americans, testified to Chinese Communist irresponsibility.7 Moreover, there had been a pitched battle between Communist and Nationalist forces over the Dongshan islands in July 1953, and Beijing had asserted air control over the Dachen islands during the spring of 1954.8 Eisenhower and Dulles were probably also jolted by the failure of their efforts to deter Chinese aggression through naval deployments and public warnings. Beijing might not be able actually to seize Taiwan, but U.S. officials found its publicly announced determination to try unnerving and treated this as a major crisis. Eisenhower and Dulles, of course, could not have known what Communist Chinese leaders hoped to accomplish. Even with better sources or greater contact through diplomatic relations, Americans would have had

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trouble penetrating Chinese deliberations. As it was, the United States collected data through espionage, from allies and refugees, as well as out of open publications, but this yielded little in the 1950s and often proved unreliable. John Melby, a foreign service officer with China experience, evaluated the effort as of 1952 as “so bad that it approaches malfeasance,” and Ray Cline, a CIA Taipei station chief, stressed in his memoir that it was “important . . . to emphasize how little we knew about mainland China.”9 What the Chinese planned to do and what was happening inside China remained elusive. The Soviet model and the Sino-Soviet alignment suggested broad parameters but not the critical details. American understanding of, and expectations for, Chinese activities sometimes hewed close to reality, with intelligence estimates tending to be judicious and cautious. At other times, the intelligence community dramatically misread developments on the Chinese mainland, as with their relatively upbeat assessments of the economic impact of Mao’s Great Leap Forward. Former intelligence analyst and China specialist Robert Suettinger summed up the China problem by noting that studies of Chinese affairs had to “delve into a realm of speculation, a dense process of trying to separate out the probable from the possible from the impossible . . . providing answers . . . with an appropriate degree of uncertainty.”10 Eisenhower preferred to fight the Cold War as a cold war. He delighted in propaganda campaigns designed to subvert leftist governments and free captive people. He had supported similar activities in World War II, and they meshed well with his belief in government instigating, but not carrying out, change. Eisenhower’s enthusiasm ensured a worldwide growth in paramilitary activities, espionage, and psychological warfare.11 Although willing to use force, Eisenhower and Dulles preferred to undermine, not overthrow, governments. Emphasizing psychological warfare made it possible to reserve the use of military, paramilitary, and covert action for small-scale and deniable ventures. Thus the administration moved from Iran in 1953, to Guatemala in 1954, to Lebanon in 1958, to Indonesia in 1957–1958, to Cuba in 1960 and never directly confronted an adversary possessing sufficient military might to retaliate effectively. For larger, stronger, or more sensitive opponents, its activities focused on psychological means, leaving coup plotting behind; such was the case with China. Making information available to and implementing propaganda campaigns for the president, however, was not easy. On the eve of the Eisenhower

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administration’s inauguration, Truman’s Psychological Strategy Board deemed operations against the Soviet Union and China largely ineffective. In both cases, leafleting had occurred, but radio broadcasting—which would be so critical in Guatemala and Eastern Europe—fell short: the Soviets jamming it and the Chinese lacking radios on which to listen.12 Furthermore, however poorly the U.S. government did in getting its message out, it had even less success in stealing secrets: American spies in China remained scarce, the Chinese published few reliable economic statistics and less political data, and refugees and collaborators sold information that too often proved fraudulent.13 Signals intelligence that could monitor China’s relatively rudimentary telecommunications would eventually allow the Pentagon, the National Security Agency, and the CIA to gather useful information, but in the early 1950s, it remained “so bad that a senior CIA official referred to this period as ‘the dark ages for communications intelligence.’”14 Working with regime opponents similarly yielded questionable results. Intelligence cooperation with the Chinese Nationalists floundered quickly because of Republic of China (ROC) ineffectiveness and unreliability. The Taiwan intelligence community wildly exaggerated the size of potential insurgent forces on the mainland and repeatedly proposed unrealistic operations to spark a revolution.15 CIA veteran James Lilley recalled that “we came to see our Taiwan partners . . . as refugees, dependent on the U.S. for work and pay. This was not a productive situation for collaboration.”16 Other sources proved similarly unpredictable. Third Force contacts on the mainland—groups from the Chinese political fringe—proved less useful than Taiwan; much of what the former “gathered” turned out to be rewritten newspaper copy. In colonial Hong Kong, British authorities facilitated American access to refugees, travelers, and businessmen, passed along information from their own civilian and military intelligence services, and tolerated one of the largest CIA stations in the world (allegedly close to 600 persons), but the yield remained irregular.17 Accordingly, when the shelling of Jinmen began, Eisenhower and Dulles lacked information and could not be certain of Chinese intentions. China’s use of force shocked the president and secretary of state, especially since two Americans died in the initial barrage. As a result, and directly contrary to Mao’s hopes, the military action forced Dulles to move forward with the mutual defense treaty he had been resisting. Earlier, Beijing’s bellicosity coupled with Robertson’s persistence and negotiation of the SEATO pact

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excluding Taiwan had weakened objections. Valued advisors to the secretary Robert Bowie of Policy Planning and Livingston Merchant from European Affairs withdrew their opposition, cautioning only that any security guarantee must not be extended to the offshore islands.18 Others urged that Congress commit publicly to administration policy through treaty ratification.19 Dulles’s surrender, however, came only after Beijing’s artillery barrage forced the issue. Although Washington did not know why China acted when it did, the United States bore some responsibility for the attack on the offshore islands. The United States had encouraged Chiang to garrison the vulnerable bits of land off China’s coast. In November 1953, Eisenhower accepted a plan of action regarding Taiwan from the National Security Council (NSC 146/2), which had explicitly called for assistance in the defense of the islands and support for raids on commerce and territory.20 Subsequent Nationalist operations, using the islands to disrupt Communist China’s trade routes and spy on communications and military dispositions, rendered them logical targets.21 Nevertheless, Chinese Communist shelling was seen as aggression. Reversing decisions made on several occasions after 1950, three of the four Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) advocated an immediate declaration that the United States would defend the islands using nuclear weapons if necessary. In NSC 162/2, approved by the president in October 1953, the United States declared that Taiwan was of sufficient importance to necessitate U.S. military participation in its defense. To ensure victory, nuclear bombs would “be as available for use as other munitions.”22 To JCS Chairman Radford, Air Force Chief of Staff General Nathan F. Twining, and Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Robert B. Carney, the Jinmen bombardment constituted the first step in an invasion of Taiwan and, therefore, activated NSC 162/2.23 Although they conceded that the islands were not crucial for the defense of Taiwan, all three emphasized the psychological state of Taiwan’s government and people. Predictably, Walter Robertson’s shop at the State Department agreed with the JCS conclusions, wanting “such severe punishment on the enemy’s naval and air strength . . . as to significantly impair his chances of success.”24 For others, conversely, it was the insignificance of the islands that argued against vigorous U.S. action. General Matthew B. Ridgway, chief of staff of the army, emphasized the islands’ vulnerability, insisting that it would be folly to try to hold them in the face of an all-out Chinese assault. Dismayed

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by his fellow chiefs, he urged the others to think strategically, not politically.25 The secretary of defense similarly dismissed the islands’ value.26 Acting Secretary of State Walter Bedell Smith urged Dulles to oppose intervention despite the deaths of two American military advisors. Those in the department who, like Smith, opposed military action noted that foreign opinion, highlighted in a special intelligence summary on September 4, feared U.S. recklessness.27 Even Rankin, writing from Taipei, discounted the incident as a political gesture. The intelligence community, moreover, concluded that not responding to the shelling would not invite an attack upon Taiwan. Barring an explicit U.S. abandonment of Taiwan, no expansion of military action should be expected.28 For Eisenhower and Dulles, three key contingencies shaped the decision regarding the U.S. response in the Strait: that the islands were too difficult to secure given their proximity to China’s coast; that they were not essential to Taiwan’s survival; and that China was not then prepared to attack Taiwan. Dulles abandoned his initial preference for defending Jinmen, noting that Chinese Communist goals were limited and that congressional and public opinion did not support an aggressive policy risking global conflagration.29 Eisenhower rejected radical action to hold the islands, pointing out that “we’re talking about going to the threshold of World War III.” A war with China could not be limited, and if such a war developed, the actual adversary would quickly become Moscow, although the president believed that the Soviets did not want war.30 “It was better,” Eisenhower thought, “to accept some loss of face in the world than to go to general war in the defense of these small islands.”31 Besides, the American people, he noted, could not understand why this mattered to the United States. “Quemoy is not our ship” he observed and added that the letters coming to the White House strongly questioned “what do we care what happens to those yellow people out there?” The president, accordingly, told the NSC that he “was personally against making too many promises to hold areas around the world and then having to stay there to defend them” since “if the Communists, by making faces and raising hell, can tie down U.S. forces, they will use that device everywhere.”32 Dulles thereupon sought a diplomatic solution. He turned to the UN and sought to involve the international community.33 But recognizing the potential for Nationalist Chinese interference and domestic political repercussions, Dulles camouflaged the U.S. initiative. He persuaded New Zealand

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to propose a cease-fire resolution to the UN Security Council and then pretended to Chiang that he had been caught by surprise. He urged, nonetheless, that the Generalissimo concur, demonstrating Taiwan’s reasonableness while Beijing and Moscow inflexibly blocked the resolution.34 In fact, both Chiang and Mao condemned Dulles’s internationalization of their domestic dispute.35 Opposition also flourished elsewhere. Secretary of Defense Wilson and Mutual Security Director Harold Stassen cautioned that once the offshore island question had been brought to the UN, there would be no way to prevent discussion of Taiwan’s status and its UN membership. Vice President Richard Nixon warned darkly of damage to the UN. Many Americans believed that UN restrictions in Korea had cost American lives and would protest UN interference on Taiwan.36 Dulles, nonetheless, persuaded the president to support Operation Oracle, as the New Zealand initiative was called. The secretary himself believed, and was not troubled by the thought, that “a probable ultimate outcome of UN intervention . . . would be the independence of Formosa and the Pescadores.”37 Thus, through the actions of the Chinese themselves, Two Chinas, the policy he preferred, would be achieved. At the same time, however, Dulles capitulated on the long-sought mutual defense treaty to minimize KMT intransigence.38 A transparent bribe to secure Chiang Kai-shek’s cooperation, the defense treaty also turned out to be a mechanism for U.S. control. Under the provisions and secret codicils, the United States required notification from Taipei prior to any large-scale use of Nationalist troops against China, reserving the power to veto such operations. In effect, this blocked mainland recovery. Moreover, Washington refused explicitly to include the offshore islands in the treaty, although ultimately the Eisenhower administration accepted compromise language from Taiwan’s Foreign Minister George Yeh regarding “such other territories as may be determined by mutual agreement.”39 The treaty protected Taiwan but lessened the threat to Beijing and thereby reduced the likelihood of war. For these very reasons, the treaty disappointed Taipei. The ROC ambassador, V. K. Wellington Koo, fruitlessly argued that Washington should not have the power to control Nationalist troop deployments. Further, Yeh insisted that Washington had no right to constrain Nationalist planning for the islands since it rejected any responsibility for them.

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The JCS objected to the treaty for different reasons. Although erstwhile proponents of a security pact, by the autumn of 1954 the JCS had concluded that the existing Seventh Fleet executive order regarding the Strait gave them and the Nationalists more maneuvering room than a fi xed commitment treaty would provide. They also opposed the treaty’s suspension of paragraph 10 of NSC 146/2, which had encouraged Nationalist raids on Communist commerce and territory. As recently as August, a tougher position had been tentatively adopted by the National Security Council (NSC 5429/2), calling for reduction “of the power of Communist China in Asia even at the risk of .  .  . war” and, to this end, maintenance of “political and economic pressures . . . [including] support for Chinese Nationalist harassing actions.”40 Furthermore, Vice Chiefs Admiral Donald B. Duncan and General Thomas D. White argued that a treaty unnecessarily removed ambiguity regarding U.S. plans for military action, freeing the Chinese Communists from pressure that otherwise moderated their behavior.41 Eisenhower, however, trusting his own military judgment, ignored the Pentagon. When he opted for the combined program of a UN initiative and a defense treaty, no one even bothered to notify the JCS. Changes in the treaty proffered by the chiefs arrived too late to influence the treaty’s contents.42 The advent of the security treaty had a clear impact on the Strait confrontation. Beijing had never intended to attack Taiwan in 1954 or 1955, recognizing that China lacked the amphibious capability. It did count on gaining experience and exploring the limits of U.S. engagement by trying to seize a few of the thirty islands being occupied by the Nationalists. In this endeavor Mao stressed that PLA forces should at no point engage the Americans directly. But according to scholars Gordon Chang and He Di, when the Mutual Defense Treaty did not explicitly embrace any of the offshore islands, Mao concluded that Washington would not stop China.43 Disregarding the precarious conditions generated by months of confrontation, on January 18, 1955, some 10,000 PLA troops stormed the island of Yijiangshan, overwhelming its meager defenses. The previous week, the Chinese air force had begun firing on the nearby Dachen islands as a preliminary step to taking the liberation campaign there as well. Moreover, construction accelerated on airfields along the Chinese coast within range of Taiwan. Until the Yijiangshan operation, Dulles had argued that Beijing could be restrained through a policy of obfuscation. Although forced to agree to

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the defense treaty that would make Washington’s commitment to Taiwan clearer, he objected to any unequivocal statement of intentions toward the offshore islands. The administration deliberately clouded the question in public while secretly ordering the military not to defend the islands.44 With the seizure of Yijiangshan, the secretary concluded that uncertainty could be an invitation as well as a deterrent. Moreover, he feared, the appearance of faintheartedness against Chinese Communist aggression hurt American credibility and prestige throughout Asia. The best way to avoid further setbacks would be a congressional grant of authority to Eisenhower that would demonstrate U.S. resolve, buttress presidential power, and commit Congress to administration policy. The president believed he had sufficient authority to evacuate the offshore islands but questioned whether he would exceed his constitutional right if it proved necessary to conduct military operations against the Chinese. He would, he noted, do this were China to assemble a massive attack force even if he risked impeachment, but this was not desirable or necessary. Vice President Richard Nixon believed that Republicans required mollifying.45 On January 24, therefore, the president requested authorization to use American forces however he deemed necessary to protect Taiwan, the Pescadores, and related territories. Just four days later, even though disgruntled Democrats opposed a “predated” license for war, Congress overwhelmingly surrendered oversight, giving Eisenhower the Formosa Resolution.46 The president, nevertheless hoped to avoid using force, and again disregarding the opposition of the JCS, and with the Chinese Communists poised to attack, Eisenhower concluded that Chiang Kai-shek should evacuate the Dachen islands—as these were 200 miles north of Taiwan and difficult to defend. In exchange, the United States would assist his redeployment and, activating the Formosa Resolution, would pledge to help protect the offshore islands of Jinmen and Mazu. At the same time, the president sought to limit U.S. exposure. He told the National Security Council that he had to defend Jinmen and Mazu to resolve the immediate impasse, but he would abandon them as soon as peace could be restored to the area.47 Eisenhower concluded that the military costs of using the islands as “stepping stones” to China outstripped any benefit.48 Ike, therefore, deceived Chiang, neither telling him of future intentions to jettison the annoying islands nor following through on earlier promises that he would announce the decision to defend Jinmen and Mazu.49 When Chiang threat-

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ened to publicize the commitment himself, he was warned that the United States might repudiate his statement and renege on the guarantee.50 On January 28th, as Congress gave Eisenhower the freedom to carry on military operations in the Strait, New Zealand implemented Dulles’s plan to defuse the crisis without war. Supported by London and prompted by Washington, the New Zealand UN delegation offered a cease-fire resolution, and the Security Council invited Beijing to join deliberations. Simultaneously, UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold sought release of Americans in China and a compromise formula regarding the offshore islands.51 But efforts to use the United Nations foundered on the reality that Beijing, having been excluded from the organization, saw no reason to accept its jurisdiction. As Zhou told the Swedish ambassador in February 1955, if the question is to force the People’s Republic of China to accept a cease-fi re . . . neither the UN nor any foreign country has the right to interfere in China’s internal affairs. . . . The United States has occupied Taiwan by force and invaded the Taiwan Strait, and threatens China’s security. That is where the real danger of war lies.52

Although American intelligence now concluded that Beijing did not intend concerted military activity, the crisis atmosphere in Washington only intensified.53 The root of the problem appears to have been mutual misunderstanding. Having safely carried off operations against Yijiangshan and the Dachens, Mao concluded that Washington wanted so desperately to avoid a war that it would not retaliate against continued low-level provocation. Mao hoped to make the United States look weak and indecisive, aggravate tensions between Washington and its allies, and intensify anxiety in Taiwan. Instead he convinced American policymakers that he was preparing for an actual assault upon Taiwan.54 Dulles, for instance, told British Foreign Secretary Sir Anthony Eden that he had thought Taiwan to be safe but now considered a Communist attack likely. And drawing the parallel to Hitler and Czechoslovakia, he asserted that aggression had to be stopped before it was “too late.”55 The alarm that gripped the administration in the spring of 1955 was out of proportion to the reality of the menace posed. Eisenhower wrote in his diary that his cabinet considered war to be likely and imminent. Admiral Robert B. Carney told reporters that the White House anticipated a confrontation and

figure 5.2 “Test for the Seventh Fleet,” by Scott Long Courtesy of the Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

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that the military not only wanted the United States to fight but believed it would have to utilize atomic bombs extensively. Talk of nuclear attacks served Eisenhower in several ways, only one of which had to do with the crisis at hand. Nuclear threats would intimidate and deter Beijing but also undercut any notion anywhere that the United States was weak and indecisive. Eisenhower also sought to demystify the bomb. Having concluded that military budgets could be kept under control only by investing in a nuclear arsenal and reducing dependence on conventional arms and armies, the president believed it vital that there be no psychological prohibitions against using them.56 In Asia, where Eisenhower strongly objected to fighting small, indecisive wars against people his racial biases suggested were impossible to understand or to oppose successfully, he wanted nuclear bombs to be seen as simply one among many available weapons.57 The president understood that nuclear bombs aroused a primal fear of Armageddon. Movies exploited public dread by portraying atomic mutants in Them! (1954), in which atomic ants terrorized California, Godzilla (1956), and The Fly (1958). More horrifying were post–World War III fi lms such as The Day the World Ended (1956), in which a scientist decided which man would mate with the only surviving female, his daughter, and On the Beach, a popular 1957 novel and award-winning 1959 fi lm. Starring Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire, and Anthony Perkins, it examined the despair felt as fallout and radiation sickness spread and mankind faced extinction.58 Military planners responded to Eisenhower with options for nuclear strikes inside China. The most ambitious came from Joint Chiefs Radford and Twining, who were encouraged by Strategic Air Command head Curtis LeMay. They called for bombing major population centers, including Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, and Chongqing.59 London took American threats seriously. The British considered Americans irrational on the subject of China. According to Selwyn Lloyd, minister of state in the Foreign Office, “There is now in the United States an emotional feeling about Communist China . . . which borders on hysteria.” Dulles, in turn, told members of Congress disparagingly that the British were “almost pathological” in their fear of the hydrogen bomb.60 In fact, neither Eisenhower nor Dulles actually anticipated using nuclear weapons.61 Whatever progress Beijing might be making in building infrastructure on the coast, and there was some, the Chinese Communists were still a long way from the necessary facilities for a serious military operation,

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a fact that intelligence and diplomatic reporting clearly communicated.62 Dulles reassured the NSC that, although “Communist probing will go on” until the leadership had “demonstrated to their satisfaction that we cannot be dislodged,” fighting could be avoided.63 He similarly emphasized to the president that administration members were sometimes too tough and “unrealistic”; that “you and I have never attempted to say that the Chinese Reds should concede [so much].”64 Dulles, moreover, did not think of nuclear bombs as legitimate weapons, and although he sometimes spoke of their use as a serious option, he actually tried throughout his tenure to make nuclear fighting less likely.65 The picture sometimes drawn of Dulles maneuvering to spark a nuclear exchange is far from reality.66 He had, after all, condemned Harry Truman for dropping atomic bombs on Japan, arguing that Christian nations did not do such things.67 When he talked of carrying out pinpoint attacks inside China without massive casualties, moreover, it was clear he did not fully understand what technical capabilities U.S. forces possessed. Gerard C. Smith, special assistant for atomic energy affairs, disabused Dulles of the notion that fallout could be minimized or that the U.S. Air Force would willingly employ small-yield weapons when their doctrine called for large-scale strategic bombardment.68 Robert Bowie provided information showing the millions of casualties that would result from blast, heat, and radiation.69 Both men had close relations with the secretary and significant influence on his views.70 Eisenhower doubted that the Chinese Communists wanted to risk war. Washington need only prevent escalation or accident. He repeatedly rejected Radford’s plans for preemptive strikes on air bases or for bombing of radar facilities. As Eisenhower recorded in his diary, “I believe hostilities are not so imminent as is indicated by the forebodings of a number of my associates. . . . I have become accustomed to the fact that most of the calamities that we anticipate really never occur.”71 So talk of exploiting nuclear arms reflected contingency planning and popular education, not serious proposals for use. Eisenhower had been the author of the massive retaliation view that the administration should “depend primarily upon a great capacity to retaliate instantly by means and at places of our choosing,” but he also asserted to the press in March 1955 that such a response “on the fringe or periphery of our interests . . . [is something] I wouldn’t hold with for a moment.”72 In 1945 he had recommended against use of the atomic bomb against Japan. As commander in chief he

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would make the final decision on dropping nuclear bombs regardless of whatever others had planned. Why then allow for such aggressive planning? As historian Matthew Jones has asserted of Eisenhower, he believed the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons was best maintained by making the consequences of any breakdown of the peace so catastrophic as to restrain adversaries from committing aggression in the fi rst place. Th is deterrent effect would also restrain over-zealous subordinates who were too eager to push toward confrontation.73

If Eisenhower and Dulles did not envision war, they nevertheless created an atmosphere in which advisors, lower-level officials, journalists, members of Congress, the public, and allies feared that the administration not only expected war but also welcomed it. Time magazine compared the offshore islands situation with Munich and shuddered at the choice between humiliation and a desperate fight for so little gain. The New Republic charged that Dulles had created a “situation where America’s honor and prestige are staked on defending two miserable islands . . . without allies, without the moral support of the United Nations, and with the disapproval of most of the Western World.” As the Reporter ’s military analyst observed, “going to war mainly to cheer up the Nationalist army would seem a bit silly.” If, as political scientist Harold Hinton noted in the Commonweal, the Chinese Nationalists insisted upon inviting self-destruction, then the Los Angeles Mirror and Daily News concluded, “it’s none of our business!”74 The business community also opposed defending the offshore islands. Eisenhower, who admired the willingness of industrial and financial magnates to give selflessly of their time for the national interest, listened carefully to their suggestions and criticisms. Ernest T. Weir, chairman of the board of the National Steel Corporation, for instance, had joined Ike’s inner circle of business confidants. In 1955 Weir warned that confidence in Eisenhower’s judgment had been jeopardized abroad by irresponsible men like Senators Knowland and Styles Bridges (R-VT). The United States, Weir believed, risked a greater loss of face in Asia by defending the off shore islands than it would by letting them go.75 Members of Congress harbored fears about what seemed a precarious situation in Asia. Senators Wayne Morse (I-WI) and Hubert Humphrey (D-MN) loudly opposed using force to save the offshore islands.76 Even

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longtime supporters of the Nationalists like Representative Walter Judd (R-MN) and Senator H. Alexander Smith (R-NJ) distanced themselves from belligerents like Knowland and Bridges who wanted a tougher line with the Communists.77 Democratic Party Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson (D-TX) angrily denounced the warmongering of the Republican right. As historian Robert Accinelli observed, “the war scare severely strained bipartisan cooperation . . . and greatly reduced the likelihood of unified public and congressional support.” 78 Equally, the recognition on the part of the president and secretary of state that they lacked solid backing from foreign governments acted as a restraint. As early as October 1954, Dulles declared to the NSC that a decision to contest forcefully the offshore islands would have “a bad effect on Europe” and that the United States would “be in this fight in Asia completely alone.”79 By March, when the administration was well into its public campaign regarding the potential use of nuclear weapons, an interdepartmental intelligence estimate predicted that non-Communist governments would be shocked by the dropping of atomic bombs on China. Japan, for one, would probably question its close alignment with Washington.80 Department counselor MacArthur, moreover, warned that bombing China at locations distant from the Strait would be interpreted as an attempt to overthrow the Beijing regime, would very likely bring Moscow into the conflict, and would “cause our allies to back away, not only in the Far East but probably in Europe, in Africa and all over the globe.” A more effective move, argued Bowie, would be evacuation of the offshore islands with a guarantee for Taiwan’s future protection from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Britain.81 Scaling back the Nationalist presence on Jinmen and Mazu appealed greatly to the president. In opting for the Formosa Resolution, Eisenhower had hoped to make the offshore islands seem less vital to Chiang. It did not. Now Eisenhower told Dulles that “any approach to Chiang along this line would have to be so skillfully conducted as to make him ostensibly the originator of the idea.”82 As the crisis progressed, Eisenhower confided to Winston Churchill his wish that Chiang could be convinced to evacuate voluntarily.83 To this end, he urged publisher Roy Howard, en route to Taipei in February, to make Chiang see that his focus on Jinmen and Mazu could produce a disaster comparable to the French experience at Dienbienphu. In April, there having been no progress, the president decided to send a formal mission to Taipei.84 Eisenhower wanted his representatives to per-

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suade Chiang either to turn the islands into outposts, with a much reduced complement of defense forces stationed there, or to evacuate and accept a U.S.-policed “maritime zone” that would take the place of the islands as a first line of warning and defense for Taiwan. Recognizing that there would be considerable resistance, Eisenhower entrusted the mission to two men who Chiang could not help but see as sympathizers: Walter Robertson and Arthur Radford.85 In proposing establishment of a defense zone off China’s coast and sending Robertson and Radford to deliver the message, Eisenhower took the United States into dangerous waters. Although the president sought to avoid war, he employed measures that at other times he had called irresponsible.86 Eisenhower’s preferred strategy was to make Jinmen and Mazu into outposts so that when, or if, they fell to a Communist invasion, the embarrassment to Chiang and the sacrifice of manpower would not be extreme or necessitate retaliation. But neither Dulles nor Radford considered the president’s formula realistic and insisted on a more radical solution. The idea of a naval blockade of the China coast had arisen on several occasions during Eisenhower’s presidency. The president-general had always objected that a blockade was an act of war and refused to consider it seriously. On April 17, however, the president appeared to capitulate, continuing to contest Radford’s assertion that significantly reduced garrisons could not survive but agreeing to allow Chiang Kai-shek to decide which alternative to take. He authorized his emissaries to propose the equivalent of a blockade—he called it an interdiction—to prevent the Chinese Communists from readying an invasion force on the coast. In exchange Chiang would have to abandon the islands. Should Beijing agree to renounce liberation of Taiwan, Eisenhower ordered that the interdiction be stopped immediately. In any case, Eisenhower wanted Chiang told that Washington would not fight solely to preserve the offshore islands. Undertaking such a mission would spark so much popular disenchantment in the United States that the administration would be forced to abandon the Nationalists entirely.87 Eisenhower’s choice of spokesmen would appear to have been misguided. Instead of giving Chiang two options, evacuation or retaining small contingents on the islands, they presented only the more extreme alternative that Radford had championed all along. Chiang rejected the plan. His suspicion that the Americans would renege on naval protection at the critical moment

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seemed confirmed. He also believed that allowing Beijing to capture these islands would permanently block his return to the mainland.88

CONCLUSION This raises a series of important questions. What did Eisenhower intend? Did Eisenhower ignore a career’s worth of caution and a lifetime of military thinking and expose the United States to a possible war at the whim of Chiang Kai-shek, a man he disparaged and distrusted? Did Eisenhower assign a sensitive initiative that he knew could produce war to two men whose views had always been contrary to his own on broad U.S.-China issues as well as the narrower immediate offshore island situation? Did Eisenhower violate his conviction that “no Western power can go to Asia militarily, except as one of a concert of powers”?89 Did Eisenhower ignore the thrust of his own New Look policy, which was designed to keep the United States out of small-scale, local wars and instead risk placing the U.S. Navy in harm’s way on a continuing basis? Successions of scholars have condemned the president for the choices he made.90 Eisenhower, in fact, did not discard his principles over China. The president had different, less obvious, goals. Eisenhower was under no illusion regarding the Radford-Robertson view of appropriate actions in the Taiwan Strait. They had told him explicitly that they doubted the viability of an outpost strategy and wanted the United States more deeply committed to Taiwan’s survival. Ike later complained to Dulles, “it is clear that as long as Radford and Robertson themselves could not grasp the concept, we simply were not going to get anywhere.”91 But even if Eisenhower could not have predicted that these envoys would ignore a presidential order and not propose outposts, he had to recognize that their briefing would lean toward their preferred solution. Th is being so, Eisenhower, a sophisticated strategist, could not have believed that the extreme solution would be the actual solution. Instead the president’s actions can be understood by looking at precedent: he was implementing a version of his Dien Bien Phu approach. In 1954, unwilling to use nuclear weapons to save the French fighting at the fragile Dien Bien Phu foothold in Vietnam, he nevertheless said he would do so if Congress and

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the British agreed.92 He could be all but certain that securing this support would be impossible. Similarly, Chiang was not going to relinquish the offshore islands. Offering to blockade China in exchange for evacuation was a pledge Eisenhower would not have to honor. The president did not see himself as putting America’s safety in Chiang’s hands. As he told Dulles, Chiang’s answer to the specific proposal made is not only what I predicted but what I think I would have made had I been in his place. As long as our representatives did not feel they could suggest any attractive position between evacuation on the one hand and a “fight to the death” on the other, there was no possibility of a meeting of minds. For one thing there was left no way by which Chiang could possibly save face.93

The impact of an interdiction had Chiang accepted that option, of course, depended heavily on the Chinese Communists. Beijing could have been angered or alarmed or, taking advantage of an unexpected opportunity, elected to strike hard at Taiwan. From the Chinese perspective, however, the idea of a blockade was neither as new nor as surprising as scholars have subsequently argued. China’s southeast coast had been suffering the economic effects of a Nationalist Chinese blockade for some time. In July 1954, Zhou described existing U.S. activities in the area as a blockade.94 Historians Gordon Chang and He Di have argued that the Chinese leadership would have faced domestic demands for action. But no one can say convincingly what the Chinese Communists would or could have done, how much pressure they might have felt, and how vulnerable they considered themselves.95 What is known from repeated instances of judicious and cautious behavior was their aversion to war with the United States.

6 DIPLOMATIC COMPLEXITIES

D

iplomacy did not come easily after the artillery shelling of the offshore islands had begun. Eisenhower and Dulles watched as sentiment in the United States became more harshly critical of China. A September 1954 public opinion poll showed that a 59 percent majority actually opposed better relations with China (compared to just 26 percent who supported better relations).1 Nevertheless, even as their public rhetoric became tougher, the president and secretary sought nonmilitary remedies for the deteriorating state of U.S.-China relations.

TWO CHINAS For Eisenhower and Dulles, the most appealing approach was one that had attracted policymakers since the creation of the People’s Republic and exile of the Republic of China in 1949: diplomatic relations with two Chinas. Many Americans saw such a strategy as acknowledging reality, freeing them from the untenable fiction that the Chinese Nationalists represented the entire Chinese people. Such a policy would prompt relief in Europe and Japan, where Washington’s position on China had little support. Eisenhower’s solution to the offshore islands dilemma reflected the logic of Two Chinas as well as a military man’s desire for a clean break, a pragmatic remedy. The president believed that Chiang Kai-shek could be persuaded to relinquish the islands with pledges of support for more important strong points and logical arguments about international opinion and military capabilities.

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figure 6.1 “No man is an island, entire of itself ” by James Dobbins Courtesy of the Boston Herald.

Two Chinas comprised a familiar reality for American separatists from the British Empire, who in 1776 had created a new entity speaking the same language as Britain and enjoying a comparable culture. The close decades-old friendship between Washington and London attested to the benefits such an arrangement could yield. The possibility of Taiwan’s severance from the mainland became a regular topic of discussion during the Truman years, and John Foster Dulles became a convert to, and champion of, the idea. Its apparent logic and simplicity made it difficult for him and other Americans to understand why the Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Strait objected. Although most often in disagreement with U.S. policies in the Strait, European governments, especially Britain’s, promoted Two Chinas, hoping thereby to prevent Nationalist leaders from luring the United States into foolhardy military adventures.2

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Advocacy of a Two Chinas policy by Eisenhower and Dulles remained low-key but frequent. Dulles recommended it in a draft article for Life magazine in 1953 but dropped it at the advice of Dean Rusk, then president of the Rockefeller Foundation, who believed such an approach was “a fish that wouldn’t swim.”3 Dulles told British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden in 1954 that he saw the Mutual Defense Treaty as an opportunity to detach Taiwan from China.4 Eisenhower told the press on January 19, 1955, that dealing with two Chinas was “one of the possibilities that is constantly [being] studied.” Newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal thereupon speculated that inevitably the United States would have to deal with two Chinas.5 Dulles urged ROC Foreign Minister George Yeh to accept the reality that Nationalist China, like West Germany and South Korea, must accommodate to being part of a divided nation.6 He assured the National Security Council that, although nonrecognition of Beijing remained administration policy, he would deal “with it on a de facto basis when circumstances made this useful.”7 In 1956 Dulles even approached former Assistant Secretary of State and Truman administration colleague Dean Rusk and asked him to discuss a new bipartisan China policy with Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Walter George (D-GA) that would be based on Two Chinas.8 In China—both Chinas—the American plan was anathema. Success for a Two Chinas approach was never contingent upon security strategies or individual personalities. The fundamental issues were sovereignty, history, and culture. Taipei and Beijing each claimed to rule all of China. Having experienced 100 years of imperialist exploitation, the Chinese nurtured a strong imperative for unity. Beijing and Taipei, at war over every other question, agreed on this. Thus, both parties resented conditions that maintained an unsatisfactory status quo: Washington’s protection for Taiwan made it impossible for Beijing to attack, but its refusal to underwrite mainland recovery thwarted KMT policy as well. The Nationalist Chinese reacted with dismay and anger to American flirtation with a Two Chinas policy. They had anticipated that the election of Eisenhower and his appointment of Dulles would simplify their relations with the United States and guarantee increased support.9 But distrust, refined over long and often unhappy association with Americans, made Kuomintang officials sensitive to the slightest indication that the United States’ China policy might be altered to deal more flexibly with Beijing.10 When Dulles told Congress and the press that a mainland government that distanced itself from

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the Soviet Union would be more acceptable, he astonished and alarmed Taipei.11 Ambassador Rankin reported that growing interest in a Two Chinas formula in the United States had seriously undermined morale in Taiwan: The Chinese on Taiwan are very much aware that the United States wrote them off once before. . . . They believe, with some justification, that important and influential elements inside and outside our Government would like nothing better than a plausible excuse to sell Free China down the river. These elements include isolationists, Europe-fi rsters, fellow-travelers and others who . . . continue to hate the guts of Chiang Kai-shek.12

Chiang’s strongest ally in denouncing Two Chinas unsurprisingly was Mao Zedong. Although Mao had mounted the offshore island campaign with the intention of gradually moving toward the liberation of Taiwan, he came to recognize that he could not capture Taiwan in the near term and that Chinese pressure could push it away from the rest of China. In November 1954, the New China News Agency denounced U.S. efforts to “hoodwink world public opinion by arranging for the traitorous Chiang Kai-shek group to ‘quit’ the coastal islands.”13 Mao realized that should American compulsion force the Nationalists to pull their troops out, Beijing would have to reach across a 100-mile divide to strike at Chiang rather than being able to challenge him within sight of shore. Thus the Chinese Communists contended that the real problem was Washington’s interference in Chinese internal affairs. Taipei should, they insisted, cooperate directly in negotiations to resolve the issue without Washington’s intimidating participation.14 Eisenhower, Dulles, and many other Americans clearly did not understand the passion in the issue. Dulles speculated that whereas the Chinese Communists would “never [accept] the alienation of the offshore islands like Jinmen . . . the Reds might agree to the independence of Formosa.”15 He and subsequent generations of U.S. policymakers were wrong.

BANDUNG Even as the offshore island crisis encouraged the United States to think more about a Two Chinas policy, Beijing saw it as an opportunity for re-

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newal of dialogue with Washington begun at the Geneva conference. Chinese leaders hoped that the use of force and clear dissatisfaction with American policy would produce a new round of negotiations, defusing the volatile situation in the Strait and dealing with broader issues. Already in meetings with the Burmese prime minister and the Swedish ambassador in February, Zhou had indicated the need for direct conversations with the Americans.16 In April, he took the opportunity presented by an Afro-Asian meeting of nonaligned states at Bandung, Indonesia, to renew that suggestion. For the Chinese, the Bandung conference meant access to a global forum, improvement of China’s international image, establishment of better relations with other Asian states, and imposition of restraints on U.S. threats to China’s survival.17 At a Politburo session days before the meeting, Chinese leaders decided to avoid raising divisive issues. Thus when delegates in Bandung voiced their concern about possible fighting in the Strait, Zhou’s response was more than conciliatory in its call for dialogue with Washington.18 For the United States, the convening of the Bandung conference and the denouement of the Taiwan crisis proved a mixed blessing. The Eisenhower administration welcomed termination of the precarious situation in the Strait—an end that had not required the surrender of Jinmen and Mazu, exchanges of gunfire, or further risk of war. There was also relief that the Chinese had not been able to manipulate the Bandung conferees into providing “a green light to . . . start violence in the Formosa area.” However, no one could deny that Zhou Enlai’s posture at Bandung had eroded China’s international isolation and that the negotiations necessitated by his proposal would further enhance Beijing’s prestige. In this way, Bandung was as detrimental as Washington had long anticipated. U.S. officials repeatedly expressed alarm that Bandung would create a vigorous nonaligned movement, build a dynamic anti-colonial/anti-racism coalition, and be a “coming out” party for Beijing, perhaps serving as a platform for China to challenge India’s dominance over the neutralist states.19 The contemporary dread among Americans of China’s yellow hordes translated into anxiety that, in the competition between Beijing and Washington for the allegiance of the third world’s nonwhite peoples, the United States would surely lose. World War II had expedited a surge toward independence of colonial populations in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America. Americans believed that, as they emerged from World War II, they could boast of reasonably good anti-colonial credentials. Franklin Roosevelt

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had repeatedly emphasized his opposition to the re-imposition of colonial privileges at the end of the conflict, and Washington freed its own Philippine colony voluntarily immediately after the war. But the Cold War quickly revealed the fragility, and sometime duplicity, of America’s position. Washington listened to its allies when they insisted on retaining colonies to strengthen vulnerable economies and shared concerns that newly liberated, but unprepared, colonials would be defenseless against the international Communist conspiracy. During the 1950s, as liberation progressed, the United States saw itself in constant competition with Communist forces for political and economic loyalties in a wide range of underdeveloped countries.20 China, it seemed certain, hoped to create an Afro-Asian bloc that would force out American business and end political ties to the West.21 The State Department convinced itself that the Bandung meeting would be so dangerous it should be prevented. Dulles believed that the organizers were Communist “dupes.” As late as January 1955, he insisted that Washington should not just accept it as inevitable.22 But inevitable it was, and Washington turned from disrupting the conference to reshaping its results, curbing incipient solidarity among third world peoples, and circumscribing China’s influence.23 The United States sought to stabilize its dominance over East Asia, preventing autonomous activities that would shut it out, and simultaneously warn against Communist expansion. One vehicle was to encourage pro-U.S. governments to attend and promote favorable policies. Dulles, for instance, urged that they endorse cease-fire resolutions to resolve the Taiwan situation.24 Pakistan and Ceylon (Sri Lanka) even tried to substitute Taiwan for China as representative of the Chinese people.25 Another tactic shifted attention to the China threat and away from European colonialism. Dulles initiated an Operations Coordinating Board special task force on Bandung to prepare propaganda highlighting Soviet and Chinese “aggression and imperialism.”26 At least one official at the United States Information Agency, who was not above using scurrilous racist tactics, proposed playing on the “dislike and fear” that countries throughout the world entertained for the Chinese “because they are Chinese rather than because they are Communists.”27 That Beijing should be allowed to present itself as a peacemaker seemed abhorrent, and the probability that its new

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posture would lull many nations of the free world into passivity and carelessness frightened the administration. In the end, Zhou’s use of the Bandung forum to call upon Washington to talk, and the enthusiastic response he evoked from countries both neutral and allied with the United States, made his initiative inescapable. 28 As William Sebald, the acting assistant secretary of state for Far Eastern affairs, observed, Zhou’s proposal apparently was designed to leave the Bandung conferees with the impression that Communist China without modifying in the slightest its basic demands for the “liberation” of Taiwan and the liquidation of the Government of the Republic of China, had gone more than half-way in a constructive effort to relax tensions over Taiwan . . . enabling the Communist propagandists to utilize the fear of war as a means of isolating the United States.29

Sebald lamented that Zhou had “stunned” the delegates with his seeming “reversal” of policy.

AMBASSADORIAL TALKS The United States had been surprised by Zhou’s resourcefulness and the virtually unavoidable prospect of direct talks with China. The president and the secretary worried that being seen to deal with the Red Chinese on a routine, if not friendly, basis would indicate to susceptible Asian states either that Beijing need no longer be feared or, more critically, that the United States placed its own national interests ahead of the security of the region. The result could be disillusionment with U.S. principles and loyalties, an increased willingness to open relations with China, greater opportunity for Chinese subversion, and the collapse of American efforts to keep China a pariah outside the international system. Ambassador Rankin insisted that Asians saw the talks as “ de facto recognition of Red China and proof positive of American determination to reach a general accommodation with the communists at almost any cost.”30

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More immediate was the threat at home. Eisenhower and Dulles did not want to be seen as having capitulated to Chinese pressure regardless of what the president or secretary might see as a desirable future for Sino-American relations. Criticism would flow from Congress, China watchers, and even from within the executive branch. To mollify Chiang supporters, the White House responded by insisting that Taiwan must attend all meetings. Dulles, however, wanted to engage with China. Less worried about Taiwan’s equities, he rejected a posture that amounted to rebuffing Zhou’s proposal. The secretary also decided to ignore the China Lobby’s denunciation against dealing directly with the communist Chinese, although Senator William Knowland (R-CA) accused the administration of inviting “another Munich.” Moreover, Dulles actually drafted a letter to Zhou in which the secretary welcomed the latter’s Bandung remarks and emphasized Washington’s peaceful intentions as well as its hope to negotiate with a similarly inclined Beijing. That letter never was sent, but Dulles’s desire to seize the moment did not disappear.31 Among the general public, opinion favored negotiation. According to a Gallup poll, by a five to one margin respondents welcomed the opening for arranging a peaceful settlement despite having to work directly with Red China.32 On the eve of the talks, press comment suggested a mixture of satisfaction and trepidation. The New York Times warned that Chinese Communist leaders hoped to maneuver the United States out of the Pacific and themselves into the UN, and the Washington Post cautioned against appeasement. Conversely, the Washington Post and the Christian Science Monitor observed that the administration, having for the first time used the title the People’s Republic of China, might be ready for more enlightened policies in the future.33 Dulles also got support in Congress, although initially from Democrats, not Republicans. Democratic leaders of the 84th Congress, including Walter George and Lyndon Johnson, offered cooperation on the China question even though they could have tried to thwart the Republican administration.34 Not until May 1st did twelve leading Senate Republicans come forward to back the talks. The exchanges that followed demonstrated that there would be no simple path to better Sino-American relations. The United States agreed to raise the talks from consular to ambassadorial level. When Beijing released American detainees, the administration minimized negative comments on their imprisonment so as not to jeopardize the talks. 35 Dulles also urged

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Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson to keep negotiations going and the door ajar.36 Dulles told his staff that “direct contacts are less dangerous than ineffectual intermediary activities . . . [which can misrepresent] what the Chinese Communists really think or vice versa.”37 He personally reviewed instruction to the U.S. delegation line by line.38 Dulles simultaneously saw the talks as a mechanism for entangling the Chinese in exchanges that would lessen the possibility of military confrontation and favored the bilateral forum as a way to keep China from further international exposure in a multinational meeting such as that suggested by Moscow on several occasions in 1955.39 Administration defensiveness about going forward with the talks meant that the issues it put on the table for resolution never posed a true challenge to a dysfunctional status quo. The agenda was either too narrow or too broad: seeking the release of Americans still held by the Chinese and the renunciation of the use of force in the Strait.40 Repatriation made the idea of talks acceptable since it meant the freeing of Americans held in Chinese prisons. As for the renouncing of force to recover Taiwan, Dulles did not expect agreement. On the other hand, if China complied he was prepared to reshape relations by reducing American troops on the island and modifying trade restrictions.41 In the interim, when the Chinese raised other subjects, American representatives listened but refused to engage or concur even on minor points.42 Beijing’s approach was far more expansive than Washington’s. China seized on the talks as an opportunity to examine a wide range of outstanding Sino-American disputes. Anxious to begin a process that would reduce the U.S. threat to China’s security as well as obtain positive international publicity, Chinese leaders moved to release Americans accused of espionage on the eve of the first meeting and were willing temporarily to set aside Taiwan and tackle trade or cultural issues in order to ameliorate tensions. Having established their strength and determination through the offshore island shelling, Chinese leaders believed they had expanded the ground for exchange. Zhou voiced optimism and placed two trusted officials in charge of a task force to advise the negotiating delegation.43 Beijing sent as its representative Wang Bingnan, who thought of Americans as “frank, open, lively, and easygoing,” having had considerable experience, dating from the 1930s, in dealing with them.44 Wang and his American counterpart, Alexis Johnson, grew to like and respect one another and, in stark

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contrast to the hostile Korean armistice talks at Panmunjom, attempted to relax the atmosphere by informal get-togethers. Johnson insisted to Assistant Secretary Robertson that Wang, while tough, was not unreasonable and that China could not be expected to meet all of Washington’s demands instantly.45 Wang made clear to Johnson that the American and Chinese economies were complementary and that China wanted to buy goods like automobiles, which were better made than the Russian variety, and send students to the United States.46 To expedite change, China urged the United States to upgrade the conversations to the foreign minister level, in a request echoed by some members of the U.S. Congress, including Senator George, who also favored recognition and a Dulles-Zhou meeting.47 Subsequent Chinese delays in freeing captive Americans could be traced directly to their disappointment in Washington’s refusal to consider a meeting between Dulles and Zhou, its unwillingness to respond constructively to the Chinese agenda, and its demand that Beijing renounce the use of force in the Taiwan Strait.48 Although it could not liberate Taiwan militarily so long as the Seventh Fleet remained in the area, the People’s Republic refused to make an explicit pledge not to employ force. China’s representative insisted that using force to recover Taiwan would be a matter of national sovereignty not subject to international scrutiny or prohibitions. U.S. troops present in Taiwan, by contrast, were occupiers and must be withdrawn.49 In fact, China came closer to renouncing the use of force in this period than it would again until 1978. But the United States did not respond, allowing suspicion of the Chinese and the pressure of internal politics to block progress. In late July, for instance, on the eve of talks Zhou delivered a speech suggesting that the liberation of Taiwan would be carried out so far as possible through peaceful means.50 Moreover, in December, at the ambassadorial talks Beijing’s Wang told Johnson that “although Taiwan [is an] internal matter . . . [China was] willing [to] settle that question by peaceful means.”51 In 1956 China remained interested in improving relations with the United States. In January it appeared to consider the idea of mentioning Taiwan in a renunciation-of-force statement. Simultaneously, Zhou announced that Beijing was willing to begin direct talks with Taipei regarding peaceful reunification, and an exchange of secret envoys followed.52 On June 29th, Zhou declared that “the possibility of peacefully liberating Taiwan is increasing . . . because international tensions are defi nitely easing.”53

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In not one of these cases did Washington seize China’s remarks as an opening, however modest, to be explored or exploited. Indeed, Dulles instead bragged about the effectiveness of brinksmanship in an ill-conceived interview in Life magazine on U.S. strategic doctrine. Dulles alluded to three occasions when the United States had contemplated using atomic bombs against China, outraging the Chinese, who declared U.S. rhetoric about a renunciation of force in the Strait rank hypocrisy.54 As James Reston noted in the New York Times, Dulles “doesn’t stumble into booby traps: he digs them to size, studies them carefully, and then jumps.”55 Thus Sino-American contacts, especially the ambassadorial talks, which had begun with excitement and some hope, became stilted and unproductive. After the agreement repatriating Americans and Chinese reached on September 10, 1955, at Geneva, no further formal accords followed. Each side on occasion proved slightly more flexible, but the moments of tractability never coincided. Before the end of 1956, a deadlock had developed, and the possibility of ending the talks loomed. Ralph Clough, who attended and wrote instructions for the meetings, recalled, “it got so that really the only thing we’d agree on . . . was the date for the next meeting.”56 British officials who had encouraged the Americans to meet with the Chinese unhappily concluded that little more would result.57 For months thereafter, Americans and Chinese nevertheless held on to the form, if not the substance, of discussion. U.S. officials believed that China was using some prisoners as bargaining chips to keep the talks going.58 Zhou Enlai told the Third Plenary Session of the National People’s Congress in June 1956 that “the United States attempted to indefinitely prolong the talks in order to freeze the status quo of the Taiwan situation.”59 Above all each side sought to blame the other if the talks collapsed, so both endured the unproductive prepared statements and the tedious repetition of arguments. When the Chinese ignored U.S. objections and raised questions about the trade embargo and the granting of visas for travel to China, the United States just did not respond. Before the end of 1957, things fell apart. Mao Zedong decided that a tougher stance against U.S. threats was vital and abandoned Beijing’s conciliatory posture. At the same time, he jettisoned the whole idea that Communism and capitalism could coexist peacefully.60 The United States, no more happy about the direction of talks, scuttled any prospect of near-term change with its response to bureaucratic necessity.

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Alexis Johnson’s ambassadorial tenure in Eastern Europe was expiring, leaving Washington with the choice of extending his assignment, appointing a new ambassadorial representative, or dropping exchanges below the ambassadorial level. Dulles somewhat reluctantly opted for the latter, which Robertson argued would show U.S. unhappiness with Beijing’s continued detention of Americans and failure to renounce the use of force.61 It also predictably disrupted the talks, although Dulles cautioned it should not end them. Dulles could, had he wanted to scuttle the talks entirely, have named Karl Rankin to deal with the Red Chinese. Rankin had not merely been ambassador to the ROC but was invariably an outspoken proponent of Chiang’s cause. This Dulles did not do, but he certainly angered Beijing. Edwin Martin, who was named the new, lower-level, representative to Warsaw, remarked later, “I don’t know whether they honestly thought in Washington that the Chinese would accept the downgrading of the talks; I never thought they would.”62

CONCLUSION Eisenhower, upon becoming president, found that resolving the China problem would be difficult and time consuming. The president knew he faced a determined adversary in Mao, who dominated the mainland, had appreciable popular support, and was committed to Communism. He also understood that he was in a struggle with his own ally, Chiang Kai-shek, a tenacious man whose agenda was quite different from his own. Under such conditions, Eisenhower maneuvered cautiously, not coming as close to the brink of war as many historians have argued, although he was surrounded by advisers who were willing to take much greater risks with U.S. security than was he. Indeed, Eisenhower hoped to fi nd a diplomatic solution to his problems with China through a Two Chinas policy and, when necessary, ambassadorial talks with Beijing. Ultimately, these efforts failed, and friction between Washington and Beijing continued, especially in the Taiwan Strait, where further confrontations erupted in 1958, 1962, and 1995–1996. The 1954–1955 Strait confrontation nevertheless had a significant impact on Eisenhower’s policies. First, the use of nuclear threats and their apparent repeated success (in Korea as well as the Taiwan Strait) inflated expectations

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of what nuclear capabilities could accomplish. Eisenhower and Dulles congratulated themselves on the wisdom of their defense policy, the New Look, with its reliance on brinksmanship and massive retaliation.63 Second, Eisenhower expanded presidential power with the Formosa Resolution. Not only did this measure marginalize Congress in the Taiwan Strait, surrendering its power to declare war on China, it also set a precedent for later abdications of congressional authority, such as the Vietnam War–era Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which gave Lyndon Johnson discretion to use force against armed attack and aggression when he saw fit. And third, Eisenhower and Dulles signed a long-lasting alliance with Chiang Kai-shek, entangling Washington ever more deeply in the Chinese civil war. The crisis, fourth, made U.S. diplomatic dealings with China a reality. The ambassadorial talks, which the administration entered into hesitantly, became an enduring feature of Sino-American relations until normalization in the 1970s. Although not a link affording a frank exchange of views or facilitating problem solving, the talks provided an important venue at which Washington and Beijing regularly interacted in ways enjoyed by few other governments. Finally, Washington came to understand, if not yet accept, that its effort to keep China out of the UN was doomed. The explosiveness of the crossStrait situation strengthened the conviction of increasing numbers of states that for international security and stability Beijing must be admitted to the UN. To them it seemed obvious that China should be subject to the UN Charter and its peacemaking mechanisms. Simultaneously, as Eisenhower and Dulles had feared, the Strait crisis led Mao to conclude that confrontation could be useful in heightening China’s prestige. Beijing proved it was strong enough to confront Washington and emerge intact. It could defend its national interests and define its sovereignty. It succeeded in compelling the United States to engage in ambassadorial talks, and at Bandung, Zhou Enlai used the nonaligned movement to break out of U.S. efforts to isolate Beijing. The international community would in the future have to pay greater attention to China. Mao also decided to commit his resources to development of an atomic bomb so that China could avoid being subjected again to nuclear blackmail. Beijing had closely followed Eisenhower’s public statements regarding the New Look policy, with its emphasis on nuclear weapons. China’s leaders watched U.S. atomic testing in the Pacific during 1954, including the dramatic

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detonation at Bikini Atoll that killed one Japanese fisherman, sickened twenty-two others, and shook U.S. relations with Japan.64 By 1954 Mao no longer dismissed atomic weapons as paper tigers as he had in 1947—that is, as an apparently devastating threat that would in reality be harmless—having learned about the actual power of the bombs. Suddenly with confrontation in the Strait, China emerged as a potential target, although the United States did not issue an explicit warning until that spring. By the time the Politburo met for a final determination on a program in mid-January 1955, the United States had nuclear-capable carrier battle groups deployed in the East China Sea. A Chinese nuclear program, then, proved a direct response to an inchoate American threat, rendering defense of the tiny offshore islands very costly.65 The Strait crisis also contributed significantly to the eventual rupture of Sino-Soviet relations, a development much anticipated by Eisenhower and Dulles. Mao turned to, and got help from, Moscow, initially strengthening Sino-Soviet ties in a sensitive arena. But China also found itself unable to secure a timely public pledge from Moscow that, were the United States to bomb China, the Soviet Union would attack American soil with nuclear weapons in retaliation.66 As McGeorge Bundy observed in retrospect, “this may be the high-water mark of third-party arrogance in the nuclear age.”67 For the president and the secretary, the tell-tale signs of Sino-Soviet tension suggested opportunities to improve relations with one of the Communist contenders as they labored to avoid further dangerous clashes in Asia.

7 IN MOSCOW’S SHADOW

A

true rift in the Sino-Soviet alliance had the potential to be an international game changer. If the ideological, economic, political, and military ties that bound Moscow and Beijing together frayed significantly or even snapped, Washington could suddenly have far greater maneuvering room. It might be able to fight the Cold War more effectively. The very nature of the Cold War could change. The Soviet Union might be more compliant. Red China might become more accommodating or more threatening. Moscow might find peaceful coexistence a valuable tool for shoring up its place in the Communist world. China, on the other hand, might enhance efforts to reach out to the emerging, decolonizing, nonwhite states of Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East since it would no longer be constrained by deference to the Soviet Union. Judging the depth and breadth of such a split, however, proved difficult with information so scarce and suspicion so pervasive. Even when sources existed on the Soviet side, Chinese actions remained opaque given the secrecy of the regime, the vagaries of upheaval, and the self-imposed U.S. isolation from the Chinese people. Thus, mounting Sino-Soviet differences gave some observers strong reason to lament restrictions that banned travel and made news reporting and intelligence gathering so difficult.

SINO-SOVIET RELATIONS For Eisenhower and Dulles, evidence of friction in the Sino-Soviet bloc carried dangers as well as opportunities. It confirmed their conclusion that

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figure 7.1 “Harmony Boys,” by John Stampone Courtesy of the Army Times and the Editorial Cartoon Collection,McCain Library, University of Southern Mississippi.

disunity lay beneath the facade of monolithic Communism. Th is might mean room for initiatives with Moscow against Beijing or with Beijing against Moscow. But they nevertheless publicly denounced Communism’s monolithic threat and promulgated policy documents such as NSC 166/1, which asserted that “confl icts of interest of both partners with the nonCommunist world are for the present much more intense than confl icts of interest between the partners.”1 In other words, they and advisers around them concluded, and concluded repeatedly, that cohesiveness between Beijing and Moscow would remain more significant than discord. Behind the rhetorical condemnation of a Sino-Soviet conspiracy bent on subversion and expansion, the president and secretary of state actually hoped for Titoism in China. The idea had been attacked by Republicans in the

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Truman years. Nevertheless, the vision of independence from Moscow’s control, as practiced by Josip Broz Tito in Yugoslavia, held out hope for winning the Cold War through erosion of Soviet power and ideological influence. Eisenhower and Dulles both believed that a Sino-Soviet split could be anticipated. As the administration’s basic national security policy asserted: The Russians could hardly view with equanimity the development of an independent China on its frontiers which was powerful, well armed, industrially competent, and politically united. . . . As the inevitable differences in interest, viewpoint, or timing of actions develop between the Russians and the Chinese; as the Chinese tend to become importunate in their demands for Russian assistance or support; or as the role of the Chinese as viceregents for international communism in the Far East becomes too independent and self reliant—there will be strong temptation for the Russians to  attempt to move in the direction of greater disciplinary control of the Chinese regime . . . [and then] the alliance will be critically endangered. 2

Questions lingered over the speed and most effective path toward that goal. So as Dulles insisted at Bermuda in December 1953 to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and French Foreign Minister Georges Bidault, one approach would be heightening friction by forcing the Chinese to become more dependent on, and more demanding of, Moscow.3 Not all efforts were to be belligerent however. Eisenhower and Dulles also contemplated inducement. Those who advocated constructive approaches to Beijing, because of, or in spite of, Moscow, however, discovered that opponents of change remained persistent and influential. When in July 1953 George V. Allen, ambassador to India and former ambassador to Yugoslavia, declared that Moscow could not control Beijing as it did Eastern Europe, Taipei charged that the United States favored Chinese Titoism so that it could befriend the Chinese. Six months later when Arthur Dean, head of the American delegation at the Korean War Panmunjom talks, called for better relations with the Chinese to lure them away from Moscow, the congressional China bloc denounced and ridiculed him, suggesting that he might be a tool of unsavory organizations they often targeted, like the Institute of Pacific Relations.4 Analysts and policymakers who tried to ascertain the actual status of SinoSoviet relations for the president and secretary of state found it exceedingly

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difficult to penetrate the arcane recesses of Communist bloc affairs and of domestic U.S. disputes regarding bloc evolution. The lack of information proved chronic. Seeing new data in the context of set beliefs proved equally debilitating. Because experienced analysts assumed that the Sino-Soviet relationship was firm and stable, the National Intelligence Estimates (NIE) they wrote minimized Sino-Soviet disagreements. Contrary judgments in 1952 and 1953 did not gain wide currency. Not only were they deemed unconvincing, but leaders in the intelligence community and beyond preferred to play safe. Thus confl icting interpretations of unity and division persisted into the 1960s.5 Repeated forecasts in a long string of intelligence studies held that there would be no serious weakening of Sino-Soviet ties. American intelligence and diplomats were not blind to evidence of SinoSoviet stress even though a few analysts denied the existence of a rift. Espionage revealed that, during the Geneva conference, Moscow refused to pledge intervention in a Sino-American war over Indochina unless Washington used nuclear weapons. CIA analysts used the word “confl ict” to describe Moscow-Beijing relations for the first time later that year.6 In the spring of 1955, intelligence sources attested to Soviet dismay at China’s “intransigence, and uncontrollability.”7 Allen Dulles reported to the NSC in October 1956 that the Chinese and the Soviets saw events in a rebellious Hungary quite differently. Beijing’s pleasure in Moscow’s distress could be “the beginning of the first rift between China and the U.S.S.R.”8 Observers pointed to a series of problem areas, including the Sino-Soviet border, patronizing and racist Soviet attitudes, Khrushchev’s 1956 de-Stalinization speech, and disputes regarding Chinese economic development. Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov lamented to Bedell Smith, “you must . . . remember that China is always going to be China, she is never going to be European.”9 Eisenhower recognized the strains in the Sino-Soviet relationship. He understood that Moscow hoped to improve relations with the United States, freeing scarce resources for domestic development rather than defense. The president concluded, as he told British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, “I do not believe that Russia wants war at this time—in fact, I do not believe that even if we became engaged in a serious fight along the coast of China, Russia would want to intervene with her own forces.”10 Soviet assistance to Chinese technological and economic modernization, however, created confusion about the nature of Sino-Soviet relations. As

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Rand Corporation analyst Allen S. Whiting pointed out, China could not manufacture its fi rst automobile until 1958, but Soviet assistance allowed it to deploy 1,800 jet fighters.11 After Stalin’s death, the new Soviet leaders dissolved joint-stock companies and returned the Changchun rail line and the ports of Dalian and Port Arthur. Moscow sent technical experts to China, dispatching 5,000 of them between 1954 and 1957 alone.12 Historian William Taubman writes that “Zhou Enlai got Khrushchev to fulfi ll obligations that Moscow had not in fact undertaken.”13 Although State Department assessments considered the amount of aid “niggardly,” Soviet support proved critical to realizing China’s fi rst 5-year plan, placing experts and funds into construction projects, and manufacturing enterprises and energy development.14 But cooperation hid, and did not eliminate, differences between Moscow and Beijing. Stalin had left a legacy of anger and suspicion, having repeatedly placed Soviet national security ahead of the needs of fraternal Communist parties. Particularly galling had been his secret negotiation of a friendship treaty with the Kuomintang in August 1945, his advice not to carry the civil war south of the Yangtze River, and his erratic assistance to the Chinese war effort in Korea.15 Mao objected also to Khrushchev’s declaring peaceful coexistence a basic principle of international affairs and the Soviet leader’s dismissal of the inevitability of an East-West war.16 Mao had long resented Stalin’s expectation of blind obedience and China’s subjugation, recalling that “I couldn’t have eggs or chicken soup for three years because an article appeared in the Soviet Union which said that one shouldn’t eat them.” Stalin had endangered the revolution by ignoring Chinese views on developments in China. Further, worship of Stalin had diminished Mao’s own status. He complained that “when Chinese artists painted pictures of me together with Stalin, they always made me a little bit shorter, thus blindly knuckling under to the moral pressure exerted by the Soviet Union.”17 But in spite of Mao’s resentments against Stalin, Khrushchev’s startling attack on Stalin in the so-called secret speech at the Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in February 1956 struck Chinese leaders as irresponsible. Khrushchev’s unexpected and massive assault on orthodoxy left little of Stalin’s legacy untouched, posing a problem for China, where, notwithstanding Mao’s friction with Stalin, heavy borrowing from the Soviet system had occurred.

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Mao resented Khrushchev’s lack of prior consultation and its implication that Beijing remained subservient to Moscow. In fact, after Stalin’s death, Mao believed that his seniority and rising status in the Communist movement, especially among Asians, mandated respect and deference from the younger, less experienced, new leaders in Moscow.18 Instead they ignored him and may have aimed indirectly to denounce his claims to infallibility along with Stalin’s cult of personality.19 Khrushchev “invariably insulted the sensitive Chinese,” observed historians Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov. “Where he had to be delicate, he was bombastic, where tact was required, he was downright rude.”20 When the secret speech ignited rebellion in Eastern Europe, Mao declared it confirmation that Khrushchev had destabilized the bloc.21 Khrushchev foolishly was “handing the sword to others, helping the tigers harm us.”22 China rendered Moscow moral and diplomatic support but utilized Soviet distress to leverage more material assistance. According to Marshal Nie Rongzhen, who ran China’s nuclear development program, for example, the Hungarian revolution of October 1956 provided Beijing with the ideal opening to secure a strategic technical accord. 23 Further, Beijing expected a new balance of power to evolve, lessening Soviet domination and allowing more scope to domestic variations on international Communism. 24 As Zhou Enlai asserted in March of 1957, “Marxism-Leninism . . . does not mean that all socialist countries . . . have . . . identical views on all questions at all times.”25 Eisenhower knew about the secret speech. Early reports suggested that it had been revolutionary, firmly ending the Stalin era. The president learned about it in greater detail when the CIA obtained a copy from Poland via Israeli intelligence in April 1956. Eisenhower approved its publication in the New York Times with the encouragement of Allen Dulles, who argued that a this would cause disarray in the Communist bloc.26 This had long been part of American strategy, using the media to emphasize Sino-Soviet resentments to drive the Soviets and Chinese apart. Washington pointed to Soviet imperialistic exploitation of Chinese territory in the northeast and sacrifice of Chinese soldiers in Korea, where US officials insisted that the Soviets refused to fight.27 There were also xenophobic strains among the Chinese people to be exploited, given the widespread intrusion of Russians into China’s urban areas and what many Chinese felt was the Russians’ arrogant demeanor. Simultaneously, VOA broadcasts to Soviet audiences emphasized

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China’s exploding population and exploited government fears of hordes flooding vast tracts of empty Soviet lands in the Far East.28 Soviet leaders did not have to be encouraged in their distrust of Beijing and fear of its recklessness. Stalin spied on Mao during the 1950 visit to Moscow, which produced the Sino-Soviet alliance treaty. Mao continually felt compelled to reassure Moscow that he would not be a Chinese Tito.29 Khrushchev saw Mao as a master of “cajolery, treachery, savage vengeance, and deceit” and complained about Mao’s “unwillingness to consider anyone else his equal.”30 Indeed, Khrushchev found the pretense of friendship burdensome and remained on guard around Mao. Khrushchev remarked in his memoirs that “confl ict between us and China is inevitable.”31 Soviet leaders, who were every bit as Europe centered as their American counterparts, were preoccupied with the issue of Germany’s rearmament and its integration into NATO, leaving little extra energy to deal with Chinese irredentism regarding Taiwan. And although the Soviets recognized that the Chinese still were consolidating their hold on power, securing national boundaries, eliminating internal dissent, and hoping to uproot colonies and thwart imperialists in the region, they themselves had reached another stage of development. Soviet officials were more concerned about stability than revolution and more interested in détente with the West than challenging superior power for minimal gain.32 Suspicion and rivalry also developed over the future of decolonizing peoples. After Stalin’s death, Mao no longer felt the same constraints in reaching out to nonwhite peoples. Although Mao assured Moscow that “the USSR is the center of the socialist camp. There cannot be other centers,” he not only urged greater equality within the bloc but also sought a larger role for China among emerging states.33 His efforts in the third world blossomed after 1960, but even before that he championed China as the most potent model to be followed in efforts to overthrow imperialism, win independence, secure political rights, and develop backward economies. The fact that Beijing was to some extent discredited by the 1959 Sino-Indian border clashes and Beijing’s unrelenting Sinocentrism did not diminish this as a source of Sino-Soviet friction. 34 Moscow’s successful launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile in August 1957 and Sputnik, the world’s fi rst artificial satellite, on October 4, 1957, won China’s admiration but did not significantly ameliorate tensions. Mao Zedong asserted that a historic turning point had come; the United

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States could never hope to catch up. Indeed, he displayed “a greater confidence in Soviet strategic power than the Russians themselves had,” observed Soviet specialist Donald Zagoria.35 Just a month after the launch of Sputnik, Mao recanted the policy of peaceful coexistence, which no longer seemed necessary.36 China’s enthusiasm alarmed the Soviets, leading Moscow to try to assert more control over the Chinese. Moscow had been rebuffed in April and July of 1957 regarding proposals for a jointly owned naval fleet and a long-wave radio station on Chinese soil. China’s response had been a surprise to Moscow since in both cases Beijing had requested assistance. In fact, during 1957, the Soviet Union helped China to build three low-power radio facilities based on common security imperatives. Khrushchev had believed that the Chinese would welcome a radio station on Hainan Island, which would support not just Soviet ships but also the new navy that Moscow was helping China to build. 37 He went to Beijing to explain the Soviet proposal, but Mao angrily denounced it, replying, “Why don’t you take the whole Chinese seacoast?”38 Soviet space prowess frightened Americans even as the Chinese celebrated this socialist triumph. Eisenhower found that the public and its representatives believed the nation faced a serious challenge, forcing the government to appropriate large sums for research and science education and confronting the Republican administration with partisan attacks for allowing a missile gap to develop. Lyndon Johnson for one mocked Eisenhower’s claim that he would soon launch a more sophisticated satellite, saying, “perhaps it will even have chrome trim—and automatic windshield wipers.”39 It did not calm popular alarm or enhance Eisenhower’s authority that in the fall the president experienced a heart attack and remained hospitalized and convalescent for weeks.

UNITED NATIONS Eisenhower and Dulles saw Moscow’s role in isolating China from the international community as a further source of Sino-Soviet friction. For instance, in 1950 Moscow walked out of the United Nations to protest Taipei’s control of the Chinese UN seat, but this was largely unnecessary since

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Washington had not yet formally opposed PRC admission. The Soviet action severely complicated Chinese entry into the UN. Ruth Bacon, of the State Department’s UN advisory staff, argued in 1953 that the Soviets understood the workings of the organization too well to have inadvertently chosen tactics that ensured that Beijing would not be admitted. Early in 1954, Henry Cabot Lodge, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, dismissed Soviet statements on China’s behalf as “perfunctory.” 40 China’s exclusion from the UN had not originally been Washington’s intention, and it did little to try to prevent Chinese representation. The People’s Republic made its desire to join clear.41 But with the outbreak of the war in Korea and China’s direct involvement, all that changed. The United States led the effort to brand the People’s Republic an aggressor state and to impose a UN trade embargo. Washington concluded that Taipei’s Security Council vote had been crucial to facilitating UN action in Korea and could not be spared in future crises. The United States decided it would keep China out. Beijing, at the same time, grew more apprehensive about the UN. The Chinese found their national security threatened by a United Nations army under American command. Although Beijing would continue to claim the UN seat under universal charter principles, it also became disillusioned with the apparent subservience of the institution to American policies.42 The “Chirep” question, as the confrontation over which Chinese government would control China’s UN seats was known, aroused considerable passion among Americans in the 1950s due to the casualties incurred in the Korean War. Having fought the Chinese on a United Nations battlefield, many Americans opposed admission of the enemy into the inner sanctum of peacemaking. The China Lobby believed the issue perfect for shaping national policy on China and created the Committee for One Million against the Admission of Communist China to the United Nations in the summer of 1953. Although the precise pedigree of the organization remains mysterious and may have involved the CIA, it received its impetus from hearings in the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Far East, chaired by Walter Judd (R-MN), and throughout its history wielded its greatest influence on Capitol Hill. Indeed, even before the Committee for One Million had been inaugurated, resolutions proposed by Senators William Knowland (R-CA), William E. Jenner (R-IN), and Everett Dirksen (R-IL) sought to ban contributions to, or withdraw the United States from, the UN if the members

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approved China’s entry.43 By July 1954, the committee’s petition drive to block China’s inclusion had collected one million signatures. When the Committee for One Million sought support, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) along with the Catholic and Jewish War Veterans, the Gold Star Mothers, the American Legion, and the General Federation of Women’s Clubs willingly complied.44 The AFL proved especially active, having battled Communism in the labor movement since the 1930s. Both AFL President George Meany and Vice President Matthew Woll lobbied assiduously against Beijing. Public opinion polling reflected more diverse opinions, especially as the decade advanced. In 1954, although just a minority favored leaving the UN were China to be admitted (some 59 percent believed that the United States ought to accept the will of a UN majority), a decided majority opposed China’s admission (78 percent against to 7 percent in favor).45 By May 1957, a Chicago Daily News poll revealed that support for a new administration policy existed among Democrats (70 percent favored China’s admission) but not in the president’s party (just 25 percent of Republicans agreed).46 Prominent newspapers also began to question whether the time had come to change inflexible attitudes.47 In the Senate, votes for excluding China from the United Nations remained overwhelming even as individual members privately acknowledged that the U.S. position on the issue could not be maintained indefinitely.48 The evidence from the documentary record, however, shows that neither Dwight Eisenhower nor John Foster Dulles agreed with barring China from the UN even when much of their public rhetoric stimulated popular passions on the question. Eisenhower resisted closing doors. He openly opposed Senate efforts to cut off funding to the UN should China be admitted, arguing that the UN was too important to the United States. Meeting personally with Republican leaders, he reminded them that every nation must accept defeat occasionally and that it would be foolish to “tie our hands irrevocably” regarding China.49 Although it was also true that Eisenhower did not want to see a belligerent China shoot its way into the organization, he objected to emotional policies that simultaneously threatened the UN and American prestige.50 Thus he articulated moral objections to China’s accession but pragmatically accepted eventual Chinese membership.51 The secretary of state also suggested there might be circumstances under which China could be integrated into the world community. Dulles had

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written to Henry Luce in 1950 asserting that Peking should neither be isolated nor excluded from the United Nations on ideological grounds. If the new regime could effectively control the population and rule its territory, then it would merit entry.52 In the summer of 1954, although he told the press corps that his views had changed because of the Korean War, he nevertheless pursued the idea of admission with Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden. Applying his Two Chinas preference, Dulles proposed that India be substituted for China in the United Nations Security Council and that both Chinas then be seated in the General Assembly.53 The following month he raised the point with John Dickey, an international lawyer, suggesting an amendment to the UN Charter that would change the composition of the Security Council. The prospect of having the Communist Chinese in the UN would not be quite so alarming if they would not have access to the veto power inherent in permanent membership in the Security Council.54 Accordingly, the president and secretary opposed the obvious tactic that would prevent China’s admission—use of the U.S. Security Council veto. Dulles’s disinclination to use the veto received broad support from State Department officials. Among Dulles’s close associates, Robert Bowie argued that “we were using up an enormous amount of effort to keep China out of the UN every year. We had to try to twist arms so that they could never get a majority. . . . My view was that it made more sense . . . not to use up all this political capital.” Instead Bowie advocated dual representation, assuming China would reject it but accepting China’s admission if it went along. Dulles, he believed, did not want to mount a fight over the issue because Dulles “didn’t think this was terribly important to American foreign policy.”55 United Nations specialists like Ruth Bacon insisted that conditions had not changed significantly from 1950, when the State Department had concluded that the issue was procedural and did not warrant application of the veto. A report by the officer in charge of international security issues for the Office of UN Political and Security Affairs contended that since the veto could ban China only from the Security Council, the United States and China might sit awkwardly together in all other UN venues.56 Pressure to use the veto, on the other hand, came from many sources. UN ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge insisted that Dulles authorize casting a veto to block China. To Chinese UN delegate T. F. Tsiang Lodge confided that he planned to veto China’s admission even though he had not

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obtained Dulles’s approval.57 Karl Rankin, whom Dulles considered extreme on the question, warned from Taipei that if Red China were accommodated without changing its government and policies, the UN would be discredited in the region and small countries would feel the need to harmonize their views with those of Beijing. Rankin made his views easier to ignore when he broadened his recommendation to advocate expelling the Soviet Union and other Communist countries for violating the principles of the UN Charter.58 More soberly, a joint Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs and Bureau of International Organization Affairs study in August argued that a number of good reasons existed to keep China out of the UN, including its actions in Korea, support for Ho Chi Minh, illegal detention of American citizens, suppression of human rights, and failure to assume China’s past treaty obligations. The UN might be a universal organization, but the report insisted that outlaw governments should not qualify.59 Similar opposition to a Beijing presence in the UN appeared in several official policy documents, including NSC 48/5 of May 17, 1951, and NSC 146/2 and 166/1 of November 1953.60 The key to Washington’s success in keeping China out, however, became the moratorium arrangement, not the veto. Through this mechanism, devised informally by Washington and London in May 1951, the question would be deferred rather than debated.61 During the course of the Korean War, few countries chose to confront Washington. But as fighting ended, various governments indicated that they wanted China in the world community, hoping such a move would prevent future wars.62 Dag Hammarskjöld, UN Secretary General, urged Washington to consider the ecumenical character of the UN and abandon its inclination to make the UN a “good boys club.”63 Ironically, Taipei also rejected the moratorium procedure, preferring to establish a clear record of votes against China.64 To Washington’s chagrin, Britain soon became uncomfortable with continuing the moratorium policy. British officials put preservation of AngloAmerican amity above equity for China—the prime minister noting that American feeling arising from wartime “losses and suffering” would not be “influenced by considerations of logic or expediency.” Nevertheless, the British complained that China’s exclusion grew increasingly indefensible to domestic constituents and members of the Commonwealth, not to mention the Chinese.65 New Delhi, in fact, pressed Dulles and Eisenhower even harder than did London. Vengalil Krishnan Krishna Menon, India’s UN ambassador, who had been dismissed by the United States as untrust-

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worthy and irritating, constantly urged greater flexibility and accommodation.66 London, meanwhile, argued that the United States ought to follow its lead and recognize China, which would simultaneously resolve the United Nations impasse.67 Caught between strong international and domestic views, London remained wary about confl ict with Washington over Chinese affairs. A brief prepared in December 1954 anticipating talks in Washington noted that this remained “one of the major threats to closer Anglo-American understanding and to a concerted . . . approach on other quite unrelated issues.” Anthony Eden darkly concluded in an April 1955 paper he called “In the Soup” that Chinese and U.S. intransigence on the UN role in the Taiwan Strait dispute might plunge them into war. But Britons could not afford to alienate Washington even if the Americans “find elementary prudence unbearably galling.”68 Although the Chinese Nationalists and their American sympathizers protested that the British had too much influence over naive Americans, London complained it had far too little.69 To Eisenhower the issue seemed bigger than just China. When Churchill warned that the Communists must not be allowed to use Taiwan to divide them lest the Soviets then exploit rifts to aggravate more significant European problems, the president concurred.70 Dulles, however, was exasperated with Beijing’s belligerence, appalled by its repressive domestic policies, and hounded by American public opinion and insisted repeatedly to the British that his government had no choice but to bar China.71 His ire was further provoked in July 1954 as concessions were made to Communist forces in Indochina during the closing days of the Geneva conference. Dulles reflected his dismay by appearing to change U.S. policy on admission to the UN, declaring that the United States would use its Security Council veto if necessary to keep China out. He continued by observing that this was unlikely since China’s entry would be “an important question” under the UN charter and would require support from twothirds of the members. Such a vote, he believed, would not be forthcoming. Nevertheless, U.S. policy seemed to have been reversed.72 The test of the administration’s position came, as it happened, not over the delicate China question but rather on the related issue of admitting Mongolia to the UN. The Soviet Union had been blocking the entry of fourteen applicants, including Spain, Ireland, Austria, and Italy, but in 1955, Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov and Canadian Prime Minister Lester Pearson arranged to

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approve these countries in exchange for seating the People’s Republic of Mongolia in the General Assembly.73 Chiang Kai-shek denounced this move as unacceptable, for giving international standing to a Communist satellite state comprised of territory the Nationalist Chinese claimed as part of China. Chiang dismissed the fact that during World War II he had surrendered rights to Mongolia in exchange for a treaty with the Soviet Union. His concessions, he insisted, had come about under U.S. pressure.74 Eisenhower and Dulles argued to Chiang that using his veto power would be a patently self-destructive act.75 The United States had been committed since the 1948 Vandenberg Resolution to the view that permanent members of the Security Council ought not to use the veto on membership questions, in so doing thwarting the will of the majority. Should Taipei cast its veto, it could turn world opinion against the Republic of China.76 So even though a distraught Dulles had told the press in July that he would resort to the veto to keep China out of the UN, he did not approve of using the veto for that purpose. At a subsequent press conference on December 6, 1955, which has been overlooked by historians, he backtracked. Instead of calling the China issue an important question that would properly be subject to a veto, as he had in July, he declared it a matter of credentials. The United States, he asserted, had not yet decided whether credentials questions could be vetoed.77 Days later when Taiwan actually did veto Mongolia’s entry, Washington did not.

TRAVEL Eisenhower and Dulles inherited Truman-era prohibitions against travel to China imposed during the Korean War and the People’s Republic’s responding ban in place. The regulations guarded against travel with a potential political edge, such as that in the 1930s and 1940s that had led some to join far-left popular front organizations and others to champion Italian fascism.78 The Manchurian Candidate, a novel published in 1959, made the dangers of exposure to Communism clear: you would be mistreated and exploited, emerging as a dupe, a spy, or an assassin. The argument that a less opaque and isolated China would be a safer and more manageable China appealed to only a minority of Americans. The

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Eisenhower administration resisted its entreaties for information about, and access to, the Red Chinese. But newsmen, musicians, scholars, and doctors became increasingly dissatisfied with restrictions as they watched European colleagues benefit from traveling there.79 So when on August 5, 1956, Beijing unilaterally and unexpectedly asked representatives from fifteen news organizations to tour China for a month, it accomplished several purposes. The invitation not only created a broad coalition of journalists eager to go and hostile to U.S. government restrictions; it breached Washington’s cordon sanitaire, getting China the news coverage it had long sought in the U.S. media.80 As Kenneth Young, a former Foreign Service officer, observed, “it is ironic that the Communist regime in Peking, which controlled its press and citizens, initiated this matter of travel and contacts, while the United States government, with its dedication to freedom, opposed it.”81 The immediate U.S. response was, in fact, to refuse. Dulles had planned to use journalist trips as leverage to expedite prisoner releases after the SinoAmerican repatriation agreement was signed in 1955.82 But in 1956, with little progress on fulfi lling the accord, Washington opposed travel, warning that more citizens could be arbitrarily detained. An assortment of influential news organizations, in contrast, reacted with excitement, including the New York Times, Associated Press, United Press, the Christian Science Monitor, NBC, and CBS. The Washington Post pointed to the absurdity of government excuses: China was hardly likely to invite journalists in order to incarcerate them. Some editors, remembering a Dulles call in 1950 for greater knowledge about China, decried his inflexibility. Others cautioned that the administration’s stance signaled to the world that it was frightened of China and its ideas.83 The Freedom of Information Committee of the American Society of Newspaper Editors called the State Department policy an imposition of an iron curtain.84 And several newsmen went to Hong Kong hoping to find an inconspicuous way to cross the border.85 Before the end of the year, three had defied the government ban only to have their passports revoked and access to their bank accounts threatened.86 Dulles realized that the blunt rejection of Beijing’s offer could not be sustained. Ambassador Johnson, writing from the ambassadorial talks in Geneva, complained about adverse publicity, insisting that it had had a more negative impact on efforts to gain release of the American prisoners than would the dispatch of the newsmen.87 Dulles suggested that Johnson

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“intimate” that once all American prisoners were released, civilian as well as military, barriers against American travel to China would likely be dropped, giving China access to the favorable attention it coveted.88 Members of Congress, who otherwise agreed with barring travel to China, objected to stopping newsmen. Senator Hubert Humphrey (D-MN), for one, recalled U.S. government protests in 1949, when the Chinese Communists first ejected reporters. If Americans had had a right to know what was happening inside China then, they did so now as well.89 Finally, in April 1957 Dulles offered a compromise, suggesting that a small pool of journalists be allowed to go without reciprocity for Chinese reporters to enter the United States.90 As Dulles’s information officer told the New York Times, the secretary wanted to move faster but had to tread carefully around the China Lobby outside, and inside, the administration. Dulles understood that a feud with the press would hurt Eisenhower’s presidency. Moreover, he believed that fair reporting from China could be useful in educating the American public. Allen Dulles, on behalf of the CIA, added that having Americans in China would facilitate efforts to collect information.91 By late summer, even unwillingness to provide reciprocity to Chinese journalists weakened once William Knowland came up with a scheme circumventing placement of visas in PRC passports, thus not risking indirect recognition of the Chinese authorities.92 The Chinese, however, spurned the final American posture. By this time, Chinese policies at home and abroad had swung left and compromise was no longer desirable.93 Beijing dismissed Dulles’s change of heart as a desire to facilitate espionage.94

CONCLUSION In the heart of the Cold War, officials worried that flexibility on any one issue might open floodgates to concessions on many outstanding problems between the United States and the Communist bloc. As a result, the United States proved largely inflexible toward China. The administration’s rhetoric continued to portray Communism as monolithic, and its policy dictated efforts to isolate China internationally. The U.S. government fought Beijing’s admission to the United Nations. It shunned the idea of recognition. It failed

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to accept the reality of a Sino-Soviet split, with some arguing that Khrushchev implied trouble where none existed in order to mislead Americans.95 But to administration critics and Chiang Kai-shek supporters, more disturbing was the possibility that acknowledging a meaningful Sino-Soviet break could free Eisenhower and Dulles to seek reconciliation with Beijing. Dulles had, after all, suggested that U.S. policy would change if a split were to materialize. Increased dissatisfaction with the economic embargo and the self-defeating ban on travel pinpointed areas where simple changes could be popular and useful. Eisenhower and Dulles regretted antagonizing foreign friends and allies over China. They spoke of the impracticality of trying to keep the Chinese out of the international community and continuing to block UN entry. And they acknowledged that a Sino-Soviet split existed and was growing. They did not, however, believe that they could defy political trends in the country, ignoring the China Lobby and the Republican right wing in order to repair relations with China. Nothing about that relationship seemed significant enough to risk the administration’s larger agenda. As Robert Bowie noted, “Dulles and Eisenhower tried to keep these people quiet by throwing them verbal bones and acquiescing in certain things which neither Eisenhower nor Dulles thought were terribly important, so as to have a free hand to deal with the other things which they did feel important.”96 In other words, Eisenhower and Dulles never effectively opposed China policies with which they did not agree because they were too busy protecting themselves. That this left the United States as an outlier in international affairs was just collateral damage.

8 “THE PERILS OF SOYA SAUCE”

D

wight Eisenhower came to the presidency with firm conservative Republican ideas about the role of trade and investment in U.S. foreign policy. He opposed government regulation and believed in the ability of business to resolve international confl ict and make the world a more peaceful and prosperous place. Thus in inheriting a system of trade restrictions against the Communist bloc, Eisenhower faced a dilemma. He believed in fighting Communism on every front, but he considered the control regime in place onerous for U.S. friends, allies, and Americans. He would accordingly oppose efforts to strengthen prohibitions and refuse to penalize those countries whose economic future depended on liberalized trade rules. This clearly applied to trade with China, where the president openly supported liberalization of the international order even though he did not revolutionize American policy. As fractious as United States relations with its allies sometimes grew over the Taiwan Strait crisis or UN admission, the allies considered trade a matter of greater moment and greater pain. The dispute over trade originated with efforts in the mid-1940s to restrict sensitive goods from flowing in quantity from the free world into the Soviet bloc. Washington found its views hard to sell until Moscow detonated its atomic bomb and Congress gave the Truman administration military aid funds that could be used as leverage for export controls.1 To handle decisions on which items ought to be limited or prohibited, the United States, Canada, and members of the Organization for European Economic Cooperation established the Coordinating Committee of the Paris Consultative Group (COCOM) early in 1950.2 But Europeans tended to view trade restrictions much differently than did resourcerich Americans. London, for one, had long protested against efforts to impede

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commercial exchange with the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The British worried about the strain imposed on their economy, whose dependence on the United States for raw materials was already high and which desperately needed additional markets. The situation was further complicated by the unilateral American decision to embargo China on December 17, 1950—cutting off all trade, barring American ships from carrying goods to China, and freezing Chinese assets in the United States—in retaliation for its entry into the Korean War.3 Washington had urged free world trade controls on sales of strategic commodities to China beginning early in 1949 but had met considerable resistance. Sanctioning China made protection of Britain’s colonial outpost of Hong Kong more difficult and challenged amity among Commonwealth members who might well refuse to adhere to prohibitions. More generally, European governments tended to emphasize the political as much as the economic implications of trade barriers and argued that greater commercial contact would reduce international tensions and diminish the need for Communist bloc unity.4 The Korean War undermined opposition to American demands. The Europeans acceded in July 1950 to extension by COCOM of controls originally intended for the Soviet bloc in Europe to China and North Korea. Then, on May 18, 1951, the UN declared that a partial embargo would stay in effect until the end of the war in Korea.5 A wary American Congress, meanwhile, sought to strengthen the system by tying U.S. aid to observance of export restrictions. First in the Kem Amendment (1951) and later through the broader Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act (the Battle Act), provision of financial, economic, and military support to foreign states became contingent on adherence to the American trade agenda. Washington’s terms seemed especially burdensome to the Japanese, who bitterly resented the expectation that they would accept anti-Chinese regulations stiffer than those required of their European competitors. Japan’s economic recovery from the devastation of the Pacific war had been accelerated by U.S. military procurement for the Korean theater, but Japanese government and business leaders fi rmly believed there would be no prosperity without trade with mainland China. They began to argue this case early in the American occupation, although Washington countered that trade would never reach the levels the Japanese anticipated and that if it did Japan would be dangerously dependent upon the Communist bloc. Japanese

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dismay in turn fueled the anxieties of American policymakers worried about China’s seductive power. As a result, the Truman administration instigated formation of a new offshoot of COCOM, the China Committee (CHINCOM), in order to embrace Tokyo, and insisted that CHINCOM impose restrictions more demanding than those of COCOM. At the same time, it also coerced the Japanese into signing a secret bilateral agreement elevating their actual controls well above CHINCOM levels.6 The Japanese had no choice but to acquiesce in Washington’s policy if they wanted rapid approval of the San Francisco peace treaty. Eisenhower, Dulles, and Treasury Secretary Humphrey agreed that Japan really would not, in the long term, develop and prosper without the raw materials and markets of northern China. Indeed, the president asserted that even in the short run Japan ought to be permitted a limited amount of trade with Communist China. Japan, he believed, could not sustain an industrial recovery without mainland iron and coal.7 To his diary he asserted, “I believe that the effort to dam up permanently the natural currents of trade, particularly between such areas as Japan and the neighboring Asian mainland, will be defeated.”8 Thus the president proved understanding when the Japanese legislature confronted the administration on July 30, 1953, with a unanimous resolution demanding that the China differential be eliminated and barriers be reduced to COCOM levels, if not below. He rejected the idea purveyed by China Lobby types like Representative Walter Judd (R-MN) that commercial connections would lead to the Communization of Japan.9 Rather than risking subversion of Japan, trade with China, he thought, would allow Tokyo to exert a democratizing influence among the Chinese and relieve their complete dependence upon Moscow. Further, and not to be ignored, Sino-Japanese trade would lighten the Japanese burden on the American taxpayer, who was providing significant aid to Tokyo because of stiff trade controls.10 Eisenhower accepted the idea of informal Sino-Japanese negotiations. A 300-strong Dietman’s League for the Promotion of Sino-Japanese Trade, formed in 1949 in the Japanese legislature, launched the talks in September 1953. The talks yielded a barter agreement calling for a permanent Chinese trade mission in Japan. So popular was the trade issue that political forces in the country opposed to Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru seized it to embarrass the government and ultimately help oust him.11 In March 1954, the NSC finally terminated the reviled bilateral agreement but insisted that Tokyo

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gradually decrease its controls to the level observed by other CHINCOM members.12 Although Tokyo welcomed the change, business interests argued that it did not go far enough. European merchants, the Japanese asserted, circumvented the CHINCOM prohibitions by selling goods to the Soviets at the lesser COCOM levels, and these materials were then transshipped to China. Since Japanese companies could not do the same, they were incurring losses and being replaced in traditional and natural markets.13 American trade policy, therefore, was not preventing China from obtaining CHINCOM goods, but it was straining free world relations.14 This became especially apparent as the approaching Korean War armistice eliminated the grounds for conformity on trade policy. Eager to reopen trade with China—and under considerable domestic pressure to do so15— allied governments balked at American proposals that sanctions continue if armistice negotiations proved inconclusive.16 Washington’s reluctance to permit sales of pharmaceuticals, including antibiotics and sulfonamides, appeared insensitive and insupportable to many Europeans.17 Objections, in particular, to treating China more harshly than the Soviet Union animated governments in Britain, France, West Germany, Portugal, Norway, and Denmark.18 Aggravating the situation, Senator Joseph McCarthy attacked various European governments for violating trade prohibitions.19 And the Chinese alluded to shipments of strategic goods in British bottoms, hoping to inflame Anglo-American suspicion and distrust.20 State Department officers invariably found themselves caught between charges from abroad that the United States demanded too much and complaints at home that it asked too little.21 Some restrictions seemed embarrassing. In Hong Kong the U.S. consulate received an inquiry from Washington regarding the oversupply of prophylactic rubbers to the colony. Wasn’t it true that the excess was being used by Chinese soldiers in Korea to keep their rifle barrels dry? Ultimately the Pentagon approved the embargo infringement, however, since the condoms would, it was found, corrode the rifles and help win the war.22 Similarly, officials in Hong Kong were told that “if . . . [a chicken] egg had been hatched in Communist China,” the resulting chicken was a Communist product when it entered Hong Kong. But “if the chicken . . . is brought across the border into Hong Kong live and lays the egg on the Hong Kong side,” asked the Hong Kong consulate, “is that then a communist product?”23 Or as one

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diplomat noted in August 1954, if the United States could not be represented at the World Poultry Congress when Communist Chinese delegates also attended, would there be any international meetings to which Americans could go?24 Then there were pandas. In July 1958, the U.S. government barred the only giant panda in the West from entering the country—an event that probably would have been hugely popular—because the high price of exhibiting the animal would enrich Beijing.25 In fact, the goal of undermining China’s economic development motivated much of the trade sanctions regime. Although ideologically committed to the Soviet bloc and to self-sufficiency, China found its growth circumscribed by the loss of the U.S. trading relationship, not only sacrificing direct trade with the United States but also, and more significantly, losing dollar earnings and remittances that reduced what China could purchase abroad by perhaps $130–$150 million annually. In 1954, for example, the China differential cost Beijing 5 percent of potential imports while the U.S. embargo added another 10 percent.26 So, although China would have reoriented its commercial relationships even without Western restrictions, these added significant strain. In partial compensation, the Chinese Communists found it possible to use the iniquitous trade controls to try to weaken the Western alliance. As part of their 1953 peace offensive aimed at Japan, Chinese leaders asserted that economic crisis in the West prompted the United States to force purchase of expensive American commodities rather than cheaper Chinese goods.27 People ’s China observed in July 1954 how assiduously capitalist states were competing for access to the China market.28 Beijing pressed London continually for relaxation of controls to expedite overall progress in establishment of diplomatic contacts. When eventually Britain announced its unilateral abrogation of the COCOM-CHINCOM differential, Chinese news media gave the decision great play and celebrated London’s defiance of American policies.29 To President Eisenhower, challenges to free world unity vitiated many of the benefits that isolating China provided. As NATO commander, he had recognized the need to seek approval or, at least, acceptance by allied governments of American policies. As president, he found Chinese affairs especially divisive. Not only did U.S. policies depart significantly from those followed by allied states, but they also tended to appear draconian, reckless, and frightening.

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Eisenhower, therefore, turned to concessions on trade to placate foreign critics. An embargo, he reasoned, ought to apply solely to war materiel, beyond which unimpeded trade would be in everyone’s interests. Moreover, the president preferred to define strategic goods narrowly, allowing Indonesia, Malaya, and Burma, for instance, to sell rubber to the Communist Chinese.30 As early as 1953, at an NSC meeting, he explicitly disparaged economic warfare policies inherited from the Korean War period. Eisenhower insisted it was “crazy” to “waste” talented manpower on enforcing such trade sanctions.31 He contended that by strengthening the economies of the free world nations, commerce would do as much for American security, if not more, than military preparedness. Applying this analysis to the China situation, Eisenhower lamented the domestic political constraints that made a general lifting of trade restrictions against the Chinese impossible. “The trouble,” he complained to the NSC in April 1954, “was that so many members of Congress want to crucify anyone who argues in favor of permitting any kind of trade between the free nations and Communist China.” Th is appeared shortsighted both because of the fiscal and economic benefits of trade and because he believed in “trade as a means of weakening the bonds between Soviet Russia and Communist China.” Further, raising psychological warfare, which historians have increasingly called a key aspect of Eisenhower’s approach to foreign affairs, Ike asserted that trade would be an effective weapon, giving the populace incentives to rise up against their Communist overlords. 32 Moreover, he told the NSC that he “could not refrain from reemphasizing the invariable difficulties the United States stored up for itself by telling other nations they should not trade with Communist China.”33 Eisenhower subscribed to the view that the Soviet Union would not, and probably could not, meet all of China’s needs. Hardliners in his administration, including Admiral Radford, Allen Dulles, and Charles E. Wilson, argued that the United States ought to try to force China to rely on Soviet largesse. Chinese enthusiasm for the alignment would quickly be punctured by the reality of Moscow’s backward technology, shortage of goods, and stinginess. Even if the Soviets transshipped Western supplies to China, the costs and the strain on carrying capacity would be enormous.34 As a result, China’s modernization would be slowed and growth in some areas rendered impossible. The burden of an impoverished China would, moreover, hamper Soviet development.

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The president, by contrast, preferred a strategy of inducement to one of punishment. “Trade is the strongest weapon of the diplomat and it should be used more,” he argued. It was nonsense to condemn such trade as “traitorous” for it would “weaken the Russian hold” on dependent countries.35 He received support in that regard even from strident anti-Communists like his vice president, Richard Nixon, and Treasury Secretary Humphrey as well as the chairman of the Council on Foreign Economic Policy (CFEP), Clarence Randall. Mao’s dedication to industrializing China and lifting its people out of poverty could be used to emphasize the advantage of good relations with the West. At the same time, a less confrontational policy would eliminate major sources of tension between Washington and leaders in Tokyo and Europe. As he would do by sending emissaries to Taipei, Eisenhower deployed hardliners, his Joint Chiefs of Staff particularly, to sell a flexible trade policy to Congress as a national security measure.36 Rather than a bold frontal assault on the issue, however, the president pursued a cautious approach that distinguished between altering American policy and modifying reactions to the policies of allied governments. He made no effort to eliminate the embargo, although he thought that it was misguided. First he quietly shifted Washington’s stance to meet the needs of friendly states regarding trade with Moscow and Eastern Europe. In the wake of the Korean armistice and the Geneva conference settlement on Indochina, the administration exchanged reductions in anti-Soviet/East European restrictions for French and British agreement to continue fullstrength curbs on China. Eisenhower argued to Churchill that allied security would be jeopardized as would his own domestic political welfare if decontrol went too far or too fast.37 Movement on China would follow but only slowly because his government was so divided on the issue. In fact, with the outbreak of the Taiwan Strait crisis, further progress became all but impossible domestically. The United States, however, had little choice. At a November meeting of Economic Defense Officers in Paris, the American representative found member nations agreeing that Washington’s inflexibility had isolated the U.S. government. Continuing in this direction was “undermining our ability to exert leadership in other matters,” he reported. By December 1954, NSC 5429/5 acknowledged that strict standards might have to be jettisoned if they became too divisive.38 U.S. allies were already circumventing controls by requesting exemptions from CHINCOM and often not waiting for

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approval before shipping goods.39 Japan’s Hatoyama Ichiro government, inaugurated in December 1954, for instance, initiated a new multidirectional diplomacy that sought to better relations with Moscow and Beijing. Although the prime minister, under American pressure, relinquished hopes of establishing de facto diplomatic relations, he welcomed a Chinese trade mission to Tokyo. Hatoyama privately assured the Dietman’s League that he would support a new barter agreement—an assurance that leaked and triggered considerable dismay among American officials.40 Just days before, NSC 5516/1 had warned of “serious friction” developing between the United States and Japan because of China policy.41 Similarly, the British, having improved their political and economic relations with the People’s Republic beginning at the Geneva Conference in 1954, were no longer willing to wait for liberalization. In December 1955, London informed Washington that it planned unilaterally to remove items from the CHINCOM list that could be traded under COCOM.42 The United States might be able to forego markets for ideological reasons, but neither Britain’s businessmen nor its balance-of-payments situation gave London that luxury. Criticism from the press, the public, and interest groups, often articulated in Parliament, made defiance of Washington more palatable.43 Additionally, given the shortness of war in the nuclear age, Britain’s military dismissed as obsolete the concept of controlling trade to prevent an adversary stockpiling goods. London also rejected suggestions that changes should be deferred until the United States had an opportunity to use trade controls as leverage in the newly launched Geneva ambassadorial talks with Beijing. Confidence that Washington actually wanted to improve relations with the Chinese was not high in the Foreign Office.44 U.S. military officers reacted angrily to the British move. Believing that American soldiers carried a disproportionate burden in the Pacific on behalf of the entire Western alliance, they argued that allied governments ought to defer to Washington on economic defense policies. Instead they saw London as “cynically embracing a lawless enemy” in defiance of Washington despite “the vast expenditure of U.S. money and energy” devoted to rescuing Britain’s economy and protecting its security. To Admiral Radford, this selfishness, so typical of the British, would have catastrophic results: I consider that any benefits which might have been expected from SEATO would be nullified; the morale of strong anti-Communist forces in Asia

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would be seriously shaken; U.S. prestige in Asia would reach a new low; friendship with the United States could well become a dangerous commodity; and the stoic temperament of the peoples of Asia would cause them to seek an accommodation with the Communists.45

Apocalyptic rhetoric from Radford paralleled other expressions of concern from government officials. Typically, the Defense Department directed the Far East Economic Defense Working Group to construct a convincing case for retention of controls even though by September 1955 that position had been all but lost and the United States needed a plan for relaxation.46 In December, responding to Britain’s unilateral renunciation of CHINCOM, Director of the Office of Chinese Affairs Walter McConaughy sought to coerce the first secretary at the embassy with a warning that Washington would have to tighten its own controls on Hong Kong to prevent development of new loopholes in supply of strategic goods. Assistant Secretary Walter Robertson also reported hopefully to Dulles that Britain had overestimated the support it would get from CHINCOM states.47 These American attempts to preserve the status quo were doomed, however, and neither Eisenhower nor Dulles would sanction a fight to save the existing embargo structure. Eisenhower steadfastly believed that U.S. trade policy lacked consistency and logic in sanctioning China more severely than the Soviet Union, which constituted a far more serious threat. Moreover, he argued that “the history of the world . . . proved that if you try to dam up international trade, the dam ultimately bursts and the flood overwhelms you.” 48 He noted in his diary that he favored “removing all restrictions on all trade with the Reds . . . [except for] a few of our types of machinery.” 49 His frustration with government personnel, including cabinet officials, who stymied much needed change through delay, grew.50 The barriers they sought to erect against China, he complained, “were actually hurting ourselves and our allies,” especially given existing agricultural and industrial surpluses. Meanwhile, Dulles, who had long worried about “the good will of our allies,” told the president that change had become vital because differences over the control system had gone well beyond the divisiveness feared in NSC 5429/5 and trade controls teetered on the edge of total disintegration. London and Paris warned that COCOM might crumble under unrelenting American pressure, and even the Italian and Turkish governments, which had long supported Washington, were wrestling with their own disgruntled

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businessmen.51 Dulles suggested, in instructions to Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson, who was conducting the ambassadorial talks, that the Chinese position on trade policies might be fruitfully explored if that would create an incentive regarding renunciation of force in the Taiwan Straits.52 Disagreement among and within government agencies made the way forward more difficult for Eisenhower and Dulles. The United Nations Affairs staff recognized as early as February 1953 that “the small psychological and economic benefits to be derived from a strengthening of the United Nations embargo are outweighed by the difficulties of obtaining it and the doubtfulness of enforcing it.”53 Interagency intelligence, moreover, estimated that “nothing short of a naval blockade, coupled with bombardment of communications, would seriously reduce communist military capabilities or even seriously affect the Chinese economy.”54 Officials in the State Department’s Far Eastern bureau, however, dismissed Dulles’s thoughts on liberalizing trade policies as too radical. The NSC stalled, urging that the issue be discussed yet again in upcoming Anglo-American summit meetings. The Department of Defense pushed hard and often for tougher measures. Treasury, the Foreign Operations Administration, and the CIA agreed that modification of controls should be resisted. When in January 1956 Eisenhower directed the CFEP to study a list of goods that London wanted to decontrol, he had in hand council recommendations that restrictions be strengthened, not weakened.55 Over the following months, the Departments of State, Defense, Treasury, and Commerce and the International Cooperation Administration (ICA) labored to preserve the “maximum feasible differential,” although State, Commerce, and the ICA grudgingly conceded some validity to London’s position.56 At the same time, on Capitol Hill conservative members of Congress from both parties threatened to target foreign aid programs if the administration did not find a way to obstruct decontrol. The loudest complaints arose in the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigation into East-West Trade, where John McClellan (D-AK), Joseph McCarthy (R-WI), Henry M. Jackson (D-WA), and Stuart Symington (D-MO) denounced the administration for not telling the American people that the nation’s allies were shipping strategic materials to the Communist bloc. Both William Knowland (RCA) and John Vorys (R-OH) wrote to Dulles to warn of dire consequences should the secretary do nothing.

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Eisenhower, however, was irritated by the rigidity of conservatives like Secretary of Commerce Sinclair Weeks, who opposed the president’s expansive view of trade. On April 26, 1956, Ike determined that negotiations with London and Tokyo would begin. He even told the National Security Council that he felt the administration had in the past been too worried about congressional views on free trade issues. But this did not expedite the policymaking process. Dulles’s disinterest in economic affairs led him to abdicate responsibility for the issue to Walter Robertson. The secretary did this knowing the department was split and that Robertson opposed any change. Robertson had put his opposition quite baldly, writing to Dulles that the British view was “a position without principle.”57 But it is not clear that Dulles intended to scuttle relaxation. At the NSC meeting of April 5, 1956, he advocated, not for the first time, that surplus American agricultural commodities be sold to the Soviet bloc, and he emphatically rejected a suggestion by the Defense Department that Washington try to stop Britain’s relaxation through threats of an agonizing reappraisal of Anglo-American relations.58 Whatever the motive, deliberations moved slowly. The Economic Defense Advisory Committee (EDAC) tried an abortive initiative to reach a common level of controls, eliminating not just the CHINCOM differential but also that between the United States and its allies.59 When a policy finally did emerge in NSC 5704/1, the United States had, for the fi rst time, made real concessions, accepting trade in all but the most sensitive items. COCOM members nevertheless dismissed Washington’s effort as too little, too late.60 That Eisenhower did not intercede to ensure a more reasonable and productive outcome reflected his concern with domestic political pressures and the higher priority he accorded to economic warfare in the Middle East and Latin America. As historian Burton Kaufman notes, the rising tide of Arab nationalism and the growing preoccupation with Communist challenges to the Western Hemisphere distracted Eisenhower from East Asia.61 The Suez Canal crisis of the summer and autumn of 1956, moreover, severely strained the Western alliance and made concessions to the British and French on the China trade differential less palatable. Some American officials, in fact, expected chastened British and French foreign ministries to abandon their insistence on trade liberalization and were disappointed when efforts to placate the United States did not eliminate the chronic trade problem.62

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On the domestic front, the president faced a reelection campaign, making it seem unwise to challenge bipartisan opposition in Congress. Eisenhower was especially concerned about attacks on his most important security programs. Therefore, he did not provide intellectual leadership, retreating to an amalgam of vacillation and inflexibility. As the New York Times lamented, American China trade policies were too emotional.63 Indeed, Eisenhower, by this time, would have preferred ending U.S. adherence to the China differential, not just approving abandonment by Europe and Japan. It seemed clear that the differential had not slowed China’s growth and exceptions were multiplying. Moreover, whereas the Sino-Soviet alignment had not been undermined, the Tokyo-Washington alliance was under serious strain. At the NSC, he lamented shortsightedness regarding the U.S. economy, declaring, “if we do not propose to put severe obstacles in the way of our allies trading with Communist China, it seemed . . . rather foolish to put such obstacles in the way of our own trade with Communist China.”64 Elsewhere the president remarked that “the Yankee . . . is a fine trader, and we got to be a great country by trade.” It was irrational to abandon that advantage.65 At the Bermuda summit in late March 1957, the British returned to the fray by arguing yet again that current policies were indefensible. The British foreign minister offered continued support on keeping China out of the United Nations in exchange for United States acquiescence on the trade issue. There had been some 200 questions raised in Parliament as to why London concurred in a system that sanctioned China more severely than the Soviet Union. Much as Prime Minister Harold Macmillan wanted to restore pre-Suez friendship, he could go no further.66 Unexpectedly, the president and his advisors got considerable backing from Congress. In the Senate, an influential group including majority leader Lyndon Johnson (D-TX), prompted by business and agricultural interests, let the president know that they were amenable to relaxing the China embargo.67 Competition from low-cost Japanese textile factories led some southern state representatives to advocate Japanese sales to the Chinese, while they and others recognized that increasing overall trade with the PRC would reduce the levels of assistance Washington had to provide to Tokyo.68 Eisenhower accordingly approved implementation of the NSC recommendations, which seemed daring in Washington even as they proved too modest for Europe.

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In May 1957, London declared it would unilaterally dispense with the China differential. Although the president complied with Dulles’s advice and asked Macmillan to desist, he privately assured Macmillan that he understood London’s view that “the commercial interests of our two countries are not at all alike,” that Britain “live[s] by exports—and by exports alone.”69 Eisenhower could not join the British by eliminating America’s own harsh controls, but he could and did reject calls from the JCS and the Department of Defense for sanctions against Britain. The president refused to withhold intelligence and/or nuclear cooperation, block assets in the United States, apply diplomatic and economic pressures upon British colonies, or support Spanish claims on Gibraltar. The president also rebuffed demands that NATO take COCOM’s place in policy enforcement so that security would overrule commercial imperatives.70 Further, he made his personal opposition to the differential clear to the press. London’s assault on the control system helped Tokyo in its efforts to diminish restrictions on trade with China. Officials could pretend reluctance to defy Washington but nevertheless align their trade policies with those of Britain, as Norway, Denmark, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France were doing. To improve their trade posture further, businessmen and the occasional government representative talked about exchanging permanent trade offices with the Chinese in spite of the de facto recognition that such a step would accord.71 In the early weeks of 1958, a fourth, “private,” Sino-Japanese trade agreement included certain diplomatic privileges for Chinese trade representatives, including the flying of the PRC flag over their proposed Tokyo office.72 Word of this concession drew a furious response from Chiang Kai-shek. He could understand the desire to carry on commercial relations with mainland China, however misguided, because Japan needed raw materials and markets. But flag flying could not be countenanced and would require that Taipei break diplomatic relations with Tokyo. Washington quietly urged Chiang to refrain and Japan to rethink loss of a valuable commercial partner. Ultimately, under intense American pressure, the Japanese government reneged on the flag provision.73 When a PRC flag subsequently sustained damage at a postage stamp exhibit in Nagasaki and the perpetrators were not punished, Beijing angrily suspended economic and cultural exchanges with Japan.74

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By 1958, it had nevertheless become clear that the United States was progressively more isolated in COCOM and that Washington’s position risked an open rupture in the Western alliance. COCOM members had jettisoned the CHINCOM list and sharply reduced restrictions against the European Soviet bloc in the spring of 1957. U.S. representatives fought a rearguard action motivated in part by Defense Department objections that strategic items of military and technological utility would now reach Communist destinations. Eisenhower, however, declared trade and strategic issues separable. The military, he believed, could not render expert advice on commercial questions. Given the corrosive effects of American intransigence, he insisted that the United States response avoid extremes in the interests of broader harmony.75 Eisenhower also realized that, although his military remained largely intransigent, other parts of the government had, by 1958, moved closer to his position on the embargo. Dulles, for instance, having fluctuated in his views of economic warfare, had concluded that restraints had not had much effect on China, nor had the relaxation of prohibitions engendered a broad expansion of trade. By contrast, controls had had a negative impact on friends and allies. The United States, he told the NSC, should not rely on economic sanctions as a tool of diplomacy.76 Coupled with Eisenhower’s refusal to oppose reduction in European and Japanese trade barriers against the Communist Chinese came the president’s decision to permit Canadian subsidiaries of American companies to trade with China. Canada had long been an unhappy hostage to American attitudes on trade with, and recognition of, the Communist authorities in Beijing.77 In 1958, when Canada began to experience economic difficulties, American interference in Canadian business suddenly appeared intolerable. The Ford Motor Company of Canada, for instance, having been approached by Chinese trade agents with a potential order of 1,000 cars, had to refuse because of the U.S. Trading with the Enemy Act. To Canadians, however, Ford’s response rankled, testifying to the abject dependence of their economy and security on a nation with very different priorities.78 Dulles felt the Canadians were playing politics with the issue and naively ignoring Chinese attempts to damage relations between Ottawa and Washington. Nevertheless, during a July trip to Canada, Eisenhower and Dulles assured the prime minister that an exception could be made for the Ford export deal.79

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In fact, others shared the desire of Ford and Canada to secure concessions from the United States. American subsidiaries in several nations wanted authorization to fi ll PRC orders. As Eisenhower and Dulles observed to the NSC, the Canadian exception had not led to large Chinese orders since Beijing had really just seen the subsidiary connection as a way to score political points. Once Washington had conceded, these suppliers became less appealing. But although the president and secretary favored relaxing the ban, they agreed to delay in the face of broader NSC opposition.80 Eisenhower’s sensitivity to Canada’s plight led to further relaxation the following year on prohibitions against transportation of Red Chinese goods, specifically frozen shrimp and soy sauce, across American soil between two Canadian destinations. Trucking companies and the Canadian press attacked American regulations as unreasonable, the Toronto Globe and Mail remarking in an editorial, titled “The Perils of Soya Sauce,” that never before had Chinese food been seen as a national security menace.81 Passions ran so high that Canadians called for retaliation against American shipments across Canada to Alaska or between Detroit and Buffalo. Ultimately, after what the New York Times called “weeks of solemn deliberation,” the United States agreed to let the Communist shrimp through. The State Department convinced Treasury officials that Washington was being made to look ridiculous and that U.S.-Canadian relations were being needlessly strained.82 So Eisenhower maintained highly visible trade barriers for the United States in self-defense, while he quietly conceded on controls governing allied trade. Sensitive to Congress and what he took to be public opinion, he did not, in fact, confront the pressure of, nor could he hide behind pleas from, business circles regarding the conduct of trade with China. Such commerce seemed inherently unstable and probably unprofitable. In 1948, just prior to the Communist takeover, U.S. exports to China had reached only $240 million or 2 percent of all exports. Imports from China totaled $117 million or, again, 2 percent.83 Only a small sector of the business community yearned for the China market, such as producers of items using hog bristles—for example, makers of paint and hair brushes—as well as export-import firms.84 Sporadic interest from car manufacturers or the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce did not suffice to cause a reconsideration of policy.85 The intelligence and research staff at the State Department dismissed the likelihood that big or even medium-size businesses would have much interest in the

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China market.86 Moreover, strongly anti-Communist unions insisted that it was “beneath the dignity of free American workers to handle goods produced by slave labor.”87 Public opinion, on the other hand, should have strengthened Eisenhower’s resolve. At the beginning of the administration, the public appeared staunchly opposed to commercial relations with China, registering poll results of 83 percent against trade to 14 percent in favor of it. Thereafter opinion fluctuated, but by 1957 the State Department noted a trend in the direction of favoring trade so long as war materials were barred. Even the British relaxed and refused to worry about Committee of One Million accusations of “arming . . . Red China a la Japan before Pearl Harbor.”88

CONCLUSION Eisenhower understood that although China suffered under the trade control regimes promoted by the United States, Washington incurred almost as much damage. Trade prohibitions undermined the economic recovery of friends and allies, complicating and straining America’s foreign relations. Efforts at isolating the Chinese economically added to the tax burden of American voters. Although dependency had the potential to widen SinoSoviet differences, Eisenhower believed that making Beijing rely exclusively on Moscow would most likely strengthen their unwelcome alliance. He insisted that the contacts resulting from economic interaction with the free world would moderate Communist behavior on the mainland. Accordingly, commerce became the main area of flexibility for an administration seeking an improved environment inside China, between Washington and Beijing, and between the United States and its allies. The president failed to take a strong leadership role on changing U.S. embargo practices. Instead he adopted a less dangerous policy of supporting and assisting the relaxation of rules that handicapped other nations as well as protecting those governments from American retribution. Privately, Eisenhower made clear his preference for trade with China. He complained about the rigidity of U.S. policy. Especially once U.S. allies significantly reduced their own restrictions, much of the justification for Washington’s embargo disappeared.

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Eisenhower might have pressed his preference for Sino-American trade, but other matters took priority. Caught between the conservatives in his own party and the Democratic opposition, he approached members of Congress warily even when he believed them wrong and/or foolish. To many of these members, the goal of thwarting China’s economic growth and overthrowing its Communist government dictated a rigid embargo and unrelenting pressure. Developments in China beginning in 1958 reinforced Eisenhower’s caution. Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward accelerated regimentation and repression among the Chinese. That and renewed trouble in the Taiwan Strait militated against flexibility.

9 BACK TO THE STRAIT

F

or Dwight D. Eisenhower and Mao Zedong, the 1958 Strait confrontation reflected different definitions of security, trouble with domestic constituencies, and clashing cultural assumptions, even as both sought to avoid a military collision. The crisis evolved slowly from the inconclusive outcome of the earlier Taiwan Strait confrontation in 1954. When Beijing began hammering the offshore islands with artillery fire on August 23rd, that action was not entirely unanticipated nor were the Americans unprepared. The United States swiftly entered the fray; an alarmed international community preferred to watch from a distance. Washington, meanwhile, pressed Chiang Kai-shek to reduce his garrison and to renounce the use of force while Moscow reluctantly supported Chinese operations. Within weeks Beijing called for resumption of ambassadorial talks and on October 6th declared a cease-fire. The end of the altercation, however, did not resolve the underlying civil war dilemma of a divided China, and in 1962 confl ict would flare again. For Eisenhower, shelling in the Strait, as in 1954, was a clarion call to defend the free world and to wage peace. He believed he must prevent the expansion of Communism but also avert military exchanges with China and the Soviet Union. Although saving the offshore islands had become even more controversial in 1958 than in 1954, too many elements of U.S. policy flowed through the Strait—domestic politics, security, international credibility, and the freedom to apply U.S. power—just to let them go. Thus he quickly, if cautiously, responded by authorizing naval convoys for Nationalist supply ships to the edge of China’s territorial waters.1 Eager to avoid an explosion, the president told his cabinet and the Joint Chiefs that even if the Chinese Communists committed “an overt act against the off-shore islands” the United

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States should be careful “not [to] take instantaneous action which would spread the hostilities.”2 For Mao, the decision to instigate the conflict most importantly served the goal of domestic reform. Capitalizing on the nationalistic fervor he expected to generate, Mao believed he could rally the government, party, and people behind breathtaking economic and social reorganization—the Great Leap Forward he had launched in January 1958.3 Since “the CPSU [Communist Party of the Soviet Union] had, in effect, repudiated much of its own past . . . [and] could no longer insist on having a monopoly on theoretical guidance,” Mao felt free to reject the Soviet economic model.4 As he plunged ahead with formation of people’s communes throughout the country beginning in August 1958, he simultaneously sought to eradicate lingering positive images of the United States—as World War II allies and missionary educators—which he believed slowed revolutionary change at home.5 Mao also had foreign policy goals. He did not intend to go to war, endanger U.S. forces, or take control of the islands.6 He wanted to test American resolve, waste U.S. resources, and weaken U.S.-Taiwan ties by triggering confl icting expectations and demonstrating the total, and embarrassing, dependence of Taiwan.7 Furthermore, Mao wanted to thwart any plans permanently to split China. The U.S. Seventh Fleet’s continuing presence in the Taiwan Strait encouraged international acceptance of two Chinas.8 He had been angered by ambassadorial talks that made no advances, but also by Washington’s willingness to disrupt them. He had been exasperated by Moscow’s focus on Soviet-American détente. And as the American intervention in Lebanon unfolded in July, he may have worried about a new American aggressiveness that could threaten China, or he might have relished an opportunity to accomplish his goals while Washington remained preoccupied.9 In May he told the Eighth Party Congress, “Dulles looks down upon us [because] we have not yet completely shown and proven our strength.”10 After the end of the first crisis in the Taiwan Strait in 1955, a range of short- and long-term irritants had accumulated. The president and the secretary of state recognized that mounting pressures on China could trigger an explosion. Chiang Kai-shek had not only retained most of the contested islands but had moved vigorously to strengthen their defenses by shifting large contingents of Taiwan’s best forces to Jinmen and Mazu. Although Eisenhower and Dulles had repeatedly urged him to reduce his commit-

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figure 9.1 “Chinese Firecracker,” by Roy Justus Courtesy of the Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

ment, by 1958 Chiang had placed some 100,000 soldiers, composing onethird of his army, in garrisons on the islands. To Mao’s distress, the United States continued support of Chiang’s government nonetheless, signing a wide range of agreements for economic, cultural, and military cooperation. Chinese Communist leaders saw these as an Americanization of Taiwan as well as a crystallization of its separation from the mainland. Beijing objected particularly to the emplacement of nuclear-warheadcapable Matador missiles on Taiwan in 1957. These weapons significantly upgraded Taiwan’s arsenal, providing a previously absent all-weather, nightfl ight capability and allowing Taipei to target eight mainland airfields as well as major population and industrial centers like Shanghai and Wuhan.11 Although deployment in Taiwan was designed to leverage Japan into upgrading its defenses to include Matadors, the Chinese Communists and Nationalists saw the gesture as confirming Washington’s commitment to Taiwan.12 It also suggested that Washington entertained the possibility of limited nuclear wars.13 Simultaneously Taiwan became a hub for American intelligence operations. It acted as a platform for infi ltrating agents and launching commando

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operations against the mainland. It played a central part in opposing Chinese rule in Tibet, and during the early 1958 coup attempt against the left-leaning Sukarno, the CIA flew missions to Indonesia from airfields in Taiwan. Mao’s frustration with the trajectory of Sino-American relations coexisted with a growing conviction that he could undermine the alignment between Taiwan and the United States. American officials were clearly irritated by their inability to persuade Chiang to reduce troops on the offshore islands. They wanted Chiang to scale back Taiwan’s oversized military budget lest it overwhelm the island’s economy even as it drained U.S. coffers. Discord also mounted between the general population of Taiwan and the growing American community of military, political, and economic advisory personnel. Despite repeated warnings from the U.S. ambassador that too many Americans lived and worked in Taiwan (some 11,000 by 1957), that their style of living was too different, and that cultural misunderstandings had provoked widespread resentment, Washington did nothing to ameliorate friction.14 On “Black Friday,” May 24, 1957, a mob of 25,000 ransacked the U.S. embassy and the headquarters of the United States Information Service in Taipei as well as threatening the offices of the Military Advisory Group over issues of extraterritoriality and racism. In addition to a spontaneous outpouring of frustration, the riot also reflected unhappiness with Taiwan’s almost total dependence upon United States protection and largesse. The ROC had few legitimate ways to voice its disagreement with American policies. To Beijing the rioting demonstrated Chiang’s understandable anti-American resentment.15 Mao believed that an attempt to liberate the offshore islands would, at the very least, aggravate friction between Washington and Taipei.16 The more immediate evidence of a brewing crisis included China’s revival of its liberate Taiwan campaign, coupled with brief air battles, heightened reconnaissance, an improved radar net, reinforcement of artillery and anti-aircraft emplacements as well as construction of four new coastal air bases.17 By the end of July, Chinese Nationalist officials had begun forecasting trouble, and between June 29th and August 8th they lost ten aircraft to Chinese fire.18 The CIA predicted interdiction of ships carrying provisions to the islands, and various U.S. agencies dusted off contingency plans.19 Among the critical questions that hot, humid summer were what kind of warnings to send to Beijing. On August 15, Under Secretary of State Christian Herter told Dulles that the JCS, CIA, and State Department wanted

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to tell Beijing—through confidential Soviet channels—that any attempt to seize the islands or starve them would run into “U.S. military countermeasures.”20 Dulles insisted on public clarification of American policy. He came as close to an open statement of intent as possible when, in a public letter to Representative Thomas Morgan (D-PA), acting chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, he asserted that Chinese ambitions to seize territory integrally related to the defense of Taiwan must be thwarted. If war developed, such a war could not be limited.21 Eisenhower, meanwhile, remained wedded to strategic ambiguity.22 He felt himself bound by the 1955 Formosa Resolution to keep his options open and not commit to defend Jinmen and Mazu.23 As the shelling began, like the JCS and the commander in chief, Pacific command (CINCPAC), Eisenhower thought that a nebulous policy would keep Beijing off balance and prevent Taipei from trying to capitalize on American support. He trusted his ally little more than his enemy, believing “Orientals can be very devious.”24 Chiang Kai-shek, similarly disparaging and distrustful of Westerners, found U.S. assurances inadequate and demanded a categorical statement of military support as well as shipments of advanced weapons.25 He also prompted Ambassador Everett F. Drumright, CIA station chief Ray Cline, Vice Admiral Roland Smoot (chief of the Taiwan Defense Command), and Admiral Harry D. Felt (CINCPAC) to urge explicit backing and arms deliveries. Intelligence sources, however, quickly reassured Eisenhower that the Chinese Communists shelling did not mean an imminent assault on Taiwan or even an effort to take the offshore islands. Reporting to the NSC just before the shooting started, CIA Director Allen Dulles had complained that the Chinese Nationalists had “overplayed and over-dramatized the situation . . . [and] by their well-advertised attacks on Chinese Communist junks, had supplied the Chinese Communists with a precedent for air attacks on shipping.”26 Nevertheless, although the bombardment was fearsome, the unsuitable deployment of forces and the start of typhoon season militated against an actual invasion.27 A wider war seemed even less likely.28 On August 25, Eisenhower directed the JCS to support Nationalist forces in the event of a major PRC assault, even including bombing of mainland air bases on the southern coast with conventional and perhaps nuclear weapons.29 But Eisenhower kept these orders secret as the crisis unfolded. Gerard Smith, assistant secretary of state for policy planning, argued that Washington should not take on an “unconditional” commitment to act.

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Referring to the same Middle East intervention that inspired Mao, Smith argued that having shown determination in Lebanon, the United States could be sensible in Asia without being perceived as weak. 30 Even Drumright, although often a special pleader for Chiang, assured Dulles that, as of September 1, he did not “regard the military situation as desperate.”31 The secretary of state, although disturbed by Chinese Communist belligerence, did not believe that Beijing intended to take Taiwan or try to wrest Jinmen and Mazu from Chiang. He saw China as absorbed in an internal development program, which he thought held a higher priority for Beijing. Intelligence estimates supported the idea that “Beijing’s leaders were chary of risking a direct military confrontation with the United States, either strategic or conventional.” What was going on in the Strait was a probing operation probably concocted between Mao and Nikita Khrushchev during the latter’s summer visit to China.32 But Dulles masked his reasonable private calculations with alarmist rhetoric, seeking to protect the administration from the Republican right wing, and the nation from China, if his estimate regarding its intentions proved wrong. Thus when he traveled to Ike’s vacation headquarters at the Newport, Rhode Island, naval base on September 4, he carried a document designed to alert Americans to dangers ahead. The paper, concurred in by the secretary of defense and the JCS chairman, warned that the fall of Jinmen would bring down Taiwan and probably the entire anti-Communist defensive line in Asia, including Japan, Korea, and much of Southeast Asia. The consequences would be “more far-reaching and catastrophic” than those accompanying the loss of China, it said. Therefore, Dulles concluded, Washington must accept the risk of nuclear and general war.33 Eisenhower’s estimate remained sober despite the escalating rhetoric and his increasingly belligerent behavior. Having already determined that the offshore islands were of no military value, he firmly rejected the idea that Chiang might use them as stepping stones to recapture the mainland. 34 Their seizure by Mao’s Communist forces would be significant as a blow to morale on Taiwan but would not undermine the ROC militarily. Morale, of course, could be of great moment, particularly with such a large contingent of Chiang’s best men on the islands who, Eisenhower complained, Chiang had turned into “hostages.”35 Indeed, Dulles emphasized to George Yeh, the ROC’s ambassador-designate, that the president “as a military man . . . felt that it was extremely foolish, utterly mad, military strategy to put the

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cream of the GRC’s [Government of the Republic of China] forces in positions of this kind.”36 More important to Eisenhower was to guard against Soviet aggrandizement and the possibility that “Russia and China—were determined to throw the West out of the Far East.”37 Notes of a meeting with the British asserted: “Should the Reds eventually control Formosa, that, in the President’s opinion, would be a real Munich.” During September, Eisenhower authorized a massive armada to be assembled in East Asian waters: six aircraft carriers, forty destroyers, three heavy cruisers, and more than twenty other ships, including submarines—the largest air-sea force in U.S. history to that time. The administration also sent eight-inch howitzers to Taiwan, which had the capacity of hitting the mainland with atomic shells, and supplied the Nationalists with F-100 and F-86 aircraft, the latter armed with air-to-air Sidewinder missiles.38 The president sought to send China a message with a “show of force” and made sure of “calculated leaks regarding our actions.”39 As a result, however, he led his own military to overestimate what the president was prepared to do to deal with the situation. The JCS assumed that Eisenhower would utilize nuclear weapons to deal with China. The cabinet—excluding Dulles, who was vacationing— concurred without objections. Arguing vociferously that the United States must defend Jinmen, the Joint Chiefs made it clear that in the event of an attack or a prolonged blockade, the United States would have to strike directly at mainland bases. Thus the operational plan presented by Pacific Air Force Commander Laurence S. Kuter relied on nuclear weapons, and in August the Strategic Air Command put five B-47s capable of dropping Hiroshima-size 10- to 15-kiloton bombs on alert in Guam. The bombs were intended for mainland airfields and, possibly, urban and industrial infrastructure in the Xiamen area directly across the Strait from Taiwan.40 Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Nathan Twining spoke of nuclear strikes as far away as Shanghai. Although the cabinet did not object, Gerard Smith expressed his deep reservations to Under Secretary Herter. Dropping bombs with as much power as had been used on Hiroshima would cause millions of noncombatant casualties.41 Moreover, nuclear war would result because China and the Soviet Union would strike Taiwan and the Seventh Fleet. Smith objected that such a strategy was not politically sustainable. U.S. leaders must not risk a general nuclear war for the offshore islands.

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The president fortuitously shared Smith’s reservations and ruled out the use of nuclear weapons even if the Chinese invaded Jinmen and Mazu. He made clear that his would be the deciding voice on a case-by-case basis regarding nuclear bombs. Eisenhower recognized the importance of KMT confidence but strongly objected to preserving it by employing nuclear weapons against mainland bases, which most likely would force the Soviet Union to intervene and trigger catastrophic conflict. His view had not changed since his alarmed rejection of dropping atomic bombs to save the French at Dienbienphu: “You boys must be crazy. We can’t use those awful things against Asians for the second time.” 42 CIA Director Allen Dulles concurred, fearing a Communist nuclear response to any attack against mainland China.43 Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Far East J. Graham Parsons emphasized negative world reaction to brandishing atomic bombs and even Assistant Secretary Walter Robertson urged that conventional resources be thoroughly exploited first.44 Eisenhower’s refusal to rely on nuclear raids against the mainland left military planners scrambling. The Pentagon had not prepared adequately for conventional attacks and found that amassing equipment strained bases throughout the Asian region. Nuclear devices, it seemed, had not become conventional weapons.45 In fact, the idea that Washington might use nuclear weapons to deal with the fate of tiny and insignificant islands off the Chinese coast spurred reconsideration of defense policies. Despite his often belligerent and reckless rhetoric, Dulles actually was torn about employing nuclear bombs. He famously remarked to Joint Chiefs Chairman Twining that “there was no use of having a lot of stuff and never be[ing] able to use it.” 46 And to the president, Dulles pointed out that hesitance in using atomic weapons out of fear of world opinion would require discarding the entire defense system envisioned under the New Look.47 But Dulles increasingly questioned the possible dropping of nuclear bombs.48 He had learned that huge civilian casualties would accompany a massive strike on the Soviet Union.49 He insisted to the NSC that “the United States must be in a position to fight defensive wars which do not involve the total defeat of the enemy.”50 He worried about the inevitability of escalation even with tactical weapons and came to argue that no war except defense of the homeland would justify nuclear weapons.51 “No man should arrogate to himself the power to decide that the future of mankind

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would benefit by an action entailing the killing of tens of millions of people.”52 In April 1958, having liberally made nuclear threats, Dulles nevertheless told the Defense Department to rethink a strategic doctrine that included massive retaliation. He had devised the concept, he claimed, as an answer to the Republican right’s advocacy of Fortress America, but all of Western civilization could be destroyed.53 By replacing conventional with nuclear capabilities, the Eisenhower administration had rendered its military arm dangerously inflexible—a realization generally, but wrongly, attributed to John F. Kennedy and his advisers.54 Talk of nuclear attack produced two other strong reactions. The Soviet Union, which had been notably silent, invoked the 1950 Sino-Soviet Treaty, warning that China remained under Moscow’s nuclear umbrella.55 Khrushchev wrote two stern letters to Eisenhower in which the Soviet leader threatened to make U.S. naval ships into “targets” and suggested that nuclear bombs dropped on China would mean retaliation on American soil.56 Khrushchev’s nuclear fulminations reinforced the image of an integrated bloc, although U.S. intelligence had also established that no Soviet military buildup was under way.57 The fact that the letters to Eisenhower arrived after the most dangerous moments of the Strait crisis had passed encouraged questions about Soviet support for Chinese actions, especially since the tardiness clearly rankled Beijing. At the same time, American threats led Mao to speak again as he had in 1946 of atomic weapons as paper tigers, horrifying Khrushchev every bit as much as it did Eisenhower and Dulles. During his 1954 visit to Beijing, the Soviet leader had tried to instruct Mao in the dangers of nuclear warfare, asserting that China’s massive army would be nothing more than “bomb fodder,” but Khrushchev recognized that Mao thought him a coward.58 Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko reported being “flabbergasted” by Mao’s calm suggestion in 1958 that a nuclear war could be waged on Chinese soil.59 Mao’s views were not, in fact, static. Soviet mastery of space led him to see the United States as a much reduced threat. Indeed, his most intense fury was aimed at Moscow. Khrushchev again raised the issue of military cooperation on September 13, expecting that in the midst of the confrontation in the Strait China’s leaders could be expected to appreciate it more.60 Instead, Beijing repeated its rejection of the Soviet initiative, suspicious that the offer entailed restrictions on China’s foreign policy and on its autonomy.61

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Mao also resented what he interpreted as Russian contempt for the Chinese people, whom the Soviets saw as “among the inferior who are dumb and careless.” Mao berated the Soviet Ambassador for seeking “joint ownership and operation [of] our army, navy, air force, industry, agriculture, education. . . . With a few atomic bombs, you think you are in a position to control us . . . you have extended Russian nationalism to China’s coast.”62 Meanwhile, Mao and Zhou Enlai had decided even before the shelling that Washington would not send its military to defend Jinmen.63 War between the United States and the People’s Republic no longer seemed imminent. To be sure, Mao tightly controlled his military commanders to avoid shelling U.S. ships, forestalling any excuse for Washington to attack China. Mao sought peace, not war, and turned to ambassadorial talks rather than to force of arms to deal with the United States. On September 6, in a conciliatory voice Zhou accepted the U.S. proposal to resume meetings, calling for discussion of the Taiwan problem directly with the United States.64 Mao described the situation that existed in Asia as a noose that America had tied around its own neck; he offered to rescue Washington lest it unwittingly be strangled.65 Eisenhower responded with relief. He reworked a draft American reply into a clear acceptance of China’s initiative.66 Although expectations for meetings with the Communist Chinese did not run high in Washington, Eisenhower thought it obvious that talking was a lot better than shooting. He dismissed critics, such as the commander in chief of the Pacific fleet, who declared that meeting with the Chinese would be an abandonment of American principles and would alarm Southeast Asian governments.67 Instead the president decided to tell China that when the shooting stopped, Chiang would be induced to remove troops from the islands and end harassment of the coast and shipping.68 The president had made clear to Dulles his “annoyance” with Chiang’s efforts to mire the United States in crises with China.69 From the Soviet perspective, Mao’s change of heart may have been as surprising as the original outbreak of shelling. Although Khrushchev and Defense Minister Rodin Malinovsky had been in Beijing from July 31 to August 3, 1958, and the Sino-Soviet Treaty of 1950 required consultation, Mao did not apprise them of the confrontation to come.70 Mao’s desire to test the United States had a Soviet corollary. The crisis would force Khrushchev to

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rethink his America policy.71 As Mao famously remarked, “The islands are two batons that keep Khrushchev and Eisenhower dancing, scurrying this way and that. Don’t you see how wonderful they are?”72 Eisenhower, Dulles, and many of their advisors assumed that Khrushchev had known and approved of China’s action.73 Even conceding that Beijing and Moscow might see the Taiwan question differently, Eisenhower’s staff secretary Colonel Andrew Goodpaster asserted that “it is unlikely that such divergences would lead Peiping to a course of action directly contravening Moscow’s views.”74 Americans imagined that Khrushchev wanted tension in Asia to distract the United States from his activities in the Middle East and Berlin.75 Although in time intelligence analysts came to believe that Moscow had not initiated the maneuver, they continued to assume that Khrushchev knew. In fact, Mao did not expect to need Moscow’s assistance, nor did he want the Soviets to try to block his Taiwan strategy or use it to control Beijing.76 The CIA failed to see how much Mao resented Soviet interference or how irresponsible Mao appeared in Khrushchev’s eyes. Distrust of Washington’s Taipei ally mirrored Sino-Soviet misunderstanding. Several members of the administration felt that Chiang had consciously left himself vulnerable and might have provoked the shelling.77 Even the JCS, which almost always supported the Nationalists, speculated angrily that Taiwan authorities were being “intentionally inept in order to draw [the] United States inextricably [into] confl ict with CHICOMS [Chinese Communists].”78 The Taiwan Defense Command’s Smoot and Ambassador Drumright, otherwise staunch exponents of Chiang’s cause, railed against the reluctance of the Ministry of National Defense to try to break the artillery-imposed blockade.79 In addition to complaints about Taipei’s inadequate performance, Americans also were dismayed about Chiang’s intentions. Eisenhower, outraged and mistrustful, saw Chiang’s stubborn refusal to stop increasing troop concentrations on the offshore islands as intended to spark a Sino-American war.80 Taipei risked dangerous overfl ights, conducted commando raids, and underestimated food and ammunition available on Jinmen to keep U.S. escorts sailing.81 Ignoring Nationalist protests, the United States insisted that before taking retaliatory action, Taipei must consult with the United States “to the maximum extent feasible.”82 Admiral Felt actually feared that Chiang would mount a mainland operation preceded by a hate America campaign.83

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Secretary of State Dulles also condemned Chiang for placing the United States in an untenable position. To Walter Robertson and Under Secretary Herter he complained in August that I do not feel that we have a case which is altogether defensible. It is one thing to contend that the Chicoms should keep their hands off the present territorial and political status of Taiwan, the Ponghus [sic], Quemoy and Matsu, and not attempt to change this by violence. . . . It is another thing to contend that they should be quiescent while this area is used by the Chinats [Chinese Nationalists] as an active base for attempting to foment civil strife.84

In other words, Dulles believed that they “shouldn’t really expect the Communists to refrain from attacking” so long as they allowed these activities to continue.85 Taipei similarly distrusted Washington. As Ambassador Drumright attempted to make clear to Dulles, Chiang would never accept a resolution through negotiations between Washington and Beijing that would put Taipei’s future totally in American hands.86 Smoot reported that Chiang feared that “his people are beginning to see him in the role of a puppet who dangles from a string to the US and who is denied the right to use his own vast experience and discretion.”87 Dulles, however, increasingly understood the crisis in quite different terms. Although he advocated preparedness and was willing to sound belligerent, he sought to avoid any use of force and searched assiduously for a compromise solution. On the very first day of shelling, he talked about a peaceful modus vivendi.88 Although historians have labeled his later public assertions of flexibility to have been an exercise in public relations, according to Rand analyst Morton Halperin, Dulles “constantly needed to be pressed by his staff to maintain his tough position.”89 Opposition to a conciliatory approach arose in many quarters of the administration. In particular, the desire of the secretary to internationalize the confrontation by taking it to the United Nations proved disturbing. The UN initiative got no support from Dulles’s Far Eastern bureau or from the JCS. Marshall Green, then regional planning adviser at the State Department, “thought it was a crazy idea”.90 Chief of Naval Operations Arleigh Burke warned of the trickiness of Communists who might accept demilitarization

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and then seize the islands.91 Not surprisingly, Walter Robertson remained one of the staunchest opponents of a flexible policy toward Beijing. He argued that a Nationalist evacuation of Jinmen would not resolve the crisis because of Mao’s determination to seize Taiwan. And he reminded Dulles of “other exposed small countries along the Sino-Soviet periphery [that] would wonder if they, too, might be considered expendable by the US when the heat was really on.”92 The China desk even opposed Dulles’s desire to have a third country, perhaps Japan, intercede.93 Despite all this advice, Dulles persisted. He told Robertson and the JCS that 90 percent of the UN membership favored admitting Beijing and making Taiwan into a UN trusteeship. Only Washington had been able to derail the effort, but the United States could not keep the China-Taiwan issue off the UN agenda indefinitely.94 Even if it became nothing more than an initiative that would improve Washington’s image in the UN, it seemed worth pursuing.95 However tempting it might have been, Dulles did not use his growing irritation with Chiang as an excuse to disassociate Washington from the Nationalist cause. Even when Gerard Smith, his policy planning director, pointed out that abandonment of the offshore islands would strengthen the Two Chinas policy that Dulles preferred, as well as eliminate a flash point that both Mao and Chiang could exploit, Dulles demurred. Under pressure from Beijing, the United States could not back down.96 Eisenhower, even more boldly than Dulles, sought a quick remedy to the crisis. In practical terms, propelled by his understanding that the offshore islands constituted a military liability, he came back repeatedly to the evacuation of soldiers from the islands. But in contrast to his proposals in 1954– 1955, he now clearly recognized that Chiang Kai-shek comprised the biggest barrier to resolving the problem. Accordingly, he seems seriously to have contemplated eliminating the Generalissimo. On September 11 he talked with Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy, who wondered if there might be someone in Taiwan who could take over Chiang’s position if the United States underwrote a coup.97 That scenario continued to interest Eisenhower long after McElroy proposed it. Just ten days later, Eisenhower emphasized to British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd his awareness that he lacked popular support for the U.S. position on the islands. Thus the president did not reject Lloyd’s suggestion that he consider a foreign ministers meeting if the Warsaw talks did not

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make progress in settling the crisis, although he warned it might be impossible because of U.S. public opinion. Most strikingly, Eisenhower confided in Lloyd that he had offered Chiang a trade of amphibious equipment for an evacuation of the offshore islands. He did not want to encourage a Nationalist assault on China, but he “was ready to ‘bribe’ Chiang in any reasonable way to remove his forces.” Chiang, however, refused, saying, as he had before, that if Jinmen and Mazu were surrendered, he would leave the presidency. Eisenhower then candidly remarked that replacing Chiang might be a good idea and that he had explored the possibility but had not found any suitable candidates. So incendiary were these thoughts that the U.S. version of the memorandum of conversation made no mention of Eisenhower’s remarks.98 Pursuing the idea of divestiture that he had found so attractive 3 years earlier, and that his secretary of defense and the JCS now also favored, Eisenhower asked General Twining to have Pentagon analysts look earnestly for ways to move Chiang’s forces off the islands. He talked again about giving Chiang amphibious craft. Eisenhower believed that chances of returning to the mainland were small and that Chiang’s rhetoric was for internal political purposes.99 Eisenhower both telephoned and wrote a reluctant Dulles that he wanted to offer Chiang the choice of an amphibious lift capability that could transport 15,000–20,000 of his men to the Chinese mainland in exchange for relinquishing the islands. He raised the prospect just days after Dulles had told reporters that Washington had “no commitment of any kind” to help Chiang return to the mainland and that it would be “foolish” to maintain troops on Jinmen once the confrontation ended.100 But Eisenhower felt sure that the deal would improve Chiang’s standing with American and world opinion. Eisenhower had discussed the proposition with the newly appointed ambassador, George Yeh, who had appeared to voice some interest, objecting only that there would have to be peace in the area before Taiwan could act on a plan of this sort. After Beijing declared a temporary interruption of the shelling, permitting unimpeded resupply, Eisenhower sought to appeal immediately to Chiang despite the likelihood that the Generalissimo would not accept the proposal.101 Eisenhower’s urgency reflected sensitivity to public unhappiness regarding the offshore islands. One poll found that 91 percent of those asked preferred to turn the matter over to the United Nations, and 61 percent favored Taiwan becoming a ward of the UN.102 Letters and telegrams to the White

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House ran overwhelmingly against involvement in war over the islands as did mail to Congress and the Department of State.103 Vice President Richard Nixon lashed out at bureaucrats who had undercut U.S. policy by leaking that 80 percent of letters to the State Department opposed the offshore island strategy.104 Elite opinion also disparaged the official posture. A meeting at Harvard University, arranged by Dulles’s friend and former colleague Robert Bowie, revealed harsh criticism. Edwin O. Reischauer, the nation’s most respected Japan historian, subsequently wrote Dulles, “in my experience at Harvard during the past twenty years, I cannot remember any important foreign policy problem on which a similar group would have been so unanimously out of sympathy with important aspects of our government’s position.”105 Journalists similarly voiced overwhelmingly negative assessments. Columnist Joseph Alsop, a longtime partisan of the Chinese Nationalists, angrily blamed Eisenhower for the crisis.106 James Reston of the New York Times pointed out that there had been no public debate regarding the offshore islands and yet the president seemed willing to go to war over them.107 In fact, according to Marquis Childs in the Washington Post, the JCS had opposed garrisoning so many soldiers on the islands but had been circumvented by their chief, Admiral Radford, who encouraged Chiang.108 The reality according to Walter Lippmann of the New York Herald Tribune was that the United States would not be able to defend the islands and that eventually Jinmen would have to be abandoned, a thought echoed by the Detroit Free Press.109 To Democratic Party leaders facing midterm elections, the Strait confrontation presented a perfect opportunity to call Eisenhower irresponsible. Having spent much of the period from 1953 to 1958 in disarray, the Democrats finally coalesced during 1958.110 Dean Acheson, who had been exiled from politics in large part because of Republican indictments of Truman administration China policy, took delight in attacking Dulles and Ike on China. “We seem to be drifting, either dazed or indifferent, toward war with China,” he warned, “a war without friends or allies and over issues . . . which are not worth a single American life.”111 When Truman came out in support of Eisenhower, a distraught Acheson pleaded with him to reconsider.112 Adlai Stevenson, the party’s standard bearer, joined the Democratic chorus, insisting that the islands were not a part of Taiwan.113 Dulles worried throughout the confrontation with China about congressional backing. He kept some thirty key members alerted to developments

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through a biweekly confidential letter, which he even distributed to their homes while they were out of session.114 Senator Wayne Morse (D-OR) right from the beginning declared that he would oppose any United States role in defending the offshore islands.115 Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Theodore F. Green (D-RI), who favored recognition and admission of Beijing into the United Nations, appealed directly to Eisenhower to end the dangerous entanglement.116 Lyndon Johnson (D-TX), having as Senate majority leader assembled a bipartisan coalition to support Eisenhower on Lebanon, refused to do the same over the offshore islands and privately expressed his opposition to Eisenhower and Dulles.117 John F. Kennedy (D-MA) publicly urged the administration to cut its losses, give up the offshore islands, and focus protection upon Taiwan.118 Aware of foreign criticism, the secretary nevertheless believed he could count on allies—NATO and SEATO—for support.119 The British, constrained by Hong Kong’s security and lingering public anger about Suez, gave their support reluctantly. Simultaneously, Foreign Secretary Lloyd urged Dulles to change U.S. policy.120 On the island of Taiwan, mainlanders expressed relief at Washington’s aid, but Taiwanese thought defense of the islands foolish and favored negotiation.121 Elsewhere in Asia, South Korea pledged support, but Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru urged surrender of the islands, as did New Zealand and Japan.122 Use of bases in Japan to help defend Jinmen and Mazu would, the American ambassador believed, be severely circumscribed. Were nuclear weapons to be employed, the United States risked sparking a popular movement to throw the bases out.123 Only secretly did some Asian leaders welcome Washington’s efforts to limit Chinese Communist expansion.124 China’s People ’s Daily newspaper enthusiastically reprinted the criticism that appeared in the Western press, which disapproval it believed would restrain American actions and further China’s goals.125 In October 5, Zhou Enlai observed to the Soviet charge d’affaires in China, S. F. Antonov that “America dares not engage in a war merely for the sake of Jinmen, because the American people and its allied countries oppose it.”126 Of course, China’s posture had risks, but Chinese belligerence also increased the numbers who wanted China in the world community. Despite resumption of the ambassadorial talks and what appeared to be a triumph over the blockade, Eisenhower and Dulles could fi nd no immediate resolution of the Strait problem. This proved true even though Mao

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dispatched Wang Bingnan to Warsaw with instructions to “use more sincere persuasion than harsh criticism . . . so as to avoid hurting their feelings.”127 China hoped renewed talks made UN involvement less likely. Dulles, meanwhile, believing that Chiang had provoked the crisis, sought to understand what conditions Beijing had found intolerable. The secretary reviewed and redrafted instructions sent to Ambassador Jacob Beam, who had finally replaced U. Alexis Johnson as head of the American negotiating team. He also thought about sending an emissary to Chiang Kai-shek to deescalate the confrontation. Eisenhower friend and sometime adviser John J. McCloy, however, declined, as did others, arguing that he would want Chiang to make concessions going beyond what the president and secretary wanted but believed Chiang would be rigid. He did not want to expend energy and effort only to end up stymied like George C. Marshall and his ill-fated mediation mission of the 1940s.128 Mao’s approach worked too well. He got talks with Washington and aggravated tensions between Washington and Taipei. The United States urged Chiang ever more stridently to remove his bloated garrison from the offshore islands. Chiang insisted, “Taiwan will not be coerced into changing its position. . . . If necessary, Taiwan will fight alone.”129 But Mao realized that seizing the offshore islands would constitute a larger defeat in his strategy to reunify with Taiwan, severing the last land bridge to Taiwan and reifying the Two Chinas concept.130 Although the Chinese coast would be free of Nationalist coercion, revitalizing trade and economic development, this would come at the cost of national sovereignty. Beijing thereupon backed away from the confrontation. Mao fi rst discussed the idea of “shelling but not landing, cutting off but not completely” privately with Zhou on September 30 and then put it forward as a plan to the Politburo Standing Committee. In “A Message to Our Taiwan Compatriots” published in People ’s Daily on October 6, Mao, in the name of Defense Minister Peng Dehuai, urged the Chinese on the island to recognize that the real enemy was in Washington, where imperialists advocated dividing China. Mao also sought to bolster Chiang’s power lest the United States install a more pliable leader not committed to the one-China principle.131 On October 25, Beijing announced that shelling would continue only on alternate days. This would allow Chiang’s forces to be resupplied and the islands to remain in Nationalist hands.132 Zhou told the Soviet ambassador that the Americans “[would] suspect . . . a tacit agreement between us and

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figure 9.2 “Lonely outpost,” by Ross A. Lewis Courtesy of the Milwaukee Journal.

Jiang. The louder Jiang yells, the more suspicious the Americans will become.”133 The United States, in fact, concluded that the Chinese had been “deterred because of their fear of U.S. intervention,” never understanding Mao’s concern about maintaining a clear tie to Taiwan.134 The appearance of reasonableness from Beijing contrasted sharply with Taipei’s intransigence. Chiang Kai-shek insisted that dangerous United States convoying continue even after the alternate-day shelling had been announced. Chiang also emphatically rebuffed Mao’s suggestion of direct talks without American interference.135 Meanwhile, Eisenhower expressed increasing exasperation with Kuomintang inflexibility. To Under Secretary Herter he “spoke with considerable heat about continuing to have to do what Chiang Kai-shek wanted us to do,” remarking that, in response to disturbing comments made to him about the situation, he was almost prepared to pull the plug on Chiang.136

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John Foster Dulles’s trip to Taiwan late in October can only be understood in this context. On October 8, Dulles remarked to a State Department group that to remedy the agonizing offshore island problem Chiang would have to realize the “narrow escape” he had had and the severe strain the situation had put on U.S. relations with its allies.137 The statement Dulles presented to Chiang on October 22 accused the Nationalists of defying free world opinion and putting the United States in jeopardy. Dulles insisted that Chiang accept a de facto armistice and cease commando raids, overfl ights, and efforts to blockade mainland ports.138 An outwardly calm but seething Chiang complained of U.S. mistrust of him and his intentions. His foreign minister made clear he would not accept a Two Chinas policy. Indeed, so firm was he on this that he told Dulles, “the use of tactical atomic weapons might be advisable,” to end the crisis. Dulles was horrified by Chiang’s ignorance about the impact of nuclear weapons and repeated what he had learned from his advisers about the millions of deaths that would result.139 Eventually they issued a compromise joint communiqué, which lacked the tough language Dulles had wanted. Chiang rebuffed suggestions he say that Taiwan “will never itself initiate war” and that his treaty with the United States was solely defensive. But, if not explicitly, Chiang did renounce the use of force.140 Dulles’s partial triumph did not come without cost. Washington sacrificed intelligence-gathering capabilities as Nationalist operations along China’s coast diminished, “blind[ing] itself” in search of peace.141 At the same time, Beijing conducted “psychological warfare” against the United States, firing shells at Jinmen on alternate days, guaranteeing continuing tension in what Dulles denounced as a policy of “promiscuous killing” for political purposes.142

CONCLUSION The end of the 1958 Strait crisis, like the conclusion of the 1954 imbroglio, satisfied neither China’s yearning for unification nor Chiang Kai-shek’s plans to return to the mainland nor Washington’s desire to end the risk of war in the area. Looking back on the rapid escalation and quick reduction of tension, officials realized that they had taken big risks for little return. Not only did the Strait remain disputed, but it would stay a tinderbox.

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China settled for a political victory that reasserted its claims to Taiwan, even though it brought unification no closer. The denouement graphically illustrated opposition to Two Chinas on both sides of the Strait, “shatter[ing] the United States scheme and upset[ting] its plan.” As Zhou Enlai later told Henry Kissinger, together Beijing and Taipei had “thwart[ed] the efforts of Dulles” to create two Chinas.143 Beijing would thenceforth abstain for decades from the use of force across the Strait. In the immediate future, according to Gong Li, professor at China’s Central Party School, the vigorous demonstration of Beijing’s claim allowed Mao to cut the armed forces and reduce the defense budget.144 Limited resources instead fueled internal economic transformation and political mobilization. Historian Chen Jian talks about the two as intertwined: “The shelling and the crisis played a role similar to the drumbeats in a Beijing opera—without them the drama [of the Great Leap Forward] would completely lose its rhythm, dramaticism, and theatricality.”145 The Nationalists, meanwhile, resumed harassment of the Chinese Communists despite their momentary collaboration. Chiang had no intention of capitulating to Mao or satisfying Eisenhower’s desire to strip the offshore islands of troops.146 Eisenhower would observe to the British prime minister during a March 1959 consultation that Chiang wanted significant numbers of soldiers in harm’s way to keep the United States obligated to rescue them and him.147 Eisenhower and Dulles harbored no illusions about their role. They realized they had been manipulated by both Mao and Chiang. Both were dismayed and angry. They recognized the unpopularity in the United States and among American allies of protecting the offshore islands. Occurring virtually on the eve of the 1958 midterm congressional elections, they watched the crisis assume partisan coloration as well. But even though they understood that the tiny islands possessed no intrinsic importance and that most Americans did not know where they were, the events of 1954 and 1958 rendered abandonment untenable.148 Indeed, the crises compelled an unwelcome rigidity. Eisenhower, for instance, explained to Defense Secretary McElroy that Dulles “tends to take a somewhat stiffer view than he holds.”149 In the wake of such a confrontation, compromise could put them, their party, and their political agenda in jeopardy. The offshore islands might seem expendable to many, but that did not mean the American people were ready to have Eisenhower and Dulles jettison Chiang and improve relations with Mao.

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n the final years of Eisenhower’s administration, a series of new international crises confronted an exhausted, lame-duck president. His hope for an arms control agreement with Nikita Khrushchev remained unfulfilled, and the myths of a bomber and missile gap gained strength. Confrontation over Germany escalated, Japanese public support for the U.S. alliance eroded, and the Congo, Algeria, and Laos were plunged into violence. Fidel Castro assumed power in Cuba, accepted Soviet assistance, and became the target of assassination and invasion plots. Soviet-American détente, which seemed to acquire a boost from Khrushchev’s 1959 U.S. visit, flagged with continual threats by both sides regarding Germany and then evaporated with the downing of an American U-2 spy plane over the Soviet Union. Moreover, it became apparent that Moscow was swinging further left under pressure from China. Beijing had become increasingly active internationally, touting itself as champion of anti-colonial peoples. Khrushchev ran to keep up. Eisenhower would have to face many of these problems without John Foster Dulles, who had succumbed to the ravages of colon cancer. When Dulles left the State Department in April 1959 after months of painful and arduous struggle, Eisenhower lost his strongest foreign policy partner. He might not always agree with Dulles, and he found him irritating, but Dulles had been crucial in shaping Washington’s overseas actions and reputation. Christian Herter, the new secretary, would prove to be a stronger international presence and better department head than many anticipated. He would meet regularly with the president and talk to him constantly, but he never built the close working relationship with Ike that Dulles had nurtured.

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Herter lacked the cues that long association gave Dulles and did not always understand what the president wanted or had said. Eisenhower took to having a third party present at their meetings to clear up misunderstandings and explained ideas in far greater detail to the new secretary than he had found necessary with Dulles.1 Like Dulles, Herter came to the State Department as a confirmed Europeanist, ignorant of, and uninterested in, China. He had been born in Paris, clerked at the embassy in Berlin, and worked with Joseph Grew in the U.S. delegation at Versailles and with Herbert Hoover on European food aid. Serving briefly in Warren G. Harding’s Commerce Department, he resigned, condemning Harding’s Washington as “a dirty kitchen where cockroaches abound.”2 But Herter believed in public service and became governor of Massachusetts and a five-term congressman. In contrast to the dour Dulles, Herter was genial and optimistic, delighting in people. He established a wide network of friends in Congress, including the Democratic Party leadership of Senator J. William Fulbright (D-AR), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Lyndon Johnson (D-TX), Senate majority leader; and Sam Rayburn (D-TX), speaker of the House. As the New York Times noted admiringly, Herter had no enemies. Tall, brushy browed, and patrician in demeanor, Herter had been touted as a potential presidential candidate had Eisenhower retired in 1956 and as a replacement for Nixon on an Eisenhower ticket, despite his liberal internationalist principles. Nevertheless, Dulles gave him little to do, and their relationship remained difficult. The secretary did not enlist his under secretary’s support in problem solving, and often Herter learned of important decisions after they had been made. The Times described his unpleasant sojourn as being “Number Two man in a one-man Department.”3 Herter told Eisenhower aide Emmet Hughes, “it is hard to know what use I am around here. . . . I have been given no authority, and no area of work is specifically my task.” 4 But although Dulles rarely consulted him, Herter served as acting secretary on some thirty-eight occasions, when Dulles traveled or proved too ill to serve. When Dulles resigned in 1959, some worried about Herter’s severe arthritis and the allegedly negative image of an American official on crutches, recommending choice of a heartier successor, such as Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs C. Douglas Dillon, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Henry Cabot Lodge, Ford Foundation Chairman John J. McCloy, or even former Republican presidential candidate Thomas Dewey. Eisenhower, how-

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ever, wanted continuity and perhaps relished having a secretary of state he could control. And this he got in large part, Herter conducting himself quite differently from Dulles, depending more on the State Department, alienating colleagues far less often, and originating fewer initiatives personally.5 In general, the soft-spoken and tolerant new secretary posed a striking contrast to his predecessor. Herter’s special assistant William W. Scranton worried that the American people “do not have a clear impression of you,” and unkind observers suggested that Herter “seemed to blend invisibly with the antiseptic corridors of the State Department.”6 Herter learned about Asia on the job. He had had even less contact with China policies than Dulles had prior to inheriting his leadership. He visited Taipei in 1957 as part of a monthlong eight-nation Asian trip—his first. Herter began serious engagement with China policy when he supervised State Department handling of the 1958 Strait crisis. He complained that Chiang Kai-shek had not done enough independently to deal with the situation, calling too early and too loudly for U.S. assistance. He believed that Chiang sought to plunge the United States into war and told the press that the offshore islands were “not strategically defensible.”7 He came to see Chiang’s determination to hold on to the islands as “almost pathological.”8 Accordingly, he did not, as Dulles had done, pressure Taipei to evacuate, because he believed that the “risks of failing to persuade Chiang were so great, the chances of success so slight, as to make the risk not worth taking.” 9 Herter had far less patience for Chiang than Dulles possessed and sought, in small ways, to make U.S. policy more flexible, although he never wavered in his determination to sustain a Free China for its propaganda value. He quickly lifted the ban on Canadian trucks hauling Chinese goods over American roadways. He agreed to have journalists’ passports validated for travel to China, eliminating a time limit on such trips that Beijing found insulting. He influenced the attorney general to lift restrictions upon Chinese reporters who applied to come to the United States.10 And when the president stopped in Taiwan on his Far East trip and heard, once again, Chiang’s plea for support to attack the mainland, Herter was no more sympathetic than Eisenhower. So China policy became a little less rigid, but “the Eisenhower administration . . . [at its close] possessed neither the imagination, nor the intellectual coherence, nor the political will to effect a genuine change of course—in . . . the Far East.”11 Herter opposed recognition of the PRC and its admission into the UN. Close to the end of his tenure, he

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figure 10.1 “Oh, that obstacle again,” by Frits Behrendt

Courtesy of Renate Behrendt.

would tell SEATO states that those countries that had established diplomatic relations with China had gotten nothing in response.12 The 1958 Taiwan crisis had drained American officials and made those who stridently advocated the Nationalist cause less outspoken. Director of the Office of Chinese Affairs Marshall Green recalled that Dulles appeared increasingly “moderate and reasonable” on Chinese issues.13 Kenneth Young, diplomat and author, suggested that Dulles would have been ready to meet

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with Zhou Enlai, as Beijing had long wanted, but that the Chinese did not grasp the opportunity.14 Early in 1959, Gordon Gray, special assistant to the president, called upon the State Department to prepare a new country paper on China, as NSC 5429/5 of 1954 was now out of date. He sought to explore the possibilities of furthering the Sino-Soviet rift and the likelihood of upheaval in China. Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson similarly thought that new opportunities to drive Moscow and Beijing apart might arise and that Washington should be in position to exploit them.15 In fact, Herter’s decision to act on journalist visas followed a Dulles turnabout shortly before his resignation.16 Administrations almost always face a measure of disarray and decline in cordiality in their last years. That became obvious in Eisenhower’s second term. The president would miss Foster Dulles after he resigned, but long before that the president’s patience with the secretary had diminished substantially, complaining that he “was apt to forget that he had [already explained something] and, within a day or so, [would] tell it over again.”17 As for Allen Dulles, the president became sufficiently disenchanted by his increasingly rigid anti-Communism and delight in covert operations that “he did not want to meet with Allen unless at least one other person was also present.”18 Two of Eisenhower’s inner circle, General Lucius Clay and Treasury Secretary Humphrey, left Washington for other assignments. Secretary of Defense Charles Wilson departed, having not had much success in controlling the Pentagon’s appetites. He was replaced by businessman Neil McElroy, who similarly deferred to others on strategic vision, and later by Thomas Gates. McElroy, though new to government and to Chinese affairs, came quickly to resent Chiang Kai-shek’s stubborn endangerment of the United States in the 1958 Strait crisis. Changes also occurred at the State Department. Herter critics, such as New York Times columnist and reporter Arthur Krock, insisted that the department stopped functioning effectively in Dulles’s wake, lacking leadership and an agenda. Historian Frederick Marks has blamed Herter for botching Cuba policy and facilitating Khrushchev’s U.S. visit even though Moscow had not met administration preconditions.19 But Herter has also received praise from many historians, especially for consulting more broadly than Dulles ever thought to do. Herter did not bring in his own team or purge Dulles’s intimates, but there were some personnel shifts toward the end of the administration.

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Ambassador Karl Rankin left Taipei to be replaced by experienced China diplomat Everett F. Drumright, who continued the hard line “in defense of the ROC position” at the U.S. embassy in Taipei. As Drumright later noted, his was “an unusually strong line,” and others thought “I was inflexible; perhaps I was.”20 Walter Robertson departed in June 1959 taking with him what the Washington Post called his zealotry and fanaticism. His successor, J. Graham Parsons, however, held similar, if less stridently expressed, views. A fascinating exchange in 1959 with Edwin Reischauer, one of Harvard’s leading Asia specialists, demonstrated Parson’s unwillingness to rethink attitudes toward China. Reischauer explained at great length the reasons why nonrecognition was a poor policy and refuted claims that isolating China protected overseas Chinese, China’s neighbors, and the UN. But Parsons “emphatically disagree[d],” insisting that Reischauer did not appreciate the evils of Chinese Communism, and although Parsons subsequently assured his interlocutor that he was not calling him naive, biased, or pro-Communist, Reischauer warned it was dangerous to dismiss all critics so cavalierly.21 Dulles’s closest associates established good but not intimate relations with Herter. Men such as Livingston Merchant and Robert Bowie continued in the department but did not connect with Herter as they had with Dulles.22 Douglas MacArthur II was in Japan as ambassador from early 1957. C. Douglas Dillon and the new secretary became friends, and Herter relied upon him for guidance on economic affairs. Dillon, however, did not deal with Asian issues and so did not insist that Herter be cognizant of them. In choosing informal advisers, Herter looked to John McCloy much as Eisenhower did. McCloy spoke with the new secretary about the European issues he knew best but also consulted on problems with the two Chinese regimes, neither of which he liked or trusted.23 Time had similarly eliminated some of the loudest critical voices on China policy. In Congress the bruising midterm electoral defeat of 1958 replaced several Republican China Lobby activists, most prominently William Knowland (R-CA), “the Senator from Formosa.” His successor, Clair Engle (D-CA), early in 1959 began his tenure by calling for a reassessment of China policies, including talks above the ambassadorial level. He did not go so far as to call for recognition but insisted, as Eisenhower often did, that “there are many concessions with reference to trade in the Far East that might be advantageous to us.”24 Senators Albert Gore (D-TN), Thomas Dodd (D-CT), and Joseph S. Clark (D-PA) supported his remarks. In fact,

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a poll of freshmen members of the House indicated increased openness toward possible future relations with China, with sixteen favorable, twenty opposed, and many of the remaining forty-five willing to be persuaded.25 Before the end of the year, Oregon Democrat Representative Charles O. Porter sued Herter on the grounds that it was unconstitutional to bar a serving member of Congress from traveling to China to gather information that would inform his voting decisions. 26 Members who had frequently signed Committee of One Million petitions moreover began to change their perspective. Senator Hubert Humphrey (D-MN) asserted already in 1957 that he favored allowing reporters to travel to China, making trade restrictions less onerous and including Beijing in disarmament negotiations. Similarly, Senator John Sparkman (D-AL) had come to support sending newsmen to China, and Representative Porter in 1959 called upon the president to invite Zhou Enlai to the United States, to establish diplomatic relations with Beijing and help create a Republic of Taiwan. 27 J. William Fulbright, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, urged the State Department to find ways to advance talks in Warsaw by agreeing to a new, more accommodating agenda and perhaps by employing external mediators. 28 A milestone of sorts came with the presentation of the Conlon report to Congress on November 1, 1959. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee had contracted for the study in November 1958 as one of fourteen similar projects, and Conlon Associates turned to a team from the University of California to draft it. Robert Scalapino, who wrote the northeast Asia portion of the study, sparked considerable comment by advocating that the United States formalize a Two Chinas policy by recognizing the Republic of China on Taiwan as the Republic of Taiwan and then facilitate admission of the ROT and the PRC to the United Nations General Assembly. Beijing would be given the disputed Security Council seat, and both Japan and India would be added to that forum at the same time. The United States would pledge to maintain its protection of Taiwan and would increase economic aid to the island, but it would also expect Nationalist withdrawal from the essentially indefensible offshore islands.29 State Department officials greeted the report with disdain, privately denouncing Scalapino as unprincipled and his recommendations as unsound. Certain that Scalapino had made up his mind before he ever undertook his exploratory travel in Asia, Marshall Green and Assistant Secretary Parsons

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complained that the report took no note of the protection America’s China policy afforded China’s neighbors, allowing them to prosper and grow stronger. Those Asians who had apparently told Scalapino they advocated Beijing’s admission into the UN had misled him. They simply wanted to score points with Beijing but knew the United States would not countenance it.30 Walter Robertson, before leaving his post, personally tried to convince Scalapino not to recommend changes in U.S. policy, insisting that his Asian contacts wanted Washington to stand firm. Scalapino later recalled, “No one in the Eisenhower administration contacted me after publication.”31 Reaction in Taiwan combined anger with efforts to minimize the report’s significance. Official newspapers reassured the public that democratic systems could not prevent irresponsible proposals but that Conlon Associates did not speak for the government. A less restrained comment by the independent English-language China Post questioned the wisdom of the Senators on the committee for contracting with Conlon’s “idiots or lunatics,” who were essentially just a “group of profit-seeking pseudo-experts.” Officials of the Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of National Defense, as well as members of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Legislative Yuan, were reported to have been deeply troubled, although Taiwan’s ambassador George Yeh dismissed it as the predictable handiwork of Senator Fulbright.32 Scalapino was denied a visa to visit Taiwan for a decade thereafter. By contrast, enthusiastic Foreign Office analysts in London welcomed Scalapino’s effort, in which the author came to terms with reality as Britain saw it. Noteworthy was the recognition that the Communist regime remained popular among the people because it delivered “psychological satisfactions and emotional releases.” The report, which British commentators snidely noted was “better written than most American documents,” admitted that the American trade embargo could not long survive. They agreed, of course, with Scalapino’s rejection of containment through isolation, taking particular note of the argument that Americans might be dangerously assuming a greater degree of accessibility and rationality from the Soviets than the Chinese, trusting the Russians too much and the Chinese too little.33 Public opinion, most often negative, also proved changeable and inconsistent. To the degree that people knew about Beijing’s imprisonment of Bishop James Walsh for spying, or repression in Tibet, or China’s border clash with India, they lashed out at the Chinese. Their concerns were reflected in novels like the Manchurian Candidate, whose portrayal of a Com-

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munist brainwashed soldier daring to try to assassinate a presidential candidate proved so popular that its fi lm version starred leading actors of the day Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh, and Angela Lansbury. William Lederer and Eugene Burdick’s The Ugly American stayed on the best-seller list for 78 weeks, rose to number six, and sold some four million copies. Set in a fictional Southeast Asian state called Sarkhan, where the government deftly played the United States and Soviet Union against each other, the story demonstrated that American foreign service officers were unprepared for the struggle and letting America down. Although the critics panned the book and Senator J. William Fulbright dismissed it as “sterile, devoid of insight, reckless and irresponsible,” Eisenhower read it. The volume went on to become a similarly popular movie starring Marlon Brando and persuaded large numbers of Americans that the U.S. effort overseas against Communism was bankrupt.34 One such book or movie could reach many more people than the work of scholars or the so-called informed public, whose views moderated, exerting some but not enormous influence on the broader populace. At the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, for instance, hostility toward Beijing had mellowed enough to accept that Communist China would not be a rapidly passing phenomenon. A 1956 study by Henry Roberts on Russia and the United States urged that Washington begin to entertain the possibility of having two Chinas seated in the United Nations.35 David Rockefeller had from early on declared it “political foolishness” not to accept the existence of the PRC. Similarly, at a foreign policy conference held at the bucolic liberal arts campus of Colgate University, academic and business opinion accepted the inevitability of Beijing obtaining a UN seat and recognition from Washington. Thomas Finletter, Truman’s secretary of the air force, disparaged provocative Republican policies that had the effect only of driving China closer to the Soviet Union.36 Just two years later Finletter would publish a book on American foreign policy in which he argued that, given world opinion, the United States would not long be able to continue barring China from the UN. Instead, the prominent member of the Democratic Advisory Committee asserted that there should be two Chinese seats in the General Assembly and that India ought to be allowed to occupy the Chinese seat in the Security Council.37 The frequency with which people began to speak out in favor of reassessing China policy disturbed the pro-Chiang community. Stanley Hornbeck,

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former director of the Office for Far Eastern Affairs, complained to a leading China Lobby propagandist Alfred Kohlberg that “the Cloisters of Academe” along with “the managed associations, societies and councils that concern themselves with foreign affairs” were filled with “dupes and tools” seemingly “hell-bent” to further the cause of Red China. 38 Kohlberg made a similar assessment of the book Communist China and Asia, which journalist and researcher A. Doak Barnett had published under Council on Foreign Relations auspices in 1960 and which cautiously advocated a Two Chinas policy. Kohlberg did not charge Barnett with being a Communist but thought him a patsy and noted that fortunately the volume would not get much attention because it was, Kohlberg insisted, too long and dull.39 The most vicious attack of the period, however, was on a volume entitled The China Lobby in American Politics by Ross Y. Koen. An exposé of proChiang efforts to sustain U.S. support of Taiwan and isolation of the Chinese Communists, the book came to the attention of the Lobby when preview copies were put into circulation. China Lobby activists immediately contracted for a counterbalancing study in The Red China Lobby, which ultimately came out in 1963. In the interim, they dissuaded Macmillan from publishing the Koen book reportedly because of his charges that the Nationalist Chinese authorities had been smuggling narcotics into the United States. Harry Anslinger, U.S. commissioner of narcotics, took strong exception to the accusation, as did governing authorities in Taipei. Nevertheless, when Harper & Row finally did publish the book in 1974, virtually nothing in the text had been altered—only the times had changed.40 The press remained divided. As the State Department’s public opinion study staff revealed to the secretary, opposition to recognition and UN admission still galvanized the right-of-center news organizations, such as the Hearst and Scripps-Howard newspapers; Knowland’s mouthpiece, the Oakland Tribune; and William Loeb’s Manchester Union Leader. Predictably, the newspapers and journals advocating change included left-wing publications such as the Nation and the New Republic. More striking were the views of several prominent papers in the center that had begun to advocate more flexibility toward Beijing, including the Atlanta Constitution, the Christian Science Monitor, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The Washington Post condemned the administration’s approach as a “negative, dead-end policy.” Meanwhile, the New York Post, the Providence Journal, and the Louisville Courier-Journal explicitly recommended a Two Chinas policy.41 In the midst

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of the 1958 Strait crisis, the editors of the Kansas City Star questioned whether the president’s “refusal to recognize Red China or agree to her admission to the United Nations [remained] in our national interest,” or whether conditions had changed enough to “point in a different direction.” Eisenhower told Dulles that the paper more closely reflected Midwest sentiment than did any other paper west of the Mississippi.42 Walter Lippmann, journalist and columnist for the Herald Tribune, confided to a British diplomat, however, that even the election of a Democrat would not yield a better China policy. The United Nations, he believed, should just admit China over American objections.43 For Eisenhower, the worries of the public, the press, and members of Congress reinforced sensitivity to the state of Sino-Soviet relations. Washington, notwithstanding its own troubles cooperating with Taipei, had underestimated Sino-Soviet friction for years. This was true even though the Eisenhower administration had since its early days in office been discussing ways to divide China and the Soviet Union. These discussions persisted even after the CIA created a unit devoted to analyzing the relationship in 1956.44 The Soviets increased confusion when, despite disputes with Beijing over the 1958 Strait crisis, Khrushchev aggressively admonished Ambassador Averell Harriman that “we have given the Chinese rockets which are .  .  . within range of Formosa and can destroy it at will. Your Seventh Fleet will be of no avail. . . . If the Chinese decide to take Formosa, we will support them even if it means war.” 45 However, like Eisenhower, Khrushchev saw the main theater of concern as Germany. In Berlin a surge of intellectuals and technicians fleeing from east to west posed a severe problem for the survival of the German Democratic Republic. In the autumn of 1958, Moscow decided that the hemorrhaging had to stop, and in November Khrushchev delivered an ultimatum demanding within six months a peace treaty that would transform Berlin into something other than a NATO salient within the Communist bloc. Accordingly, however much Khrushchev might threaten Harriman, the Soviet leader’s patience for Beijing aspirations and operations in the Taiwan Strait vanished.46 The State Department China desk argued in 1960, “Khrushchev probably sees a perennial threat of war in Peiping’s insistence that military force be used, if need be, to ‘liberate’ Taiwan.” They could point to evidence in Khrushchev’s 1959 warning to Mao against “testing the stability of the capitalist

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system by force” as would be necessary to push the United States out of Taiwan. There also appeared to have been a Soviet suggestion of joint action to resolve the Taiwan dilemma, according to Llewellyn Thompson, the American ambassador in Moscow, who reported being told that the need to act was urgent and that there was little time left for a simple solution.47 State Department officials Edwin Martin and J. Graham Parsons believed that their strategy “of partial responsibility, whereby we have put Khrushchev on notice that there cannot be a détente in Europe while his partner pursues a policy of aggression in the Far East” was working.48 In fact, during this period Khrushchev widened his dispute with Mao by seeking better Soviet-American relations. Mao neither understood nor sympathized with this policy. He believed that the Western alliance was on the verge of collapse because of capitalist repression and should not be bolstered by Moscow. He also worried about U.S. meddling in China. In November 1959, Mao had his secretary Lin Ke translate three of Dulles’s public statements on peaceful evolution—the elimination of socialism through an evolutionary process that could be encouraged from the outside—which he then annotated and circulated among his top leaders for discussion and as a warning to guard against malign U.S. influence.49 Thus word that Khrushchev would engage in a summit with Eisenhower on American soil in the autumn of 1959 came as galling reminder of Mao’s lack of influence in Moscow.50 Khrushchev approached his visit, the first of a Soviet leader to the United States, cautiously, focusing on Germany and disarmament. At Camp David he and Eisenhower continued to disagree, coming together only in favor of a further summit in exchange for which Khrushchev withdrew his Berlin ultimatum. As the two men sparred, China became entangled in the German dispute, with Eisenhower asserting that “if the two German states remained, they would be an indefinite hot bed of confl ict,” to which Khrushchev replied that Americans seemed content to accept the existence of two Chinas. Historian Wang Dong has suggested that an implicit bargain was struck between them “that if Khrushchev could sell ‘two Chinas’ to the Chinese, then Eisenhower might very well consider ‘two Germanys.’”51 Khrushchev, on the other hand, argued to Eisenhower and Herter that Taiwan was a Chinese province and that Mao was right to threaten force against it. Chiang Kai-shek was nothing more than a mutinous general or perhaps a Chinese Alexander Kerensky, seeking to preserve a weak and feckless regime. Furthermore, China should be in the UN.

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The Soviet leader flew within days of his return from the United States to China, with disastrous results. In the United States he had been celebrated. “Cinema and television cameras turned the trip into a graphic spectacle for thousands of Soviet elites, and many more in the general public.” But Khrushchev found the Chinese cold, irate, and truculent. Offended by Khrushchev’s elevation of Soviet-American détente above the Sino-Soviet alliance, the Chinese were incensed when he urged Mao to accept Tibetan independence and the Taiwan status quo, essentially supporting a Two Chinas policy.52 As the Soviets later described the scene, Khrushchev and Foreign Minister Chen Yi shouted at one another, refusing to shake hands and the Soviet leader declaring, “Don’t you try to spit on us. . . . You haven’t got enough spit.”53 Although Washington did not know the details of the exchanges, it quickly became clear that tensions had been pronounced. The repercussions of Sino-Soviet mutual suspicion crystallized during 1959 and 1960. While Beijing waited to receive the prototype tactical nuclear weapon and equipment for a plutonium reactor from Moscow promised in their 1957 nuclear sharing agreement, Khrushchev decided that adhering to the commitment would be too dangerous, that Beijing had proven itself unreliable and reckless.54 Thus in June 1959, he persuaded the Party Presidium to renege and notified Beijing that no bomb, no mathematical models, no components would be forthcoming.55 Washington, of course, knew nothing of Khrushchev’s decision and continued to calculate Soviet assistance into its predictions about a Chinese bomb. Only in December 1960 did analysts speculate that the USSR might be slowing delivery of aid in the hope that this would postpone a “Chinese nuclear weapons capability as long as possible.”56 Inadequate intelligence gathering, long the bane of American analysts—despite imagery from U-2 fl ights, the Corona spy satellite, and the Navy P-2V Neptune aircraft—left China “a real mystery.” Although the intelligence agencies had discovered nuclear facilities at Lanzhou in northwest China, ten uranium mines, and a cadre of Western-educated nuclear scientists, their knowledge remained uncomfortably “fragmentary.” John McCone, chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, barely exaggerated when he told the press that “we have no evidence on China’s weapons development program.”57 Eisenhower was similarly ill-informed about China’s economic progress. Analysts told the president that Beijing’s new economic strategies had produced remarkable growth even as the Soviets dismissed Chinese policies as

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irrational and misguided. Khrushchev told Senator Hubert Humphrey that the Chinese were pinning their hopes on policies tried and rejected by Moscow.58 Later he asserted that China’s economic adventure would lead to collapse and so “we did all we could to influence the Chinese and stop them before it was too late, but Mao thought he was God.”59 The private dismay of Soviet leaders eventually grew into public condemnation. U.S. intelligence nevertheless continued to believe, and was drastically wrong in telling Eisenhower, that “China’s economy will continue to grow rapidly” over the period from 1960 to 1965 as it had done between 1958 and 1960.60 In reality, China’s economy had been severely damaged by the Great Leap Forward and Moscow had already begun to reduce aid to China. The Chinese noted delays in deliveries of equipment and resistance to sharing technical data. Nie Rongzhen, who headed China’s nuclear program, reported to the Politburo in January that “Soviet technical aid has become untrustworthy,” the Soviets seeking to prevent China from benefiting from Soviet scientific achievements. Mikhail Klochko, a Soviet scientist detailed to China, later recalled that Moscow did, in fact, shortchange the Chinese by sending inferior personnel, particularly when it came to military industries.61 Yet it took China’s response to the U-2 incident to convince Khrushchev to disregard domestic critics and openly take action against the Chinese. Khrushchev overcame what political scientist Steven I. Levine has called the problem of the “‘meta-alliance,’ deriving from the fictive identity of interests that socialist states supposedly shared. Th is contributed to the creation of a structure of unfulfi llable expectations.” Levine argues further: “Disagreements, rather than being handled at the working levels, escalated rapidly into questions of good faith, fundamental belief, and personal power.” 62 Although on the surface Beijing appeared to support Moscow’s outrage at the American aerial spying and congratulated Khrushchev for disrupting the May summit meeting with Eisenhower, its subtext soon emerged clearly. The Soviet leadership had been naive to trust the Americans. American spying could have been predicted and the need to shoot down the plane simply proved the superior wisdom of Chinese policies.63 An angry Khrushchev decided to teach Mao a lesson by withdrawing some 1,400 Soviet technicians from China. Between July 18 and August 24, they packed up their blueprints and abandoned half-completed projects all over China. According to Klochko,

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The abruptness of the withdrawal meant that construction stopped at the sites of scores of new plants and factories while work at many existing ones was thrown into confusion. Spare parts were no longer available. . . . Planning on new undertakings was abandoned because the Russians simultaneously canceled contracts for the delivery of plans and equipment.64

Americans watched these developments from afar with only partial awareness of the interplay and wondered about their significance. They knew that Moscow had recalled technicians from China, impeding Chinese modernization. They recognized that confl ict stemmed from several basic questions of theory and practice relating to different stages of development in the two countries. Moscow favored peace for economic growth, whereas Beijing sought to eliminate rapacious imperialism through liberation struggles. China sought new methods of agricultural organization to speed production, whereas the Soviet Union promoted its development model to preserve leadership in the bloc. Furthermore, ordinary clashes over borders, allies, and economic assistance complicated efforts to resolve ideological and developmental disagreements according to Ambassador Thompson, whose report was read personally by Eisenhower.65 No one could predict confidently what the course of the Communist alliance would be and whether the United States stood at the threshold of a  new international order. When the Soviet advisers departed, American officials found it difficult to decide whether Moscow had removed them or China had expelled them.66 Although some analysts insisted that a serious Sino-Soviet rift had developed, others still assumed in 1960 that underlying doctrinal compatibility would ameliorate friction and sustain a continuing military alignment. In either case, the Chinese challenge to American interests appeared increasingly menacing. If China had chosen actually to defy the Soviet Union, then its strength, or at least its arrogance, made it unstable and dangerous. If, on the contrary, it remained tied to Moscow, then it added a serious auxiliary hazard to the formidable Soviet threat. The United States received little useful assistance from its allies in reaching a conclusion. British analysts, despite their supposedly closer ties to Beijing, appeared equally uncertain, doubting both the possibility of Sino-Soviet reconciliation and the potential for a complete rupture.67 The U.S. embassy

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in Tokyo dismissed a Japanese Foreign Ministry study of “Sino-Soviet Relations” as a less sophisticated version of American analyses, but with an additional naïveté regarding Chinese motives.68 Not surprisingly, Taipei spurned all evidence of a genuine Sino-Soviet dispute as a power struggle.69 American analysts needed to tell the president precisely how serious the Sino-Soviet rift had become for many reasons, not the least of which was the likelihood and nature of war. Repeatedly during the period, Eisenhower and his advisers reviewed the possibility of limited war and wondered whether fighting with the Soviet Union would require a confl ict with China as well. During the March 1959 discussion of NSC 5904, “U.S. Policy in the Event of War,” at the 398th National Security Council meeting, Acting Secretary of State Christian Herter, for instance, argued that at the start of combat with the Soviets, the United States ought not simply assume involvement of the entire bloc and, therefore, automatically attack Communist China and Eastern Europe. Eisenhower worried that “Communist China [could not be allowed] to stay on the sidelines and develop, after perhaps forty years, into another Soviet Union.”70 But although he insisted on action, and thereby appeared among the alarmists, he said that action need not be military. At the same time, Eisenhower administration officials could take comfort from the fact that China comprised a challenge to its erstwhile friends as well as its enemies. Chester Bowles, a John F. Kennedy foreign policy adviser, observed that “the Soviet Union is going to find it difficult to control China” and argued that evidence of Moscow’s distress should not be disregarded.71 Eisenhower and Dulles emphasized a provocative Soviet hand in the 1958 crisis, but in the weeks following the confrontation, both men publicly conceded that Moscow seemed to be facing an ally no longer following orders.72 At a state dinner with First Deputy Premier Anastas Mikoyan, in the midst of the 1958–1959 Berlin crisis, Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy took pleasure in needling a Soviet official regarding relations with China. Wasn’t it true, McElroy insisted, that China’s increasing power and decreasing dependency would present serious problems to Moscow?73 By the spring of 1960, the rift had become more public. The Chinese Communist theoretical journal Red Flag published several articles critical of Soviet foreign policy. Particularly devastating was the essay entitled “Long Live Leninism!,” which pointed relentlessly to the divergence in party views. The Chinese took issue with Soviet positions regarding the inevitability of

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war, the viability of détente, and the scientific superiority of the Communist bloc.74 In self-defense, the Soviet Communist Party used the pages of Pravda and Sovetskaya Rossiya to reaffirm the predominance of Moscow’s experience as the only legitimate path to socialism, attacking the Chinese commune movement and Beijing’s misunderstanding of peaceful coexistence and arms control. And yet American reluctance to accept the idea that a split between Moscow and Beijing could be genuine persisted. Entrenched prejudices, institutional biases, self-interest, and fear of being fooled by a communist Conspiracy underlay their resistance. Chiang Kai-shek sought to play on, and aggravate, these fears, telling Eisenhower that a genuine rift was impossible.75 Vice President Nixon, whose career had been built upon fervent anti-Communism, unsurprisingly doubted the authenticity of the split—he had not yet undertaken his 1960s world travels nor experienced his conversion on China. The newly appointed Secretary of Defense Thomas Gates not only denied that any real ideological differences existed but worried that accepting such a diagnosis would jeopardize security and budgets.76 Analysts in the nation’s intelligence community, including the CIA, the State Department’s Intelligence and Research Bureau, the army, navy, air force, and JCS, rejected evidence that they were witnessing the irreparable breakdown of the Communist alliance. Rather they anticipated that “discord will ebb and flow” but that it would not drive the two “so far apart that they cease to look to each other for support in their common drive against the West.”77 Writing in NIE 13-60 that December, analysts declared, “we believe that the differences between Peiping and Moscow are so basic and so much a product of the different situations and problems in the two countries that any genuine resolution of the ‘fundamental’ differences is unlikely.” Nevertheless, they needed each other too much to permit a reprise of the Soviet-Yugoslav rupture of 1948. 78 Eisenhower, the most important judge of the relationship, recognized the existence of a doctrinal dispute and other frictions but believed that Moscow and Beijing would not permit disagreement to produce collapse of the bloc.79 He worried that relations were strong enough for the Soviets to be willing to build nuclear plants in China to hide facilities from Western inspections.80 His assumptions, even when contradictory, remained relatively fi xed. The fact that so many of the nation’s officials, expert observers of the Communist bloc, and incisive analysts of China made such a profound

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miscalculation followed from several realities. First, Americans simply did not have enough information to make solid judgments. Second, few harried policymakers studied the situation carefully enough. Third, Washington exaggerated the importance of ideology as a Sino-Soviet bond, ignoring factors such as nationalism that produced friction. Fourth, while taking ideology seriously, U.S. analysts missed deep-seated differences between Beijing and Moscow. Fifth, officials listened to, processed, and accepted information regarding Sino-Soviet relations on the basis of established knowledge and experience, not hearing, or denying, data that did not fit. Preconceived notions about the strength of bloc ties made fresh insight virtually impossible.81 Sixth, regulations governing the U.S. intelligence community barred analysts from examining the impact of U.S. policies on the decisions and behavior of the Chinese, creating a significant gap in understanding.82 And finally, seventh, the Sino-Soviet alliance had become too useful in forming and executing policies, winning appropriations from Congress, maintaining the U.S. alliance system, and managing relations with Moscow and Beijing. They were reluctant to let it go. American policymakers came to believe that Sino-Soviet ties curbed Chinese activism and that without Soviet supervision the Chinese would be more unpredictable and dangerous. Beijing’s disapproval of warming Soviet-American relations, notable in the Sino-Soviet debate, contributed to this perception. In the 1940s, when analysts had spoken about splitting China and the Soviet Union, their assumption had been that as a result the United States would win the Chinese to its side against the Russians. By the middle of the 1950s, that calculus had broken down. Chester Bowles reflected the views of many informed citizens when he asserted that “China is more likely to threaten our interests in the next twenty years than the Soviet Union.”83 Dulles remarked to the press, “the Chinese Communists seem to be much more violent and fanatical, more addicted to the use of force than the Russians are or have become.”84 Walter Robertson argued that the threat of the Soviet Union, “though great and dangerous, is not as active as the Chinese Communist menace to Asia.”85 Former ambassador to Taipei Karl Rankin emphasized that a China that accepted Moscow’s dictation meant a China that would abide by peaceful coexistence.86 And this tendency to see Russians as more predictable and less volatile than the Chinese contributed to a belief that when the Soviets acted combatively, they were being pushed to do so by Beijing.87

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Edwin W. Martin, director of the China desk, explained much later that he and others “exaggerated” the Chinese menace “to offset the idea that because there’s a Sino-Soviet split, [one need] not . . . worry about the Chinese anymore.”88 In reality, China was widely perceived as strong and confident. Eisenhower and Dulles had early on rejected the possibility that the Communist government could be overthrown and that conviction remained in place at the end. Eisenhower would be willing to go to the rescue if the Chinese people called for assistance, but that seemed unlikely, he reasoned, and “a decision to intervene in the absence of an appeal for help would be quite another thing.”89

CONCLUSION The final years of the administration saddened Eisenhower. He believed he had served the country well but lamented the things he had not been able to accomplish. After the U-2 disaster, the president bemoaned his lost opportunity to check the Cold War. He had struggled to “restrain and restrict the military programs . . . [of ] the services which were highly competitive with each other” and yearned “to demilitarize the nature of international relationships.”90 As he told his science advisor, “he saw nothing worthwhile left for him to do . . . until the end of his presidency.”91 The election campaign added to his dismay. He glumly dismissed Nixon as a worthy successor. On the other hand, he “could not believe that the same country that had twice elected him could turn the government over to a man like Kennedy.”92 China policy did not lead campaign priorities, but neither was it absent from the contest. The most notable moment came with sparring over the offshore islands. Kennedy mocked Nixon as a “trigger-happy Republican” for his willingness to use U.S. troops to save the islands. “Quemoy and Matsu,” he warned, “are not essential to the defense of Formosa.” Nixon counterattacked by vigorously denouncing Kennedy for suggesting that “he is willing to hand over a part of the Free World. . . . I assure you,” he intoned, “that I will not hand over one square foot.”93 Kennedy thereupon used Eisenhower-style moderation against Nixon’s vehemence. The president, Kennedy reminded the country, had sent delegations

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to Taipei to convince Chiang Kai-shek to evacuate the islands, preparing to put them in Communist hands. This was a dispute between Nixon and Ike, Kennedy declared, not Nixon and himself. Indeed, Christian Herter and JFK’s foreign policy liaison Chester Bowles in secret meetings discussed the danger of continuing public debate. The Chinese might be misled into thinking Americans were divided and weak, and the China Lobby in the United States might be unnecessarily aroused.94 Eisenhower listened to the campaign arguments about his policies with indignation and anguish. Nixon made Eisenhower’s legacy appear more rigid and belligerent than the departing president wanted. It was true that Eisenhower exited the presidency in 1961 much the same as he had entered it. He still cared more about Europe than Asia. He still had a public China policy that was tough and seemed supportive of Chiang Kai-shek. Indeed, his 1960 visit to Taiwan sent a message of solidarity with the Generalissimo, and his warm welcome in Taipei belied the various points of friction that challenged the relationship. Eisenhower assured the crowds that not “the slightest lessening of our determination” to support them had occurred.95 Ike, however, regretted that during his time in office he had not been able to break free of political and popular restraints to alter the U.S. relationship with Beijing. He was more attuned to the elements of popular culture, such as the Manchurian Candidate, that warned him not to be flexible than to the moderating views among businessmen, scholars, international affairs organizations, and even public opinion. He had not noticed that the nation he had led for 8 years had become more open to a new direction on China.

CONCLUSION

P

residential transitions often prove difficult. Dwight D. Eisenhower had experienced one of the worst when he assumed power from Harry S. Truman in 1953. After an ugly campaign, Ike had concluded that Truman “was guilty of extreme partisanship, poor judgment, inept leadership and management, bad taste, and undignified behavior.”1 During his term, Ike told Richard Nixon, “he would not appear on the same platform with Truman no matter what was at stake.”2 Truman, for his part, had come to see Eisenhower as a hypocrite for his vicious campaign attacks on foreign policy choices that Ike had helped to reach and realize. Eisenhower had not previously objected to Truman’s approach to containment, the Berlin airlift, NATO, or the war in Korea. Secretary of State Dean Acheson recalled Eisenhower’s behavior at a November 1952 briefing: he “seemed embarrassed and reluctant to be with us—wary, withdrawn, and taciturn to the point of surliness.”3 Truman and Eisenhower met just once after the election, for a disagreeable session at the White House, in which Ike remained unresponsive to lessons Truman sought to teach. By contrast to that ordeal, the Eisenhower-Kennedy changeover appeared almost ideal. Although without particular warmth, their discussions did not devolve into bitter wrangling. What John F. Kennedy encountered in his older predecessor was someone who, like Truman, wished to impart lessons learned. Kennedy recognized issues on which he might be able to enlist Eisenhower’s post-presidential support and those on which Ike would be less likely to help. He understood that Eisenhower might not agree with his future actions, but he did not anticipate public struggles with the former president. Eisenhower never became a cheerleader for a new direction on China; that would have cast doubt on his presidential decisions, would have meant

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a sudden intensification of his interest, and would have elevated China above more important problems. But as this volume demonstrates, given that Ike thought diplomatic relations with China inevitable, the trade embargo foolish and self-defeating, and UN admission necessary and unavoidable, he would not have tried to block movement toward those goals. Eisenhower did not wish to strengthen a Communist regime in China, but he understood that the government would endure regardless of Washington’s position, and he did not want China policy to undermine international respect for the United States. Kennedy, it has been said, hoped to change American China policy, bringing the nation to a more flexible and open relationship with the Chinese.4 That may or may not be so, but it was not Dwight D. Eisenhower who stopped him. This is not to say that Eisenhower was disengaged or passive. As noted earlier, new sources and fresh analysis have long since rescued the president from a standard narrative that assigned him a peripheral role in his own administration. It is clear that Eisenhower did not defer automatically to John Foster Dulles, or to anyone else. He had his own ideas and objectives regarding America’s place in the world. The assessment of Eisenhower that gave him greater agency, insight, and impact, however, has developed into an indictment of his performance in unfamiliar locales, siding with imperialists rather than emerging nationalists for the sake of stability and anti-Communism. The president missed opportunities and made the wrong choices in places like Guatemala and Indonesia even though he was cognizant of the political ferment that was sweeping away vestiges of an old, discredited world. He also made mistakes in his relations with China, but China was not an arena in which he could act with little anxiety about the consequences. Eisenhower, a man who intimately understood combat, feared the possibility of war with China. The president had no trouble supporting covert operations in small nations to oust left-leaning leaders. His record in Latin America and the Middle East made clear his enthusiasm for psychological campaigns and propaganda victories. He did not, however, want to fight the Soviet Union and believed that military clashes with the Chinese would quickly produce World War III. China might be poor and weak, but it could not be trifled with. He came closest to triggering war in the Taiwan Strait. Talk of blockading the Chinese coast or giving Chiang Kai-shek amphibious capabilities involved substantial risk. But Ike never meant to take the

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country that far. He engineered these situations to avoid, not occasion, confl ict and succeeded in maneuvering around China, manipulating Taiwan, and capturing the right wing of his party and government. What, then, does a close look at China policy say about Eisenhower and Dulles? Why did Eisenhower do so little to advance his constructive approach to China? As a decisive military leader imbued with the enormous authority of the American presidency, supported by a talented, experienced, and bold secretary of state, Eisenhower nonetheless did not adopt positive initiatives toward China. To begin with, Eisenhower had problems of much higher salience. He remained an Atlanticist, as he had been before entering the White House and throughout his 8 years in office. The most compelling issues on the president’s mind included Germany, the Soviet Union, and Cuba, not China. Neither he nor Dulles considered China to be worth sacrifice of any domestic political or foreign policy objectives. China was and would remain an afterthought. Crisis in the Taiwan Strait compelled attention, but once violence subsided the president and secretary quickly moved on. Further, although they could not get a clear picture of developments inside China, its backwardness and poverty were manifest. Nothing about China in the 1950s argued for elevating it to a key foreign relations concern. Had Eisenhower actually threatened the incoming president, it surely would have been on an issue that meant a lot more to the nation and to him. Eisenhower recognized the value that the portrait of an aggressive and irrational China offered. It kept allies, particularly in Asia, alert and wary of accommodating Beijing. More important, it freed Eisenhower to pursue a carefully modulated improvement in relations with Moscow. Rigidity on China deflected criticism of summits with the Soviets. Eisenhower could play his own version of Henry Kissinger’s later “China card.” Intensifying Beijing’s alignment with and dependency on Moscow, moreover, could exacerbate strains in the Sino-Soviet relationship, giving the United States greater leverage with both states.5 Improving relations with the Soviet Union while vilifying China would, Eisenhower believed, reduce the likelihood of global crisis and at the same time dismay and distress the Chinese. But actions toward and attitudes about China also hinged on values. Eisenhower, his cabinet, and his advisors adopted and retained a tough policy because of their own anti-Communist fervor. Reflecting prevailing views of the evils of Communism, they allowed their rhetoric and many of their actions

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to blur image and reality. Eisenhower and Dulles understood that Communism was not monolithic, but their approach to China implied that they regarded Beijing’s leaders as little more than puppets of Moscow. As a result, they misled contemporaries and historians. Chinese leaders in the 1950s drew excessively grim conclusions about U.S. intentions. Eisenhower and Dulles were either unaware that this would occur or believed it was a necessary price to pay to control domestic opposition. More broadly, they wrongly convinced historians and pundits to think they shared the hysteria and hatred of China Lobbyists and right-wing partisans. As a result, analysts have allowed the U.S. Cold War vision in the 1950s to overwhelm their scrutiny of the record and have not listened to the things both men said that did not fit the Cold War template, leaving their more moderate ideas inexplicable. Eisenhower’s view of public opinion also inhibited change. He perceived it as insistent and frightening but also uncertain, volatile, and contradictory. He could neither challenge it nor rely on it. Historian Robert Divine has suggested that Ike became a slave to his own popularity, refusing to pursue controversial initiatives because he wanted “to be liked by everyone.” 6 And Andrew Bacevich, an international relations specialist, adds that Ike sought “to sustain the illusion he was fully in command” by “remain[ing] publicly silent” when outspokenness would have better served the nation.7 Thus the president saw himself as constrained and even helpless. He lamented to the National Security Council, “our trouble was that our domestic political situation compelled us to adopt an absolutely rigid policy” on trade and, he noted at other times, on everything Chinese.8 Strident opposition to change in China policy intimidated Eisenhower and Dulles. They believed the China Lobby and the congressional China bloc to be treacherous and feared their toxic effect on administration policies well beyond Chinese affairs. This is not surprising given the ability of the Lobby’s Committee of One Million to use “Congress as a propaganda unit” and “generate . . . the illusion that it could mobilize mass public opinion.”9 Eisenhower and Dulles had seen, and contributed to, a vicious backlash on China. Awareness that Truman and Acheson had failed in Asia, that war had engulfed them, and political opponents had pilloried them constituted persuasive barriers against venturing too far in front of what Eisenhower and Dulles identified as popular tolerance. They publicized the harshest aspects of their China policy in the hope that this would protect them against

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the Lobby and the broader Republican right. Their anti-Communism was, after all, political as well as a product of values and experience. When various segments of the population began to rethink their automatic condemnation of all things Chinese, Eisenhower and Dulles nevertheless continued to exaggerate their resistance to change. To someone predisposed to seeing danger, danger lurked everywhere. The president and his secretary of state, accustomed to broad gauged hostility toward China and sensitive to potential political repercussions, reflexively dismissed evidence inconsistent with their assumptions.10 Franklin Roosevelt famously did the same after giving his 1937 Quarantine speech probing action against the Axis powers. The public and press reacted favorably, but the administration heard only the strident isolationists and dropped the initiative.11 Eisenhower and Dulles, given that polls revealed contradictory views and the results of surveys shifted regularly, judged that daring would be ill advised. Eisenhower could have mounted a domestic campaign to win over congressional and popular opinion on the China issue, but he never did. As his secretary Ann Whitman recalled, “I believe that he came to office with a healthy fear of Congress,” but by the middle of his second term, he was standing up, not “kowtowing,” to members. He might have found the bully pulpit congenial even on the subject of China. But in no case did a strong, united constituency emerge to encourage him to take a risky initiative. Eisenhower expressed his dissatisfaction with the U.S. approach to China in private to trusted aides and in classified meetings of the National Security Council where he had nothing to gain, or lose, by voicing complaints about his own administration policies. Those opinions were more genuine than the things he said openly to score partisan points. Nevertheless, he did not take a leadership role in educating the American people about the need for new policies that, he believed, would make more sense for the national interest and to America’s allies and friends abroad. The president preoccupied himself with the costs of change, not the ways to make change happen. He wasn’t indecisive; he opted not to act because he feared political retribution that would exceed any gain. For instance, although he favored a UN seat for China and believed it to be inevitable, he dreaded the possibility that China’s admission would escalate demands at home that the United States withdraw.12 Only when deep-seated personal conviction motivated Eisenhower did he find a way to act. Eisenhower staunchly advocated that the United States

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apply the precepts of free enterprise, not governmental largesse, abroad. In some cases, foreign aid might be a catalyst, but for fundamental solutions he turned to private investment and free trade.13 He upheld commercial restrictions against Beijing but did not approve of them. He argued on many occasions that they were counterproductive. Trade should be unfettered and would accomplish Washington’s goals more effectively than prohibitions and sanctions.14 An open China market would promote U.S. business interests and make possible positive influences on Chinese Communist economic and political practices. It also, Eisenhower asserted, promised “more security with fewer dollars.”15 Free trade was not just inherently good but also a critical factor in the United States’ relations with other governments. Eisenhower became increasingly aware that Washington’s unyielding posture on China trade restrictions was alienating many nations for whom the exchange of goods and services with China had become economically important. Europeans and Japanese, still hobbled by slow post–World War II recovery, wanted the raw materials and markets that China offered. They resented that America’s comparative prosperity made U.S. officials unsympathetic to their complaints. Thus whereas he only grumbled about recognition or UN admission, Eisenhower worked to roll back rules hampering trade. Resistance, emerging even from his cabinet, persuaded him to retain U.S. sanctions, but he could and did support U.S. allies.16 Trade mattered to him in a way that these similarly controversial issues did not. Eisenhower’s entire career had been based on working with allies and friends to accomplish critical international objectives. If it had been possible to come to common positions during wartime, it should, he was sure, be possible to find solutions to a struggle over China, whose comparative importance did not appear high. To alienate people and governments for rules he did not believe in seemed ridiculous. For U.S. relations with China, the 8 years of the Eisenhower administration saw a slow transition toward greater realism and flexibility. Barriers to interaction largely remained in place—although international trade rules relaxed, ambassadorial talks commenced, and war was avoided—but dissatisfaction with existing obstacles existed among national leaders and spread steadily, if quietly. Had Eisenhower been willing to act, he might have caught China at an approachable moment when it, too, longed for improved

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relations. Normalization might have begun well before 1969. Instead, U.S.China relations remained caught in a Cold War paradigm. Eisenhower and Dulles never implemented a consistent and coherent policy toward China. On that snowy evening of January 19, 1960, Eisenhower had neither a strategy for a new China relationship to bequeath to his successor nor a threat ready to keep American policy static.

ABBREVIATIONS

adst ca records ccp cfep chicoms chinats chincom chirep cia cincpac cocom columbia ddel ddrs edac fbi fbis frus grc hoover ica jcs jfkl jprs kmt lbjl maag memcon mhs

Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Records of the Office of Chinese Affairs Chinese Communist Party Council on Foreign Economic Policy Chinse Communists Chinese Nationalists China Committee (of COCOM, see below) Chinese representation in the United Nations issue Central Intelligence Agency Commander in chief, Pacific command Coordinating Committee of the Paris Consultative Group Columbia University Manuscript Library Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas Declassified Documents Reference Service Economic Defense Advisory Committee Federal Bureau of Investigation Foreign Broadcast Information Service Foreign Relations of the United States government of the Republic of China Hoover Institution on War Revolution and Peace, Stanford, California International Cooperation Administration Joint Chiefs of Staff John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts Joint Publications Research Service Kuomintang Lyndon B. Johnson Library, Austin, Texas Military Assistance Advisory Group Memorandum of conversation Minnesota Historical Society, Minneapolis

188 | Abbreviations

mudd na nato nie norc nsa nsc ocb oh pla pro rg 59 rg 84 roc seato scmp snie usia voa wnrc

Seeley Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University National Archives and Records Administration North Atlantic Treaty Organization National Intelligence Estimate National Opinion Research Center National Security Archive National Security Council Operations Coordinating Board Oral History People’s Liberation Army Public Records Office, British Foreign Office Records, Kew, Great Britain General Records of the Department of State China Post Files Republic of China Southeast Asia Treaty Organization Survey of China Mainland Press Special National Intelligence Estimate United States Information Agency Voice of America Washington National Records Center, Suitland, MD

NOTES PREFACE 1. Richard Immerman makes a convincing case for examining the centrality of individuals and reviews the use of psychology in the analysis of foreign policy in a compelling essay, “Psychology,” in Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson, eds., Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 103–22. See also the classic Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976), and the discussion of biography and history in the symposium published in 2009: Lois W. Banner, “Biography as History,” American Historical Review 114 (June 2009), 579–86; Alice Kessler-Harris, “Why Biography?” American Historical Review 114 (June 2009), 625–30; Kate Brown, “A Place in Biography for Oneself,” American Historical Review 114 (June 2009), 596–605.

INTRODUCTION 1. Those present at the meeting were Secretary of State Christian Herter, Secretary of Defense Thomas Gates, Secretary of the Treasury Robert Anderson, and White House chief of staff Wilton Persons on the Eisenhower side and their opposite numbers from the incoming administration, Dean Rusk, Robert McNamara, C. Douglas Dillon, and freelance adviser and lawyer Clark Clifford. 2. Clark Clifford, Counsel to the President (New York: Random House, 1991), 345. Dean Rusk asserted all had been present when Ike threatened JFK. Dean Rusk, As I Saw It (New York: Penguin, 1990), 428. 3. For instance see Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., A Thousand Days (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 1965), 479–80. Kennedy foreign policy analyst Noam Kochavi calls the contradiction between this remark and Eisenhower’s record “a vexing riddle.” Noam Kochavi, A Conflict Perpetuated: China Policy During the Kennedy Years (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2002), 18n23. 4. Rusk, As I Saw It, 283.

190 | Notes to Pages 1–4

5. According to David Ormsby-Gore, minister of state in the British Foreign Office, this exchange actually occurred on December 6, 1960, and severely disturbed Kennedy. Kennedy confided in Ormsby-Gore that he might nevertheless act on China in six to nine months if his political situation improved. Kennedy’s motives when confiding in Ormsby-Gore, however, could have had little to do with Eisenhower since (1) British pressure for a different U.S. policy on China had been constant, as Kennedy knew; (2) Kennedy consistently blamed others for his inaction on China; and (3) in 1961, a leak, allegedly from the British to an Associated Press reporter, claiming China policy had changed angered Kennedy and, according to the British Ambassador, damaged U.S.–U.K. relations. 1525 Cable P. Dean, December 7, 1960, FO371/152108, provided to this author by Professor Matthew Jones, University of Nottingham; 158446 Minute John W. Russell, April 13, 1961, FC2251/83, British Foreign Office Records, Public Records Office, Kew, Great Britain (hereafter PRO). Note also that Eisenhower’s diary entry for December 6, 1960, mentions the Far East in passing and does not suggest conversation about China. Robert Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 379–83. 6. Similar confusion surrounded a promise Eisenhower supposedly made to defend South Vietnam. Fred I. Greenstein and Richard H. Immerman, “What Did Eisenhower Tell Kennedy about Indochina? The Politics of Misperception,” Journal of American History 79 (September 1992), 569. 7. Telephone Call, Dwight D. Eisenhower with Ben Fairless, August 19, 1960, Box 52, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Presidential Papers, 1953–1961 Ann Whitman File, Diary Series, Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas (hereafter DDEL). 8. Richard Reeves, President Kennedy: Profile of Power (New York: Touchstone, 1994), 22. 9. Theodore C. Sorenson, Kennedy (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 640 (quote); Schlesinger, A Thousand Days, 163. 10. Greenstein and Immerman, “What Did Eisenhower Tell Kennedy about Indochina?,” 576. 11. Ibid., 583. 12. Declassified documents indicate just one mention of China in the general review of issues and that in conjunction with discussion of Laos. For instance, see Memorandum for the Record, January 19, 1961, Box 2, folder: Kennedy, John F., 1960–1961 (2), Eisenhower: Post-presidential Papers, John F. Kennedy Library, Columbia Point, Boston, Massachusetts (hereafter JFKL). 13. Jim F. Heath, Decade of Disillusionment (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975), 137. 14. Clifford seems to have been prone to interpreting situations to please the president he was serving at any given time. For instance, he probably misled Kennedy about Eisenhower’s changing impressions of the young senator, telling him that after the first, December 6th, session, Eisenhower was “overwhelmed” by JFK’s “understanding of world problems, the depth of his questions, the grasp of the issues, and the keenness of his mind.” Clifford, Counsel to the President, 342. Eisenhower’s skepticism about JFK, however, endured.

Notes to Pages 7–9 | 191

1. EISENHOWER’S WORLD 1. The significance of Eisenhower’s personality, experience, perceptions, beliefs, and assumptions is manifest in the discussion that follows. For a review of the various methods of analyzing the qualities of a leader’s thinking and decision making, see Richard H. Immerman, “Psychology,” in Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson, eds., Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 103–22. 2. Richard H. Immerman, “Eisenhower and Dulles: Who Made the Decisions?” Political Psychology 1 (Autumn 1979), 21–38; Fred I. Greenstein. The Hidden-Hand Presidency (New York: Basic Books, 1982), 80, 87–90; Robert Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 350; Roscoe Drummond and Gaston Coblentz, Duel at the Brink (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1960), 20–22. 3. Traditional views of Eisenhower as largely incompetent in foreign affairs were written by Marquis Childs, Eisenhower: Captive Hero (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1958), and Richard Rovere, The Eisenhower Years: Affairs of State (New York: Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1956). Early revisionism appeared with Murray Kempton’s “The Underestimation of Dwight D. Eisenhower,” Esquire 68 (September 1967), 108–9, 156, and Gary Wills, Nixon Agonistes (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970). Since then there have been influential books by Greenstein, Hidden-Hand; Blanche Wiesen Cook , The Declassified Eisenhower (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1981); Robert Divine, Eisenhower and the Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981); Herbert S. Parmet, Eisenhower and the American Crusades (New York: Macmillan, 1972); and Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower: The President (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984). For assessments of some of the revisionists, see Gary Reichard, “Eisenhower as President: The Changing View,” South Atlantic Quarterly 77 (Summer 1978), 265– 81; Vincent P. DeSantis, “Eisenhower Revisionism,” Review of Politics 38 (April 1976), 190–207; Mary S. McAuliffe, “Eisenhower the President,” Journal of American History 68 (December 1981), 625–32; Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., “The Ike Age Revisited,” Reviews in American History 11 (March 1983), 1–11; Jeff Broadwater, “President Eisenhower and the Historians: Is the General in Retreat?” Canadian Review of American Studies 22 (Summer 1991), 47–59; Stephen G. Rabe, “Eisenhower Revisionism: The Scholarly Debate,” in Michael J. Hogan, ed., America in the World (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 300–325. 4. Post-revisionism sees Eisenhower as neither inconsequential nor unusually wise but, rather, as a strong leader who was often wrong. For examples, see H. W. Brands, Jr., “The Age of Vulnerability: Eisenhower and the National Insecurity State,” American Historical Review 94 (October 1989); Robert J. McMahon, “Eisenhower and Third World Nationalism,” Political Science Quarterly 101 (1986), 453–73; Kathryn C. Statler and Andrew L. Johns. The Eisenhower Administration, the Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006). 5. Eisenhower to Swede Hazlett, letter, October 23, 1954, in Robert Griffith, ed., Ike ’s Letters to a Friend, 1941–1958 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1984), 134.

192 | Notes to Pages 10–12

6. William Manchester, American Caesar (New York: Dell, 1978), 68, 129; Dwight D. Eisenhower, At Ease (New York: Doubleday, 1967), 12–13. 7. Ferrell, Eisenhower Diaries, 226. Apparently he took the presidency with several conditions, including that he not be involved in curriculum issues. David M. Kennedy, “Soldier President,” New York Times Book Review, October 24, 1999, 10. 8. Emmet John Hughes, The Ordeal of Power (New York: Dell, 1963), 18. 9. For instance, see Ira Chernus, Apocalypse Management (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008), 1–28. 10. Cook, Declassified Eisenhower, 43; Chris Tudda, The Truth Is Our Weapon (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006), 31. 11. Cook, Declassified Eisenhower, 64–65; Jeff Broadwater, Eisenhower and the AntiCommunist Crusade (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992), 23. 12. Ferrell, Eisenhower Diaries, 40, 42–43 13. David Eisenhower, Eisenhower at War, 1943–1945 (New York: Vintage, 1986), 82. 14. Ferrell, Eisenhower Diaries, 174. 15. Michael D. Pearlman, Truman and MacArthur (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008), 253–54; Steven Casey, Selling the Korean War (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 335. 16. Cook, Declassified Eisenhower, 108; Broadwater, Eisenhower and the Anti-Communist Crusade, 24. 17. Formosa was the Portuguese name for the island that the Chinese called Taiwan. In the 1950s, the only politically acceptable term of reference was Formosa. To call it Taiwan was to identify as a Communist sympathizer. 18. Discussion of lifting the ban against significant Nationalist attacks on the mainland began under the Truman administration, but officials decided it would not be a good idea. 793.00/10-852 H. M. Holland (CA) to Martin (CA), Box 4202, General Records of the Department of State, Record Group 59 (hereafter RG 59), National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland (hereafter NA); 793.00/10=2052 Memorandum of conversation (Memcon), Acheson with McConaughy, in ibid. 19. Humphrey to Josiah Brill of Brill & Brill (legal fi rm), February 11, 1953, Hubert Humphrey Papers, Senatorial Files, 23 L9 2F, Box 93, Minnesota Historical Society, St. Paul, Minnesota (hereafter MHS); State Department Study of Reactions to Unleashing, drafted by Charlton Ogburn, February 11, 1953, General Records of the Department of State, Records of the Office of Chinese Affairs, Box 40, “410 Chinese Nationalist Armed Forces” (hereafter RG 59, CA); “Most of Europe’s Press Criticizes Formosa Step as New War Risk,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, February 3, 1953. The British had hoped to preserve neutralization but failed. FO371/105196 (FC1018/5) 206, R. Makins, Washington, January 31, 1953, PRO. British diplomats doubted that the Chinese would feel compelled to shift large numbers of troops to the coast. FO371/105196 (FC 1018/25), F. S. Tomlinson, Washington, to R. H. Scott, London, February 2, 1953, PRO.

Notes to Pages 13–16 | 193

20. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953–56 (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1963), 139–40. 21. Greenstein, Hidden-Hand, 83–85. Eisenhower also was annoyed by Wilson’s public statements, which embarrassed the administration. Eisenhower Memo for the Files, March 12, 1955, Dwight D. Eisenhower Papers, Ann Whitman File, Diary Series, Box 10, fi le: March 1955 (2), Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas (hereafter DDEL). 22. Wilson’s appointment was proposed by Ike’s search team of Lucius Clay and Hebert Brownell, but he selected Radford himself. Ambrose, Eisenhower, 23, 30. 23. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 464; Robert J. Donovan, Eisenhower: The Inside Story (New York: Harper, 1956), 19. 24. Ambrose, Eisenhower, 202–3. 25. Ibid., 319, 320. 26. Richard Nixon, Six Crises (New York: Pocket Book, 1962), 172. 27. Fawn M. Brodie, Richard Nixon: The Shaping of His Character (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 321. 28. Wills, Nixon Agonistes, 31. 29. Kenneth A. Osgood., “Form before Substance: Eisenhower’s Commitment to Psychological Warfare and Negotiations with the Enemy,” Diplomatic History 24 (Summer 2000), 405–34. 30. Chernus, Apocalypse Management, 1–28. 31. Hughes, Ordeal of Power, 98. 32. 793.001/2853, Memcon, F. S. Tomlinson (British Counselor) with Assistant Secretary Allison, Box 4203, RG 59 NA; Major General William C. Chase, Chief MAAG, to General Chow Chih-jou, Chief of General Staff, Taipei, February 5, 1953, China Post Files, Record Group 84, Box 2, fi le: 11 Offensive Uses of Chinese Forces 1953–1956, NA (hereafter RG 84). 33. Robert J. Donovan, Confidential Secretary (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1988), 69. 34. Legislative Supplementary Notes, May 19, 1953, Eisenhower Papers, Box 4, fi le: Staff Notes, January–December, 1953, DDEL. 35. Memorandum of conversation with Nehru, December 19, 1956, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 20, December 1956, Eisenhower Papers; Memorandum of discussion, 271st National Security Council (NSC) Meeting, December 23, 1955, Whitman File, NSC Series, Eisenhower Papers, DDEL. 36. Ambrose, Eisenhower, 333. 37. Anna K. Nelson, “John Foster Dulles and the Bipartisan Congress,” Political Science Quarterly 102 (Spring 1987), 43–44. 38. Cook, Declassified Eisenhower, 165; Ambrose, Eisenhower, 118. 39. Greenstein, Hidden-Hand, 28, 79–80; Ferrell, Eisenhower Diaries, 239. 40. Hughes, Ordeal of Power, 47. 41. Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 1994), 449.

194 | Notes to Pages 16–22

42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47.

48. 49. 50. 51.

52. 53. 54. 55.

56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61.

62.

Greenstein, Hidden-Hand, 120; Grose, Gentleman Spy, 449. Jean Edward Smith, Lucius D. Clay (New York: Henry Holt, 1990), 614, 621. Smith, Clay, 163, 173, 621. Smith, Clay, 173–80 (quote 174). H. W. Brands Jr., Cold Warriors: Eisenhower ’s Generation and American Foreign Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), 40. Robert Accinelli, Crisis and Commitment: United States Policy toward Taiwan, 1950– 1955 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), 189; Anna K. Nelson, “The Importance of Foreign Policy Process: Eisenhower and the National Security Council,” in Stephen E. Ambrose and Gunter Bischoff, eds., Eisenhower: A Centenary Assessment (Baton Rouge: Louisiana University Press, 1995), 120. Note that Cutler was not a national security adviser in the mode of Henry Kissinger, but rather an organizational and information coordinator. Mark Perry, Partners in Command (New York: Penguin, 2007), 114. Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes (New York: Doubleday, 2007), 62. Brands, Cold Warriors, 76. 751G.00/5–2354 Dulte 101 Memo Smith-Molotov Meeting, May 22, 1954, in U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States (hereafter FRUS) 1952–1954, vol. 16: The Geneva Conference: Korea and Indochina (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1981), 897. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 16, 23. Ibid., 270. Manchester, American Caesar, 585. Kai Bird, The Chairman (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992), 429–30, 447, 477; John J. McCloy Oral History, DDEL and Columbia University, December 18, 1970, OH-221, 19. Bird, The Chairman, 474–75; McCloy Oral History, 24. Andrew J. Goodpaster Oral History, OH-544, DDEL, November 7, 1983, 5. Ibid., 25–26. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 477; Goodpaster Oral History, OH-37, DDEL, September 7, 1967, 110. Milton Eisenhower, The Wine Is Bitter (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1963), 187–89. Robert Murphy, Diplomat among Warriors (New York: Pyramid Books, 1965), 391–93; Letter, Murphy to Irwin, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, September 28, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19: China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1996), 599. Regarding nuclear threats, see Daniel Calingaert, “Nuclear Weapons and the Korean War,” Journal of Strategic Studies 11 (June 1988), 177–202; Rosemary Foot, “Nuclear Coercion and the Ending of the Korean Confl ict,” International Security 13 (Winter 1988–1989), 92–112; Edward C. Keefer, “President Dwight D. Eisenhower and the End of the Korean War,” Diplomatic History 10 (Summer 1986), 267–89. Simultaneously, there were concerns that a Korean settlement coupled

Notes to Pages 22–27 | 195

with the Communist peace offensive of 1953 would weaken the coherence and resolve of the free world and China’s isolation. Memo, Holland (CA) to Martin, Hope, and Jenkins (CA), May 11, 1953, Records of the Office of Chinese Affairs (hereafter CA Records), folder: 320 International Political Relations, RG 59, NA; Walter Robertson in oral history interview, “John Foster Dulles and the Far East,” July 17, 1964, 18, John Foster Dulles Papers, 1860–1988, Seeley Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University (hereafter Mudd); Memcon, V. K. Wellington Koo, Chinese Ambassador, with Adlai Stevenson, February 15, 1953, Box 187, V. K. Wellington Koo Papers, Columbia University Manuscript Library, New York (hereafter Columbia). 63. He Di, “Paper or Real Tiger: America’s Nuclear Deterrence and Mao Zedong’s Response,” 6–10, paper prepared for the international conference “New Evidence on the Cold War in Asia,” Hong Kong, January 9–12, 1996. Zhang Shu Guang notes that the Chinese discounted the likelihood because of world opinion and Soviet support of China but nevertheless prepared for tactical strikes. Zhang Shu Guang, Mao ’s Military Romanticism (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1995), 233–34, 238. 64. For a broader statement of this idea, see McMahon, “Eisenhower and Th ird World Nationalism,” 453–73. 65. Cook, Declassified Eisenhower, 183.

2. FIRE, BRIMSTONE, AND JOHN FOSTER DULLES 1. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953–56 (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1963), 23. 2. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 365; Walter LaFeber, The American Age (New York: Norton, 1989), 510. 3. Hans-Jurgen Grabbe, “Konrad Adenauer, John Foster Dulles, and West GermanAmerican Relations,” in Richard Immerman, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 111. 4. LaFeber, American Age, 510. 5. H. W. Brands Jr., Cold Warriors: Eisenhower ’s Generation and American Foreign Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), 123. 6. Memo, Dulles to Herter and Robertson, August 23, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19: China, 70. 7. Eisenhower to Dulles, June 15, 1957, “Eisenhower Dwight D., 1957,” John Foster Dulles Papers, Mudd; Ronald Pruessen, John Foster Dulles: The Road to Power (New York: Free Press, 1982), 11. Dulles’s grandfather John W. Foster had worked with the Chinese during negotiation of the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895 at the end of the Sino-Japanese War. He facilitated Foster Dulles’s exposure to prominent Chinese, including T. V. Soong and H. H. Kung, as well as Americans deeply involved with China, such as Arthur Young and Nelson Johnson.

196 | Notes to Pages 27–29

8. Memcon, Dulles with Truman, October 3, 1951, John Foster Dulles Papers, Mudd; Ronald W. Pruessen, “John Foster Dulles and the Predicaments of Power,” in Immerman, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War, 21. 9. John Foster Dulles, War or Peace (New York: Macmillan, 1950). 10. Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), 172. 11. Pruessen, Dulles, 11. 12. Richard H. Immerman, John Foster Dulles: Piety, Pragmatism, and Power in U.S. Foreign Policy (Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 1999), 31. 13. Douglas MacArthur III, Oral History, Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training (hereafter ADST), available from http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections /diplomacy/index.html. 14. Miyasato Seigen, “John Foster Dulles and the Peace Settlement with Japan,” in Immerman, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War, 189–212; Warren I. Cohen, “China as an Issue in Japanese-American Relations, 1950–1972,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The United States and Japan in the Postwar World (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1989). 15. Jeff Broadwater, Eisenhower and the Anti-Communist Crusade (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992), 135; Brands, Cold Warriors, 13; Pruessen, Dulles, 401. 16. The Chinese diplomat Wang Bingnan asserted in his memoirs released in 1985 that the confrontation never occurred. But in conversation with this author, both Pu Shan, Zhou’s aide, and U. Alexis Johnson insisted that they had witnessed the entire incident. Wang Bingnan, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu, “Nine Years of Sino-U.S. Talks in Retrospect,” JPRS-CPS-85–079, August 7, 1985 (Beijing: Shijie Zhishi Chubanshe, 1985). 17. Dulles, War or Peace, 190–91. 18. Dulles to Luce, April 24, 1950, “Luce, Henry,” John Foster Dulles Papers, Mudd. 19. John Garver argues that Titoism was never an option and that U.S. policymakers did not take it seriously. John W. Garver, “Polemics, Paradigms, Responsibility, and the Origins of the U.S.-PRC Confrontation in the 1950s,” Journal of AmericanEast Asian Relations 3 (Spring 1994), 7–12. 20. David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), 118. 21. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Patterns in the Dust: Chinese-American Relations and the Recognition Controversy, 1949–1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), 187. 22. 611.93/3-2853, Dulles to H. Freeman Matthews (G), April 4, 1953; Memo, Matthews to Dulles, March 31, 1953; and Memo, Charles C. Stelle to Matthews, March 28, 1953, Box 2861, RG 59, NA; NSC 139th Meeting, April 8, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14: China and Japan, pt. 1 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1985), 181; Dulles to Rankin, April 16, 1953, FRUS 14, p. 191.

Notes to Pages 30–32 | 197

23. Memcon, Dulles with Harold Macmillan, San Francisco, June 20, 1955, FO 371/115054 (FC 1041/943), PRO. 24. Steven M. Goldstein, “Dialogue of the Deaf? The Sino-American AmbassadorialLevel Talks, 1955–1970,” in Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 213–15. 25. U. Alexis Johnson, The Right Hand of Power (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1984), 239. Johnson speculated that Dulles appointed him because “Dulles was interested in . . . lessening tensions with the Chinese . . . [and] he thought I could do that without raising the hackles of the powerful American ‘China Lobby.’” Ibid., 234. 26. Tucker, Patterns in the Dust, 200. 27. Report by the Secretary of State to the NSC, October 28, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 810. 28. Robertson to Philip C. Jessup, October 8, 1949, Box 25, fi le: Communism-ChinaCorrespondence, Christopher Emmet Papers, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, Stanford University (hereafter Hoover); 611.93/3-2053, Box 2861, RG 59, NA; Lyman P. Van Slyke, ed., The China White Paper, August 1949 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967), 2:629–32. 29. Townsend Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles (Boston: Little, Brown, 1973), 146; Norman A. Graebner, “Eisenhower and Communism: The Public Record of the 1950s,” in Richard A. Melanson and David Mayers, eds., Reevaluating Eisenhower (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1987), 69. 30. FRUS 1952–54, vol. 14, pt. 1, 399n4; Hoopes, The Devil and Dulles, 147. 31. FO371/110222 (FC10345/12), M. G. L. Joy to W. D. Allen, November 30, 1954, PRO; Brands, Cold Warriors, 83. Of course, that depended somewhat on which British official one spoke to. Others found him “ignorant and loathsome.” Matthew Jones, “The Geneva Conference of 1954: New Perspectives and Evidence on British Policy and Anglo-American Relations,” 30th international workshop on “The Geneva Conference and the Cold War in Asia: New Evidence and Perspectives,” Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., February 17, 2006. 32. Robertson to Marvin Liebman, February 5, 1960, Box 23, fi le: RC Lobby, Marvin Liebman Associates Papers, Hoover; Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 93–94: Marshall Brement is quoted on desk banging, and Marshall Green is quoted on balance. 33. 793.02/1-550, McConaughy, Shanghai, FRUS 1950, vol. 6: East Asia and the Pacific (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1976), 264–69; 793.02/1-650, in ibid., 268n9. 34. Mayers, Cracking the Monolith, 95; McConaughy speech to Richmond Public Forum, December 7, 1953, “China in the Shadow of Communism,” CA Records, Box 38, fi le: 060 McConaughy, RG 59, NA. 35. 793.00/9-450, Rankin to Rusk, Box 4196, RG 59, NA; Rankin to Perkins, June 23, 1952, Karl Lott Rankin Papers, Box 18, fi le: Chiang Kai-shek, Mudd; 793.5/9-3054, Rankin to McConaughy, Box 4220, RG 59, NA.

198 | Notes to Pages 32–35

36. Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), vii; Memorandum, Special Assistant to President Eisenhower, October 9, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3: China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1986), 625. On the other hand, Rankin also wrote Drumright, on the eve of Drumright’s posting to Hong Kong, that at high levels where decision were made, few people read reports from the field. 793.00/0-2954, Rankin to Drumright, Box 4209, RG 59, NA. 37. Despatch 610, June 6, 1955, Rankin papers, Box 14, fi le: Bangkok Conference, Mudd. 38. Rankin to Robertson, April 6, 1959, Rankin Papers, Box 36, fi le: China, People’s Republic of, Mudd. 39. Rankin, China Assignment, 185, 324. 40. Rankin to John M. Allison, Assistant Secretary, January 22, 1953, Rankin Papers, Box 20, fi le: China, People’s Republic of, Mudd. 41. E. J. Kahn Jr., The China Hands (New York: Viking, 1972), 38, 277–78. 42. Bennett C. Rushkoff, “Eisenhower, Dulles and the Quemor-Matsu Crisis, 1954– 1955,” Political Science Quarterly 96 (Fall 1981), 467–68; Morton H. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Straits Crisis: A Documented History,” RM-4900-ISA (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, December 1966), 146 and 201. 43. Brands, Cold Warriors, 166–67. 44. 310.2/6-1153, Dulles to Lodge, June 19, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3: United Nations Affairs (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1979), 679– 80; 310.2/3-3054, Dulles to Lodge, April 10, 1954, in ibid., 728–30; Brands, Cold Warriors, 175–77; Geoff rey Kabaservice, “Moderation and Courage; Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.,” available from http://www.frumforum.com/moderation-and-courage -henry-cabot-lodge-jr (accessed January 7, 2010). 45. Johnson, Right Hand of Power, 247. Roderic O’Connor, who may or may not have been part of the inner circle, recounted that Walter Robertson “annoyed [Dulles] terribly.” Hoopes, The Devil and Dulles, 147. 46. Th is is the list provided by MacArthur in his oral history recorded by the ADST. Richard Immerman also includes John Hanes, William Macomber, Robert Murphy, and Roderic O’Connor. See “Eisenhower and Dulles: Who Made the Decisions?” Political Psychology 1 (Autumn 1979), 32. 47. Hoopes, The Devil and Dulles, 147. 48. Tucker, China Confidential, 91. 49. Barry Rubin, Secrets of State (New York: Oxford, 1985), 279n11; Memcon, March 28, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2: China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1986), 411. Others on the Policy Planning Staff went further to call for recognition. Memo, Robert McClintock to Bowie, February 8, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 470–73. 50. Memo, Bowie to Dulles, June 19, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 548. 51. “The No. 1 Objective,” Time, June 27, 1960, available from http://www.time .com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,827656–1,00.html (accessed January 3, 2008);

Notes to Pages 35–44 | 199

52.

53. 54. 55. 56.

57.

58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66.

Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 1994), 333–34. Douglas MacArthur II Oral History, Eisenhower Library, 34, available from http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/Research/Oral_Histories/oral_history_ transcripts/MacArthur_Douglas_538.pdf (accessed March 13, 2010). Ibid. Ibid. 793.5/2-2654, Merchant to Dulles, Box 4219, RG 59, NA. 893.50 Recovery/5-449, 141, Merchant, Taipei, FRUS 1949, vol. 9: The Far East: China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1975), 324–26; 894A.00/ 5-2449, Merchant to Butterworth, ibid., 337–41. Livingston Merchant Oral History, p. 1, John Foster Dulles Oral History Project, Mudd. Merchant also became a close associate of President Eisenhower as were others in this circle. After Foster Dulles’s death, Eisenhower considered Merchant for the secretary’s position. Bowie Memo, November 26, 1954, FRUS 1952–54, vol. 14, pt. 1, 950–51; Hoopes, The Devil and Dulles, 147. McConaughy to Johnson, Geneva, August 26, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 5. Grose, Gentleman Spy, 341. David Halberstam, The Fifties (New York: Villard Books, 1993), 373. Grose, Gentleman Spy, 88. Ibid., 4–5, 338n. Ibid., 10, 258, 409–10, 562. Anna K. Nelson, “John Foster Dulles and the Bipartisan Congress,” Political Science Quarterly 102 (Spring 1987), 46, 47, 64. Richard Immerman, “Conclusion,” in Immerman, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War, 267.

3. CONSTRAINTS 1. Thomas Paterson, J. Garry Clifford, and Kenneth J. Hagan, American Foreign Relations: A History since 1865, 5th ed. (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 2000), 278. 2. Note Dulles’s decision to force John Carter Vincent into retirement though Acheson had recommended the opposite. Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation (New York: Norton, 1969), 712. 3. M. J. Heale. American Anticommunism (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990), 169–70, 183; Stephen J. Whitfield, The Culture of the Cold War (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), 140–41. 4. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Patterns in the Dust: Chinese-American Relations and the Recognition Controversy, 1949–1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983),

200 | Notes to Pages 44–47

5.

6. 7. 8. 9.

10. 11. 12.

13. 14.

15. 16. 17.

18.

19. 20.

21.

80–99; see also Ross Y. Koen, The China Lobby in American Politics (New York: Harper & Row, 1974). Thomas G. Paterson and Les K. Adler, “Red Fascism: The Merger of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia in the American Image of Totalitarianism, 1930’s–1950’s,” American Historical Review 75 (1970). Thomas Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 105. John W. Dower, War without Mercy (New York: Pantheon, 1986). Max Hastings, The Korean War (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987), 287. Milton Leitenberg, “New Russian Evidence on the Korean War Biological Warfare Allegations: Background and Analysis,” CWIHP Bulletin 11 (Winter 1998), 185–99; Nicholas J. Cull, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 76. Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), 213. Mary L. Dudziak, Cold War Civil Rights (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 120. Letter, President Eisenhower to Ralph McGill, February 26, 1959, available from ht t p: //w w w.e i s e n ho w e r. a rc h i v e s .g ov/ R e s e a rc h / D i g it a l _ D o c u me nt s /Civil_Rights_Eisenhower_Administration/New20PDFs/1959_02_26_DDE_to _McGill.pdf (accessed May 3, 2009); Blanche Wiesen Cook, The Declassified Eisenhower (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1981), 174–75; Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 86–92. Qing Simei, From Allies to Enemies: Visions of Modernity, Identity, and U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1945–1960 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007), 176, 178. Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), 171 (Anderson), 172 (Dulles to Koo). Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 51, 88, 105. Chang, Friends and Enemies, 172. Yi Sun, “Militant Diplomacy: The Taiwan Strait Crises and Sino-American Relations, 1954–1958,” in Kathryn C. Statler and Andrew L. Johns, eds., The Eisenhower Administration, the Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), 275. John Prados, “The Central Intelligence Agency and the Face of Decolonization under the Eisenhower Administration,” in Statler and Johns, eds., The Eisenhower Administration, 30–31. Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower: The President (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 371. Kenneth A. Osgood, “Words and Deeds: Race, Colonialism, and Eisenhower’s Propaganda War in the Th ird World,” in Statler and Johns, eds., The Eisenhower Administration, 11. Kenneth A. Osgood, “Form before Substance: Eisenhower’s Commitment to Psychological Warfare and Negotiations with the Enemy,” Diplomatic History 24 (Summer 2000), 413.

Notes to Pages 47–56 | 201

22. Craig Allen, Eisenhower and the Mass Media (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1993), 14, 40. 23. Cull, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency, 105. 24. Dudziak, Cold War Civil Rights, 107; Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 87; Osgood, “Words and Deeds,” 12–15. 25. Ambrose, Eisenhower, 52–55; Robert Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 271. 26. Allen, Eisenhower and the Mass Media, 60; Nancy E. Bernhard, U.S. Television News and Cold War Propaganda, 1947–1960 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 147. 27. Robert M. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 3–4, 48–49. When news of the NORC initiative broke, it triggered congressional hearings. 28. Allen, Eisenhower and the Mass Media, 15–16, 37–39. 29. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 116. 30. Letter, H. Schuyler Foster to the author, February 24, 1979. 31. H. Schuyler Foster, Activism Replaces Isolationism: U.S. Public Attitudes, 1940–1975 (Washington, D.C.: Foxhall Press, 1983), 10, 12. 32. Ralph B. Levering, The Public and American Foreign Policy, 1918–1978 (New York: William Morrow, 1978), 113. 33. Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America’s China Policy, 1949–1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984), 174. 34. See, for instance, Gregory Mitrovich, Undermining the Kremlin: America’s Strategy to Subvert the Soviet Bloc, 1947–1956 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2000). 35. John L. Gaddis, Strategies of Containment (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 129. 36. Ibid., 144. 37. John P. Burke, The Institutional Presidency (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 37, 64; Anna K. Nelson, “The Importance of Foreign Policy Process: Eisenhower and the National Security Council,” in Stephen Ambrose and Gunter Bischoff, eds., Eisenhower: A Centenary Assessment (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1995), 125. 38. Ambrose, Eisenhower, 52. 39. “State Department Transcript of Remarks Made by Dulles at News Conference,” New York Times, October 1, 1958, 8. 40. Ferrell, The Eisenhower Diaries, 200.

4. FEAR OF COMMUNISM 1. NSC 166/1, “U.S. Policy toward Communist China,” FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt.  1, 278–306; NIE 13–54, “Communist China’s Power Potential through 1957,” June 3, 1954, in ibid., 445–61.

202 | Notes to Pages 56–58

2. They took similar steps regarding Eastern Europe in NSC 174 (“United States Policy toward the Soviet Satellites in Eastern Europe,” 1953) and NSC 5501 (“Exploitation of Soviet and European Satellite Vulnerabilities,” 1955). 3. Robert Accinelli, Crisis and Commitment: United States Policy toward Taiwan, 1950–1955 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), 180–81; SarahJane Corke, U.S. Covert Operations and Cold War Strategy: Truman, Secret Warfare and the CIA, 1945–53 (London: Routledge, 2008), 160–61; Gregory Mitrovich, Undermining the Kremlin: America ’s Strategy to Subvert the Soviet Bloc, 1947–1956 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2000), 167. 4. Stephen J. Whitfield, The Culture of the Cold War (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), 14. 5. Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949– 1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984), 63 (quote), 84n4. 6. Chen Jian, “Bridging Revolution and Decolonization: The ‘Bandung Discourse’ in China’s Early Cold War Experience,” in Christopher Goscha and Christian F. Ostermann, eds., Connecting Histories: Decolonization and the Cold War in Southeast Asia, 1945–1962 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009), 153. 7. Xia Yafeng. Negotiating with the Enemy (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 77. 8. Mao actually chastised Zhou for the “mistake of failing to raise the Taiwan issue” at Geneva. Chen, “Bridging Revolution,” 154. 9. Shu Guang Zhang, “Constructing ‘Peaceful Coexistence’: China’s Diplomacy toward the Geneva and Bandung Conferences, 1954–55,” Cold War History 7 (November 2007), 511. 10. Geoff rey Roberts, “A Chance for Peace? The Soviet Campaign to End the Cold War, 1953–1955,” Cold War International History Project Working Papers, 57, December 2008, 63; Dwight D. Eisenhower, “A Chance for Peace,” speech made to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953, available from http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/ike_chance_for_peace.html (accessed June 14, 2009). 11. Kenneth A. Osgood, “Form before Substance: Eisenhower’s Commitment to Psychological Warfare and Negotiations with the Enemy,” Diplomatic History 24 (Summer 2000), 405–34; Melvyn P. Leffler, For the Soul of Mankind (New York: Hill & Wang, 2007), 95–113; Nicholas J. Cull, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 90. 12. John L. Gaddis, Strategies of Containment (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 141. 13. Klaus Larres, “Eisenhower and the First Forty Days after Stalin’s Death: The Incompatibility of Detente and Political Warfare,” Diplomacy & Statecraft 6 (July 1995), 431–69; Immerman, John Foster Dulles: Piety, Pragmatism, and Power, 53–55. 14. Mary Dudziak, Cold War Civil Rights (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 137.

Notes to Pages 58–61 | 203

15. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 114. 16. Thomas Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 105–6. 17. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, “John Foster Dulles and the Taiwan Roots of the ‘Two Chinas’ Policy,” in Richard Immermann, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 244–51; Bertil Lintner, Burma in Revolt (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1994), 96, 99, 102–6, 120–25. 18. John Prados, Safe for Democracy: The Secret Wars of the CIA (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2006), 137. 19. Kenneth Conboy and James Morrison, The CIA ’s Secret War in Tibet (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 2002), 12; John B. Roberts II and Elizabeth A. Roberts, Freeing Tibet: 50 Years of Struggle, Resilience, and Hope (New York: AMACOM Books, 2009), 18. 20. John Kenneth Knaus, Orphans of the Cold War (New York: Public Affairs, 1999), 139; Roberts and Roberts, Freeing Tibet, 24; Robert J. McMahon, ““U.S. Policy toward South Asia and Tibet during the Early Cold War,” Journal of Cold War Studies 8 (Summer 2006), 140. 21. Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA (New York: Doubleday, 2007), 301. 22. Prados, Safe for Democracy, 199–200. 23. Audrey R. Kahin and George McT. Kahin, Subversion as Foreign Policy (New York: New Press, 1995), 12–19; Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009), 492; Kenneth Conboy and James Morrison, Feet to the Fire: CIA Covert Operations in Indonesia, 1957–1958 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1999), 43, 60–61. 24. Kahin and Kahin, Subversion as Foreign Policy, 75–76, 81, 186; Robert J. McMahon, “‘The Point of No Return’: The Eisenhower Administration and Indonesia, 1953– 1960,” in Kathryn C. Statler and Andrew L. Johns, eds., The Eisenhower Administration, the Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), 75–99. 25. John W. Garver, “Polemics, Paradigms, Responsibility, and the Origins of the U.S.-PRC Confrontation in the 1950s,” Journal of American-East Asian Relations, 3 (Spring 1994), 13. 26. Lorenz M. Lüthi, The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 142. 27. 793.00/11–553, Rankin, Taipei, Box 4206, RG 59, NA; G. William Skinner, “Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 321 (January 1959), 136–47. 28. Although Rankin commended Nationalist accomplishments in bringing high school students to Taiwan, providing textbooks for primary schools overseas, and establishing anti-Communist organizations during 1953, most observers considered Beijing more vigorous and more productive in commanding the interest of overseas communities. 793.00/10–2753, Despatch 242, Rankin, Taipei, Box 4206, RG

204 | Notes to Pages 61–62

29.

30.

31.

32. 33.

34. 35.

36.

59, NA. Analysis of PRC activities in 793.001/7–654, Despatch 19, Julian F. Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 4213, RG 59, NA. Ena Chao, “U.S. Policy towards the Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia, 1953–57” (in Chinese), paper delivered at the 2nd Conference on the U.S. in the Cold War, Taipei, Taiwan, 1994, 2–4. NSC 146/2, “United States Objectives and Courses of Action with Respect to Formosa and the Chinese National Government,” November 6, 1953, FRUS 1952– 1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 316–17; 793.00/4–3053, Despatch 479, Hendrick an Oss, Kuala Lumpur, Box 4204, RG 59, NA; Statement by Overseas Affairs Commission, Peiping, May 20, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 1, file: 11P Indochina, RG 59, NA. In October 1958, the Indonesian government nationalized all overseas Nationalist Chinese enterprises, industries, and educational facilities, affecting some 20 percent of the countries’ commercial establishments, “which may be an effort to create a scapegoat for economic deterioration.” Staff Notes 443, October 22, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes—October 1958, DDEL. The problem for overseas Chinese, of course, has continued. See Keith Richburg, “For Southeast Asia’s Chinese, Success Breeds Discrimination,” Washington Post, March 20, 1988, A25. 793.08/9–254, Despatch 109, Howard L. Parsons, Bangkok, Box 4218, RG 59, NA; 793.00/10–454, Despatch 595, Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 4209, RG 59, NA; Zhang, “Constructing ‘Peaceful Coexistence,’” 519. U.S. officials reported continued Chinese aid to local insurgent forces in Burma, Indonesia, and Nepal. NIE 13–57, March 19, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 504. “The Overseas Chinese as an Instrument of U.S. Policy,” July 13, 1956, Declassified Documents Reference Service (DDRS) (1992), fiche 182 2619; “The Overseas Chinese and U.S. Policy,” Drafts August 7, 1956, and September 6, 1956, DDRS (1993), fiche 17 106 and fiche 73 717. Regarding plans from Taipei to deal with the overseas Chinese problem, see Memo, October 22, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 19, fi le: 570.2 Overseas Chinese, RG 59, NA; Memo, November 23, 1956, in ibid. Christina Klein, Cold War Orientalism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 34. Despatch 507, Jones, Taipei, May 8, 1952, Box 14, folder: 570.1, RG 84, NA; 793.00/7– 1753, Despatch 164, McKillop, Hong Kong, Box 4205, RG59, NA; 793.00/7–953, Memcon, Radford with Chiang Kai-shek, Box 4205, RG 59, NA. Eventually one State Department officer observed that in countries that recognized the PRC, it might not be in U.S. interests to have the overseas Chinese pledge their loyalties to the host government. Guidelines for U.S. Programs, October 17, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 8, fi le: 570.2 Overseas Chinese, July–December, RG 59, NA. In August 1960, the National Security Council reaffi rmed, in amendments to NSC 6012, the policy of encouraging allegiance to host countries when this would not confl ict with other U.S. objectives. J. Graham Parsons to secretary, August 11, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 15/16, pt. 1: East Asia, Pacific Region, microfiche supplement, 1993.

Notes to Pages 62–64 | 205

37. NIE-43–54, “Probable Developments in Taiwan through mid-1956,” September 14, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 634–35; Robert W. Barnett to Averell Harriman, March 3, 1964, James C. Thomson Papers, fi le: Far East: Taiwan 1958, 1962– 1964, JFKL. 38. “John Foster Dulles and the Far East,” 16, Mudd. Dulles repeatedly asserted that Chiang did not have the capability of retaking the mainland; see 214th NSC Meeting, September 12, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 614; Dulles to Ike, May 16, 1956, White House Office Files, Office of the Staff Secretary, Subject Series, State Department Subseries, Box 1, fi le: State Dept. 1956 (April–June) (3), DDEL. 39. Despatch 320, Rankin, Taipei, November 30, 1953, Rankin Papers, Box 20, fi le: Chiang Ching-kuo, Mudd; 793.00/6–954, Despatch 690, Rankin, Taipei, Box 4208, RG 59, NA. 40. Robert O. Keohane, “The Big Influence of Small Allies,” Foreign Policy (Spring 1971), 172. 41. Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), 311. 42. Memo, Jenkins to McConaughy, July 7, 1953, CA Records, Box 41, fi le: 430.1 U.S. Aid to Nationalist China, RG 59, NA. 43. Taylor, The Generalissimo, 460. 44. Harrison M. Holland (CA) to Walter McConaughy (CA), October 29, 1953, CA Records, Box 40, file: 410 Chinese Nationalist Armed Forces, RG 59, NA; 794A.5 MSP/11–254, McConaughy to Robertson, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 1025–26. 45. Memcon, Koo, Dulles, and Allison, March 19, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 157. Taipei argued it should be included in SEATO, but the United States refused. 610, Rankin, Taipei, May/June 1954, Box 2, fi le: Pacific Pact, RG 84, NA; Memcon, Drumright, Acting Assistant Secretary, with Koo, July 16, 1954, Koo Papers, Box 191, Columbia. 46. Memcon, Koo, Dulles, and Allison, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 158; Bowie to Robertson, March 22, 1954, noted in ibid., 400n5; Memcon, Koo, Dulles, and McConaughy, May 19, 1954, in ibid., 422–25; Memo by Robertson, September 1, 1954, in ibid., 555; and 214th Meeting of the NSC, Memo of Discussion, September 12, 1954, in ibid., 614; Memcon, Eisenhower, J. F. Dulles, A. W. Dulles, Anderson, Radford, and Cutler, May 22, 1954, in ibid., 428. 47. Fred I. Greenstein, The Hidden-Hand Presidency: Eisenhower as Leader (New York: Basic Books, 1982), 22. 48. “Remarks of the Secretary Regarding Proposed U.S.-Chinese Security Pact,” February 27, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 368–70; Robertson to Dulles, March 31, 1954, in ibid., 399–401, particularly note 8. 49. 790.5/2–2454 476, Jones, Taipei, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 367. 50. Memcon, Koo and Judd, July 16, 1954, Box 191, Koo Papers, Columbia; Memcon, Koo and Knowland, July 14, 1954, and Koo and Nixon, July 15, 1954, in ibid.; Letter, George Yeh, Foreign Minister, to Nixon, December 18, 1953, Record Group 84,

206 | Notes to Pages 64–66

51.

52.

53.

54. 55. 56.

57.

58.

59.

Box 3, fi le: KMT Troops in Burma, NA; O. Edmund Clubb, “Formosa and the Offshore Islands in American Policy, 1950–55,” Political Science Quarterly 74 (December 1959), 519–20. Telegram, CCP Central Committee to Zhou Enlai, July 27, 1954, CWIHP Bulletin 16 (Fall 2007–Winter 2008), 83–84; He Di, “The Evolution of the People’s Republic of China’s Policy toward the Offshore Islands,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The Great Powers in East Asia, 1953–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 225. Concern about the rise in China’s prestige was expressed in NIE 10–7-54, “Communist Courses of Action in Asia through 1957,” November 23, 1954, FRUS 1952– 1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 933, 940. The Chinese prepared arduously for the opportunity according to the secretary general of the delegation, Wang Bingnan, in his memoirs, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu (Nine Years of Sino-U.S. Talks in Retrospect), JPRS-CPS-85–079, August 7, 1985 (Beijing: Shijie Zhishi Chubanshe, 1985), 4. Wang Bingnan asserted that the incident never happened, but in conversations with this author, two other witnesses, U. Alexis Johnson and Zhou’s aide Pu Shan, both attested to the event. Wang, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu , 12–13; Interview with Pu Shan, Beijing, China, 1987; Interview with U. Alexis Johnson; U. Alexis Johnson, The Right Hand of Power (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1984), 204; David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith: U.S. Policy against the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1949–1955 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), 128–29. Zhang, “Constructing ‘Peaceful Coexistence,’” 518. Zhai Qiang, The Dragon, the Lion, and the Eagle (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1994), 140. Wang discusses the differences between Bedell Smith and Walter Robertson in Geneva. Wang, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu , 11–12. At a dinner with Alex Johnson in 1955, Wang recalled that Smith had initiated better Sino-American relations when he spoke to Zhou at a buffet at the Geneva meeting in 1954. 611.93 /8–2355 589, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 4. Gong Li, “Tension across the Taiwan Strait in the 1950s: Chinese Strategy and Tactics,” in Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 146. Zhang Baijia and Jia Qingguo, “Steering Wheel and Shock Absorber, and Diplomatic Probe in Confrontation: Sino-American Ambassadorial Talks Seen from the Chinese Perspective,” in Ross and Jiang, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War, 177. Zhang Baijia, “The Changing International Scene and Chinese Policy toward the United States, 1954–1970,” in Ross and Jiang, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War, 49.

Notes to Pages 66–71 | 207

60. FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 414–555 passim; Kenneth T. Young, Negotiating with the Chinese Communists (New York: McGraw Hill, 1968), 37–40; Johnson, Right Hand of Power, 204, 233–36; Wang, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu , 14–17.

5. NO INHERENT WORTH 1. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953–56 (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1963), 465–67. 2. Zhang Baijia and Jia Qingguo, “Steering Wheel and Shock Absorber, and Diplomatic Probe in Confrontation: Sino-American Ambassadorial Talks Seen from the Chinese Perspective,” in Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 179, 181. 3. According to Yao Xu, Zhou Enlai later came to call this “the concept of confronting the United States on three fronts.” Cong yalujiang dao banmendian [From the Yale River to Panmunjon] (Beijing: People’s Press, 1985), 21–22, cited in Chen Jian, China ’s Road to the Korean War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 94. 4. Gordon Chang and He Di, “The Absence of War in the U.S.-China Confrontation over Quemoy and Matsu in 1954–1955: Contingency, Luck, Deterrence?,” American Historical Review 98 (December 1993), 1504, 1507, 1512, 1514; Gong Li, “Tension across the Taiwan Strait in the 1950s,” in Ross and Jiang eds., Re-Examining the Cold War, 148; “Chinese Communist Capabilities and Intentions with Respect to Formosa,” October 12, 1954, CJCS 091 China, Chairman’s File, Admiral Radford, 1953–57, Box 7, fi le: (Oct.–Dec. 1954), Joint Chiefs of Staff Records, Record Group 218, Modern Military Records, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland (hereafter JCS Records). 5. Niu Jun, “Chinese Decision Making in Th ree Military Actions Across the Taiwan Strait,” in Michael Swaine and Zhang Zuosheng, eds., Managing Sino-American Crises. (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2006), 309–311. 6. Robert Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), 296. 7. “Navy’s Air Power Sharp off Hainan,” New York Times, July 31, 1954, 3. It should be noted that the United States had fueled tensions in the area by sending warships to the edge of Chinese territorial waters and encouraging Nationalist overfl ights of PRC territory during the summer of 1954. 8. Chen Xiaolu, “China’s Policy toward the United States, 1949–1955,” in Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds., Sino-American Relations, 1945–1955: A Joint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1989), 194. Chen notes that according to Nie Fengzhi et al., Sanjun Huige Zhan Donghai [The three armed services fight in the East China Sea] (Peking: People’s Liberation Army Publishing House, 1985), Chinese leaders began talking about seizure of

208 | Notes to Pages 71–74

9.

10.

11. 12.

13. 14.

15.

16. 17.

18. 19. 20.

coastal islands in July 1952, began executing plans in the spring of 1954, and agreed upon specific moves against Yijiangshan and Dachen on August 31, 1954. The British believed that the CIA in the guise of Western enterprises helped plan the ill-fated Dongshan operation. 040716z, August 4, 1953, FO 371/105198 (FC 1018/105), PRO; E. H. Jacobs-Larkcom, Tamsui, to R. S. H. Shattock, London, August 7, 1953, FO371/105198 (FC 1018/109), PRO. Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA (New York: Doubleday, 2007), 62; Ray S. Cline, Secrets, Spies, and Scholars: Blueprint of the Essential CIA (Washington, D.C.: Acropolis Books, 1976), 176. Robert Suettinger, “Introduction,” in Tracking the Dragon: National Intelligence Estimates on China during the Era of Mao, 1948–1976 (Washington, D.C.: National Intelligence Council, 2004), xi (quote), xvi. Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War (Lawrence: University of Kansas, 2009). PSB D-35, “National Psychological Effort as of December 31, 1952,” January 5, 1953, FRUS 1950–1955: The Intelligence Community, 1950–1955 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 2007), 393; Christopher J. Tudda, “Reenacting the Story of Tantalus: Eisenhower, Dulles, and the Failed Rhetoric of Liberation,” Journal of Cold War Studies 7 (Fall 2005), 33. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 109. Matthew M. Aid, “The National Security Agency during the Cold War,” http:// www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB260/index.htm. Signals intelligence hubs in Hong Kong run by Britain and Australia and in Taiwan by the ROC and United States produced details about troop deployments and modernization projects. In 1954, for instance, they requested 30,000 parachutes to drop teams of 100, which would incite uprisings among the estimated 650,000 dissidents. The NSC projected just 50,000, which itself was probably a greatly inflated figure. Kenneth Conboy and James Morrison, The CIA ’s Secret War in Tibet (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2002), 38. James Lilley, China Hands (New York: Public Affairs 2004), 78, 82 (quote). Johannes R. Lombardo, “A Mission of Espionage, Intelligence and Psychological Operations: The American Consulate in Hong Kong, 1949–64,” in Richard J. Aldrich, Gary D. Rawnsley, and Ming-Yeh T. Rawnsley, eds., The Clandestine Cold War in Asia, 1945–65 (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 66–67, 69; Lilley, China Hands, 136–37. 793.5/3–2054, Bowie to Robertson, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 552–53; 793.5/ 3–2054, Merchant to Robertson, in ibid., 553. 793.5/8–2554, Robertson memo drafted by Martin, Box 4219, RG 59, NA. NSC 146/2, “United States Objectives and Courses of Action with Respect to Formosa and the Chinese National Government,” November 6, 1953, FRUS 1952– 1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 308. Regarding encouragement to defend the islands in the Truman

Notes to Pages 74–75 | 209

21.

22. 23.

24 .

25.

26. 27.

28.

29. 30. 31. 32.

period, see JCS 2118/39, May 7, 1952, CCS 381 FE(11-28-50)sec 15, JCS Records, RG 218, NA. General C. J. Chow, Chief of General Staff, Ministry of National Defense, Taipei, to General William Chase, Chief, MAAG, February 13, 1953, China Post Files, Box 2, fi le: 11 Offensive Uses of Chinese Forces, 1953–1956, RG 84, Washington National Records Center, Suitland, MD (hereafter WNRC). Ambassador Rankin, who was avowedly in favor of an offensive stance, nevertheless worried about the provocative nature of raids encouraged by MAAG, which seemed to have no real purpose. Rankin to Drumright, February 20, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 362–64. NSC 162/2, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 2 pt. 1, 593 (quote) and see 607–8. 793.00/5–2454, W. R. Smedberg, U.S. Navy, Director International Affairs, Box 4208, RG 59, NA; SM-792–54, Memo for the Secretary of Defense (Draft—Navy, Marine Corps-Air Force view), September 7, 1954, Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, RG 218, Chairman’s Files, Admiral Arthur N. Radford, Box 7, 091 China, fi le: September 1954, NA. Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), 205; 793.5/9–454, Robertson to Acting Secretary Smith, FRUS 1952– 1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 561–63. Nevertheless, Robertson opposed use of nuclear weapons. A British official reported Roberston remarking, “Everyone knew his feelings about the Communist Chinese. But this did not mean that he advocated a preventive war against them.” Letter, M. G. L. Joy (Micky) to W. D. Allen (Denis), November 30, 1954, FC10345/12, PRO. JCS 967254, Acting Secretary of Defense to the President, September 3, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 556–57; Appendix B from Memo, Radford to Wilson, September 11, 1954, “Views of the Chief of Staff, United States Army (Ridgway),” in ibid., 605–66. 213th NSC Meeting, September 9, 1954, in ibid., 588. 93.00/9–354, Tedul 7, Smith to Dulles, in ibid., 557–58. On foreign opinion, see Special National Intelligence Estimate (hereafter SNIE) 100–4-54, ibid., 569; St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 5, 1954, 1. SNIE 100–4-54, “The Situation with respect to Certain Islands Off the Coast of Mainland China,” September 4, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 570. See also NIE 43–54, “Probable Developments in Taiwan through Mid-1956,” September 14, 1954, in ibid., 629. Memo by Dulles, September 12, 1954, in ibid., 611–12. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 464; Letter, Eisenhower to Al Gruenther, February 1, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 192. 221st NSC Meeting, Memo of discussion, November 2, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 837. 214th NSC Meeting, Memorandum of discussion, September 12, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 617, 621–22.

210 | Notes to Pages 75–77

33. 214th NSC Meeting, Memorandum of discussion, September 12, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 619–23. 34. On the approach to New Zealand, see Dulte 9, Dulles, London, September 29, 1954, DDRS (1989), fiche 155 2783. Dulles wrote Chiang that he was “not surprised that your initial reaction to the New Zealand proposal is negative. I have myself shared many of your doubts.” 793.00/10—1454 237, Hoover to Rankin, transmitting Dulles letter to Chiang, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 762; and see difficult discussion between Chiang and Robertson, 793.00/ 10–3154, Memcon, McConaughy, Taipei, in ibid., 728–53. 35. 214th NSC Meeting, Memorandum of discussion, September 12, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 613–24; 216th NSC Meeting, Memo of discussion, October 6, 1954, in ibid., 693; FO 371/110231 (FC01042/12G) 1275 FONOFF to Dennis Allen, UN delegation, September 28, 1954, and 1283, September 30, 1954, PRO; 793.5/10–1854 247, Dulles to Taipei, Box 4220, and FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 775. 36. 214th NSC Meeting, Memorandum of discussion, September 12, 1954, in FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 622. 37. 216th NSC Meeting, Memo of discussion, October 6, 1954, in FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 695; Memo by Dulles, September 12, 1954, in ibid., p. 613. To the British, Dulles asserted that the creation of two Chinas could lead to relaxation of the trade embargo against Beijing and acceptance of both Chinas in the UN. 5 Eden, Paris, October 21, 1954, FO 371/110235 (FC 1042/96G), PRO. 38. 793.00/10–2454, Memcon, Box 4209, RG 59, NA; 793.00/10–754, Robertson to Secretary, Box 4209 and 4220, RG 59, NA; 4998 London to Embassy Washington, October 6, 1954, FO 371/110232 (FC 1042/32G), PRO. 39. Memcon between Yeh, Koo, and Robertson, November 4, 1954, Box 192, Koo Papers, Columbia. Taipei struggled to keep the notes secret because of opinion in Taiwan and because they did not want the British to know about the restrictions. In fact, the British were informed early in the process without Taipei’s knowledge, and the notes were revealed to Congress in February 1955 for U.S. domestic political reasons. Despatch 277, Rankin, Taipei, December 7, 1954, Box 2, fi le: SinoAmerican Bilateral Treaty 1954/55, RG 84, NA. 40. 611.94A/9–2654, Cutler to Secretary, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 661–62; Memo, JCS to Wilson, October 1, 1954, forwarded to Cutler, October 5, 1954, ibid., 684–87; JCS 1966/91 Notes, October 22, 1954, CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 15, JCS Records, RG 218, NA. 41. Memcon, JCS with Secretary, October 29, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1., 814–16. 42. 221st NSC Meeting, Memo of discussion, November 2, 1954, ibid., 832; Memo, Assistant Secretary of Defense for ISA to JCS, January 19, 1955, transmitting letter from Dulles to Wilson, January 5, 1955, CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 15, JCS Records, RG 218, NA. 43. Chang and He, “The Absence of War,” 1513.

Notes to Pages 78–79 | 211

44. Robert Accinelli, “Eisenhower, Congress, and the 1954–55 Offshore Island Crisis,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 20 (Spring 1990), 331. It is not entirely clear who was the main proponent of ambiguity—Eisenhower or Dulles. Those who attribute it to Ike include C. T. Crowe Minutes, August 25, 1954, FO 371/110257 (FC 1094/19) PRO; and Chang and He, “Absence of War,” 1511. 45. 221st NSC Meeting, November 2, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 837; 233rd NSC Meeting, January 21, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 91, 93. 46. Accinelli, “Eisenhower, Congress,” 331, 333, 337–38. The votes were 409 to 3 in the House and 85 to 3 in the Senate. Gary W. Reichard, “Divisions and Dissent: Democrats and Foreign Policy, 1952–1956,” Political Science Quarterly 93 (Spring 1978), 62–64. 47. Memcon, President with Dulles and Radford, January 19, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2 , 42–43; 233rd NSC Meeting, January 21, 1955, in ibid., 92; Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 466–67. Ironically, Ambassador Rankin in July 1953 had pressed a resistant Chiang to hold these islands despite their vulnerability. 793.00/7–2453 50 Rankin, Taipei, Box 4205, RG 59, NA. Radford fruitlessly pointed this out: 199th NSC Meeting, May 27, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 434. In September, the Office of Chinese Affairs declared the idea of evacuating the Dachens “unrealistic” given Nationalist determination to hold them. 793.5/902454, Martin to Drumright, Box 4220, RG 59, NA. 48. Document 1398, Eisenhower to Lewis Williams Douglas, April 12, 1955, Series: EM, AWF, Administration Series, The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, vol. 16: The Presidency: The Middle Way, Part VII, January 1955 to May 1955, chap. 15, available from http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/fi rst-term /documents/1398.cfm (accessed May 3, 2009). 49. 293.9332/1–3055 497, Rankin, Taipei, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2 , 167–68; 293.9332/1– 3055, Memcon, in ibid., 170–71; Memcon, Yeh and Koo with Dulles, Robertson, and McConaughy, January 28, 1955, in ibid., 156; V. K. Wellington Koo Diary, January 31, 1955, Box 220, Koo Papers, Columbia. Dulles did tell Foreign Minister Yeh that it made no sense to commit forces to a bunch of rocks and that they should abandon the Mazu islands. Memcon, Yeh and Koo with Dulles and Robertson, January 19, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 46–47. 50. 793.5/2–355, Memcon, Yeh with Robertson, in ibid., p. 205; Memcon, President with Hoover and Radford, February 5, 1955, in ibid., 221. 51. Transcript of fi rst meeting between Hammarskjöld and Zhou, January 6, 1955, DAG-1/5.1.3, Box 3, fi le: China: Basic Documents visit to Peking 1954/55, United Nations Archives, New York (hereafter UN); Letter, UNUK to Denis Allen, Foreign Office, January 24, 1955, FO 371/115082 (FC 1041/281), PRO. Dulles expressed reservations about Hammarskjöld’s diplomacy and noted that when “dealing with Communists and Orientals it was important to keep the channels clear.” 793.00/ 2–755, Memcon, Dulles with Makins et al., FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 237. 52. Xue Mohong and Pei Jianzhang, eds., Diplomacy of Contemporary China (Hong Kong: New Horizon Press, 1990), 97. Also see Trevelyan message, Peking, January

212 | Notes to Pages 79–82

53.

54. 55.

56. 57.

58.

59. 60.

61.

62. 63. 64.

65.

28, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles-Herter Series, Box 3, fi le: Dulles January 1955, Ike. 793.00/2–1755, Memcon, Dulles with Munro, Laking, and Scott, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 286; Message, Eden to Dulles, March 25, 1955, in ibid., 397–98; NSC Briefing, February 3, 1955, in ibid., 199. Chang and He, “Absence of War,” 1516–17. 794A.5/2–2155 Dulte 2, Dulles, Manila, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2 , 300; 793.5/2–2555 Dulte 8, Dulles, Bangkok, in ibid., 308; 396.1 BA/2–2555 Dulte 10, Dulles, Bangkok, in ibid., 312. Chang and He note that intelligence and military sources provided confl icting reports regarding the magnitude of China’s buildup. Chang and He, “Absence of War,” 1519. Paul Boyar, By the Bomb ’s Early Light (New York: Pantheon, 1985), 334–51; 240th NSC Meeting, March 10, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 347. Fred Kaplan, Wizards of Armageddon (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983), 174–84. Sam Wells, “The Origins of Massive Retaliation,” Political Science Quarterly 96 (Spring 1981), 31–52. Lawrence L. Murray, “Th e Film Industry Responds to the Cold War, 1945– 1955: Monsters, Spys [sic], and Subversives,” Jump Cut 9 (1975), 14–16, http: // www.ejumpcut.org/archive/onlinessays/JC09folder/ColdWarFilms.html; “Living under a Mushroom Cloud: Fear and Hope in the Atomic Age,” http://www .wisconsinhistory.org/museum/atomic/fear.asp. Matthew Jones, “Targeting China U.S. Nuclear Planning and ‘Massive Retaliation’ in East Asia, 1953–1955,” Journal of Cold War Studies 10 (Fall 2008), 57. Matthew Jones, “The Geneva Conference of 1954: New Perspectives and Evidence on British Policy and Anglo-American Relations,” presented at the international workshop “The Geneva Conference and the Cold War in Asia: New Evidence and Perspectives,” Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars, Washington D.C., February 17, 2006, 13. Historian Appu Soman argues that “the goal of the American nuclear diplomacy in the spring of 1955 was to set the stage for employing nuclear weapons against China.” I clearly disagree. Appu K. Soman, Double-Edged Sword (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2000), 116. Memorandum for the Record by Cutler, March 11, 1955, ibid., 357. NSC 240th Meeting, March 10, 1955, ibid., 348. Document 1369, Letter, Ike to George M. Humphrey, March 29, 1955, Series: EM, AWF, Administration Series, The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, vol. 16: The Presidency: The Middle Way, Part VII, January 1955 to May 1955, chap. 15, available from http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/1369 .cfm (accessed May 3, 2009). Henry W. Brands Jr., “Testing Massive Retaliation: Credibility and Crisis Management in the Taiwan Strait,” International Security 12 (Spring 1988), 151; Dillon Anderson Oral History, 97–98, DDEL. Dulles biographer Fred Marks argues that Dulles never

Notes to Pages 82–84 | 213

66. 67. 68.

69. 70. 71.

72. 73.

74. 75.

76.

77. 78. 79. 80.

agreed with Ike’s view that nuclear weapons were no different morally from other weapons. Frederick W. Marks III, Power and Peace: The Diplomacy of John Foster Dulles (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1993), 25, 178n9. Soman, Double-Edged Sword, 116, 152 Ibid., 2. Jones, “Targeting China,” 60–61. Smith told an interviewer that his own view of the atomic bomb had been changed while watching the power of a weapons test. Gerard C. Smith Oral History, DDEL, available from http://www.eisenhower. archives.gov/Research/Oral_Histories/oral_history_transcripts/Smith_Gerard _513.pdf (accessed March 13, 2010), 29. Tucker, China Confidential, 126–27. Smith Oral History, DDEL, 6–8. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 478–79; Memo, Goodpaster to Eisenhower, March 15, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 367; McGeorge Bundy, Danger and Survival (New York: Vintage, 1988), 277–79. Jones, “Targeting China,” 52, 54. Jones, “Targeting China,” 60–61. Nina Tannenwald in Nuclear Taboo (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 140–42, argues that Ike and Dulles set out to undermine the growing inhibition against use of nuclear weapons, but a close reading of the record shows that although they wanted freedom of action that did not mean they favored using nuclear weapons. Daniel J. Leab, “Canned Crisis: U.S. Magazines, Jinmen and the Mazus,” Journalism Quarterly 44 (1967), 340–44. Blanche Wiesen Cook, The Declassified Eisenhower (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1981), 69–71; Ernest T. Weir to Eisenhower, April 1, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles-Herter Series, Box 4, fi le: Dulles April 1955 (1), Ike. In a reply to Weir, the president emphasized the importance of psychological factors. Eisenhower to Weir, April 6, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 10, fi le: DDE Diary, April 1955 (2), Ike. Humphrey’s long-term interest in solving the China problem was probably reflected in the comment of his staff member Max Kapelman to a member of Senator Lehman’s office staff that “if you find anybody who has got a solution to the problem in China, you needn’t even wait to send it by mail. Call me on the telephone!” Kapelman to Julius C. C. Edelstein, March 24, 1953, Humphrey Papers 23L 9 2F, Box 93, fi le: Foreign Policy, China, MHS. Soman, Double-Edged Sword, 145. Accinelli, “Eisenhower, Congress,” 340. 216th NSC Meeting, October 6, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 699; 793.00/ 9–1454, Eisenhower to Acting Secretary, in ibid., 577. NIE 100–4-55, “Communist Capabilities and Intentions with Respect to the Offshore Islands and Taiwan through 1955, and Communist and Non-Communist Reactions with Respect to the Defense of Taiwan,” March 16, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957,

214 | Notes to Pages 84–87

81.

82. 83. 84.

85.

86. 87.

88. 89. 90.

91.

92.

93.

94.

95.

vol. 2, 379. Townsend Hoopes noted the negative Asian reaction to America’s obsession with Communism and undue willingness to use military force. Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles (Boston: Little, Brown, 1973), 280. Memcon, March 28, 1955, in ibid., 411, 414. The British ambassador told Dulles in January that he assumed that both Washington and London were moving toward such a trade. Memcon, Dulles with Makins, January 20, 1955, in ibid., 86. Tedul 6, Eisenhower to Dulles, February 21, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 301–2. Letter, Eisenhower to Churchill, March 29, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 420. Hagerty Diary Entry, February 24, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 305–6; 793.00/ 4–855 080814Z, Chase to Stump, in ibid., 465–66; 793.00/4–955 090359Z, Stump to Carney, in ibid., 471–73. Ironically, Chiang confided to his diary that Robertson was “a son of a bitch” and that the Americans were “naïve and ignorant.” Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009), 481, 682n125. Memo for the Record by Rankin, Taipei, April 29, 1955, ibid., 529–30. Memcon, Eisenhower with Dulles, April 17, 1955, ibid., 491–95. Eisenhower continued to advocate his outpost strategy even after Robertson and Radford left for Taiwan. 711.5800/4–2155 2, Hoover to Robertson and Radford, Taipei, ibid., 501–2. 711.5800/4–2155 4, Robertson to Secretary, April 25, 1955, ibid., 510–17; Memcon, Eisenhower with Dulles, April 25, 1955, ibid., 517. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 352. The quote comes from a letter to Al Gruenther and actually pertains to intervention at Dien Bien Phu. These include Brands, “Testing Massive Retaliation,” and Gordon H. Chang, “To  the Nuclear Brink: Eisenhower, Dulles, and the Quemoy-Matsu Crisis,” International Security 12 (Spring 1988), 96–123. Document 1406, Eisenhower to Dulles, April 26, 1955, Series: EM, AWF, International Series: Formosa (China), Th e Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, vol. 16: The Presidency: The Middle Way, Part VII, January 1955 to May 1955, chap. 15, available from http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/fi rst-term / documents/1406.cfm (accessed May 3, 2009). Ronald W. Pruessen, “John Foster Dulles and the Predicaments of Power,” in Richard Immermann, ed., John Foster Dulles and the Diplomacy of the Cold War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 27. Document 1406, Eisenhower to Dulles, April 26, 1955, http://www.eisenhower memorial.org/presidential-papers/fi rst-term/documents/1406.cfm, (accessed May 3, 2009). Shu Guang Zhang, “Constructing ‘Peaceful Coexistence’: China’s Diplomacy toward the Geneva and Bandung Conferences, 1954–55,” Cold War History 7 (November 2007), 520. Gordon Chang in his book condemned Ike for a policy that he insisted, had it been carried out, would definitely have led to war with China. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972 (Stanford: Stan-

Notes to Pages 87–92 | 215

ford University Press, 1990), 135–37, 139–41. In a subsequent article based on new documents, he admits that he exaggerated the threat. Chang and He, “Absence of War,” 1520n55.

6. DIPLOMATIC COMPLEXITIES 1. Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949– 1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1984), 69. 2. Ambassador Karl Rankin considered it a “disastrous and defeatist” British scheme. Rankin to McConaughy, August 22, 1956 (quote from September 3, 1954), Rankin Papers, Box 29 fi le: “China, Republic of,” Mudd. 3. Dean Rusk, As I Saw It: A Secretary of State ’s Memoirs (New York: Penguin, 1990), 285. 4. FO371/110235, Eden to Foreign Office, October 20, 1954, PRO. 5. Kusnitz, Public Opinion, 72. 6. Memcon, Dulles with Yeh and Koo, February 10, 1955, Box 195, Koo Papers, Columbia. 7. Report of the Secretary to the NSC, October 28, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 810. 8. Warren I. Cohen, Dean Rusk (Totowa, N.J.: Cooper Square, 1980), 85; Gary W. Reichard, “Divisions and Dissent: Democrats and Foreign Policy, 1952–1956,” Political Science Quarterly 93 (Spring 1978), 53, 61; Francis O. Wilcox Oral History, 146–48, Association of Former Members of Congress, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. 9. Despatch 268, Rankin, Taipei, November 1952, RG 84, NA. 10. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Strait Talk (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009), discusses the problem of mistrust at length. 11. 793.00/1–3053, Rankin, Taipei, January 30, 1954, RG 59, NA; David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith: U.S. Policy against the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1949–1955 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), 128. 12. Rankin to McConaughy, November 17, 1954, Rankin Papers, fi le: “China, Republic of,” Mudd. 13. United States, Consulate General, Hong Kong, Survey of China Mainland Press (SCMP) 935, November 25, 1954, 7. 14. Jia Qingguo, “Searching for Peaceful Coexistence and Territorial Integrity,” in Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds., Sino-American Relations, 1945–1955: A Joint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1989), 280. Zhou Enlai later explained to Henry Kissinger that shelling of the offshore islands was meant to advise Chiang not to withdraw in order to maintain an existing relationship with the mainland. Richard Solomon, “Chinese Political Negotiating Behavior, 1967–1984,” report R-3299, (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, December 1985), 11. 15. Memo by Dulles, September 12, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 611.

216 | Notes to Pages 93–95

16. 793.00/2–655 447, Lodge, USUN, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 232–33; Kenneth T. Young, Negotiating with the Chinese Communists: The United States Experience, 1953 – 1967 (New York: McGraw Hill, 1968), 43. 17. Xue Mouhong et al., eds., Dangdai Zhongguo Waijiao [Contemporary China’s diplomacy] (Beijing: Zhongguo Shehui Kexue Chubanshe, 1990), 81–94. The Pancha Shila were included in a Sino-Indian agreement in 1954: mutual respect for territory integrity and sovereignty, nonaggression, noninterference in internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence. 18. Gordon Chang and He Di, “The Absence of War in the U.S.-China Confrontation over Quemoy and Matsu in 1954–1955: Contingency, Luck, Deterrence?,” American Historical Review 98 (December 1993), 1520. On the other hand, Jia Qingguo speaks of a secret meeting at Bandung in which Zhou declared that “China cannot claim it is an independent country,” until it reclaimed Taiwan. Jia, “Searching for Peaceful Coexistence and Territorial Integrity,” 268. 19. Jason Parker, “Cold War II: The Eisenhower Administration, the Bandung Conference, and the Reperiodization of the Postwar Era,” Diplomatic History 30 (November 2006), 871. 20. NIE 100–57, “Sino-Soviet Foreign Economic Policies and Their Probable Effects in Underdeveloped Areas,” March 26, 1957, DDRS (1990), fiche 55, 632. 21. NIE 13–57, “Communist China through 1961,” March 19, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 503–4. 22. Minutes of a Meeting, January 9, 1955, U.S. Department of State. FRUS, 1955– 1957, vol. 21: East Asian Security; Laos, Cambodia (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1990), 14; Cary Fraser, “An American Dilemma: Race and Realpolitik in the American Response to the Bandung Conference, 1955,” in Brenda Gayle Plummer, ed., Window on Freedom: Race, Civil Rights, and Foreign Affairs, 1945–1988 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2003), 118–22. 23. Memo, K. T. Young (PSA) to Robertson, Sebald, and Baldwin, January 4, 1955, Lot 56D679, Box 1, fi le: Afro-Asian Conference, January 1955, RG 59, NA; Memo, Max W. Bishop to Hoover, January 6, 1955, in ibid.; Draft Circular 340, January 7, 1955, in ibid. 24. Memcon, Dulles with Makins, April 7, 1955. FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 21, 80. 25. Wang Tao, “Isolating the Enemy—The Bandung Conference and Sino-American Relations,” paper prepared for national conference of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, Washington D.C., 2009. 26. Parker, “Cold War II,” 874. 27. Robertson congressional testimony, January 26, 1954, U.S. Congress, House, Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Hearings, Department of State Appropriations, 83rd Cong., 2d sess., 1954, 125; AA(WG)D-7, “Afro-Asian Conference Propaganda,” prepared by Busick (USIA), February 10, 1955, Lot 56D679, Box 1, fi le: Afro-Asian Conference, RG 59, NA. 28. U. Alexis. Johnson, The Right Hand of Power (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: PrenticeHall, 1984), 236–37.

Notes to Pages 95–97 | 217

29. Memo from Sebald to Dulles, April 25, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 508. 30. 611.93/9–1255 163, Hoover, Acting Secretary, to all posts, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 6; Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), 254; 611.93/2–956, McConaughy to Robertson, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 16; Rankin to McConaughy, August 3, 1956, Rankin Papers, Box 29, fi le: “China, Republic of,” Mudd. 31. Draft letter, Dulles to Zhou, May 24, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 571–72. 32. Young, Negotiating, 45; Robertson to Marvin Liebman, May 25, 1955, Box 22: Committee of One Million—Correspondence, Emmet Papers, Hoover; Frederick McKee to Dulles, April 16, 1955, William Knowland Papers, Box 274: McKee, 1953–1955, Bancroft Manuscript Library, University of California, Berkeley (hereafter Bancroft); Robert Accinelli, “Eisenhower, Congress, and the 1954–55 Offshore Island Crisis,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 20 (Spring 1990), 342–44; George Gallup, The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935–71 (New York: Random House, 1972), 1329 (May 1, 1955). Seventy four percent favored the proposition, 16 percent opposed, it and 10 percent had no opinion. 33. 1805 Makins, Washington, August 3, 1955, FO 371/115009 (FC 10345/50), PRO. 34. Walter George wanted to go further and see a foreign ministers meeting. Meet the Press transcript, NBC Television, July 24, 1955, FO 371/115009 (FC 10346/44), PRO. Memcon, Dulles with Congressman Richards (D-SC), chairman, HFAC, August 2, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 10–11; Makins, Washington, August 7, 1955, FO371/115009 (FC 1034/57), PRO. 35. Joy to Crowe, August 26, 1955, FO 371/115010 (FC 10345/73), PRO. 36. McConaughy to Johnson, August 8, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 2. 37. Dulles to Robertson with copies to Hoover, MacArthur, Murphy, and Phleger, July 5, 1955, Dulles Papers, Subject Series, Box 10, file: Wang-Johnson Talks (55)(4), Mudd. 38. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 98. 39. 793.00/2–455 1241, Bohlen, Moscow, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 217n2; 793.00/5–1755, Memcon, Dulles with Molotov, May 14, 1955, ibid., 563. 40. Dulles suggested that Johnson “intimate” that once all American prisoners were released, civilian as well as military, barriers against American travel to China would likely be dropped and their reports might paint a more favorable picture of China in the United States. 611.93/8–1655 526, Dulles to Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 4. Wang made clear the Chinese desire for visitors— for example, proposing an exchange of a Chinese opera company for a troupe performing Porgy and Bess. 611.93/8–2355 585, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 4. 41. Johnson to McConaughy, November 1, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 10. 42. Steven M. Goldstein, “Dialogue of the Deaf? The Sino-American Ambassadorial Level Talks, 1955–1970,” in Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 209

218 | Notes to Pages 97–98

43. There is reason to believe they may have anticipated relaxation of the trade embargo as a quid pro quo for the prisoner release. Johnson, Geneva, August 2, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 3; Zhang Baijia and Jia Qingguo, “Steering Wheel, Shock Absorber, and Diplomatic Probe in Confrontation: Sino-American Ambassadorial Talks Seen from the Chinese Prespective,” in Ross and Jiang, Re-Examining the Cold War, 183. 44. Wang Bingnan, Zhong Mei Huitian Jiunian Huigu [Nine years of Sino-U.S. talks in retrospect], JPRS-CPS-85–079, August 7, 1985 (Beijing: Shijie Zhishi Chubanshe, 1985), 19–23; Interview with Wang Bingnan, Beijing, September, 1988. 45. Robertson and Wang actually knew one another from the Marshall Mission negotiations in the 1940s. Beam, Multiple Exposure, 126. McConaughy indicated skepticism in Washington: “I believe there is a tendency here to read less significance into his conciliatory approach. . . . The semblance of reasonableness and willingness to go part way may be recognizable, but when his draft agreement is taken apart there is really nothing in the way of tangible concession at all.” McConaughy to Johnson, August 12, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 31n2. 46. 611.93/8–2955 642, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 5. 47. Memcon, Dulles and Congressman James P. Richards, August 2, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 10–11; Young, Negotiating, 54. 48. Johnson anticipated Chinese fury if the United States did not follow an agreement on repatriation with constructive dialogue about other issues. Johnson to McConaughy, September 7, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 5. McConaughy suggested keeping Wang so busy discussing implementation of repatriation that there would be no opportunity to raise other agenda items. McConaughy to Johnson, September 9, 1955, in ibid. At the fi rst post-agreement session of the talks, Wang proposed discussion of the trade embargo and a foreign ministers meeting. 611.93/9–1455 726, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 6. 49. Goldstein, “Dialogue of the Deaf,” 211–13. 50. Zhou Enlai, “The Present International Situation and China’s Foreign Policy,” delivered July 30, 1955, printed in People ’s China, August 16, 1955, 7. According to the Chinese ambassador in Berlin, China would not use force if the United States recognized China’s peaceful claim to Formosa. 611.93/8–255 249, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 2. Wang Bingnan also remarked upon China’s willingness to settle the Taiwan issue by peaceful means. 611.93/12–155 1235, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 11. Skepticism was apparent in 611.93/8–555 384, Dulles to Johnson, and 611.93/8–655 399, Dulles to Johnson, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 2. 51. 1240, Johnson, Geneva, December 1, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 193n4; 611.93/ 11–2955 1329, Dulles/McConaughy to Johnson, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 11; Goldstein, “Dialogue of the Deaf,” 213. 52. Th is included Chiang Ching-kuo’s former secretary Cao Juren and Chiang Kaishek’s personal representative Song Yishan, who had been a personnel chief of the KMT’s Organization Department. Qing Simei, From Allies to Enemies: Visions of

Notes to Pages 98–104 | 219

53. 54. 55. 56. 57.

58.

59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65.

66.

67.

Modernity, Identity, and U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1945–1960 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007), 283. Lorenz M. Lüthi, The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 48. 611.93/1–1956 1398, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 14. Townsend Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles (Boston: Little, Brown, 1973), 311 Tucker, China Confidential, 99. McConaughy to Johnson, Geneva, August 26, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 5; Rosemary Foot, “The Search for a Modus Vivendi: Anglo-American Relations and China Policy in the Eisenhower Era,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The Great Powers in East Asia, 1953–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 149; Robert Boardman, Britain and the People’s Republic of China, 1949–1974 (London: Macmillan, 1976), 127–29. The Chinese were quite open about this, seeing the early release of prisoners as a political favor. 611.93/8–2955 642, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 70–71. On speculation over the determination to keep talks going, see 611.93/10–2155 924, Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 9; Johnson to McConaughy, December 22, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 12. Zhang and Jia, “Steering Wheel, Shock Absorber,” 186. Zhang Baijia, “The Changing International Scene and Chinese Policy toward the United States, 1954-1970,” in Ross and Jiang, Re-Examining the Cold War, 52. Rosemary Foot, “The Eisenhower Administration’s Fear of Empowering the Chinese,” Political Science Quarterly 111 (Autumn 1996), 509-510. Tucker, China Confidential, 99–100. For example, see James Shepley, “How Dulles Averted War,” Life, January 16, 1956, 70–72. Roger Dingman, “Alliance in Crisis: The Lucky Dragon Incident and JapaneseAmerican Relations,” in Cohen and Iriye, eds., Great Powers, 187–214. Chinese scholar Wang Tao argues in his manuscript “Isolating the Enemy” that the key to China’s decision to move forward in January 1955 was Moscow’s offer to provide the requisite resources. PhD dissertation in progress, Georgetown University, Washington D.C.. John Wilson Lewis and Xue Litai, China Builds the Bomb (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 16–18, 36–40; Zhang Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1992), 220–22. McGeorge Bundy, Danger and Survival: Choices about the Bomb in the First Fifty Years (New York: Vintage, 1990), 529.

7. IN MOSCOW’S SHADOW 1. NSC 166/1 “U.S. Policy toward Communist China,” November 6, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 280.

220 | Notes to Pages 105–107

2. NSC 166/1, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. XIV, pt. 1, 296–97. 3. U.S. Delegation Memorandum of Fourth Tripartite Heads of Government Meeting, Bermuda, December 7, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 710–12. 4. Allen, New Delhi, to McConaughy, July 16, 1953, CA Records, Box 38, fi le: 112.1 W. P. McConaughy, RG 59, NA; Rankin to Allen, July 29, 1953, Rankin Papers, Box 20, fi le: Allen, George V. 1953, Mudd; David Allan Mayers, Cracking the Monolith: U.S. Policy against the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1949–1955 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), 130; Makins, Washington, January 16, 1954, FO371/110222 (FC 10345/3), PRO; M. G. L. Joy, Washington, January 25, 1954, FO371/110222 (FC 10345/5), PRO. 5. Foreign Documents Division and the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, “Propaganda Evidence Concerning Sino-Soviet Relations,” April 30, 1952, and Philip Bridgham, Arthur Cohen, and Leonard Jaffe, “Chinese and Soviet Views on Mao as a Marxist Theorist and on the Significance of the Chinese Revolution for the Asian Revolutionary Movement,” September 6, 1953, discussed in Harold P. Ford, “Calling the Sino-Soviet Split: The CIA and Double Demonology.” Studies in Intelligence (Winter 1998–1999): 57–71, online at https://www.cia.gov/library /center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/winter 98_99/art05.html (accessed October 21, 2011). 6. Ford, “Calling the Sino-Soviet Split,” 58. 7. Mayers, Cracking the Monolith, 132, 138. 8. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 67. 9. Rosemary Foot, The Practice of Power: U.S. Relations with China since 1949 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), 123. 10. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953–56 (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1963), 471. 11. Allen S. Whiting, “Dynamics of the Moscow-Peking Axis,” Annals of the Academy of Political and Social Science (January 1959), 101. 12. Shen Zhihua and Li Danhui, “After Leaning to One Side: China and Its Allies in the Cold War.” Manuscript in author’s possession. 13. William Taubman, Khrushchev (New York: W. W. Norton, 2003), 337. 14. FE-158, “Joint Sino-Soviet Agreements of October 12,” October 25,1954, found in British records, FO371/110221 (FC 10338/47) PRO; 661.93/10–1354, Memo, Edwin W. Martin (CA) to Drumright (FE), Box 2949, RG 59, NA. The British independently saw indications that Moscow did not want to be drawn into the Taiwan imbroglio. Minutes by A. E. Donald, September 14, 1954, and Crowe, September 11, 1954, in FO371/110258 (FC 1094/25 and FC 1094/29, respectively), PRO. On Soviet contributions, see Steven I. Levine, “Breakthrough to the East: Soviet Asian Policy in the 1950s,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The Great Powers in East Asia, 1953–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 308. 15. On the Soviet reluctance to commit to support Chinese intervention, see Sergei N. Goncharov, John W. Lewis, and Xue Litai, Uncertain Partners: Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993), 190–92. Hao Yufan and

Notes to Pages 107–108 | 221

16. 17.

18.

19.

20. 21. 22. 23.

24.

Zhai Zhihai, “China’s Decision to Enter the Korean War: History Revisited,” China Quarterly 121 (March 1990), 111–12. Jia Qingguo states that China expended some $10 billion in the war effort and received only $1.43 billion from Moscow. Jia, “Searching for Peaceful Coexistence and Territorial Integrity,” in Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds., Sino-American Relations, 1945–1955: A Joint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1989), 268. R. Craig Nation, Black Earth, Red Star (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1992), 208–9. Mao Zedong, “Talks at the Chengtu Conference,” March 10, 1958, in Stuart Schram, ed., Chairman Mao Talks to the People; Talks and Letters: 1956–1971 (New York: Pantheon, 1974), 98–99; Record of Conversation, Mao Zedong with Soviet Ambassador P. F. Yudin, March 31, 1956, P. F. Yudin Journal, CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 164–67; Memcon, Mao Zedong with Yugoslavian Communist Delegation, Beijing, September 1956, Mao Zedong waijiao wenxuan [Selected diplomatic papers of Mao Zedong] (Beijing: Central Press of Historical Documents, 1993), 251–62, translated in ibid., 148–51. 661.93/3–2553, Memo, A. S. Chase (DRF) to Harald W. Jacobson (DRF), March 20, 1953, Box 2949, RG 59, NA; Memo, J. L. Barnard to Paul Nitze (S/P), “Vulnerabilities of the Sino-Soviet Entente,” April 3, 1953, Records of the U.S. Presidential Committee on International Information Activities (Jackson Committee) Records, Box 13: Misc. File, Material M-P (2), DDEL; 661.93/4–153, Despatch 1988, John M. Steeves, Tokyo, Box 2949, RG 59, NA. Regarding Asian speculation on Stalin’s death, see 661.93/4–153, Despatch 1988, John M. Steeves, Tokyo, Box 2949, RG 59, NA. For the Khrushchev speech, see “On Historical Experience Concerning the Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” Renmin ribao, April 5, 1956; Donald Zagoria, The SinoSoviet Conflict, 1956–1961 (New York: Atheneum, 1966), 45–46. Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War: From Stalin to Khrushchev (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996), 229–30. Lorenz M. Lüthi, The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 54–70. John Gaddis, We Now Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 213. Nie Rongzhen, Nie Rongzhen Huiyilu [The memoirs of Nie Rong zhen] (Beijing: People’s Liberation Army Press, 1986), 800–4; John Wilson Lewis and Xue Litai, China Builds the Bomb (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 60–63. Americans guessed at the time that Beijing would use its position on Communist solidarity to wrest economic aid from Moscow. William O. Anderson, Berlin, to Clough, November 26, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 6, fi le: 350.1 Communism, RG 59, NA. Staff Notes 125, June 5, 1957, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Box 25, fi le: June 1957 Diary—Staff memos, DDEL; 301st NSC Meeting, October 26, 1956, DDEL; Zagoria, Sino-Soviet Conflict, 54–65. A story retailed to journalist Joseph Harsch suggested that the Chinese had hoped that Nehru, during his December 1956 trip

222 | Notes to Pages 108–110

25.

26.

27.

28. 29.

30.

31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36.

37.

to Washington, could fashion a deal with the United States to reduce Chinese dependency on the USSR by promising trade and a UN seat. Only after that effort failed did the Chinese publicly support the intervention in Hungary. “ChineseSoviet Relations,” February 1957, FO 371/127287 (FC 10338/10), PRO. Whiting, “Dynamics,”105. Polish Communist liberals had hoped that China would support them against the Soviets, and although disappointed by Beijing’s avowal of solidarity with Moscow in December 1956, they welcomed the Hundred Flowers Movement, still hoping it foreshadowed the possibility of a WarsawBeijing axis to curtail Soviet domination. Lutkins to Drumright, May 7, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 7, fi le: 362 Chinese Communist Government, May–August, RG 59, NA; G. F. Hudson, “New Phase of Mao’s Revolution,” Problems of Communism 7 (November–December 1958), 14. Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 1994), 420–27; William Taubman, Khrushchev: The Man and His Era (New York: W. W. Norton, 2003), 270–86. Mayers, Cracking the Monolith, 115–16; Foot, Practice of Power, 122. Americans were surprised to discover that the Chinese had to buy weapons from the Soviets and saw it as a propaganda opportunity. 661.93/3–453 2311, Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 2949, RG 59, NA. 793.00/1–1254, Despatch 1250, Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 4207, RG 59, NA; Mayers, Cracking the Monolith, 144. David Wolff, “‘One Finger’s Worth of Historical Events’: New Russian and Chinese Evidence on the Sino -Soviet Alliance and Split, 1948–1959,” Cold War International History Project Working Papers, 30, August 2000, 9. Nikita S. Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers (Boston: Little Brown, 1970), 461, 466; William Taubman, “Khrushchev vs. Mao,” CWIHP Bulletin 8–9 (Winter 1996–97), 243. Taubman, “Khrushchev vs. Mao,” 243. Robert G. Sutter, China-Watch (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), 34–35, 38–42. Lüthi, Sino-Soviet Split, 64. Odd Arne Westad, The Global Cold War (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 161–63. Zagoria, Sino-Soviet Conflict, 159 and 152–65. Constantine Pleshakov, “Nikita Khrushchev and Sino-Soviet Relations,” in Odd Arne Westad, ed., Brothers in Arms: The Rise and Fall of the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1945–1963. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 19980, 233; Lüthi, Sino-Soviet Split, 96. But Sergey Radchenko argues that Mao had no choice but peaceful coexistence since he did not want war or reconciliation. H-Diplo Roundtable Reviews, vol. 9, no. 25 (2008), 16, available from http://www.h-net.org/~diplo/roundtables/PDF /Roundtable-IX-25.pdf (accessed July 26, 2009). Shen Zhihua and Li Danhui, After Leaning to One Side: China and Its Allies in the Cold War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011), 148–150, 152–155.

Notes to Pages 110–112 | 223

38. Taubman, “Khrushchev vs. Mao,” 245. 39. Michael R. Beschloss, Mayday: The U-2 Affair (New York: Harper & Row, 1986), 149. 40. Memo, Bacon to McConaughy, May 20, 1953, CA Records, Box 40, fi le: 312.2 Chinese representation at UN, RG 59, NA; Bacon to Drumright, April 6, 1954 (quotes from 611.61/4–254 571 of April 2), FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 726. 41. The Far Eastern bureau’s UN adviser, on the other hand, called Chinese efforts to enter “half-hearted,” suggesting that recognition of Ho Chi Minh just as the French were about to support giving the seat to China indicated a lack of interest in joining. Of course, this ignores lots of other contributing factors. “UN Aspects of the Problem of Chinese Representation in the Event of an Armistice,” Memo, Bacon (FE) to McConaughy (CA) May 26, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 647. 42. Foot, Practice of Power, 24–27, 30–31. 43. Stanley D. Bachrack, The Committee of One Million (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 51–58, 72, 81; 310.2/5–2553, Memo by Bacon, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 652. 44. Matthew Woll to Hubert Humphrey, January 28, 1954, Humphrey Papers, 23 L10 5B, Box 106, fi le: Foreign Policy: China, MHS; Matthew Woll, “Why Communist China Should Not Be Admitted to the United Nations,” Free Trade Union News, September 1954, Eisenhower Papers, Central Files, Official File, Box 332, fi le: 85-DD Admission of CC into UN, Ike; Speech by George Meany, AFL to American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 22, 1955, Freda Utley Papers, Box 3, fi le: American China Policy Association, Hoover; “Answering Prime Minister U Nu’s Statements of July 6, 1955 at a United Nations News Conference,” July 7, 1955, Emmet Papers, Box 23, fi le: Committee—Press Releases, Hoover. 45. Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949– 1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1984), 68–69. There were also activists in favor of seating China in the UN, for example, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Letter, Mrs. Alexander Stewart to Humphrey, July 30, 1954, 23L 10 5B, Box 106, fi le: Foreign Policy: China, MHS. 46. “American Press Opinion, May 1–15, 1957,” Chinese News Service, Freda Utley Papers, Box 74, fi le: Taiwan 74–3, Hoover. 47. De la Mare to Dalton, March 21, 1957, FO 371/127289 (FC 10345/18), PRO. 48. Humphrey to Glenn Arter, Michigan, April 12, 1957, Humphrey Papers, 23 K3 6F Box 137, MHS. 49. Special Legislative Conference, June 2, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 654. 50. Roscoe Drummond and Gaston Coblentz in Duel at the Brink: John Foster Dulles ’ Command of American Power (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1960), 29, argued that Eisenhower was privately flexible on China before 1954 but thereafter he became “intensely emotional” on the subject and “the British found it impossible to reason with him calmly,” whereas Dulles was fi rm but dispassionate and evinced understanding of British views. 51. Memo, Bacon (FE) to Johnson (FE), May 15, 1953, CA Records, Box 40, fi le: 312.2 ChiRep at UN, RG 59, NA.

224 | Notes to Pages 113–114

52. Dulles to Luce, April 24, 1950, fi le: Luce, Henry, Papers of John Foster Dulles, Mudd. 53. Memcon, Dulles with Eden et al., July 2, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 734; William P. Snyder, “Dean Rusk to John Foster Dulles, May–June 1953: The Office, the First 100 Days, and Red China,” Diplomatic History 7 (Winter 1983), 85–86. 54. Wang Jisi, “The Origins of America’s ‘Two China’ Policy,” in Harding and Yuan, eds., Sino-American Relations, 205. 55. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 148–49. 56. Bechhoefer, “Chinese Representation in the United Nations,” July 8, 1953, Box 40, fi le: 312.2: Chinese Representation at the UN, RG 59, NA. Dulles explained this point to reporters on November 9, 1953, Dulles Papers, Press Conference 20, Box 68, fi le: “China, People’s Republic of,” Mudd. 57. 795.00/6–953 786, Lodge, USUN, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 661–62; 310.2/6–1153, Lodge to Dulles, in ibid., 667, and reply, 310.2/6–1153, Dulles to Lodge, June 19, 1953, in ibid., 679–80; Telcon, June 10, 1953, Koo Papers, Box 187, Columbia. 58. 310.2/8–2453 96, Rankin, Taipei, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 686–89; Rankin to Robert Aura Smith, Editorial Council, New York Times, November 24, 1953, Rankin Papers, Box 20, file: “China, People’s Republic of,” Mudd; Karl Lott Rankin, China Assignment (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), 185. 59. 310.2/8–3054, Cowles to O’Connor, transmitting “Communist China in the United Nations,” FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 767–72. 60. NSC 48/5, “United States Objectives, Policies and Courses of Action in Asia,” May 17, 1951, U.S. Department of State, FRUS 1951, vol. 6, pt. 1: Asia and the Pacific (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1977), 33; NSC 166/1, “U.S. Policy towards Communist China,” November 6, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 282; NSC 146/2, “United States Objectives and Courses of Action with Respect to Formosa and the Chinese National Government,” November 6, 1953, in ibid., 317. 61. CAB 129/62, c.(53)247, Memorandum by the Lord President of the Council, Cabinet Minutes, September 4, 1953, PRO. 62. T. Clifton Webb, New Zealand Commissioner of External Affairs, Acting High Commissioner to Secretary of State for External Affairs, 36 and 37, July 8, 1954, Record Group 25/86–87/160, Box 118, fi le: 10464-A-40, pt. 3, External Affairs Department Records, National Archives of Canada, Ottawa (hereafter Canada); 310.2/7–1454 10, Scotten, Wellington, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 741. 63. 310.2/3–254, Memo, Lodge, USUN, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 719–20; Judd to Hammarskjöld, March 3, 1954, Papers of Walter Judd, Box 172, MHS. 64. 310.2/9–353 154, Wadsworth, USUN, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 698; Memcon, Wellington Koo with Robert D. Murphy, September 9, 1953, Koo Papers, Box 187, Columbia. 65. CAB 128/26 Pt. II, c.c.(53)51, 1953, Cabinet Minutes, PRO. Churchill to Eisenhower, July 8, 1954, Anthony Eden Papers, FO 800/786, PRO. Canadians believed that China’s exclusion was “not consistent with the contemporary facts of life” but

Notes to Pages 114–116 | 225

66.

67.

68.

69. 70.

71. 72. 73.

74.

75.

76.

that nothing could be done till the United States changed its mind. R. A. MacKay to the Minister, July 14, 1954, Record Group 25/86–87/160, Box 118, fi le: 10464-A40, pt. 3, Canada. 1532 Makins, Washington to London, July 2, 1955, FO 371/115054 (FC 1041/94), and 1572 Makins, Washington to London, FO 371/115054 (FC 1041/954), PRO. U. Alexis Johnson called Menon an “international meddler” both vain and “truly sinister.” Johnson, The Right Hand of Power (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: PrenticeHall, 1984), 222, 241. U Nu of Burma also tried to play intermediary. 611.93/8–455 368, State to Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 2. 793.02/7–654, Memcon, M. G. L. Joy, British Embassy, with H. B. Day (PSA), Box 4217, RG 59, NA; 6181, Eden to Nutting, December 14, 1954, FO 371/ 110241 (FC 1042/252), PRO. Michael Dockrill, “Britain and the First Chinese Off-Shore Islands Crisis, 1954– 55,” in Michael Dockrill and John W. Young, eds., British Foreign Policy, 1945–1956 (London: Macmillan, 1989), 173–96 (quotes on 175 and 190). Koo Diary, January 22, 1955, Box 220, Koo Papers; Crowe Minutes, August 20, 1954, FO 371/110257 (FC 1094/21), PRO. Eisenhower to Churchill, February 10, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 9, fi le: DDE Diary February 1955 (2), Ike; FO 800/787, 697, Churchill to Eisenhower, February 15, 1955, Eden Papers, PRO. Memcon, Dulles with Eden et al., July 2, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 734. Transcript, Press and Radio News Conference, 8, July 8, 1954, Dulles Papers, Box 79, fi le: “China, People’s Republic of,” Mudd. “China’s Veto of Outer Mongolia for United Nations Membership,” drafted by Embassy Taipei, December 23, 1955, Rankin Papers, Box 26, fi le: Chiang Kaishek, Madame, Mudd. John Garver, “China’s Wartime Diplomacy,” in James C. Hsiung and Steven I. Levine, eds., China ’s Bitter Victory: The War with Japan, 1937–1945 (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1992), 26–27; Letter, Chiang Kai-shek to Eisenhower, November 26, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 9, fi le: Formosa (China) 1952–1954 (4), Ike; Memcon, Robertson and Bacon with Koo, November 17, 1955, Lot 60D648, Box 1, fi le: 4P Inner and Outer Mongolia, RG 59, NA; Memo, Osborn to McConaughy, November 19, 1955, in ibid. Taipei was angered when USIA made U.S.-Taiwan contention public by calling Taipei’s proposed act suicidal. “China’s Veto of Outer Mongolia for United Nations Membership.” The Nationalist foreign minister, however, argued the new members would dilute support in the UN, with only Spain of the eighteen proposed free and Communist countries offering a reliable vote. Rankin, Taipei, November 28, 1955, Rankin Papers, Box 26, fi le: Chiang Kai-shek, Madame, Mudd. Eisenhower to Chiang, November 22, 1955, John F. Kennedy Papers, President’s Office Files, Box 113a, fi le: China Security 1961, JFKL. 305, Dulles to Rankin, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman Files, Dulles-Herter Series, Box 5, fi le: Dulles, November 1955 (1), Ike; 317, Eisenhower to Chiang, November 28, 1955, in ibid.

226 | Notes to Pages 116–118

77. Memo, Bacon to Robertson, December 6, 1955, Lot 56D679, Box 11, fi le: United Nations, RG 59, NA. 78. Christina Klein, Cold War Orientalism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 137. 79. Drumright to McConaughy, June 22, 1956, Lot 60D648, Box 2, fi le: 030.2a Invitations to American Correspondents to Visit Mainland China, RG 59, NA. 80. Murphy to Sebald, August 6, 1956, Lot 60D648, Box 2, fi le: 030.2a Invitations to American Correspondents to Visit Mainland China, RG 59, NA. 81. Kenneth T. Young, Negotiating with the Chinese Communists: The United States Experience, 1953 –1967 (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968), 116. 82. McConaughy to Johnson, September 30, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 7. 83. De la Mare to Crowe, August 9, 1956, FO 371/120896 (FC 10345/97), PRO; de la Mare to Dalton, April 15, 1957, FO 371/127412 (FC 1671/15), PRO, refers to a Washington Post editorial of April 8, 1957. 84. AP news clipping, August 20, 1956, Lot 60D648, Box 2, fi le: 030.2a Invitations to American Correspondents to Visit Mainland China, RG 59, NA. 85. John Hightower, Associated Press, to Carl McCardle, Dulles’s press secretary, August 14, 1956, Lot 60D648, Box 2, fi le: 030.2a; de la Mare to Crowe, August 21, 1956, FO 371/120896 (FC 10345/102), PRO. 86. David Caute, The Great Fear: The Anti-Communist Purge under Truman and Eisenhower (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1978), 251; R. A. Aylward (CA) to McConaughy (CA), March 5, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 2, file: 030 William Worthy Trip, RG 59, NA. British comment on the issue appears in FO 371/127264 (FC1013), PRO; “3 Newsmen in Red China Face Action,” Washington Post and Times-Herald (1954–1959), December 29, 1956, A2, ProQuest Historical Newspapers; Stephen J. Whitfield, The Culture of the Cold War (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), 160–61. 87. Sebald to Acting Secretary, August 17, 1956, Lot 60D648, Box 2, fi le: 030.2a Invitations to American Correspondents to Visit Mainland China, RG 59, NA. Lawrence’s views were generally quite conservative. 88. 611.93/8–1655 526, Dulles to Johnson, Geneva, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 4. 89. McConaughy to Robertson, April 10, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 3, fi le: 220.2 Passport Policy for Visits to CC, January–July, RG 59, NA; Youde to Mayall, February 13, 1957, FO 71/127412 (FC 1671/9), PRO. 90. Within the State Department, the September 19, 1957, remarks by Lu Dingyi, director of the Propaganda Department of the CCP Central Committee, asserting that “journalism is a tool for class struggle,” was circulated. Clough to Robertson, September 26, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 7, fi le: 350.1a Chinese Communism, July–September, RG 59, NA. 91. Allen W. Dulles to Shepard Stone, Ford Foundation, November 9, 1958, Allen W. Dulles Papers, Box 76, fi le: “Re China, People’s Republic of, 1958,” Mudd. 92. Young, Negotiating, 116–29. For many who opposed the journalist exchange, this had been the sticking point. Senator Styles Bridges (R-NH) to Dulles, September 24, 1957, Dulles Papers, Box 114, fi le: Bridges, Styles 1957, Mudd.

Notes to Pages 118–123 | 227

93. Zhang Baijia and Jia Qingguo, “Steering Wheel, Shock Absorber, and Diplomatic Probe in Confrontation: Sino-American Ambassadorial Talks Seen from the Chinese Prespective,” in Ross and Jiang, Re-Examining the Cold War, 187. 94. “A Clumsy Deception,” People’s Daily, August 26, 1957, Lot 60D648, Box 3, fi le: 220.2 Passport Policy for Visits to CC, August–December, RG 59, NA; Young, Negotiating, 130. 95. Memo, Roberston to Herter, 8/1/58, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 36–37. 96. Tucker, China Confidential, 149.

8. “THE PERILS OF SOYA SAUCE” 1. Yoko Yasuhara, “Japan, Communist China, and Export Controls in Asia, 1948– 52,” Diplomatic History 10 (Winter 1986), 80. 2. The participating countries included the United States, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxemburg. Later adherents included Japan, West Germany, Canada, Portugal, Greece, and Turkey. Cooperative agreements were reached with Sweden, Austria, and Switzerland. Ultimately, they established three categories of restrictions: (1) list IL/I entailed a strict embargo; (2) list IL/II imposed quantitative controls, and (3) IL/III consisted of a watch list of goods that although saleable had to be reported to COCOM. 3. The Hong Kong Consulate General calculated that in 1950 the United States provided 29 percent of China’s total imports, which meant that it was the single largest supplier of the year. As for exports, China sent 36 percent of its goods to the United States and 36.4 percent to the Soviet Union. 493.00/8–1053, Despatch 339, David H. McKillop, Hong Kong, Box 2204, RG 59, NA. 4. Memorandum by President of the Board of Trade, March 2, 1953, CAB 129/59, c.(53)81, PRO; “Report on Economic Defense Policy,” June 29, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy, RG 59, NA. 5. 493.009/7–150, Douglas to Acheson, FRUS 1950, vol. 6, 642; Documents having to do with trade restrictions, U.S. Department of State, FRUS 1951, vol. 7: Korea and China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1983), pt. 2, 1874–2055. 6. CHINCOM included the United States, United Kingdom, France, Canada, and Japan. All the members of COCOM served provisionally. On the struggle to establish CHINCOM, see Yoko Yasuhara, “Japan, Communist China, and Export Controls in Asia, 1948–52,” Diplomatic History 10 (Winter 1986), 85–87. On the bilateral agreement, see 400.949/9–1952 321, circular from Acheson, Box 1791, RG 59, NA; and NSC 104/2, 6th progress report, January 19, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 1: General and Political Matters (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1983), pt. 2, 918–19. See also Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, “American Policy toward SinoJapanese Trade in the Postwar Years: Politics and Prosperity,” Diplomatic History (Summer 1984), 183–208. The CHINCOM list included some 200 items not

228 | Notes to Pages 123–124

7.

8. 9. 10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15. 16.

restricted for the European Soviet bloc and another 89 embargoed for China but simply watched in European trade. “Multilateral Trade Controls against Communist China: U.S. Position and Statement in Support,” December 30, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy, RG 59, NA. 139 NSC Meeting, April 8, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 2, 1406–8; 532, Sir Roger Makins, Washington, Secretary of State for Prime Minister, March 9, 1953, Eden Papers, FO 800/783, PRO. Robert Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), March 30, 1956, 325. “Significance for Free Trade of Communist Conquests in Asia,” Speech to World Trade Luncheon, May 19, 1954, Walter Judd Papers, Box 210: Speeches, MHS. OIR 6335, October 5, 1953, RG 59, NA; 169th NSC Meeting, November 5, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 268; 228th NSC Meeting, December 9, 1954, in ibid., pt 2, 1797. Sayuri Shimizu, “Perennial Anxiety: Japan-U.S. Controversy over Recognition of  the PRC, 1952–1958,” Journal of American-East Asian Relations 4 (Fall 1995), 228–32. Decision confi rmed at 188th NSC Meeting, March 11, 1954, and incorporated as a new addition into NSC 152/3, “Economic Defense,” of November 6, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 387–88; 493.949/4–354 2410, Allison, Tokyo, Box 2218, RG 59, NA. And see 187th NSC Meeting, March 4, 1954, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Series, Box 5, Ike; 493.949/4–154 2378, Allison, Tokyo, Box 2218, RG 59, NA; 493.949/4–154 2229, Dulles to Tokyo, in ibid. IR 7445, “Japan’s Expanding Trade with Communist China,” 11, March 21, 1957, State Department Intelligence and Research Reports, NA. Of course, each country seemed to see itself as most disadvantaged. See China Association Bulletin 84, London, May 20, 1953, FO 371/105238 (FC 1106/4), PRO. The British even suspected that American merchants were using the Japanese to front for illicit trade with China. Robert Boardman, Britain and the People ’s Republic of China, 1949–1974 (London: Macmillan, 1976), 100. The Japanese believed that British companies like Jardine Matheson were doing well in China, and the British ambassador concluded that the Japanese prime minister didn’t believe his denials. Moreover, he lamented, Americans thought that London wanted to deflect Chinese trade to China so as to protect British trade in Southeast Asia. William Dening, Embassy, Tokyo to W. D. Allen, London, September 29, 1953, FO 371/105266 (FC 1151/141) PRO. C. T. Crowe to Trevelyan, Peking, November 2, 1953, FO 371/105228 (FC 1072/2), PRO; 493.639/4–154, Despatch 1439, Woodbury Willoughby, Vienna, RG 59, NA. Problems with maintaining controls were reported in NSC 104/2, 6th progress report, January 19, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 1, pt. 2, 915–16; 493.009/6–1553, Hemmendinger (NA) to Young (NA) Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 150th NSC Meeting, June 18, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 204–5; NSC 154/1, “U.S. Tactics

Notes to Pages 124–125 | 229

17.

18.

19.

20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26.

27. 28.

Immediately Following an Armistice in Korea,” July 7, 1953, in ibid., 238–39; 169th NSC Meeting, November 5, 1953, in ibid., 265–77. 460.509/1–2953 793, Dulles to Office of the Special Representative in Europe, ibid., 130–31; 202nd NSC Meeting, June 17, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 1, pt. 2, 1203. European annoyance was aggravated in February 1953 when, without warning, the United States temporarily embargoed shipments of antibiotics to Western Europe to force limits on sales to China. 493.419/3–653, Vernon (EDT) to General Smith (U), Box 2211, RG 59, NA; 411.9331/11–2253, Hope to Drumright, Box 1859, RG 59, NA; Hope to McConaughy, October 12, 1953, and Kalijarvi (E) to Acting Secretary, October 19, 1953, Box 43, fi le: 500.007.1 CHINCOM, CA Records, RG 59, NA. CIA/RR IM-452, Intelligence Memorandum, “The Economic Importance of the Abolition of Multilateral Differential Trade Controls against Communist China,” 2, June 17, 1957, Dulles Papers, Box 114, fi le: “China, People’s Republic of,” Mudd. 493.009/4–2353 937, Roswell H. Whitman, Oslo, and 490.009/5–753, Despatch 980, Whitman, Oslo, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 493.009/4–2353 1113, John O. Bell, Copenhagen, in ibid.; 493.009/4–2453, Despatch 2453, Lloyd A. Free, Rome, in ibid.; FO 371/105254 (FC 1122/3), Minutes on trade with China, May 29–June 30, 1953, PRO; 493.009/5–2153, Despatch 1189, Albert E. Pappano, Ottawa, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 746G.00 (W)/5–853 2941, Joint Weeka 19 from SANA, Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 3599, RG 59, NA; Fred I. Greenstein, The Hidden-Hand Presidency: Eisenhower as Leader (New York: Basic Books, 1982), 167–68; 493.009/3–3053, Byroade (NEA) to Dulles, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 493.009/4–2353 937, Roswell H. Whitman, Oslo, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 493.009/4–2353 1113, John O. Bell, Copenhagen, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 493.009/4–2453, Despatch 2255, Lloyd A. Free, Rome, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 746G.00(W)/5–853, Joint Weeka 19, Harrington, Hong Kong, Box 3599, RG 59, NA. 493.419/9–154, Despatch 649, Dwight E. Scarbrough, London, Box 2211, RG 59, NA. Robertson to Secretary, on NSC-152 Economic Defense Policy, June 2, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 202. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 110. Richard E. Johnson, Hong Kong economic officer, in Tucker, China Confi dential, 109. Bacon to Robertson, August 25, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 3, 764–65. “Giant Panda Barred Here by Red Taint Is Booked in Europe at $2,000 a Week,” New York Times, July 11, 1958, 12. Council on Foreign Economic Policy Staff Study 6 Economic Defense Policy Review, June 1955, U.S. Council on Foreign Economic Policy Records, Reports Series, Box 2: Economy Policy Review (5), Ike. 693.94/6–954, Despatch 1651, Samuel D. Berger, Tokyo, Box 3004, RG 59, NA. Boardman, Britain and the People ’s Republic of China, 108.

230 | Notes to Pages 125–127

29. 124 Shanghai summary, May 16–31, 1957, FO 371/127264 (FC 1015/12), PRO. 30. Memcon, Eisenhower and Dulles with Eden, Lloyd, and Makins, January 31, 1956, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 10: Foreign Aid and Economic Defense Policy (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1989), 309–12. The U.S. government put intense pressure on Indonesia and Ceylon for violating the Battle Act. Memcon, July 9, 1954, Lot 60D171, Box 1, fi le: 543.1010(.1) French Vessels Trading with Communist China and Bunkering Thereof, 1954, RG 59, NA; Memcon, November 1, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 3, fi le: 511.13 Trade with Ceylon, RG 59, NA; Robertson to Acting Secretary, November 4, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: U.S. Trade Policy: Export Control Policy; Administration Actions Program 1955, RG 59, NA. 31. Eisenhower was referring to NSC 104/2, U.S. Policies and Programs in the Economic Field Which May Affect the War Potential of the Soviet Bloc, April 1951. 137th NSC Meeting, March 19, 1953, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Series, Box 4, fi le: 137th Meeting, Ike. 32. 193rd NSC Meeting, April 13, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 409–10. He had made similar statements at the 169th NSC Meeting, November 5, 1953, in ibid., 268. 33. 194th NSC Meeting, April 29, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 1, 1155. 34. Intelligence analysts estimated costs annually reaching $110 million, whereas Robertson told Dulles that the loss to China went as high as $300 million annually, or a reduction of some 24 percent in strategic goods that China could acquire. He also estimated a 3- to 5-month delay in securing goods. W. Park Armstrong to Kalijarvi (E), September 20, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 9, fi le: 500.021 Embargo Effects on Communist China, RG 59, NA; Carl F. Espe, Director of Naval Intelligence, to Deputy Director for Intelligence, The Joint Staff, February 14, 1956, DDRS (1990), fiche 34, no. 409; Robertson to Dulles, September 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 7, fi le: 500.002 General Economic Policy including Trade and Export Control, Je– December 1956, RG 59, NA. 35. James Hagerty Diary as quoted in Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower: The President (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 202. 36. 193rd NSC Meeting, April 13, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 409–12. Commerce Secretary Sinclair Weeks favored trade but worried about strengthening China’s war-making capabilities. 460.6031/6–754, Weeks to Cutler, FRUS 1952– 1954, vol. 1, pt. 2, 1181. 37. 493.009/4–554, Robertson to Secretary, Box 2206, RG 59, NA; Eisenhower to Churchill, March 19, 1954, in Peter G. Boyle, ed., The Churchill-Eisenhower Correspondence, 1953–1955 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), 127–28. In fact, at Geneva the British and Chinese agreed to strength trade relations. Boardman, Britain and the People ’s Republic of China, 87–88. 38. 493.009/9–1654, L. W. Goodkind (EDS) to Samuel Waugh (E), Box 2206, RG 59, NA; Thorsten V. Kalijarvi, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Affairs, to Dulles, November 29, 1954, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 958; NSC 5429/5, “Current U.S. Policy in the Far East,” December 22, 1954, Records of the National Security Council, RG 273, NA.

Notes to Pages 128–129 | 231

39. Edwin Layton, deputy director for intelligence, Joint Staff to Radford, June 29, 1955, and Layton to Radford, June 21, 1956, Radford Files, Box 6, 091 China (1956), April–December 1955, RG 218, NA. Layton’s intelligence group also estimated that West Germany, for one, transacted roughly $100 million in business with the Chinese during 1955 through “concealed” routes. Edwin Layton, deputy director for intelligence, Joint Staff to Radford, February 16, 1956, Radford Files, Box 6, 091 China (1956), 1956, RG 218, NA. 40. Hosoya Chihiro, “From the Yoshida Letter to the Nixon Shock,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The United States and Japan in the Postwar World (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1989), 28; Shimizu, “Perennial Anxiety,” 233–36. 41. NSC 5516/1, “U.S. Policy toward Japan,” April 9, 1955, 6, DDRS (1987), fiche 177, no. 2887. 42. Dulles to Eisenhower, January 1956, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DullesHerter Series, Box 5, November 1955 (2), Ike; 271st NSC Meeting, December 22, 1955, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Series, Box 7, Ike. 43. Boardman, Britain and the People ’s Republic of China, 109. 44. Richard Collins, Brig. General, Deputy Director for Intelligence, Joint Staff, to Radford, September 26, 1956, JCS Records, Radford Files, Box 6, 091 China (1956), fi le: 1956, RG 218, NA. 45. Edwin T. Layton, Deputy Director for Intelligence, Joint Staff, to Radford, December 7, 1955, Radford Files, Box 6, 091 China (1956), fi le: April–December 1955, RG 218, NA; CM-242–55, Radford to Wilson, December 12, 1955, in ibid.; CM-242– 55, Radford to Dulles, December 12, 1955, in ibid. Radford’s condemnation notwithstanding, the United States itself on occasion purchased specific items from China to enhance its own stockpile. CFEP Staff Study 4, Ike. The British were angered that Washington had done little to protect London from McCarthy. Commercial Relations and Export Department, Board of Trade to Economic Relations Department, Foreign Office, June 16, 1953, FO 371/105254 (FC 1122/14), PRO; Minutes by Alastair G. Maitland, August 14, 1953, FO 371/105254 (FC 1122/18), PRO. 46. I-15167/5, Charles K. Nichols, Defense member to Chairman, Executive Committee, EDAC, September 27, 1955, 60D171, Box 2, fi le: 500.007 East-West Controls, COCOM 1955, RG 59, NA. 47. Robertson to Secretary, December 7, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: East-West Controls with Communist China, China Communist (CHINCOM) 1955, RG 59, NA. Regarding the damage the United States had already done to the Hong Kong economy with trade controls, see Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Uncertain Friendships: Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the United States, 1945–1992 (New York: Twayne/Macmillan, 1994), 200–6. 48. 271st NSC Meeting, December 22, 1955; 308th NSC Meeting, January 3, 1957, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman Files, NSC Series, Box 7, Ike; Totten to Radford, May 22, 1956, Radford File, Box 6, 091 China (1956), 1956, RG 218, NA. 49. Ferrell, Eisenhower Diaries, March 30,1956, 325.

232 | Notes to Pages 129–131

50. For example, see 274th NSC Meeting, January 27, 1956, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Series, Box 7, fi le: NSC Summaries of Discussion, Ike. 51. Hodge (CA) to Jones (FE) and McConaughy (CA), March 8, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 8, fi le: 500.007.1 Multilateral Controls with China—CHINCOM January– June 1956, RG 59, NA. Warren I. Cohen, “China in Japanese-American Relations,” in Cohen and Iriye, eds., United States and Japan, 47. 52. 230th NSC Meeting, January 5, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 2, 4; Dulles to Eisenhower, December 8, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy, RG 59, NA; Prochnow to Dulles, December 20, 1955, Lot 58D209, Box 2, fi le: CHINCOM (East-West Trade) 1955, RG 59, NA; 493.419/12–1055 3258, Dulles to Macmillan, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 10, 277. On trade, see 611.93/10–1255 870, Dulles to Johnson, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 7; and McConaughy to Johnson, October 14, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, supplement, fiche 9. 53. “Strengthening the Economic Embargo on China,” February 12, 1953, draft report from United Nations Affairs, CA Records, Box 43, fi le: 500.008 Economic Sanctions, RG 59, NA. 54. 493.509/3–253, White on Special Estimate-37, “Probable Effects on the Soviet Bloc of Certain Courses of Action Directed at the Internal and External Commerce of Communist China,” Box 2213, RG 59, NA; Qing Simei, From Allies to Enemies: Visions of Modernity, Identity, and U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1945–1960 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007), 174. 55. CFEP 36th Meeting Minutes, January 12, 1956, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 10, 286–88; Joseph M. Loage to Dillon Anderson, Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, January 13, 1956, DDRS (1985), fiche 11 118. 56. “The U.S. Position on China Trade Controls,” April 14, 1956, JCS Records, Radford Files, 1953–5197, 091 China (1956), Box 6, fi le: 1956, RG 218, NA. 57. Qing, From Allies to Enemies, 194. 58. 281st NSC Meeting, April 5, 1956, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 10, 332–34; 419.6–2256, Wilson to Dulles, in ibid., 372; “Th ink-Piece on China Trade Control Dilemma,” Howard Jones to Robertson, June 5, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 7, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy including Trade and Export Control, June–December 1956, RG 59, NA; Qing, From Allies to Enemies, 180–83. 59. L. Tyson (FE) to Sebald and Robertson, August 24, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 7, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy including Trade and Export Control, June–December 1956, RG 59, NA. 60. Qing Simei, “The Eisenhower Administration and Changes in Western Embargo Policy Against China, 1954–1958,” in Cohen and Iriye, eds., Great Powers, 131–32; 161 Eisenhower to Harold Macmillan, May 17, 1957, Series: EM, AWF, International Series: Macmillan, The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, vol. 18: The Presidency: Keeping the Peace, Part I: A New Beginning, Old Problems; January 1957 to May 1957, chap. 2: Foreign Aid, note, available from http://www.eisenhower memorial.org/presidential-papers/second-term/documents/161.cfm (accessed January 16, 2010).

Notes to Pages 131–133 | 233

61. Burton I. Kaufman, “Eisenhower’s Foreign Economic Policy with Respect to East Asia,” in Cohen and Iriye, eds., Great Powers, 109. 62. NSC Progress Report on “Multilateral Export Controls on Trade with Communist China,” September 27, 1956, DDRS (1989), fiche 86, no. 1568. In striking contrast, officials in the Far East bureau and in the Joint Chiefs concluded that anger over Suez motivated London and Paris to be intransigent. Marshall Brement (FE) to Robertson, May 31, 1957, Lot 59D19, Box 1, fi le: Far East—General, January– December 1957, RG 59, NA; Joint Staff to Radford, October 5, 1956, JCS Records, Radford Files, 1953–1957, Box 6, 091 China (1956), fi le: 1956, RG 218, NA. 63. Ralph Clough (though actually drafted by Hodge) to Robertson, May 23, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 7, fi le: 500.002 General U.S. Economic Policy including Trade and Export Control, March–May 1956, RG 59, NA. 64. 161, Eisenhower to Macmillan, May 17, 1957, Series: EM, AWF, International Series: Macmillan, The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, vol. 18: The Presidency: Keeping the Peace, Part I: A New Beginning, Old Problems; January 1957 to May 1957, chap. 2: Foreign Aid, available from http://www.eisenhowermemorial .org/presidential-papers/second-term/documents/161.cfm. 65. Zhang Shu Guang, Economic Cold War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), 186–89 (quote 188–89); Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949–1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1984), 77. 66. Tracy Lee Steele, “Allied and Interdependent: British Policy during the Chinese Offshore Islands Crisis of 1958,” in Anthony Gorst, Lewis Johnman, and W. Scott Lucas, eds., Contemporary British History, 1931–1961 (New York: Pinter, 1991), 232. 67. Philip J. Funigiello, American-Soviet Trade in the Cold War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988), 107. 68. The Japanese in turn argued that growing protectionism in the United States and Europe necessitated trade with China. Visit of Foreign Minister Fujiyama Aiichiro, September 1957, Lot 60D514, Box 2, fi le: Fujiyama, FM Aiichiro Visit, September 1957, RG 59, NA. 69. Eisenhower to Macmillan, May 24, 1957, DDRS (1986), fiche 126, no. 1672; Harold Macmillan, Riding the Storm (London: Macmillan, 1971), 317–18. Chinese officials welcomed the British announcement, believing it signified an Anglo-American split, according to Con O’Neill, British charge in Beijing. Shao Wenguang. China, Britain and Businessmen: Political and Commercial Relations, 1949–57 (London: Macmillan, 1991), 171, 231n94. 70. Memo to Radford, July 20, 1956, JCS Records, Radford Files, 1953–1957, Box 6, 091 China (1956), fi le: 1956, RG 218, NA; Funigiello, American-Soviet Trade, 107. 71. Memcon Shima, Japanese Embassy with Parsons, Acting Deputy Director, Office of Northeast Asian Affairs, Lot 60D171, Box 8, fi le: 500.007.1 Multilateral Controls with China—CHINCOM, January–June 1956, RG 59, NA; Warren I. Cohen, “China in Japanese-American Relations,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The United States and Japan in the Postwar World. (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1989), 48.

234 | Notes to Pages 133–135

72. 493.9441/2–1458 2116, MacArthur, Tokyo, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 17: Japan; Korea, microfiche supplement 1994, 430; 493.9441/3–1258 2357, MacArthur, Tokyo, in ibid., 433. 73. Shimizu, “Perennial Anxiety,” 235–48; 493.9441/3–1458 574, Parsons to Robertson in Taipei, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 17, microfiche 434; 493.9441/3–2558 2476, MacArthur, Tokyo, in ibid., 436; 493.9441/3–2658 615, Dulles/Robertson to Tokyo, in ibid., 437; 493.9441/3–2858 2521, MacArthur, Tokyo, in ibid., 438; 493.9441/4–458 2596, MacArthur, Tokyo, in ibid., 442. 74. FUJ D-2/3 Position Paper, “Chinese Communist Economic Warfare against Japan,” September 4, 1958, Fujiyama Visit, September 10–14, 1958, Lot 60D514, Box 6, fi le: Fujiyama Visit, WSR Briefi ng Book, September 1958, RG 59, NA. 75. Telcon, Eisenhower with Humphrey, April 19, 1956, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 10, 339n2; 356th NSC Meeting, February 27, 1958, NSC Action 1865, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 4: Foreign Economic Policy (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1992), 709. 76. Memcon, 356th NSC Meeting, February 27, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 4, 704–6. 77. Paul M. Evans and B. Michael Frolic, eds., Reluctant Adversaries: Canada and the PRC, 1949–1970 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991), 4–5. 78. H. J. Sceats, leader of the opposition, to Lester Pearson, May 1, 1958, and editorial from Maclean’s magazine, Lester Pearson Papers, MG26N2, vol. 46, file: 722 Trade with Communist China, Canada. 79. Qing, “Changes in Western Embargo Policy,” 135; Memcon, Eisenhower with John Diefenbaker, Prime Minister, July 10, 1958, Records of the White House Staff Secretary, International Trips and Meetings, Box 6: DDE Trip to Canada, Chronology 7/10/58 (1), Ike. 80. Memcon, 393rd NSC Meeting, January 15, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 4, 754–58. 81. 611.93231/5–459 867, Wigglesworth, Ottawa, Reel 9, Confidential Central Files, RG 59, NA; 611.93231/2–2659, Despatch 880, Willis C. Armstrong, Ottawa, in ibid.; 611.93231/3–2159 681, Herter to Embassy Ottawa, in ibid. 82. 611.93231/5–759 887, Wigglesworth, Ottawa, in ibid.; 611.93231/5–1459, Despatch 1229, Edward J. Th rasher, Ottawa (press summary), in ibid; 611.93231/6–159, Despatch 1309, Th rasher, Ottawa, in ibid; E. W. Kenworthy, “U.S. to Look Away as Shrimps Go By,” New York Times, May 23, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers (accessed January 16, 2010). 83. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Patterns in the Dust: Chinese-American Relations and the Recognition Controversy, 1949–1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), 112–33; CFEP Staff Study 5 Economic Defense Policy Review, June 30, 1955, U.S. Council on Foreign Economic Policy Records, Reports Series, Box 2: Economy Policy Review (5), DDEL. 84. 411.936/7–1652, Philip H. Thayer, Hanlon, and Goodman Co., New Jersey, Box 1859, RG 59, NA. In fact, Foreign Assets Control Regulations did not keep all brushes made with Chinese bristles out of the U.S. market. 611.93231/3–155, A. Guy Hope (CA) to McConaughy (CA), Confidential Central Files, Reel 8, RG 59, NA.

Notes to Pages 135–140 | 235

85. 411.9331/11–1653, Harrison Lewis (CA) to McConaughy, Box 1859, RG 59, NA; 493.119/11–2053, Despatch 1360, Dallas L. Jones, Paris, Box 2209, RG 59, NA; Arthur de la Mare, Washington Embassy to Oscar Morland, Foreign Office, February 8, 1957, FO 371/ 127239 (FC 1071/5), PRO; de la Mare to Peter G. F. Dalton, Foreign Office, March 15, 1957, FO 371/127289 (FC 100345/15), PRO; Kusnitz, Public Opinion, 77. 86. OIR, “Political Impact of Holding the Present CHINCOM Embargo Line or of Downward Modified Controls,” November 15, 1955, Lot 60D171, Box 2, fi le: EastWest Controls with Communist China, China Communist (CHINCOM) 1955, RG 59, NA. 87. 411.9331/1–3154, Despatch 764, Peter J. Peterson, Manila, Box 1859, RG 59, NA; 493.009/6–1053, Memcon, Morris Shriro, Shriro Trading Company, with Arthur J. Smith (EE), Box 2206, RG 59, NA; 493.119/6–2653, Jack Burby, Honolulu Advertiser, to John Leddy, Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Affairs, Box 2209, RG 59, NA; 411.93/9–1653, Norma Wyatt to Henry Cabot Lodge, USUN, Box 1859, RG 59, NA; International Longshoremen’s Association, “Resolution on Relations with Red China,” July 15, 1957, John Foster Dulles Papers, Mudd. 88. A. J. de la Mare to P. G. F. Dalton, Foreign Office, July 18, 1957, FO 371/127340 (FC 11345/4), PRO; Letter, Alfred Kohlberg to Senators Theodore F. Green and James O. Eastland and Representative Francis Walker, June 27, 1957, Stanley Hornbeck Papers, Box 268, fi le: “Kohlberg, Alfred,” Hoover.

9. BACK TO THE STRAIT 1. Eisenhower authorized preparation for escorting of supply ships on August 25, although actual convoys did not begin until September 7. Morton H. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis: A Documented History,” RM-4900-ISA (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, December 1966), 112–14. 2. Memo for the Record, August 14, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 54. 3. Zhang Shu Guang suggests that Mao began planning for a new bombardment of Jinmen toward the end of 1957 but waited for the most opportune moment. Zhang Shu Guang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1992), 235–36. Michael Szonyi notes the many different motivations analysts have proposed for the 1958 crisis. Michael Szonyi, Cold War Island: Quemoy on the Front Line (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 65–66. 4. Odd Arne Westad, “Mao on Sino-Soviet Relations,” CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 157. 5. Li Zhisui, The Private Life of Chairman Mao (New York: Random House, 1994), 268–71. 6. According to Wu Lengxi, a Central Committee member, director of Xinhua, and editor in chief of People ’s Daily, Mao told the Poliburo on August 26 that he had not yet determined his goal regarding Jinmen’s future. Lorenz M. Lüthi, The

236 | Notes to Pages 140–142

7.

8. 9.

10. 11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 100; Wu Lenxi, “Inside Story of the Decision Making during the Shelling of Jinmen,” Zhuanji wenxue 1 (1994), translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 209–10. Wang Bingnan Interview, Beijing, 1988; N. F. Twining, chairman of the JCS, shared Mao’s perception that U.S. forces were being stretched “dangerously thin.” Twining to Secretary of Defense, n.d., Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (2), DDEL. For a contrary view, see Melvin Gurtov, “The Taiwan Strait Crisis Revisited,” Modern China (January 1976), 50, 94–95. On fear of Lebanon-style action, see Xue Mouhong et al., eds., Diplomacy of Contemporary China (Hong Kong: New Horizon Press, 1990), 131; Li Xiaobing, “Making of Mao’s Cold War: The Taiwan Crises Revised,” in Li Xiaobing and Li Hongshan, eds., China and the United States (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1998), 49. Mao’s speech to the Eighth Party Congress, May 23, 1958, as quoted in Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 229. Bird to Radford, February 3, 1956, Chairman’s Files, Adm. Radford, Box 6, fi le: 091 China (1956), RG 218, NA; Lawrence Weiss, “American Policy during the Quemoy-Matsu Crisis of 1958: The Bureaucratic Politics of Policy Change,” MA thesis, Columbia University, 1975, 8. DM-104–57, B. L. Austin, Vice Adm, Director Joint Staff, to Chm JCS, March 20, 1957, CCS 381 Formosa (11-28-50), sec. 30, RG 218, NA; A. A. E. Franklin to Peter Dalton, May 21, 1957, FO 371/127494 (FCN 1193/17), PRO; People ’s Daily, May 8, 1957, SCMP, 1528, 26. Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 226; Richard A. Aliano, American Defense Policy from Eisenhower to Kennedy (Athens: University of Ohio Press, 1975), 178–95; Weiss, “American Policy,” 26. Rankin to Radford, January 3, 1956, sent to Clough, January 9, 1956, Lot 60D171, Box 18, fi le: 430.1 U.S. Aid to Nat. China (MAAG) 1956, RG 59, AII; 193, Embassy to Washington, November 6, 1956, Rankin Papers, Box 29, fi le: “China, Republic of,” Mudd; Rankin to Frank Nash (President’s Special Consultant), June 17, 1957, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 542–44; Marshall Green, John H. Holdridge, and William N. Stokes, War and Peace with China (Bethesda, Md.: Dacor, 1994), 44; Mei Wen-li, “The Intellectuals on Formosa,” China Quarterly (July–September 1963), 73. Wu Lengxi, Memoir in Zhuangji wenxue (Biographical Literature, Beijing) 1, 1994, in Li Xiaobing, Chen Jian, and David L. Wilson, trans., “Mao Zedong’s Handling of the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1958: Chinese Recollections and Documents,” CWIHP Bulletin 6–7 (Washington, D.C.: WWICS, Winter 1995/96), 214. Mao subsequently told Soviet diplomat and Sinologist S. F. Antonov that the riot had been orchestrated by Chiang Ching-kuo and that Chiang’s minions had seized documents establishing the existence of a plot to overthrow Chiang Kai-shek.

Notes to Pages 142–143 | 237

17.

18.

19.

20. 21. 22.

23.

24.

25.

26. 27.

28.

Summary of conversation with Mao Zedong from the Journal of S. F. Antonov, October 14, 1959, CWHIP Bulletin 3 (Fall 1993), 58. Arthur C. O’Neill, “Fifth Air Force in the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1958,” Pacific Air Force, Fifth Air Force, Office of Information Services, Director of Historical Services, December 31, 1958, 32–33, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/nukevault/ ebb249/index.htm (accessed July 7, 2009). Jacob Van Staaveren, “Air Operations in the Taiwan Crisis of 1958,” 13, Air Force Historical Division Liaison Office, November 1962, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv /nukevault/ebb249/index.htm (accessed July 7, 2009); Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 33, 41–42. Memorandum of Conference with the President, August 11, 1958, and August 12, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary Series, Box 35, fi le: August 1958 Staff Notes (2), DDEL; Green, Holdridge, and Stokes, War and Peace, 45–46; Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 58–59. Herter to Dulles, August 15, 1958, Christian Herter Papers, Box 9, fi le: Misc. Memoranda 1958 (1), DDEL. E. W. Kenworthy, “U.S. Warns Peiping after Red Th reat to Invade Quemoy,” New York Times, August 29, 1958, 1, 3. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, “Strategic Ambiguity or Strategic Clarity?,” in Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., Dangerous Strait (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), 188–91. Robert Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace’ The Eisenhower Administration and the 1958 Offshore Islands Crisis,” in Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War: U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 116. Memcon with the President, August 25, 1958, dated August 29, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 35, fi le: August 1958 Staff Notes (1), DDEL. Chiang Kai-shek demonstrated his extreme xenophobia in his China ’s Destiny, published in China in 1943. The English-language version, with far less anti-foreign passion, was released by Macmillan in 1947. Editorial Note on 375th NSC Meeting, August 7, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 42–43. 421, A Special Watch Report of the Intelligence Advisory Committee, August 29, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3), DDEL; Memcon with the President, August 25, 1958, in ibid. Subsequent reports noted that additional troops could be moved into place in 3–4 days, but even then the numbers would only match those on the offshore islands. Memcon, State with Defense and White House, September 3, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (2), DDEL. SNIE 100–11–58, “Probable Chinese Communist and Soviet Intentions in the Taiwan Area,” September 16, 1958, in John K. Allen, John Carver, and Tom Elmore, eds., Tracking the Dragon: National Intelligence Estimates on China during

238 | Notes to Pages 143–145

29. 30. 31.

32.

33.

34. 35. 36. 37. 38.

39.

40.

the Era of Mao, 1948–1976 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 2004), 182–83. JCS 947046, Telegram, JCS to CINPAC Felt, August 25, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 76. Memo from Smith to Dulles, August 15, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 58. 273, Drumright, Taipei, September 1, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3), DDEL. Arleigh Burke, chief of naval operations, reported to Dulles that, lacking a naval tradition and having taken most of its officers from among the lesser lights of the army, Taiwan’s navy was poorly led and its shortage of ships made it reluctant to risk any. Memcon, September 2, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (2), DDEL. Robert Suettinger, “Introduction,” in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, xviii; NIE 13–58, “Communist China,” May 13, 1958, paragraph 90, in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, 143; Memcon, State with Defense and White House, September 3, 1958, DDEL. “Summary” estimate by Dulles, September 4, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, September 1958, DDEL. Halperin notes that the extreme views expressed in this document contrasted sharply with those of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 276n. It is also important to note that the September 4 statement was immediately translated and passed around at the Supreme State Council meeting and finally was published in China. Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 250. Memcon, Dulles with the President, September 11, 1958, DDRS (1985), fiche 177 2551. Memo of Meeting, August 29, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 98. Memcon, Dulles with George Yeh, ambassador-designate, September 13, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 181. Memcon, September 21, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 251. Richard P. Stebbins, The United States and World Affairs (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1959), 322; Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), 185; McGeorge Bundy, Danger and Survival: Choices about the Bomb in the First Fifty Years (New York: Vintage, 1990), 673n107; Robert W. Barnett, Quemoy: The Use and Consequence of Nuclear Deterrence (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University, 1960), 77. Memcon with the President, August 25, 1958, dated August 29, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 35, fi le: August 1958 Staff Notes (1), DDEL. JCS 947046, JCS to CINCPAC, August 25, 1958, JCS Records, Box 147 CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 37, RG 218, NA, or Whitman Files, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3) DDEL; 282358z, CINCPAC to JCS, August 29, 1958, JCS Records, Box 147 CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 37, RG 218, NA; “The

Notes to Pages 145–147 | 239

41. 42.

43. 44.

45. 46. 47. 48. 49.

50. 51. 52. 53.

54.

Case for U.S. Intervention,” September 2, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Records of the White House Staff Secretary, Subject Series, State Subseries, Box 3: State Department September 1958–January 1951 (1), DDEL; JCS 2118/110, Appendix “The Taiwan Situation,” September 3, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (2), DDEL. On Kuter, see Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 143–44; Hans M. Kristensen, “Nukes in the Taiwan Crisis,” Federation of Atomic Scientists, http://www.fas.org/blog/ ssp/2008/05/nukes-in-the-taiwan-crisis.php (accessed July 7, 2009); Bernard C. Nalty, “The Air Force Role in Five Crises, 1958–1965,” 19, USAF Historical Division Liaison Office, June 1968, in William Burr, ed., Special Collection: Some Key Documents on Nuclear Policy Issues, 1945–1990, Nuclear Vault, NSA, http://www. gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/nukevault/ebb249/index.htm (accessed July 7, 2009). Gerard Smith to Christian Herter, August 13, 1958, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/ nsa/DOCUMENT/DOC-PIC/950809_1.gif (accessed July 29, 2009). William Chafe, The Rise and Fall of the American Century (New York: Oxford, University Press, 2009), 161. Eisenhower repeatedly asserted his ultimate control of nuclear weapons, for instance, at a White House meeting on August 25, 1958; FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 74. Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 248. Memorandum of Conference with the President, August 14, 1958, White House Office, Office of the Staff Secretary Records, Subject Series, State Department Subseries, Box 3, fi le: State Department—1958 (May–August) (5), DDEL; 6481/6483, CINCPAC to JCS, August 26, 1958, JCS Records, Box 147 CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48) sec. 37, RG 218, NA. Van Staaveren, “Air Operations,” 13, 28, 50–51; Nalty, “Air Force Role,” 27. Chang, Friends and Enemies, 189. Memcon with the President, September 4, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (C) 1958–1961 (3), DDEL. Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace,’” 119. Memorandum for the File, “Discussion with the Secretary,” by Gerard C. Smith, Special Assistant to the Secretary of State for Atomic Energy, March 16, 1955, Top Secret, in Burr, Some Key Documents, http://www.gwu.edu/!nsarchiv/nukevault/ special/index.htm (accessed July 8, 2009). March Trachtenberg, History and Strategy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 266–67. H. W. Brands Jr., “The Age of Vulnerability: Eisenhower and the National Insecurity State,” American Historical Review 94 (October 1989), 981. Trachtenberg, History and Strategy, 146. Memcon, Dulles with Defense Secretary McElroy et al., April 7, 1958, in Burr, Some Key Documents, http://www.gwu.edu/!nsarchiv/nukevault/special/index.htm (accessed July 8, 2009). Appu K. Soman, “‘Who’s Daddy’ in the Taiwan Strait? The Offshore Islands Crisis of 1958,” Journal of American East Asian Relations 3 (Winter 1994), 396.

240 | Notes to Pages 147–148

55. Allen Dulles reported to the NSC on August 27 that the Soviets had not mentioned the Taiwan Straits in their broadcasts. 378th NSC Meeting, August 27, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Series, Box 10: NSC Summaries of Discussion, DDEL. At a September 11 White House meeting, Ike mentioned a letter from Cyrus Eaton saying that the USSR was prepared to support Beijing on the Taiwan issue and that the Soviet people backed their government. Ike said that he had had other such reports, including one from Edward Ryerson. Memcon, Dulles with the President, September 11, 1958, DDRS. 56. Thomas E. Stolper, China, Taiwan, and the Offshore Islands (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1985), 119. Zagoria points out that Khrushchev hedged his support for China in his letters. Donald Zagoria, The Sino-Soviet Conflict, 1956–1961 (New York: Atheneum, 1964), 214. 57. Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace,’” 122. 58. Nikita S. Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970), 470; Nikita Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers: The Glasnost Tapes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1990), 148; Zagoria, Sino-Soviet Conflict, 217–21. 59. Andrei Gromyko, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday, 1989), 251–52. Gromyko arrived in Beijing on September 5 with China specialist M. S. Kapitsa. Gordon Chang suggests that Gromyko’s story was a fabrication since Mao did not anticipate an American invasion. He also notes the Chinese denial of the story in 1988. Chang, Friends and Enemies, 190, 339n37; U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Foreign Broadcast Information Service, FBIS-CHI-88–041, March 2, 1988, 1. On the other hand, a recently released document suggests that Gromyko might have been inaccurate regarding a possible American invasion and that he did not misrepresent China’s declaration that Moscow could watch a tactical nuclear assault on China and stand by passively. Letter, CPSU Central Committee to the CCP Central Committee, September 27, 1958, translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 226–27. 60. Mao Zedong’s remarks on the June 5, 1958, report by Peng Dehuai, June 7, 1958, Mao Zedong waijiao wenxuan, 316–17, translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 155; Xue et al., Diplomacy, 140–41. 61. He Di, “The Evolution of the People’s Republic of China’s Policy toward the Offshore Islands,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, eds., The Great Powers in East Asia, 1953–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 243. 62. Memcon, Mao Zedong with P. F. Yudin, July 22, 1958, Mao Zedong waijiao wenxuan, 322–33, translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 155, 157. Li Zhisui suggests in his memoir that Mao so disliked that he treated him insultingly like a barbarian come to pay tribute during Khrushchev’s brief 1958 visit and insisted on going forward with his own policies despite Soviet objections. Li, Private Life, 261–62. 63. Lüthi, Sino-Soviet Split, 97. 64. Oppose U.S. Occupation of Taiwan and “Two Chinas” Plot (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1958), 73–74. China claimed a 12-mile limit, whereas the United States recognized only a 3-mile standard.

Notes to Pages 148–149 | 241

65. He, “Evolution of the PRC’s Policy,” 236–38; Xue, Diplomacy, 132; Mao Zedong, “Talk at the Supreme State Conference,” September 8, 1958, in Mao Zedong waijiao wenxuan, 348–52, translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 218–21. 66. Memcon with the President, September 8, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, September 1958, DDEL. 67. 5705, CINCPAC to JCS, September 22, 1958, JCS Records, CCS 381 Formosa (118-48), sec. 40, Box 148, RG 218, NA. 68. Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace,’” 130. 69. Telcon, Eisenhower and Dulles, September 1, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 113. 70. Lüthi, Sino-Soviet Split, 99. 71. O. B. Borisov and B. T. Koloskov, Soviet-Chinese Relations, 1945–1970 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975), 154–55. Borisov is the pseudonym of Oleg Borisovich Rakhmanin, a China specialists and senior staff official of the CPSU Central Committee. 72. Li, Private Life, 270. 73. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1965), 293; Green, Holdridge, and Stokes, War and Peace, 52. 74. Memo, Goodpaster to Aurand, “Recent Political Aspects of Taiwan Straits Developments,” August 31, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman Files, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3), DDEL. 75. SNIE 100–4-59, “Chinese Communist Intentions and Probable Courses of Action in the Taiwan Strait Area,” March 13, 1959, paragraph 14, in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, 197. 76. Sources disagree about whether Mao told Khrushchev. Liu Xiao, China’s ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1955 to 1962, wrote in his memoirs that China did not inform the Soviets during Khrushchev’s visit of the planned shelling of Jinmen. Cited in Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 254. On the other hand, Xue’s official history asserts that Soviet leaders were told and “were apprehensive that this action .  .  . would jeopardize their plan of Soviet-U.S. cooperation for world domination.” Xue, Diplomacy 143. Khrushchev later claimed that he was told in general terms of an operation against Chiang and that he supported it generously. Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War: From Stalin to Khrushchev (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996), 220. On the other hand, Allen S. Whiting notes in his article “Quemoy 1958: Mao’s Miscalculations,” China Quarterly 62 (June 1975), 611, that interviews with M. S. Kapitsa and others in Moscow convinced him that the Soviets did not know. Older analyses assumed that Khrushchev knew; see, for example, Zagoria, Sino-Soviet Conflict, 200–206, 430n21. 77. Sharing this interpretation were Herter, Burke, Quarles, and Twining. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 84n, 203. 78. JCS 9447931, JCS to Admiral Felt, September 12, 1958, JCS Records, CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 39, RG 218, NA. Eisenhower also questioned whether the

242 | Notes to Pages 149–151

79. 80.

81. 82. 83. 84.

85. 86. 87. 88. 89. 90.

91. 92. 93.

94. 95. 96.

Nationalists were willing to take as many risks as U.S. forces were taking. Memcon, Dulles with the President, September 11, 1958, DDRS. 8835 COMTAIWANDEFCOM(US)/MAAG TAIWAN to CINCPAC, September 2, 1958, JCS Records, Box 147 CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 38, RG 218, NA. Dwight D. Eisenhower Oral History, 22, MUDD; “China Reds Shell Quemoy Outpost,” New York Times, August 28, 1958, 1. There is evidence that Admirals Radford and Felix Stump, of CINCPAC, encouraged Chiang. Tang Tsou, “The Quemoy Imbroglio: Chiang Kai-Shek and the United States,” Western Political Quarterly 12 (1959), 1080. 611.93/9–1758, Memcon, Chinese Ambassador Designate George Yeh with Acting Assistant Secretary for Far Eastern Affairs J. Graham Parsons, RG 59, NA. JCS 2118/110, Appendix, “The Taiwan Situation,” September 3, 1958, DDEL. 220741z, CINCPAC to JCS, September 22, 1958, JCS Records CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 40, RG 218, NA. Memo, Dulles to Herter and Robertson, August 23, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 69. According to a State Department memcon cited by Halperin, Dulles told Chiang on October 21 that he did not share the view that Chiang was trying to involve the United States. in war. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 521. Memcon, September 8, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 157. 267, Drumright, Taipei, August 31, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3), DDEL. 2335z/31 COMTAIWANDEFCOM(US)/MAAG TAIWAN to JCS, August 31, 1958, JCS Records, Box 147 CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48), sec. 38, RG 218, NA. Memo, Dulles to Herter and Robertson, August 23, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 69. Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace,’” 129–30; Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 414n. Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, ed., China Confidential (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), 128. Green claims both to have mustered the opposition in the bureau to the UN move and then to have traveled to New York to stop Dulles’s initiative at the UN. Green, Holdridge, and Stokes, War and Peace, 48, 50. Op-00 memo 000416–58, September 7, 1958, Burke to Twining, JCS Records, CCS 381 Formosa (11-8-48) sec. 38a, RG 218, NA. Memo, Robertson to Dulles, August 20, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 62–65, (quote 63). Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 105–6, 186, 254–55, 270. Dulles nevertheless continued to discuss the idea of intermediaries with the British, even if they proved useful only in explaining the American position. 2717 Caccia, Washington, October 10, 1958, FO 371/133538 (FCN 1193/418), PRO. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 434. 2717 Caccia, Washington, October 10, 1958, FO 371/133538 (FCN 1193/418), PRO; Memcon, September 8, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 156–57. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 504.

Notes to Pages 151–153 | 243

97. Memcon, McElroy with the President, September 11, 1958, summarized by Goodpaster, September 15, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, September 1958, DDEL. McElroy, president of Procter & Gamble, took Charlie Wilson’s place as defense secretary in October 1957. 98. 1071, Sir Pierson Dixon, September 21, 1958, UKUN mission, New York, FO 371/133532 (FCN 1193/256G), PRO; and the U.S. version at Memcon, September 21, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 249–52; 2796 Caccia, Washington, October 17, 1958, FO 371/133544 (FCN 1193/465G), PRO. 99. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, 300; Memcon, Twining with the President, September 30, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, September 1958, DDEL; Memo for the Secretary of State, October 7, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: DDE Dictation, October 1958, DDEL. 100. Dana Adams Schmidt, “Taiwan Is Chided,” New York Times, October 1, 1958, 1. 101. Eisenhower to Dulles, October 7, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles/Herter Series, Box 8, fi le: Dulles, October 1958, DDEL. If Yeh actually did express interest in the plan, that would have been a striking reversal of his views of September 12 and 13, when he met with Ike and Dulles and rejected withdrawal, neutralization, or demilitarization. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 343–44. 102. Accinelli, “‘A Thorn in the Side of Peace,’” 126; Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949–1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1984), 93n133. 103. Barnett, Quemoy, 81; The White House tally came to 470 against involvement in war, 89 for going to the UN, 39 in support of the president regardless of his course of action, and 9 for negotiations. Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (1), DDEL. Letters to the State Department ran 80 percent opposed to the administration’s policy. 104 . MacAlister Brown, “The Demise of State Department Public Opinion Polls: A Study in Legislative Oversight,” Midwest Journal of Political Science 5 (February 1961), 16. 105. 611.93/9–2058, Reischauer to Dulles, Reel 6, RG 59, NA; 611.93/9–2058, Dulles to Reischauer, October 31, 1958, Reel 6, RG 59, NA. 106. Joseph Alsop, “Quemoy: We Asked for It,” New York Herald Tribune, September 3, 1958, 18. The British were wont to see Alsop as “calamity Joe,” a prophet of gloom. Alexander Grantham, Hong Kong Governor to T. V. Soong, February 10, 1954, T. V. Soong Papers, Box 4, fi le: Grantham, Sir Alexander, 1948–1960, Hoover; and 235, Makins, Washington, January 26, 1955, FO 371/115027 (FC 1041/113), PRO. 107. James Reston, “War-Making Power,” New York Times, September 4, 1958, 4. 108. Tsou, “Quemoy Imbroglio,” 1080. 109. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 240; Kusnitz, Public Opinion, 80. 110. Gary W. Reichard, “Divisions and Dissent: Democrats and Foreign Policy, 1952– 1956,” Political Science Quarterly 93 (Spring 1978), 68–72.

244 | Notes to Pages 153–155

111. Douglas Brinkley, Dean Acheson: The Cold War Years, 1953–71 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 63. 112. Letter, Acheson to Truman, September 17, 1958, Dean Acheson Papers, S1, B 31, F 395, Yale University Library, New Haven (hereafter Yale). 113. “Stevenson Urges Talks on Quemoy,” New York Times, September 7, 1958, 7. 114. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Straits Crisis,” 104. 115. Russell Baker, “Capital Watches Far East Closely,” New York Times, August 26, 1958, 3, ProQuest Historical Newspapers. His comments were given publicity by People ’s Daily on September 2, 1958, 5. 116. Letter, Green to Eisenhower, September 29, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: DDE Dictation, October 1958, DDEL. Green, 90 years old and forgetful, was generally not an active committee head. Carl M. Marcy Oral History, AFMC, 96–97. 117. Memcon, Johnson with Felt (CINCPAC), Brocker (Cmdr, Honolulu), William B. Macomber (AS for Congressional Relations), and George Reedy, October 3, 1958, Notes and Transcripts of Johnson Conversations, Box 1, Lyndon B. Johnson Papers, Lyndon B. Johnson Library, Austin, Texas (hereafter LBJL). Soman, “‘Who’s Daddy,’” 390. 118. Baltimore Sun, September 30, 1958, cited in Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Straits Crisis,” 392. 119. Memcon, September 3, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 127. 120. 1230, Whitney, London, August 29, 1958, DDRS (1988) fiche 54 911. 121. Staff Notes 435, October 3, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, October 1958, DDEL. 122. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Straits Crisis,” 391; Harold Macmillan, Riding the Storm, 1956–1959 (London: Macmillan, 1971), 550; Memcon, Dulles with George Yeh, ambassador-designate, September 13, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 180. 123. 493, MacArthur, Tokyo, August 30, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, International Series, Box 10, fi le: Formosa (1958) (3), DDEL; JCS 2118/110 Appendix, “The Taiwan Straits Situation,” September 3, 1958, DDEL. 124. Memcon, Johnson with Felt, Brocker, Macomber, and Reedy, October 3, 1958, LBJL. 125. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 215. 126. Memcon, Zhou with Antonov, October 5, 1958, Zhonggong zhongyang wenxian yanjiushi, comps., Zhou Enlai waijiao wenxuan [Selected diplomatic writings of Zhou Enlai] (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian, 1990), 262–67, translated in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 222. 127. Zhang, Deterrence and Strategic Culture, 253. 128. McCloy to Dulles, September 27, 1958, White House Office of the Staff Secretary, 1952–1961, Subject Series, State Department Subseries, Box 3, fi le: State Department, September 1958–January 1959 (1), DDEL. 129. He, “Evolution of the PRC’s Policy,” 239. 130. Wu Lengxi suggests that Mao revealed this view to the Politburo at meetings on October 3 and 4. Wu, “Inside Story,” 212–13. Zhou Enlai mentioned having expressed

Notes to Pages 155–158 | 245

131.

132.

133.

134. 135. 136. 137. 138.

139.

140. 141. 142.

143. 144. 145. 146. 147. 148.

the view to the Soviet charge on September 30. Memcon, Zhou with Antonov, October 5, 1958, CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 222. Although the message was issued in the name of Defense Minister Peng Dehuai, it was drafted by Mao. He, “Evolution of the PRC’s Policy,” 242. Krishna Menon told the UN General Assembly that secret negotiations had been under way between Beijing and Taipei before August 23. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, an emissary from the PRC in Hong Kong offered to make Taiwan an autonomous region under Chiang’s rule and with its own army. Tsou, “Quemoy Imbroglio,” 1082, 1088. Chen Jian, Mao ’s China and the Cold War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2001), 199-202. Halperin suggested another motive for the change in shelling. He believed that Beijing was trying to keep other countries from seeing that Chinese power had been bested by Nationalist-American convoying. Halperin, “The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 485. Minutes, Zhou conversation with S. F. Antonov on the Taiwan issue, October 5, 1958, in Li, Chen, and Wilson, “Mao Zedong’s Handling of the Taiwan Straits Crisis of 1958,” 223. SNIE 100–9-58, “Probable Developments in the Taiwan Strait Area,” August 26, 1958, paragraph 20, in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, 170. 39 A. Veitch, Tamsui, October 7, 1958, FO 371/133540 (FCN 1193/448), PRO. Memo, Herter for Dulles, October 6, 1958, DDRS (1987), fiche 13 175. Halperin, “The Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 504–5. Dulte 4, Dulles, Taipei, October 22, 1958, White House Office of the Staff Secretary Records, 1952–1961, Subject Series, State Department Subseries, Box 3, fi le: State Department—September 1958–January 1959 (2), DDEL. Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009), 500; Halperin, “The Taiwan Strait Crisis,” 532. Taylor, Generalissimo, 500. 45 A. Veitch, Tamsui, FO 371/133544 (FCN 1193/550), PRO. News Conference, October 28, 1958, Dulles Papers, Box 127, fi le: People’s Republic of, MUDD; Zhai Qiang, The Dragon, the Lion, and the Eagle (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1994), 203–4. Taylor, Generalissimo, 501. Gong Li, “Tension across the Taiwan Strait in the 1950s: Chinese Strategy and Tactics,” in Ross and Jiang, eds., Re-Examining the Cold War, 170–71. Chen, Mao ’s China and the Cold War , 203. De la Mare, British Embassy, Washington to MacDermot, Foreign Office, May 25, 1959, FO371/141236 (FC 1693/4), PRO. Memcon, Macmillan and Lloyd with Eisenhower, March 27, 1959, DDRS (1987), fiche 37, 522; 399th NSC Meeting, March 12, 1959, DDRS (1990), fiche 82, 1018. A March 1955 Gallup Poll revealed that only 77 percent of respondents had heard about the Strait crisis and that of those only 14 percent gave acceptable answers

246 | Notes to Pages 158–164

regarding location of the offshore islands. George Gallup, The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935–71 (New York: Random House, 1972), 1319–20. 149. Memcon, McElroy with the President, September 11, 1958, summarized by Goodpaster September 15, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, DDE Diary, Box 36, fi le: Staff Notes, September 1958, DDEL.

10. WAGING COLD WAR 1. Andrew J. Goodpaster Oral History, OH-508, June 11, 1980, 39–40. 2. Russell Baker, “Herter Outlook Is a Global One,” New York Times, April 19, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers. 3. G. Bernard Noble, Christian A. Herter (New York: Cooper Square, 1970), 23. 4. Emmet John Hughes, The Ordeal of Power (New York: Atheneum, 1962), 254. 5. “The 3 States: A Time for Governors,” Time, August 17, 1953, http://www.time .com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,858152–1,00.html (accessed July 28, 2009); John R. Gibson, “Herter’s Appointment Means Larger Foreign Policy Role for Ike,” Wall Street Journal, April 20, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers. 6. Letter, William W. Scranton to Herter, October 29, 1959, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles-Herter Series, Box: 7, folder: October 1959 (1), DDEL; “The Unassuming American,” Time, April 18, 1960, 22. 7. Noble, Herter, 297. 8. Lawrence Weiss, “American Policy during the Quemoy-Matsu Crisis of 1958: The Bureaucratic Politics of Policy Change,” MA thesis, Columbia University, 1975, 61. 9. Noble, Herter, 107. 10. Leonard Kusnitz, Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: America ’s China Policy, 1949– 1979 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 1984), 81, 94n142. 11. Townsend Hoopes, The Devil and John Foster Dulles (Boston: Little, Brown, 1973), 495. 12. Noble, Herter, 233. 13. Marshall Green, John H. Holdridge, and William N. Stokes, War and Peace with China (Bethesda, Md.: Dacor, 1994), 53. 14. Kenneth T. Young, “American Dealings with Peking,” Foreign Affairs 45 (October 1966), 82–83. 15. Gray to Herter, January 14, 1959, DDRS (1987), fiche 69, 1065. 16. Ernest H. Fisk (FE/P) to Robertson, January 16, 1959, Lot 61D6, Box 4, fi le: American Travel to China 1959, RG 59, NA. 17. Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles (Boston: Houghton Miffl in, 1994), 449. 18. Ibid., 463. 19. Frederick W. Marks III, Power and Peace (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1993), 145–47. 20. Letter, Drumright to Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, July 5, 1989.

Notes to Pages 164–168 | 247

21. Parsons Papers, Box 2, folder 53, Edwin Reischauer, letters June–December 1959, Georgetown University. 22. Henry D. Owen Oral History, ADST, Frontline Diplomacy, http://memory.loc .gov/cgi-bin/query/D?mfdip:3:./temp/~ammem_WFDp (accessed March 11, 2010). 23. Kai Bird, The Chairman (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992), 478. 24. Carroll Kilpatrick, “Engle Says It’s High Time for U.S. to Begin Talk of Trade with Peking,” Washington Post, May 22, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers. 25. Kusnitz, Public Opinion, 81, 94n143. 26. “Porter Sues for China Visa, Citing Duty as Congressman,” Washington Post, August 28, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers. 27. Humphrey to Mary Schneider, Washington, D.C. , July 24, 1957, Humphrey Papers, Senatorial Files, 23 K3 6F Box 137, MHS; Franklin to Lloyd, September 24, 1957, FO371/127472 (FCN 10345/48), PRO; Porter, August 4, 1959, Reel 7, RG 59, NA; 611.93/11–2459, Despatch 273, Memcon, President Ch’en Ch’eng with Joseph Yager, Taipei, Reel 7, RG 59, NA. 28. 611.93/8–759, Fulbright to C. Douglas Dillon, Acting Secretary of State, Reel 7, RG 59, NA. 29. “Study Unit Urges New China Policy,” New York Times, November 1, 1959, 27. 30. Green to Scalapino, April 9, 1959, Lot 61D6, Box 5, file: G, RG 59, NA; Memo, Parsons, drafted by Green, to Acting Secretary, August 11, 1959, in ibid. 31. Letter, Scalapino to Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, June 16, 1995, 2. 32. 611.93/11–659 406, Yager, Taipei, Reel 7, RG 59, NA; 611.93/11–359, Memcon, Yeh with Parsons and Martin, Reel 7, RG 59, NA. 33. Minute by R.H.V. Benson, December 16, 1959, FO371/141216 (FC 10345/10), PRO. 34. Bruce Weber, “William J. Lederer, Co-Author of the ‘Ugly American’ Dies at 97,” New York Times, January 14, 2010. 35. Robert D. Schulzinger. The Wise Men of Foreign Affairs: The History of the Council on Foreign Relations (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984), 177–78, 237. 36. E. Youde, British Embassy, Washington to Mayall, Foreign Office, July 14, 1956, FO371/120896 (FC 10345/88), PRO. 37. “A Th reat to National Security: Communist China’s Admission into the United Nations,” Washington Report, June 1961, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. Papers, Box: W4, fi le: China Reports, JFKL. 38. Hornbeck to Kohlberg, May 26,1958, Hornbeck Papers, Box 268, fi le: “Kohlberg, Alfred,” Hoover. 39. Kohlberg to Liebman, March 18, 1960, Marvin Liebman Associates Records, Box 29, fi le: “Alfred Kohlberg,” Hoover. 40. Stanley D. Bachrack, The Committee of One Million: “China Lobby ” Politics, 1953–1971 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 167–72; David Rowe to Marvin Liebman, March 23, 1960, Liebman Records, Box 29, fi le: “Alfred Kohlberg,” Hoover. 41. Kusnitz, Public Opinion, 82–83; “Builder of the Wall,” Washington Post, June 10, 1959, ProQuest Historical Newspapers.

248 | Notes to Pages 169–171

42. “Our Long Term Policy toward Red China,” September 15, 1958, and Memo, Eisenhower to Dulles, September 30, 1958, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles-Herter Series, Box 8, fi le: Dulles, September 1958 (1), Ike. 43. Minute by O’Neill, March 9, 1959, FO 371/141365 (FC 2251/9), PRO. 44. The Sino-Soviet Studies Group began immediately to generate reports on frictions. Harold P. Ford, “Calling the Sino-Soviet Split,” Studies in Intelligence (Winter 1998–1999), 59. 45. 734 Owen, Moscow, June 26, 1959, with Memcon of Khrushchev-Harriman talks, June 23, 1959, Box 126, fi le: USSR-Vienna Meeting Background Documents, 1953–1961 (D), President’s Office Files, Country Files, JFKL; Gordon H. Chang, Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948–1972 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), 212. 46. Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War: From Stalin to Khrushchev (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996), 223. 47. Halperin makes clear that this possible initiative was not pursued and was too vague for Washington to act on. Morton H. Halperin, “The Taiwan Strait Crisis: A Documented History,” RM-4900-ISA (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, December 1966), 28. 48. The policy was controversial and the Policy Planning Staff objected to portions of it. 661.93/9–160, Martin to Parsons, Box 1367, fi le: 661.93/9–160, CDF 1960–1963, RG 59, NARA; Memo, Parsons to Herter, December 1, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 637. 49. Qiang Zhai, “Mao Zedong and Dulles’s ‘Peaceful Evolution’ Strategy: Revelations from Bo Yibo’s Memoirs,” and Bo Yibo, “To Prevent ‘Peaceful Evolution’ and Train Successors to the Revolutionary Cause,” Ruogan zhongda juece yu shijian de huigu [Recollections of certain major decisions and events] (Beijing: Zhonggong zhongyang dangxiao chubanshe, 1993), in CWIHP Bulletin, Winter 1995/1996, 228–30. 50. Lorenz M. Lüthi, The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 137–38. 51. Memcon, Camp David, September 26 and 27, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 596–98; Wang Dong, “The Quarrelling Brothers: New Chinese Archives and a Reappraisal of the Sino-Soviet Split, 1959–1962,” CWIHP Working Paper 49, 22. 52. Zubok and Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, 201. Zubok and Pleshakov raise doubt over whether Khrushchev explicitly broached the Two Chinas issue. See p. 230; Qing Simei, From Allies to Enemies: Visions of Modernity, Identity, and U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1945–1960 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007), 266. 53. Zubok and Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, 202. 54. Lorenz Lüthi argues that another motive was concern that Washington would retaliate by transferring nuclear weapons to West Germany. Lüthi, Sino-Soviet Split, 138, 252. Vojtech Mastney rejects this, arguing that Khrushchev was not so worried about Germany. H-Diplo Roundtable Reviews, vol. 9, no. 25 (2008), 10,

Notes to Pages 171–174 | 249

55.

56.

57. 58. 59. 60. 61.

62.

63. 64.

65. 66.

67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72.

http://www.h-net.org/~diplo/roundtables/PDF/Roundtable-IX-25.pdf (accessed July 26, 2009). Jeff rey T. Richelson, Spying on the Bomb (New York: Norton, 2006), 141; Zubok and Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, 228. Moscow promised a prototype atomic bomb, a medium-range ballistic missile, fighter aircraft, a ballistic missile submarine, and technical support data along with machinery to process and enrich uranium. Soviet nuclear physicists and geologists went to China to render assistance. Constantine Pleshakov, “Nikita Khrushchev and Sino-Soviet Relations,” in Odd Arne Westad, ed., Brothers in Arms: The Rise and Fall of the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1945–1963 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), 233. NIE 13—2–60, “The Chinese Communist Atomic Energy Program,” December 13, 1960, paragraph 59, in John K. Allen, John Carver, and Tom Elmore, eds., Tracking the Dragon: National Intelligence Estimates on China during the Era of Mao, 1948–1976 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 2004), 307. Richelson, Spying on the Bomb, 142–44; McCone quoted on 607n29. Chang, Friends and Enemies, 209. Nikita Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers: The Glasnost Tapes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1990), 153. NIE 13–60, December 6, 1960, in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, 255. John Wilson Lewis and Xue Litai, China Builds the Bomb (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 72, 267n144; Nie Rongzhen, Nie Rongzhen Huiyilu [The memoirs of Nie Rongzhen] (Beijing: People’s Liberation Army Press, 1986), 805–6. Steven I. Levine, “Breakthrough to the East,” in Warren I. Cohen and Akira Iriye, The Great Powers in East Asia, 1953–1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 311. Zubok and Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, 233. Maurice Meisner, Mao ’s China and After (New York: Free Press, 1986), 249; 724 Thompson, Moscow, September 11, 1960, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Dulles-Herter Series, Box 11, fi le: Herter, September 1960, DDEL. 724 Thompson, Moscow, September 10, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 721–23. 661.93/11–260, Memcon, Lho Shin Yong, Korean Embassy, with William O. Anderson (Soviet Affairs) and John H. Holdridge (Chinese Affairs), Box 1367, fi le: 661.93/9–160, RG 59 NA. 661.93/10–660 1694, Witney, London, Box 1367, fi le: 661.93/9–160, RG 59, NA. 661.93/11–1760, Despatch 523, Coburn Kidd, Tokyo, Box 1367, fi le: 661.93/9–160, RG 59, NA. 661.93/11–260, Despatch 233, Osborn, Taipei, Box 1367, file: 661.93/9–160, RG 59, NA. 398th NSC Meeting, March 5, 1959, DDRS (1990), fiche 82, 1014; Editorial note on 399th NSC Meeting, March 12, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 546–47. Bowles to Kohlberg, May 31, 1956, Chester Bowles Papers, Yale. Zhai Qiang, The Dragon, the Lion, and the Eagle (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1994), 199.

250 | Notes to Pages 174–178

73. Notes on Mikoyan dinner with Vice President, January 17, 1959, Livingston Merchant Papers, Box 5, fi le: Nixon, Richard M. 1959, Mudd. 74. 661.93/5–1360, J. Graham Parsons to Hare (G), Box 1367, fi le: 661.93/1–860, RG 59, NA. 75. US/MC/4, Memcon, Eisenhower with Chiang et al., June 18, 1960, FRUS 1958– 1960, vol. 19, 676–79. 76. 448th NSC Meeting, June 22, 1960, DDRS (1991), fiche 300, 3354. 77. 661.93/6–1460, Hugh S. Cumming Jr. (INR) to Acting Secretary, RG 59, NA; NIE 100–3-60, “Sino-Soviet Relations,” August 9, 1960, DDRS (1990), fiche 55, 633, quotes from 2. Harold Ford argues that this NIE lagged behind awareness of the seriousness of the spilt within the CIA. Ford, “Calling the Sino-Soviet Split,” 61. 78. NIE 13–60, “Communist China,” December 6, 1960, paragraphs 6–7, 70–73, in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, 253, 270. 79. Notes on Pre-Press Briefing, August 17, 1960, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diary, Box 51, fi le: Staff Notes, August 1960 (2), DDEL 80. 448th NSC Meeting, June 22, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 690; Editorial note, in ibid., 724; Memcon, Taipei, June 18, 1960, in ibid., 680. 81. Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976), 143–54. 82. Robert Suettinger, “Introduction,” in Allen, Carver, and Elmore, Tracking the Dragon, xxiv. 83. Bowles to Alfred Kohlberg, May 31, 1956, Bowles Papers, Series 1, pt. 4: Correspondence, Box 142, fi le: 376, Yale. 84. Kenneth T. Young, Negotiating with the Chinese Communists: The United States Experience, 1953 –1967 (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968), 58. 85. Robertson memo on NSC 152, June 2, 1953, FRUS 1952–1954, vol. 14, pt. 1, 202. 86. Rankin to Harold C. Vedeler, Director of the Office of Eastern European Affairs, October 3, 1960, Rankin Papers, Box 38, fi le: “China, People’s Republic of,” Mudd. 87. NIE 100–3-60, 2; 464th NSC Meeting, October 20, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 730. 88. Edwin M. Martin Oral History Interview II, ADST, Frontline Diplomacy, http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mfdip:@field28DOCID+mfdip 2004mar1229. 89. 419th NSC Meeting, September 17, 1959, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 589. 90. Andrew J. Goodpaster Oral History, OH-3, October 11, 1977, 80, 85. 91. George B. Kistiakowsky, A Scientist at the White House (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1976), 375. 92. Michael R. Beschloss, Mayday: The U-2 Affair (New York: Harper & Row, 1986), 2. 93. Christopher Matthews, Kennedy & Nixon (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996), 159–61. 94. Howard B. Schaffer, Chester Bowles: New Dealer in the Cold War (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993), 180.

Notes to Pages 178–184 | 251

95. Chiang turned out crowds of 300,000 to celebrate Ike’s visit. Jay Taylor, The Generalissimo: Chiang Kai-shek and the Struggle for Modern China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2009), 508; Letter, Herter to Bowles, July 20, 1960, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 19, 700.

CONCLUSION 1. Stephen E. Ambrose, Eisenhower: The President (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), 13. 2. Richard Nixon, RN (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1978), 379. 3. Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation (New York: Norton, 1969), 706. 4. Noam Kochavi, A Conflict Perpetuated: China Policy during the Kennedy Years (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2002), 25. Kochavi’s is a complex and nuanced analysis of a complicated president whose China policy remained rigid during his short tenure. See his conclusions, 243–52. 5. John L. Gaddis called this the wedge strategy. Gaddis, “The American ‘Wedge’ Strategy, 1949–1955,” in Harry Harding and Yuan Ming, eds., Sino-American Relations, 1945–1955: A Joint Reassessment of a Critical Decade (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 1989), 157–83. 6. Robert A. Divine, Eisenhower and the Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981), 9. 7. Bacevich was referring specifically to the military-industrial complex. Andrew J. Bacevich, “The Tyranny of Defense Inc.,” The Atlantic, January/February 2011, 77. 8. Memo of Discussion, 271st NSC Meeting, December 22, 1955, FRUS 1955–1957, vol. 3, 228. 9. The fi rst quote comes from an interview that Robert Keohane conducted with the secretary of the Committee of One Million, Marvin Liebman. Keohane, “The Big Influence of Small Allies,” Foreign Policy (Spring 1971), 179. 10. Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976), 143–54; Richard H. Immerman, “Psychology,” in Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson, eds., Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 116–17. 11. Dorothy Borg, “Notes on Roosevelt’s ‘Quarantine’ Speech,” Political Science Quarterly 75 (September 1957), 405, 425–33. 12. Memo of Discussion, 364th NSC Meeting, May 1, 1958, FRUS 1958–1960, vol. 3: National Security Policy; Arms Control and Disarmament (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1996), 91. 13. Michael R. Adamson, “‘The Most Important Single Aspect of Our Foreign Policy’?: The Eisenhower Administration, Foreign Aid, and the Th ird World,” in Kathryn C. Statler and Andrew L. Johns, eds., The Eisenhower Administration, the

252 | Notes to Page 184

Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), 47–72. 14. Robert M. Spaulding Jr., “‘A Gradual and Moderate Relaxation’: Eisenhower and the Revision of American Export Control Policy, 1953–55,” Diplomatic History 17 (Spring 1993), 232–49. 15. Qing Simei, From Allies to Enemies: Visions of Modernity, Identity, and U.S.-China Diplomacy, 1945–1960 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007), 175. 16. On cabinet resistance, see Tor Egil Forland, “‘Selling Firearms to the Indians’: Eisenhower’s Export Control Policy, 1953–1954,” Diplomatic History 15 (Spring 1991), 226–27.

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ORAL HISTORY Anderson, Dillon. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. Bowie, Robert. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Clough, Ralph. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Drumright, Everett. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Dulles, John Foster. Seeley Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University. Goodpaster, Andrew J. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. Grant, Lindsey. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Holdridge, John. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Lacy, John A. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. MacArthur, Douglas, II. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, http://www.eisen hower.archives.gov/Research/Oral_Histories/oral_history_transcripts/Mac Arthur_Douglas_538.pdf (accessed March 13, 2010). MacArthur, Douglas, II. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. McCloy, John J. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. Marcy, Carl M. Association of Former Members of Congress, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. Martin, Edwin M. Interview II, Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Merchant, Livingston. Seeley Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University. Murphy, Robert. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. Owen, Henry D. Frontline Diplomacy: The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Robertson, Walter. John Foster Dulles Oral History Collection, 1964–1967, Seeley Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University. Smith, Gerard C. Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. Wilcox, Francis O. Association of Former Members of Congress, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

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INTERVIEWS Cline, Ray S., Washington, D.C. Clough, Ralph, Washington, D.C. Green, Marshall, Washington, D.C Han Nianlong, Beijing, China. He Fang, Beijing, China. Jiang Zhenhao, Beijing, China. Johnson, U. Alexis, Washington, D.C. Lin Ping, Beijing, China. Ma Lie, Beijing, China. Peng Di, Beijing, China. Pratt, Mark, Washington, D.C. Pu Shan, Beijing, China. Reischauer, Edwin O., Boston, Massachusetts. Sullivan, Roger, Boston, Massachusetts. Wang Bingnan, Beijing, China. Whiting, Allen, S., Beijing, China. Zhang Wenjin, Beijing, China. Zou Siyi, Beijing, China.

PUBLISHED DOCUMENTS Allen, John K., John Carver, and Tom Elmore, eds. Tracking the Dragon: National Intelligence Estimates on China During the Era of Mao, 1948–1976. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 2004. Cold War International History Project Bulletin Fall 1993; Winter 1995/1996; Fall 2007/Winter 2008. Galambos, Louis, ed. The Papers of Dwight D. Eisenhower. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001. Multivolume. U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Foreign Broadcast Information Service, open source reports. U.S. Congress, House, Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, Hearings, Department of State Appropriations, 83rd Cong, 2d sess., 1954. U.S. Consulate General, Hong Kong, Survey of China Mainland Press. U.S. Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1949, vol. 9: The Far East: China (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1974). U.S. Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950, vol. 6: East Asia and the Pacifi c (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1976).

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MISCELLANEOUS Antonov, S. F. Journal, October 14, 1959, CWHIP Bulletin, 3 (Fall 1993), 58. Drumright, Everett F. Letter to Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, July 5, 1989. Eisenhower, Dwight D. “A Chance for Peace,” American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953, http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/ike _chance_for_peace.html (accessed June 14, 2009). Foster, H. Schuyler. Letter to Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, February 24, 1979. H-Diplo Roundtable Reviews. The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Digital Documents, http://www.eisen howermemorial.org: The Eisenhower Administration, the Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006. 3(10) Scalapino, Robert. Letter to Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, June 16, 1995.

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INDEX

Accinelli, Robert, 84 Acheson, Dean, 27, 29; attacks on, xi, 14, 28, 31, 182; denounces Dulles and Esenhower, 153; Dulles, view of, 27, 28; Eisenhower, 179; Taiwan independence, 35 Adenauer, Konrad, 26 Africa, 21, 42, 46, 49, 84, 93, 103 Afro-Asian bloc, 94 Aircraft, supplied to Taiwan, 145 Algeria, 159 Allen, George V., 105 Alsop, Joseph, 153, 243n106 Ambassadorial talks, 95–101; China, Republic of, 30, 96; China Lobby, 96; Clough, Ralph, 99; Dulles, 30, 96–97; Eisenhower, 96, 100; George, Walter, 96, 98; Impact on Asia, 95; Implications for US policy, 95–100; Important link provided by, 101; Interruption of, 99–100; Johnson, Lyndon, 96; Johnson, U. Alexis, 97–98, 100, 117, 130, 155; Knowland, William, 96; Martin, Edwin, 100; Media opinion, 96; PRC, 97–98, 99, 101; Public opinion, 96; Rankin, Karl, 95, 100; Renunciation of force, 97–98, 99; Repatriation, 97, 98, 99, 218n48; Robertson, Walter, 100; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 97, 101; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 151, 155;

Unproductiveness, of, 99; US Congress, 96, 165; Wang Bingnan, 97–98. See also Johnson, U. Alexis; Wang Bingnan American Federation of Labor (AFL), 112 American Legion, 112 American prisoners in China: Geneva Conference, 117–118; Repatriation of, 66, 97–99, 117, 218n48 American Society of Newspaper Editors, 117 Anderson, Dillon, Racism of, 45 Anslinger, Harry, 168 Antonov, S.F., 154, 236n16 Apocalypse management, 14 Arbenz, Jacobo, 37 Asia First policy, 13 Astaire, Fred, 81 Atoms for Peace, 47 Australia, 60, 84, 208n14 Austria, 115, 227n2 Bacevich, Andrew, 182 Bacon, Ruth, 111, 113 Bandung Conference, 92–95, 96, 101, 216n18; Taiwan and, 94 Barnett, A. Doak, 168 Batten, Barton: Durstine and Osborn, 48 Beam, Jacob, 155

278 |

Index

Berlin, 2, 149, 160; Crisis (1958–59), 7, 17, 169, 170, 174, 179 Bermuda Conferences, (1953) 105, (1957) 132 Bidault, Georges, 105 Bikini Islands nuclear weapons testing, 101–102 Blockade of China, 22, 57, 69, 85–87, 130, 157, 180 Bohlen, Charles, 57 Bowie, Robert, 33–34, 74, 84, 119; Herter, 164; Nuclear weapons, 82–84; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 84; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 153; United Nations, 113 Bowles, Chester, 174, 176, 178 Bradley, Omar, 11 Brando, Marlon, 167 Brands, H. W., Jr., 26 Bricker Amendment, 17 Bridges, Styles, 84 Brinksmanship, 41, 99, 101 Brown v Board of Education, 1954, 47 Bundy, McGeorge, 102 Burdick, Eugene, 167 Burke, Arleigh, 150, 238n31 Burma: Anti-China operations, 37, 59; Trade with China, 126 Businessmen, 32, 61, 73, 130; Britain and China trade, 128; China Lobby, 44; Eisenhower, 9, 178; Japanese and China trade, 133; Recognition of China, 167; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 83; United Nations, 167 Cambodia, CIA in, 60 Canada, 84; Trade with China, 121, 134–135 Cantril, Hadley, 48 Carney, Robert B., 74, 79 Castro, Fidel, 43, 159 Catholic War Veterans, 112 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), 19, 36, 37; Agents imprisoned by PRC, 69; China trade, 130; Cline, Ray, 72, 143; Committee for One Million Against

the Admission of Communist China to the United Nations, 111; Eisenhower reliance upon, 42; Indonesia, 142; Intelligence assessments of PRC, 72–73, 118; Khrushchev secret speech, 108; Operation Circus (Tibet), 59–60; Operation Success (Guatemala), 37; Project Paper (China-Burma border), 59–60; Sino-Soviet relations, 106, 149, 169, 175; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 71; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 142–143, 146. See also Intelligence Central Treaty Organization (CENTO), 41 Ceylon (Sri Lanka), 94, 230n30 Chang, Gordon, 77, 87 Chase, William C., 15 Chen Jian, 57, 158 Chengdu, 81 Chiang Ching-kuo, 218n52, 236n16 Chiang Kai-shek, 29, 31, 62, 92, 96, 119, 218n52; Acheson, 27; Bowie, Robert view of, 34; China Lobby, 44, 167–168; Clay, Lucius view of, 17; Coup against, 62, 151, 236n16; Dislike of Americans, 214n85, 237n25; Distrust of, 33, 157; Distrusts others, 143; Dulles, 27, 28, 29, 31, 62, 63, 67, 242n84; Eisenhower, 8, 11, 15, 62, 63, 66, 67, 86–87, 100, 178, 180, 251n95; Japan, 133; Kennedy, 178; Khrushchev, 170; McCloy, John J., view of, 20; Merchant, Livingston view of, 35; Mongolia, 116; Murphy, Robert view of, 21; New Zealand Resolution, 76, 210n34; Offshore islands, 74, 78–79, 84–87, 89, 139–142, 178, 211n47, 215n14; PRC rejects US support for, 23; Radford, Arthur, 62, 85–86; Rankin, Karl view of, 32, 62, 100, 211n47; Return to the mainland, 62, 63, 205n38; Robertson, Walter, 31, 85–86, 214n85; Rusk, Dean, 62; secret talks with

Index | 279 China, 245n131; Sino-Soviet split, 175; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 71, 84–88; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143–144, 148–153, 155–158, 161–162, 163, 241n76; Truman administration, 35; Two Chinas policy, 92; Unleashing of, 12–13, 15, 23, 29; US embassy sacking, 142; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 30, 64, 76, 101 Chicago Daily News, 112 Childs, Marquis, 153 China, People’s Republic of: Ambassadorial talks, 30, 95–101, 130, 139, 140, 148, 154–155; American prisoners, 69, 96–99, 117–118, 218n48; Anglo-American relations, 124, 125; Attacks on, 26, 38, 62–63, 74, 80–81, 84, 157; Bandung Conference, 92–95, 96, 101, 216n18; Blockade, 22, 57, 69, 85–87, 130, 145, 157, 180; Central Intelligence Agency, 69, 71, 73, 130; Collapse, 56; Conlon report, 165–166; Containment and isolation, 56, 118, 125, 164; Covert operations against, 59–60, 142–143; Economic policies, 140, 144, 171–172, 173; Formosa Resolution, 78, 84, 101, 143; Geneva, US-China talks, 66; Geneva Conference, 28, 57, 64–65, 69, 128; Great Britain, aircraft attacked, 71; Imperialism, 23, 46; intentions, 77, 79, 81–82, 140–143, 148, 184–185; Japan, 89, 122–124, 125, 128; Kennedy, 1–4, 180; Khrushchev, 106, 107, 170–172; Korean War, 12, 22, 56–57, 59, 71, 114, 122, 124; Lebanon, 140, 144; Liberate Taiwan campaigns, 69, 77, 85, 92, 94, 98; Liberation struggles, 46, 173; Media, 83, 91, 96, 117, 125, 153, 154, 168–169; Message to Our Taiwan Compatriots, A, 155; Military threats to, 56–57, 143; Monolithic communism, 23, 28, 30, 118; Nazi Germany comparison, 45; Nuclear coercion, 22, 74, 101; Nuclear weapons, 3, 45, 81–83,

100, 141, 145–146, 175; Nuclear weapons, China development of, 101–102, 147, 171–172; Offshore islands, 74–75, 77–79, 144, 208n8, 211n47; Offshore islands, seizure of, 71, 143, 150–151; Offshore islands, US abandonment of, 78; Opportunity for opening to, 99; Overseas Chinese, 61, 203n28; Peace policy, 57–58, 61, 94–95; Psychological warfare, Jinmen, 157; Public opinion, 44, 49, 56–57, 89, 96, 112, 152, 166; Racism, 45, 46, 58–59; Raids on, 15, 56, 74, 77, 149, 157, 209n21; Recognition of, 2–3, 7, 15, 28, 96, 115, 180; Red China, 12, 15, 16, 22, 32, 33, 95, 96, 103, 114, 135, 136, 168–169; Renunciation of force, 97–99, 130, 218n50; Robertson, Walter, 45; Secret talks with Taiwan, 245n131; Sino-Soviet relations, 106–107, 110, 132, 136, 171; Sino-Soviet split, 109–110, 149, 171, 174, 176–177; Sino-Soviet split, Taiwan Strait crises, 102, 148, 174; Sino-Soviet Treaty, 1950, 109, 147, 148; Soviet Union, 32, 102, 109–110, 120, 140, 148–149, 159, 167, 169–171, 220n14; Soviet Union, curb on China, 176; Soviet Union, distrust of China, 109; Soviet Union technicians, 172–173; Strategic ambiguity, 63, 78, 143; Survivability of, 56, 59, 66, 167, 177, 180; Taiwan recovery, 32, 57, 63, 69–71, 75, 87, 91–92, 95, 142, 151, 169; Th ird World leader, 94, 103, 159; Titoism, 104–105; Trade embargo, 121–137, 165, 180, 184; Travel to, 116–118, 161, 165; Two Chinas policy, 30, 66, 76, 89–92, 100, 140, 155, 158, 170–171; United Nations, 33, 75–76, 79, 151, 152, 167, 180, 223n41; United Nations, China representation question, 2, 15, 28, 32, 34, 101, 110–118, 221n24, 223n45; US, benefits and costs of contact, 56; US aircraft, attack on, 69; US Congress, 78, 83–84, 96, 111, 118,

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China, People’s Republic of (continued ) 122, 126, 130, 132, 154, 164–165; US domestic politics, 11–12, 22, 24, 177; US fears radicalism of, 176–177; US intelligence about, 72–73, 81–82, 103, 143, 171–172; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 91, 101; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, ambassadorial talks, 66; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, off shore islands, 71, 73, 76; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, opposition to, 64, 69, 71; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, United Nations, 77; US, Taiwan dependence on, 140, 142; US threat to, 22, 69, 71, 81–83, 100, 143, 170, 182; War with, 8, 22, 77, 79, 87, 140–141, 144, 145, 148, 169, 174, 180. See also Dulles, Allen W.; Dulles, John Foster; Eisenhower, Dwight D.; Mao Zedong; Sino-Soviet relations; Sino-Soviet split; Taiwan Strait crises; Zhou Enlai China, Republic of (Taiwan), xii, 45, 61, 192n17. Abandonment of, 38, 67, 75; Ambassadorial talks, 95–100, 148; Anti-American riot, 142; Bandung, 94; Burma, 59; China Lobby, 96, 168, 178, 197n25; China Lobby, Dulles, 28, 31, 38, 55, 67, 119, 182, 197n25; China Lobby, Dulles advisers, 21, 33, 119; China Lobby, Eisenhower, 12, 13, 15, 55, 67, 119, 182; China Lobby, Joseph McCarthy, 43–44; China Lobby, trade, 123; China Lobby, travel, 118; China Lobby, US Congress, 164; Distrust, 91, 149, 150; Drumright, Everett, 31–33, 164; Dulles, 28–30, 38–39, 62, 67, 144, 150; Dulles Taiwan trip, 157; Eisenhower, 3, 8, 38–39, 66, 78, 152, 180–181; Eisenhower Taiwan trip, 161, 178; Formosa Resolution, 78, 84, 101, 143; Free China, 15, 30, 32, 67, 92; Free China, propaganda value of, 38–39, 161;

Geneva Conference, 64; Great Britain, 115; Gruenther, 20; Indonesia, 60; Intelligence cooperation, 73, 74, 141–142, 208n14; Japan, 133; Korean War, 22; MacArthur, II, 35; Mainland recovery, 91; Manipulates US, 15, 16, 29, 62, 158; Mao Zedong, 64–65; Merchant, 35–36; Military of, 15, 62, 74, 140–141, 142, 144–145, 149, 238n31; Ministry of National Defense, 149, 166; Morale in, 12, 15, 74, 144; Murphy, 22; National Security Council, 56, 74, 77, 84, 143; Offshore islands, 74–75, 78–79, 84–85, 143–145, 153–154; Offshore islands, troops in, 140; Overseas Chinese, 61, 203n28; PRC takeover of, 63, 69, 75, 79, 95; Raids on mainland, 15, 56, 74, 77, 149, 157, 209n21; Rankin, Karl, 31–33, 100; Rioting against US, 142; Secret talks with China, 245n131; SEATO, 73–74; Soviet Union, 92, 116, 145, 146, 170; Two Chinas policy, 89, 91–92, 165; United Nations, 76, 115–116, 152, 225n75; UN trusteeship, 62, 151; US arms, 69, 141, 143, 145; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 63–64, 66, 76–79, 91; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, secret codicil, 76, 210n37. See also Kuomintang (KMT) (Chinese Nationalist Party); Nationalists China Lobby, 11, 44, 57, 181–182; China Lobby in American Politics, The, 168; Dulles, 28, 31, 38, 55, 67, 119, 182, 197n25; Dulles advisers, 33, 119; Eisenhower, 12, 13, 15, 55, 67, 119, 182; Johnson, U. Alexis, 197n25; Kennedy/Nixon campaign, 178; Kohlberg, Alfred, 168; McCarthy, Joseph, 43–44; McCloy, John, 21; Opposes talks with PRC, 96; Red China Lobby, The, 168; Trade, 123; Travel to China, 118; US Congress, 164. See also Committee for One Million Against the Admission of Communist

Index | 281 China to the United Nations; U.S. Congress: China bloc China White paper, 11 Chinese Communist Party (CCP), 71 Chongqing, 81 Christian Science Monitor, 96, 117, 168 Churchill, Winston, 50, 84, 105, 106, 115, 127 Clark, Joseph S., 164 Clay, Lucius, 17, 20, 163 Clifford, Clark, 1, 4 Cline, Ray, 71, 143 Clough, Ralph, 99 Coca Cola, 21 Cold War, 103; Alignment in, 49; Alliance diplomacy, 63; Dulles, 182; Eisenhower, 10, 41, 50, 72, 182; Ending of, 57, 177; Framework for policy, xi, 39, 94, 118, 185; Kennedy, 3; Racism, 45; Sino-Soviet split, 103; Taiwan, 22; Titoism, 104–105; Truman, 42; Waging of, 49, 103 Colgate University, 167 Commander-in-Chief, Pacific (CINCPAC), 143 Committee for One Million Against the Admission of Communist China to the United Nations, 111–112 Commonweal, 83 Commonwealth, 114, 122 Communist China and Asia, 168 Congo, 2, 42, 159 Conlon report, 165–166 Containment, 10, 27, 49, 56, 166, 179 Coordinating Committee of the Paris Consultative Group (COCOM), 121–123; China Committee (CHINCOM), 123–134, 228n6 Council on Foreign Economic Policy (CFEP), 127, 130 Council on Foreign Relations, 20, 167, 168 Covert action, 7, 37, 55, 72 Cuba, 2, 7, 42, 43, 72, 159, 163, 181

Cutler, Robert, 18, 194n47 Czechoslovakia, 79 Day the World Ended, The (1956), 81 Dean, Arthur, 105 Decolonization, 27, 35, 46, 49, 93–94 Democratic Party, 12, 16, 41, 43, 49, 84; Herter, 160; Taiwan Strait crisis, 153 Denmark, 124, 133, 227n2 Detroit Free Press, 153 Dewey, Thomas, 28, 160 Dickey, John, 113 Diem, Ngo Dinh, 37 Dien Bien Phu, 37, 86, 146, 214n89 Dillon, C. Douglas, 3, 45, 160, 164 Dirksen, Everett, 16, 111 Divine, Robert, 182 Dodd, Thomas, 164 Donovan, “Wild Bill,” 37 Downey, Jack, 37 Drumright, Everett, 31, 32, 33, 164, 198n36; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143–144, 149, 150 Dulles, Allen W.: Asia, disinterest in, 16, 37; Contrast with John Foster Dulles, 16; Dulles, John Foster, adviser to, 36–37; Eisenhower view of, 16, 163; Sino-Soviet split, 106, 108, 126; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143, 146; Travel to PRC, 118; Vietnam, 37 Dulles, John Foster: Acheson, Dean, 27–28; Advisers, 30–37, 38, 58, 83, 104, 149, 157, 164 (see also individual entries); Ambassadorial talks, 30, 95; Anti-China rhetoric, 25–26, 183; Anti-communism, of, 43, 49, 50; Assumption bias, 183; Background of, 26–27; Bandung, 94; Blockade, 154, 157; Brinksmanship, 41, 99, 101; Chiang Kai-shek, 28–29, 62–63, 66, 150, 152, 157, 158, 161; Chiang Kai-shek, coup against, 62; Chiang Kai-shek and attack on PRC, 29; China, early

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Dulles, John Foster (continued ) contact, 27, 161; China, Republic of, 29–30, 38–39, 91; China and Asia, disinterest in, 37, 38, 66; China Lobby, 28, 38, 55, 67, 96, 182; Containment, 29, 49, 56, 60–61; Covert action, 59–61; Domestic politics, 27–28, 38, 181, 182; Dulles, Allen, 36–37; Eisenhower, consultation, 38; Eisenhower view of, 25, 163, 180; Europe, importance of, 27, 66, 84; European Defense Community, 64; Fear of being attacked, 27, 38, 182; Free China, 30, 38, 67; Geneva Conference, 28; Great Britain, 27, 30, 79, 81, 91, 105, 115, 131, 133; Herter, Christian, 159–160, 163, 164; Intelligence, 59, 75, 81–82, 144; Japanese Peace Treaty, 27, 28, 36, 38; Korean War, 27; Kuomintang, 28, 35, 36, 62, 91; Mao Zedong, 158; Massive retaliation, 26, 101, 147; Monolithic communism, 28, 43, 50, 104, 182; National Security Council, 30, 80, 84, 135, 146; Nationalism, 27; Nationalist Chinese, 29, 30, 63; Nationalist Chinese protests ignored, 30; New Look, 101, 146; Nuclear weapons, attitude toward, 81–82, 157; Offshore islands, 74–75; Operation Oracle, 76, 79, 242n90; Peaceful evolution, 170; Personal style, 25–26, 38, 99; Political convictions and philosophy of, 50; PRC benefits and costs of contact, 56, 181–182; PRC characterization of, 55, 58; PRC hostility toward, 29, 66, 176, 182, 183; PRC information about, 56, 71–73; PRC moderate policies toward, 31, 56, 58, 162–163, 182; PRC nuclear weapons, 99; PRC overthrow of, 72, 177; PRC policy change, 183; PRC recognition of, 28; PRC survivability of, 56, 59, 66, 177; PRC travel to, 163; PRC understanding of, 72, 176, 182; PRC war with, 66, 83,

144; Private vs public views of, 26, 30, 50, 55, 144; Public opinion, 38, 50–51, 55, 89, 182, 183; Risk management, 28, 65, 119, 144; Rollback, 26, 49, 56; Sino-Soviet split, 30, 102, 149; Smith, Walter Bedell, 19, 75; Soviet Union, 149; Strategic ambiguity, 63, 77–78; Strategic thinking, 67, 185; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 71, 73, 75–76, 79, 84, 88; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 142–155, 157–158, 174; Taiwan, trip, 157; Tibet, 59–60; Titoism, 28; Trade embargo, 129–131, 134, 210n37; Truman, Harry S, 27; Two Chinas policy, 30, 66, 89–92, 151, 158; United Nations, 1, 24, 28, 30, 62, 75–76, 112, 113, 119, 151; United Nations, Veto use, 115–116; US Congress, 37–38, 47, 55, 96, 153–154, 182; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 63–64, 66, 73–74, 76, 91, 101; War and Peace, 27; Zhou Enlai, 28, 64 Duncan, Donald B., 77 Eaton, Cyrus, 14, 240n55 Economic Defense Advisory Committee (EDAC), 131 Eden, Anthony, 79, 91, 113, 115 Egypt, 2, 15, 42 Eisenhower, Dwight D. (Ike): Acheson, 153, 179; Advisers, 16–22, 50, 74, 83, 100, 104, 132, 149, 155, 163, 174, 181 (see also individual names); Alliance strategy of, 10, 42, 63; Ambassadorial talks, 95–96; Anti-China rhetoric, 2, 8, 25–26; Anti-communism, 10, 14, 23, 43, 49, 50, 180–181; Assumption bias, 183; Background of, 7, 9–10, 11, 13; Berlin, 7, 169, 170, 179, 181; Blockade, 22, 69, 85–87, 154, 180; Business, view of, 16–17, 121–137, 178; Central Intelligence Agency, 42; “Chance for Peace” speech, 58; Chiang Kai-shek, 8, 11, 12, 15, 23, 62–63, 66, 100, 149, 151–152,

Index | 283 156, 158, 178; Chiang Kai-shek, coup against, 151; Chiang Kai-shek, distrust of, 86; China, and Asia, disinterest in, 11, 24, 50, 51, 66, 178, 181; China, judgment of, 1–4, 5, 71; China Lobby, 11, 13, 16, 55, 67, 182; Chinese Nationalists, 15, 23; Cold War, hopes to moderate, 177; Collective security, 10; Containment, 49, 56, 60–61, 179; Covert action, 2, 7, 42, 55, 59–61, 72, 180; Decision-making, 9, 13, 25, 42, 48, 50, 51, 82–83, 191n1; Decolonization, 23, 46, 49, 180; Dislikes administration policies, 24, 55, 178, 179–180, 182, 183; Domestic politics, 3, 11–12, 15–16, 22, 42, 47, 50, 55, 59, 139, 177–179, 181, 183; Dulles, Allen, 16, 108, 118, 126, 143, 146, 163; Dulles, John Foster, 9, 14, 16, 25, 87, 163, 180, 181; Dulles, John Foster, death of, 159; Europe, importance of, 2, 7, 10, 11, 12–13, 23, 50, 66, 178, 181; Fear of communism, 43, 60–61; Foreign economic policy of, 47, 55, 119, 121–137; Formosa Resolution, 78, 84, 101; Free China, 38, 67; Great Britain, 46, 86, 106, 133, 145, 151, 158; Heart attack, 110; Herter, 7, 156, 159–160, 161; Ideology, 23; Intelligence, 21, 37, 42, 59, 60, 72, 81–82, 133, 143, 172; Kennedy, 1–4, 179, 180, 181; Korean War, 11, 12, 22, 41, 57, 179; Kuomintang, 23, 156; Lame duck, 177; Mao Zedong, 7–8, 12, 23, 100, 158; Massive retaliation, 26, 82, 101; McCarthy, Joseph, 11, 43, 51; Media, 47–48; Missile gap, 110, 159; Moderation of, 65, 177, 182; Monolithic communism, 23, 43, 50, 104, 182; National Security Council, 14, 15, 42, 50, 75, 126, 131–132, 134, 135, 174; Nationalism in Asia, 22–23; New Look, 41, 86, 101, 146; Nixon, Richard M., 13–14, 127, 160, 177, 178, 179; Nuclear deterrence, 10, 100–101; Nuclear weapons, 10, 12, 22,

41, 42, 81–83, 101, 146, 159, 176, 213n73, 239n42; Offshore islands, 74–75, 84–87, 153; Operation Oracle, 77, 78, 79; Performance of, 9, 180, 182, 183; Political convictions and philosophy of, 50, 51, 86–87, 134, 177, 184; Popular culture, 81, 167, 178; Pragmatist, 9, 24; PRC, knowledge of, 171; PRC, war with, 3, 13, 63, 75, 82–83, 85, 86, 100, 174, 180–181; PRC and UN, 2, 15, 110; PRC benefits and costs of contact, 56; PRC characterization of, 55; PRC hostility toward, 66, 182; PRC information about, 56, 73; PRC isolation of, 4; PRC moderate policies toward, 56; PRC overthrow of, 7–8, 72, 177; PRC perceptions of Eisenhower, 58; PRC policy change, 178, 179–180, 181, 184–185; PRC propaganda usefulness of, 181; PRC raids on, 15; PRC recognition of, 2, 7, 15, 57, 71, 180; PRC survivability of, 56, 59, 66, 177, 180; PRC understanding of, 23, 72; Private vs public views, 15, 22, 26, 51, 55, 58, 183; Psychological warfare, 14, 42, 47, 50, 72, 126, 136, 180, 223n50; Public opinion, 1, 22, 38, 38, 48, 50–51, 55, 75, 89, 169, 178, 182, 183; Racism of, 45–46, 47, 58–59, 143; Radford, 13, 14, 82; Radford/Robertson mission, 85–87; Risk management, 3, 7, 13, 24, 51, 65, 78, 82, 85–87, 100, 119, 180, 183; Rollback, 49, 56; Self-confidence of, 13, 77; SinoSoviet relations, 106; Sino-Soviet split, 102, 149, 169, 173, 175, 181; Soviet Union, 2, 7, 8, 10, 57, 149, 159, 170, 172, 174, 175, 180, 181; Strategic ambiguity, 143; Strategic thinking, 67, 86–87; Taiwan, 3, 15; Taiwan amphibious lift capabilities, 152, 180; Taiwan Strait crises, 2, 3, 7, 15, 100, 181; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 71, 73, 78–79, 83, 84, 89–101; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 139–141, 143–149, 151–156, 158, 174;

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Eisenhower, Dwight D. (Ike) (continued ) Taiwan, visit, 178; Th reat to Kennedy, 1–4, 180, 181, 185; Tibet, 59–60; Trade with PRC, 23, 57, 121–137, 180, 183–184; Truman, Harry S, 11, 12, 14, 15, 23, 42, 49, 179; Two Chinas policy, 3, 89, 91, 92, 100; United Nations, 2, 15, 24, 77, 110, 112, 119, 180, 183, 184; Unleashed Chiang Kai-shek, 12–13, 15, 23, 29; US Congress, 16, 47, 55, 86–87, 154, 183; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 63, 101. See also Dulles, John Foster; Herter, Christian Eisenhower, Milton, 18, 20 Engle, Clair, 164 European Defense Community, 41, 64 Far East Economic Defense Working Group, 129 Fecteau, Richard, 37 Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 43, 45; Suspicious of Chinese Americans, 61 Felt, Harry D., 143 Finletter, Thomas, 167 Fly, The (1958), 81 Ford Foundation, 20, 160 Ford Motor Company, 134 Foreign Operations Administration, 130 Formosa, 16, 76, 92, 93, 145, 164, 169, 177, 192n17. See also China, Republic of (Taiwan) Formosa Resolution, 1955, 78, 84, 101, 143 Formosa Strait, 12 Fortress America, 147 Foster, H. Schuyler, 48 France, 27, 37, 58, 60, 124, 133; Geneva Conference, 63–66 Fulbright, J. William, 160, 165, 166; Ugly American, 167 Gallup, George, 48 Gallup polling, 96, 217n32, 245n148

Gardner, Ava, 81 Gates, Thomas, 163 General Federation of Women’s Clubs, 112 General Motors, 13 Geneva Conference, 19, 64, 69, 115, 127 George, Walter, 37, 91, 96, 217n34; PRC, 28, 57, 64–65, 69, 128; Sino-American talks, 66, 93; Sino-Soviet relations, 106 Germany, 26, 27, 45, 124, 181; As campaign issue, 42; As divided nation, 91, 170; Soviet Union, 109, 159, 169, 170 Godzilla (1956), 81 Gold Star Mothers, 112 Gong Li, 158 Goodpaster, Andrew J.: China, 21, 149; Relationship with Eisenhower, 21 Gore, Albert, 164 Graham, Philip, 20 Grand Old Party. See Republican Party Gray, Gordon, 163 Great Britain, 27, 30, 46, 58, 65, 90, 158, 190n5; Aircraft attacked, 71; Ambassadorial talks, 99; Churchill, Winston, 105, 106; Conlon Report, 166; Dien Bien Phu, 86–87; Eden, Anthony, 79, 91, 113; Hong Kong, 73, 122, 154; Indonesia, 60; Influence over US, 115; Geneva Conference, 64, 128; Nuclear weapons, 81; Radford, 128; Rankin, 32; Robertson, 131; Sino-Soviet split, 173; Suez, 11, 154; And Taiwan, 84, 90; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 145, 151; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 154; Trade embargo, 122, 124–125, 127, 128, 131–133, 136, 166; United Nations, 114, 115, 129, 169; US irrational on China, 81 Great Leap Forward, 72, 137, 140, 158, 172 Greece, 57, 227n2 Green, Marshall, 150, 162, 165, 242n90 Green, Theodore F., 154 Grew, Joseph, 160 Gromyko, Andrei, 147, 240n59

Index | 285 Grose, Peter, 36 Gruenther, Alfred M., 16, 20 Guatemala, 2, 7, 14, 39, 61; Covert action, 37, 42, 55, 72–73, 180 Hagerty, James, 48 Hainan Island, As military base, 110 Hall, Leonard, 17 Halleck, Charles, 16 Halperin, Morton, 150 Hammarskjold, Dag, 79, 114 Harding, Warren G., 160 Harriman, Averell, 169 Harsch, Joseph, 221n24 Harvard University, 153, 164 Harvey, Laurence, 167 Hastings, Max, 45 Hatoyama Ichiro, 126 He Di, 77, 87 Herter, Christian, 20, 26, 159–178; Asia, knowledge of, 7, 160; Background of, 160; Chiang Kai-shek view of, 161; China, recognition, 161; Cuba, 163; Disability of, 160; Eisenhower, relationship with, 159–160; Free China, 161; Ignored by Dulles, 160–161; Khrushchev US visit, 163; Personality of, 160–161; PRC travel to, 163, 165; PRC war with, 174; Presidential possibility, 160; Secretary of State, 163–164; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 141–142, 145, 150 Hinton, Harold, 83 Hiroshima, 145 Hiss, Alger, 28 Hitler, Adolph, 79 Ho Chi Minh, 114, 223n41 Hong Kong, 61, 117, 154; Espionage base, 73; Trade controls, 122, 124, 129 Hoopes, Townsend, 34 Hoover, Herbert, 160 Hoover, J. Edgar, 43, 45 Hopkins, Harry, 17

Hornbeck, Stanley, 167 Howard, Roy, 84 Hughes, Emmet, 10, 16, 160 Humphrey, George, 17, 19, 22, 123, 127, 163 Humphrey, Hubert, 83; Khrushchev disparages China to, 172; Travel to PRC, 118, 165 Hungary, 1956: revolution in, 42, 60, 106, 222n24 Hurley, Patrick, 31 Immerman, Richard, xiii, 38 India, 15, 36, 58–59, 93, 105; Sino-Indian border, 109, 166; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 154; United Nations, 113–114, 165, 167 Indochina, 7, 42, 56, 106; French war, 22, 37, 43, 71; Geneva Conference, 19, 63–64, 115, 127 Indonesia, 61, 93; Covert action in, 7, 60, 72, 142, 180; Sukarno, 60, 142; Trade with China, 126 Institute of Pacific Relations, 105 Intelligence, 103; Ambassadorial talks, 97; China, estimates of, 56, 72, 79, 82–83, 130, 171, 172; Corona spy satellite, 171; Donovan, “Wild Bill,” 37; Dulles, Allen, 16, 36, 37; Eisenhower, 72; Goodpaster, Andrew, 21; Great Britain, 133; Hong Kong, 73; Khrushchev secret speech, 108; Korean War, 19; Navy P-2V Neptune aircraft, 171; Nuclear weapons, 19, 84, 171; Off shore islands, 74, 75; Republic of China, cooperation with, 73, 141–142, 157; Signals intelligence, 73, 208n14; Sino-Soviet split, 106, 147, 175–176; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 75; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143, 144, 149; U-2, 172; US, 69, 72, 118, 176; Vietnam, 60. See also Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); National Intelligence Estimates (NIE); U-2 spy plane

286 |

Index

International Cooperation Administration (ICA), 130 Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 43 Iran, 2, 7, 14, 42, 55, 61, 72 Ireland, 115 Israel, 57; Khrushchev secret speech, 106; Trade embargo, 130 Japan, xii, 11, 35, 56, 64, 159, 164; China, relations with, 89, 122–124, 125, 128; Dietman’s League for the Promotion of Sino-Japanese Trade, 123, 128; Dulles, 27, 82; Eisenhower, 82; Korean War, 22; Nuclear weapons, 84, 102; Occupation of, 21; Peace Treaty, 27–28, 36, 38, 62, 123; Racism, 44, 58; Sino-Soviet split, 174; Taiwan, 133, 141, 144, 151, 154; Trade embargo, 122–125, 128, 132–136, 184; Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, 35; United Nations, 165; US alliance, 159 Jenner, William E., 111 Jewish War Veterans, 112 Johnson, Lyndon B., 84, 96, 101, 160; Eisenhower, 16, 110; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 154; Trade embargo, 132 Johnson, U. Alexis, 19; Ambassadorial talks, 30, 97–98, 100, 117, 130, 155; Wang Bingnan, 97–98 Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS): Dachen island evacuation, 78; Sino-Soviet split, 175; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 74; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 142–145, 149, 150–153; Trade embargo, 133; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 77 Jones, Matthew, 83 Journalists, 79, 83, 152, 169; China Lobby, 44; China trade, 123; Eisenhower and, 47; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 153; Travel restrictions, 118, 161, 165 Judd, Walter: China Lobby, 84, 111; Dulles, 28; Robertson, 31; Travel to PRC, 34, 117–118, 161, 163

Kaufman, Burton, 131 Kem Amendment, 1951, 122 Kennedy, John F., xi, 174, 179; 1960 election campaign and offshore islands, 177–178; China, 1–4, 180; Domestic politics, 3; Eisenhower, 2, 177, 179, 190n5; Military capabilities of US, 147; Nixon, 177–178; Nuclear weapons, 3; Sino-Soviet split, 3; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 154; Th reatened by Eisenhower, 1–4, 7; Tibet, 60 Kerensky, Alexander, 170 Khrushchev, Nikita: Berlin crisis, 169, 170; Chiang Kai-shek, 170; China, and, 106, 107, 170–171; Eisenhower, 159, 170; Mao Zedong, 108, 109, 147, 170, 172; Military cooperation with China, 110, 147, 171, 172; secret speech, 106, 107–108; Sino-Soviet split, 118–119; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 144, 147, 148–149, 169–170, 241n76; Two Chinas, 170, 171; U-2, 159, 172; US visit, 49, 163, 170 Kissinger, Henry, 158, 181, 194n47, 215n14 Klochko, Mikhail, 172 Knowland, William, 83, 84, 96, 164, 168; American prisoners in China, 69; Dulles, 37; Eisenhower, view of, 16; Trade embargo, 130; Travel to PRC, 118; United Nations, 111 Koen, Ross Y., 168 Kohlberg, Alfred, 168 Koo, V.K. Wellington, 45, 76 Korea, 56, 63, 91, 144; Covert action in, 37; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 154 Korean War, 11, 19, 42, 44, 55, 116, 179; bacteriological warfare, charges of, 45; China, 12, 22, 56–57, 59, 71, 114, 122, 124; Eisenhower trip to, 41; Geneva Conference, 64; McConaughy, 32; Nuclear threats, 100; Panmunjom talks, 98, 105; Public opinion, 56, 57, 111; Racism in, 45; Soviet Union, 107, 108;

Index | 287 Trade embargo, 111, 122–127; United Nations, 76, 111, 113, 114 Kremlin, 23, 56 Krock, Arthur, 163 Kuomintang (KMT) (Chinese Nationalist Party), 12; Acheson, 29; Distrust of US, 91; Dulles, 29–30; Merchant, 35; Offshore islands, 71; Return to the mainland, 62, 91; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 146; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 76; US support, 31. See also China, Republic of (Taiwan) Kuter, Laurence S., 145 LaMay, Curtis, 81 Landsdale, Edward, 37 Lansbury, Angela, 167 Lansing, Robert, 25, 36 Laos, 2, 3, 159, 190n12; Pathet Lao, 60 Larmon, Sigurd, 48 Lebanon, 42, 72, 140, 144, 154 Lederer, William, 167 Leigh, Janet, 167 Levine, Steven I., 172 Li Mi, 59 Life magazine, 91, 99 Lilley, James, 73, 91, 99 Lin Ke, 170 Lippmann, Walter, 153, 169 Little Rock school crisis, 45 Lloyd, Selwyn, 81, 151–152, 154 Lodge, Henry Cabot, Jr.33; U.S. UN representative, 111, 113, 160 Los Angeles Mirror and Daily News, 83 Luce, Henry, 113 MacArthur, Douglas, General, 11, 20, 22, 38 MacArthur II, Douglas, 34–35, 84; Ambassador to Japan, 164; Decolonization, 35; Dulles, 33 Macmillan, Harold, 30; Trade embargo, 132–133

Macmillan publishing company, 168 Magsaysay, Ramon, 37 Mainland recovery, 63, 76, 91 Malaya, 61, 126 Malenkov, Georgii, 57 Malinovsky, Rodin, 148 Manchurian Candidate, The, 116, 166–167, 178 Mao Zedong, 19, 43, 127; Chinese Tito, 28, 109; Dulles, 28, 140; Eisenhower, 7–8, 12, 23, 100; Eisenhower/Dulles split, perceived, 65; Geneva Conference, 65; Great Leap Forward, 72, 13; Hopes to split US and Taiwan, 142; Lebanon, 144; McConaughy, 32; Nuclear weapons, view of, 59, 101–102, 147, 171–172; Peace policy of, 61, 110; Rankin, 32; Revolution, 61; Sino-Soviet split, 102, 107–109, 169–172; Soviet Union, 109, 110, 148–149; Sputnik, 109–110; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 69, 71–87, 101; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 139–140; Two Chinas policy, 92, 151, 158; Uprising against, 7–8, 19, 37, 56; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 64; US policy, 57–58, 65, 71, 79, 99, 148, 155 Marks, Frederick, 163 Marshall, George C., 11, 20, 155 Martin, Edwin, 170, 177; Ambassadorial talks, 100 Massive retaliation, 26, 82, 101, 147 Matador missiles, 141 Mazu (Matsu), 78, 84, 85, 93, 140, 143, 144, 146, 152, 154 McCarthy, Joseph, 11, 27, 37, 43–44, 51; Trade embargo, 124, 130, 231n45 McClellan, John, 130 McCloy, John J., 20–21, 155, 160, 164 McConaughy, Walter, 31–32, 129 McCone, John, 171 McElroy, Neil, 151, 158, 163, 174 Meany, George, 112

288 |

Index

Media, 33, 43, 48, 108; China, 117, 125; Newspapers, 48, 73, 91, 112, 117, 154, 166, 168, 169; Radio, 48, 73; Television, 43, 48, 171; Used by administration, 47–48. See also names of individual media outlets Melby, John, 72 Menon, Vengalil Krishnan, 114, 245n131 Merchant, Livingston, 33, 35–36, 74, 164 Middle East, 46, 93, 103, 131, 144, 149, 180 Mikoyan, Anastas, 174 Molotov, Vyacheslav, 20, 106, 115 Mongolia, United Nations, 115–116 Morocco, 42 Morse, Wayne, 83, 154 Moscow. See Soviet Union Munich, 83, 96, 145 Murphy, Robert, 19, 22 Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act (the Battle Act), 122, 230n130 Nanjing, 35 Nasser, Gamal Abdel, 15 National Intelligence Estimates (NIE), 106; NIE, 13–60, 1960, 175 National Opinion Research Center (NORC), 48 National Security Agency (NSA), 73 National Security Council (NSC), 17, 29, 42, 78, 91, 131, 174, 182, 183; Dulles, 30, 82, 84, 146; Dulles, Allen, 106; Eisenhower, 15, 42, 50, 75, 126; Goodpaster, 21; MacArthur, II, 34; National Security Act, 1947, 42; NSC 48/5, 1951, 114; NSC 146/2, 1953, 74, 77, 114; NSC 162/2, 1953, 74; NSC 166/1, 1953, 56, 104, 114; NSC 5429/2, 1954, 77; NSC 5429/5 1954, 56, 77, 127, 129, 163; NSC 5516/1, 1955, 128; NSC 5704/1, 1957, 131; NSC 5904, 1959, 174; Trade embargo, 123–124, 130–143 National Steel Corporation, 83 Nationalism, 35, 46, 49, 131, 176

Nationalists: Aircraft, 145; Alsop, Joseph, 153; Burma, 59; China, harassment of, 158; Dulles, 28, 63; Eisenhower, 8, 15, 22, 23; Great Britain, 115; Indonesia, 240n30; Intelligence, 73; Lodge, 33; mainland, attacks on, 22, 63, 77; McConaughy, 32; Offshore islands, 77, 85; PRC, blockade of, 87; Public opinion, 57; Smuggling charges against, 168; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 83; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143, 149, 150, 157, 242n78; Two Chinas, 89, 91–92; Unimportance of, 35; United Nations, 75–76, 116; Unleashing of, 12; US commitment to, 141; US Congress, 84; US domestic politics, 55, 75; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 63, 77; World War II, 17. See also China, Republic of (Taiwan); Kuomintang (KMT) (Chinese Nationalist Party) Nehru, Jawaharlal, 15, 57, 58, 60, 113, 154, 221n24 Netherlands, 133, 227n2 New China News Agency, 92 New Look, 41, 86, 101, 146; Solarium project, 41 New Republic, 83, 168 New York Herald Tribune, 22, 153 New Zealand, 75–76, 79, 84, 154; United Nations resolution (Operation Oracle), 75–76, 79 Nie Rongzhen, 108, 172 Nixon, Richard, 179; 1960 election campaign and offshore islands; Chiang Kai-shek, 64; Eisenhower view of, 13–14, 177, 178; Herter, 160; Kennedy, 177–178; Offshore islands, 177–178; Public opinion, 153; Republicans, 78; Sino-Soviet split, 175; State Department, 153; Trade, and, 127; United Nations, 76 Nonaligned movement, 93, 101

Index | 289 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 9, 11, 20, 21, 34, 41, 42, 63, 109, 125, 133, 154, 169, 179 Norway, 124, 133, 227n2 Nuclear weapons, 128; Atoms For Peace, 47; Chiang Kai-shek, 157; China’s development of, 101–102, 147, 171–172; Dien Bien Phu, 86–87; Dulles, 82, 144, 146–147, 157, 213n65, 213n73; Eisenhower, 10, 12, 22, 41, 42, 81–83, 101, 146, 159, 176, 213n73, 239n42; Great Britain, 133; Joint Chiefs of Staff, 145–146; Kennedy, 3; Matador missiles, 141; New Look, 41, 101; Open Skies, 47; paper tigers, 102; Proliferation of, 42; Robertson, 209n24; Sino-Soviet nuclear sharing agreement, 1957, 171; Soviet Union, 102, 106, 108, 147, 171–172, 175, 240n59, 248n54, 249n55; Th reats and, 22, 74, 81–82, 100–101; Use of, 45, 81–84, 141, 143, 145–147, 154, 212n61 Offshore islands: China seizure of, 71, 143, 150–151; Dachen islands, 71, 77–79, 208n8, 211n47; Defense of, 19, 21–22, 63, 74–75, 83–84, 102, 146, 153–154, 161, 208n20; Dongshan, 71, 208n8; Dulles, 63, 78, 92, 143, 158; Eisenhower, 63, 89, 139, 149, 151, 158; Evacuation of, 20, 78, 84–85, 87, 142, 148, 151–152, 155, 158, 165, 211n47, 211n49, 215n14; Herter, 161; Insignificance of, 74–75, 144, 146; Jinmen (Quemoy), 71, 92, 140, 143, 149, 153; Kennedy/Nixon campaign, 177–178; Mao Zedong, 69–87, 92, 139–158; Public opinion, 246n148; Smith, Gerard, 145, 151; Taiwanese public opinion, 154; Th reat to China, 71, 78; Troop concentrations on, 140–142, 144, 149, 153, 237n27; United Nations, 79; US influence on, 74, 211n47; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 71, 76, 78;

Yijiangshan island, 77–78, 79, 208n8. See also Taiwan Strait crisis (1954); Taiwan Strait crisis (1958) On the Beach (1957, 1959), 81 Open Skies, 47 Operations Coordinating Board (OCB), 47, 94 Organization for European Economic Cooperation, 121 Ormsby-Gore, David, 190n5 Overseas Chinese, 61–62, 164 Pakistan, 94 Pancha Shila, 57, 61, 216n17 Panda bears, 125 Paris, 23, 127, 160; Paris Consultative Group (COCOM), 121, 129; Summit, 1960 Parsons, J. Graham, 164, 165, 170; Nuclear weapons, 146 Peaceful coexistence, 45, 48, 57, 58, 99, 103, 107, 110, 175, 176 Pearson, Lester, 115 Peck, Gregory, 81 Peng Dehuai, 155 Pentagon, 11, 73, 77, 124, 146, 152, 163 Perkins, Anthony, 81 Pescadores islands, 76, 78 Peurifoy, John, 37 Philippines, 37, 38, 46; China and threat, 35; Eisenhower, 11; Indonesia, 60; US alliance with, 63 Phleger, Herman: Ambassadorial talks, 36; Dulles, 33, 36 Pleshakov, Constantine, 108 Poland: Khrushchev secret speech, 108; Warsaw-Beijing axis, 222n25 Policy Planning Staff, 33, 64 Port Arthur, 107 Porter, Charles O., 165 Portugal, 124, 133, 227n2 Pravda, 175

290 | Index Princeton University, 21, 36 Psychological Strategy Board, 47, 73 Psychological warfare, 47, 157; Eisenhower, 14, 42, 50, 72, 126 Public opinion, 48–49, 56, 75, 89, 92, 96, 166, 168; Asia, disinterest, in, 48; Dulles, 38, 50–51, 55, 115; Eisenhower, 1, 22, 50–51, 55, 135–136, 152, 178, 182; Europe, importance of, 48; Polls, 89, 112; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 152–153 Racism, xii, 44–45; Bandung, 93–94; Decolonization, 46, 93; Eisenhower, 45–46, 47, 58–59, 143; Impact on US foreign policy, 46, 58; Soviet Union exploits it, 45–46; Taiwan, 142 Radford, Arthur W., 129, 193n22; Asia fi rst policy, 13; Chiang Kai-shek, 62, 153; Eisenhower, 13, 14, 82, 86; Great Britain, 128; Sino-Soviet split, 126; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 74, 81, 85; Trip to Taiwan, 1955, 85; Rand Corporation, 107, 150 Randall, Clarence, 127 Rankin, Karl, 164; advises CKS to ignore Washington, 62; Ambassadorial talks, 95, 100; Dulles, 31, 62, 114; Republic of China, sympathy with, 31–33, 100; Sino-Soviet relations, 176; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 75; Two Chinas policy, 32, 92; United Nations, 114 Rayburn, Sam, 16, 160 Red China. See China, People’s Republic of Red China Lobby, 168 Red Flag, 174 Reischauer, Edwin O., 153, 164 Reporter magazine, 83 Republican National Committee, 48 Republican Party, 1, 2, 16, 17, 41, 160; Acheson, 153; Ambassadorial talks, 96; China, 3, 11–12, 15, 17, 23, 56, 67, 167; China Lobby, 164; Dulles, 25, 28, 33,

38, 64, 144, 147; Eisenhower, 8, 12, 15, 22, 24, 121; Formosa Resolution, 78; McCarthy, Joseph, 43; Missile gap, 110; Nixon, 78; Offshore islands, 177; Right and isolationist wing, 34, 55, 66, 84, 119, 144, 183; Titoism, 105–106; United Nations, 112 Reston, James, 99, 153 Ridgway, Matthew B., 174 Roberts, Henry, 167 Robertson, Walter S., 26, 32, 33, 164; Ambassadorial talks, 98, 100; Anticommunism of, 31; Bowie, 34; China, 176; China, Republic of, sympathy with, 31; Conlon report, 166; Eisenhower, 86; Judd, 31; Nuclear weapons, 146; SEATO, 73; Sino-Soviet relations, 176; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 74, 86; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 150, 151; Trade embargo, 129, 131; Trip to Taiwan, 1955, 85 Robinson, William, 22 Rockefeller, David, 167 Rockefeller Foundation, 91 Rollback, 49, 56 Roosevelt, Franklin D., xi, 48, 93; Quarantine Speech, 1937, 183 Rusk, Dean, 1, 28, 62, 91, 189nn1 and 2 Scarselleta, Mario, 45 Scott, Robert H., 31 Sebald, William, 95 Shanghai, 32, 81, 141, 145 Sidewinder missiles, 145 Sinatra, Frank, 167 Sino-Soviet relations, 103–110, 171; Joint naval fleet, 110; Joint stock companies with China, 107; Long wave radio stations, 110; Nuclear sharing agreement, 1957, 171; Soviet assistance, 106–107, 132, 136; Sputnik, 110; Treaty, 1950, 109, 147, 148; US, 23, 72, 136, 176.

Index | 291 See also Khrushchev, Nikita; SinoSoviet split; Soviet Union Sino-Soviet split, 149; Chiang Kai-shek, 175; China threat, 176–177; Doubts about, 3, 104–106, 119; Dulles, 103–105, 119; Eisenhower, 103–105, 106, 119; Great Britain, 173; Ideology, 176; Intelligence, 106, 147, 175–176; Japan views on, 174; Joint Chiefs of Staff, 175; Kennedy, 3; “Long Live Leninism!” 174; McElroy, Neil, 174; Nationalism, 176; Nuclear weapons, 171; ROC views on, 174; Soviet hostility toward China, 109–110; Soviet technicians depart, 172–173; State Department Intelligence and Research, 175; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 102; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 148, 174; Th ird world, 109; Tibet independence, 171; Titoism, 104–105; Two Chinas policy, 171; US strategy toward, 105, 108–109, 163, 169, 181; US understanding of, 102, 103, 169, 173, 175, 176, 248n44. See also Khrushchev, Nikita; Sino-Soviet relations; Soviet Union Smith, Gerard C.: Geneva, 19; Nuclear weapons, 82, 145–146; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143–144, 151; Two Chinas policy, 151 Smith, H. Alexander, 84 Smith, Walter Bedell, 33; Dulles, Allen, 19; China, 20, 106; CIA, 19; Dulles, John Foster, 19; Eisenhower, 19, 34; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 75 Smoot, Roland, 143, 149, 150 South Africa, 49 Southeast Asia, 61, 66, 144, 148, 167 Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), 35, 41 Sovetskaya Rossiya, 175 Soviet Union, 2, 10, 13, 27, 28, 42, 145, 167; China, 32, 102, 110, 159, 167, 176; Distrust of China, 109; Dulles, 30,

57, 66, 91; Eisenhower, 2, 7, 8, 66, 72, 126, 180–181; Geneva Conference, 64; Intelligence operations, 73; Mao on, 107–108, 140; McConaughy, 32; Nuclear war, 146–147; Nuclear weapons, 102, 171, 172; Peaceful coexistence, 57; Sino-Soviet split, 103, 169, 173–176; Soviet curb on China, 176; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 75; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 139; Technicians withdraw from China, 172–173; Technician withdrawal, US analysis of, 173; Trade, 49, 122, 124, 129, 132; U-2, 159; United Nations, 114–116 Soy sauce, 135 Spain, 49, 115, 225n75 Sparkman, John, 165 Sputnik, 43; PRC, 109–110 Stalin, Joseph, 57; China, 107, 109; Dulles, 27; Eisenhower, 10, 58; Khrushchev secret speech, 106, 107–108; Sino-Soviet split, 26, 107–109 Stassen, Harold, 76 Stevenson, Adlai, 153 Strategic Air Command, 81, 145 Strategic ambiguity, 143 Stuart, John Leighton, 31 Stump, Felix, 21 Suettinger, Robert, 72 Suez, 7, 42, 60, 131, 132, 154 Sullivan and Cromwell, 36 Summit meetings, 49, 132, 159, 170 Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers in Europe, 21 Symington, Stuart, 130 Taft, Robert, 34 Taiwan. See Chiang Kai-shek; China, Republic of (Taiwan); Kuomintang (KMT) (Chinese Nationalist Party); Nationalists Taiwan, Republic of, 165

292 | Index Taiwan Defense Command, 143, 149 Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 69–87, 139, 140; American prisoners, 69; Business community, 83; Chiang Kai-shek, 1, 74, 76, 78, 84–85, 87; Chinese caution, 21, 77; Cultural misunderstanding, 77; Diplomatic solution, 75–76; Dulles, 71–79, 81–83; Eisenhower, 69, 71, 78–87; Foreign opposition, 84, 121; Formosa Resolution, 78–79, 84; Intelligence, 71–73, 79; Mao’s intentions, 69, 71, 73, 77, 79, 101; Naval blockade proposed, 69, 85–87; Nuclear weapons threats, 81–83, 100; Radford-Robertson mission, 84–86; Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, 71, 73–74; Taiwan, liberation of, 69–71, 74; Trade 127; United Nations (Operation Oracle), 75–76, 79; US and garrison of islands, 74; US Congress, 78–79, 83–84; US intervention, 74–75; US policy, 74, 78, 100; US responsibility for, 74; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 30, 71, 73, 76–77; War scare, 79–81, 83. See also Offshore islands Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 139–158; Alarmist reactions, 144; Ambassadorial talks, 139, 140, 148, 154; Chiang Kai-shek, 140–141, 143, 149, 150, 151, 152, 155, 156, 158; China, 144; Democratic Party, 153; Distrust, 149–150; Dulles, 143, 144, 146–147, 149, 151, 157, 158; Eisenhower, 139, 143, 144, 148–149, 151, 156, 158; Foreign views of, 153–154, 157, 158; Formosa Resolution, 143; Intelligence, 143, 147, 149, 157; Khrushchev, 241n76; Lebanon, 140, 144, 149; Mao Zedong, 139, 140, 147–148, 155, 156; Media, 153; Naval convoys, 139, 149; Nuclear weapons, 143, 145–147, 157; Offshore island evacuation, 148, 151–152, 155, 158; PRC attack by, 139, 140, 143, 155, 157;

PRC attack on, 145; PRC domestic reform, 158; Public opinion, 151–153, 158; ROC morale, 144, 146; ROC troops, 140–141, 142, 144–145, 149; Settlement of, 150–151, 154–156, 157; Sidewinder missiles, 145; Soviet Union, 140, 143, 145, 147–149, 155, 174, 240n55; Taiwan, liberation of, 142; Test of US resolve, 140; Two Chinas policy, 140, 141, 151, 155, 158; United Nations, 150–151, 155; US anticipation of, 139, 143; US commitment to, 143–144, 145; US Congress, 153–154, 158; US military, 143, 145, 149; US-ROC joint communiqué, 157; US understanding of motives, 156; War, possibility of, 148, 157; Zhou Enlai, 148, 154, 155–156, 158. See also Offshore islands Taiwan Strait crisis (1962), 139 Taubman, William, 107 Th ird Force, 19, 73 Th ird World, 2, 27, 35, 46, 93, 94, 109 Thompson, Llewellyn, 163, 170, 173 Tibet: China, 59–60, 142, 166; CIA, 59–60, 142; Dalai Lama, 59–60; Khrushchev, 171 Time magazine, 83 Tito, Josip Broz, 28, 32, 105 Titoism, 104, 105, 109, 196n19 Tonkin Gulf Resolution, 101 Toronto Globe and Mail, 135 Trade, 56, 121–137; Advocacy of, 32, 135; Ambassadorial talks, and, 97, 99, 218n43, 218n48; Canada, 134–135; China Committee (CHINCOM), 123–134, 228n6; China’s economy, 125; Conlon report, 166; Coordinating Committee of the Paris Consultative Group (COCOM), 121–123, 134; Decontrol, 135, 222n24; Dulles, 129–131, 134, 210n37; Economic Defense Advisory Committee, 131; Eisenhower, 15, 24, 57, 121, 125–127, 129–137, 180, 182, 184;

Index | 293 France, 124, 127, 131, 133, 227n2; Great Britain, 122, 127–129, 131, 133, 214n81, 227n2, 228nn13–14, 230n37; Hong Kong, 124–125; Humphrey, George, 123, 127; Japan, 122–124, 125, 128, 132, 133, 134, 228nn13–14, 223n68; Korean War, 122, 126; Labor unions, 136; Public opinion, 136; restrictions, 23, 24, 55, 97, 111; ROC disruption of, 74, 155; Soviet Union, 49, 126, 136; US coercion of Europe, 229n17; US Congress, 122, 130, 132, 137, 164–165; US economy, impact on, 132; US military opposition to decontrol, 128–129, 130, 134; Weeks, Sinclair, 230n36 Travel restrictions, 34, 55, 99, 103, 116–118, 119, 161, 165, 217n40 Treaties: Aviation treaty with China, 1946, 36; Berlin treaty, 169; China, treaty obligations, 114; Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, 1945, 107, 147; Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance, 1950, 107, 109, 116, 148; US-Japan Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, 35. See also Japan; Peace treaty; US-Republic of China Mutual Defense Treaty Truman, Harry S, 1, 41, 42, 179; Acheson, 153, 179, 182; China, 3, 11, 12, 15, 17, 23, 35, 37, 153, 167; CIA, 37; Dulles, 27–28, 42, 62, 82, 90, 91, 182; Eisenhower, 14, 41, 42, 49, 153, 179; Finletter, 167; Loyalty and security program, 42; Merchant, 35; National Security Council, 42; Presidential transition, 179; Psychological Strategy Board, 47, 73; Rollback, 49; Rusk, 91; Smith, Walter Bedell, 19; Taiwan, 90; Tibet, 59; Titoism, 104–105; Trade embargo, 121, 123; Travel restrictions, 116; United States Information Agency, 47 Tsiang, T.F., 113

Tunisia, 42 Turkey, 57, 227n2 Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, 1956, 107–109 Twining, Nathan F., 74, 81, 145, 152 Two Chinas policy, 89–92, 100, 113, 140, 151, 155, 157, 158; Barnett, A. Doak, 168; Bowie, Robert, 34; China, 76, 91, 171; China Lobby, 168; China, Republic of, 91–92; Divided Germany, 170; Dulles, 30, 32, 34, 66, 76, 89–92; Eisenhower, 3, 89–92; George, Walter, 91; Great Britain, 32, 90; Khrushchev, 170, 171; Louisville Courier Journal, 168; Operation Oracle, 76; Rankin, 32; Rusk, 91; United Nations, 32, 76, 167; Wall Street Journal, 91 U-2 spy plane, 43, 60, 159, 171, 172, 177 Ugly American, The, 167 United Nations, 64; Bacon, 113; Britain, 115; China representation question, 2, 15, 28, 32, 34, 101, 110–118, 221n24, 223n45; Dulles, 28, 34, 110, 113; Eisenhower, 2, 15, 110; Funding, threats to, 112; Korean War, 111; Lodge, 33; Mongolia, 115–116, 225n75; Moratorium, 114; Operation Oracle, 76, 77, 79, 242n90; Soviet Union, 110; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 79, 83; Trusteeship, 29, 62, 151; Veto use, 113 United States Information Agency (USIA), 47 U.S. Air Force, 74, 82, 145, 167, 175 U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 135 U.S. Congress, 66; Ambassadorial talks, 96, 98, 164–165; American prisoners in China, 69; Appropriations from, 176; Bricker Amendment, 17; Chiang Kai-shek, 63–64; China bloc, 28, 43, 55, 105, 164–165, 182; China, travel to, 118, 165; China, views of, 164–165; Committee

294 | Index U.S. Congress, 66 (continued ) of One Million, 165, 182; Confi rmation hearings, 10, 33; Conlon Report, 165–166; Dien Bien Phu, 86–87; Drumright, 33; Dulles, 33, 37, 91, 153–154; Eisenhower, 15, 16, 47, 137, 169, 183; Formosa resolution, 78–79, 84, 101; Herter, 160; McCarthy, 43–44; Public opinion, 48, 153; SinoSoviet, relations, 176; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 73, 75, 81, 83–84; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 153, 158; Trade embargo, 121, 122, 126, 127, 130, 131, 132, 135, 137; Unleashing Chiang, 12; US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, 73; White House congressional liaison staff, 15, 47 U.S. Department of Defense, 13; Massive retaliation, 147; and television, 47; Trade embargo, 129–131, 133–134 U.S. Department of State: Ambassadorial talks, 165; Bacon, 111, 113; Bandung, 94; China, 31, 42, 163, 165; Conlon report, 165; Dulles, 30, 49, 130, 159; Eisenhower, 49; Herter, 160–161, 163; Intelligence and Research Bureau, 135, 175; MacArthur, II, 34–35; Phleger, Herman, 36; Policy Planning Staff, 64; Public opinion, 48, 56, 153, 168; Public Studies Division, 48; Robertson, 31, 74; Sino-Soviet relations, 107, 169–170, 175; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 74; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 143, 150, 153, 157; Trade embargo, 124, 130, 135–136; Travel ban, 117; United Nations, 111, 113; United Nations Bureau, 64 US embassy: sacking of, 142; Taiwan, 164; Tokyo, 173 U.S. Military Advisory Group (MAAG), 15, 142 U.S. Seventh Fleet, 35, 60, 64, 77, 80, 98, 140, 145, 169 U.S. Trading with the Enemy Act, 134 U.S. Treasury Department Trade embargo, 130, 135

US-Republic of China Mutual Defense Treaty, 101; Ambassadorial talks, 66; Bowie, 74; Chiang Kai-shek, 64, 157; Dulles, 66, 73, 78, 91; Eisenhower, 63, 77; Joint Chiefs of Staff, 77; Koo, 76; Lobbying, 63; Merchant, 73; Offshore islands, 71, 73, 76; PRC opposition to, 64, 69, 71; Robertson, 73; Secret codicils, 76; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 77; Two Chinas policy, 91; United Nations, 77 Vandenberg Resolution, 1948, 116 Vietnam, 34, 37; Covert operations, 60; French war, 37, 71, 86, 146, 214n89; Overseas Chinese in, 61; Tonkin Gulf Resolution, 101 Voice of America (VOA), 47, 108 Vorys, John, 140 Wall Street Journal, 91 Wang Bingnan, 97–98, 155, 196n16, 206n52–53, 218n50; Smith, Walter Bedell, 206n56 Wang Dong, 170 Washington Post, 20, 96, 117, 153, 164, 168 Weeks, Sinclair, 131, 230n36 Weir, Ernest T., 83, 213n75 West Point, 9, 21 White House congressional liaison staff, 47 Whiting, Allen S., 107 Whitman, Ann, 183 Wilson, Charles E., 13, 14, 19, 76, 126, 163, 193nn21–22 Wilson, Woodrow, 15, 25, 26 Woll, Matthew, 112 World Poultry Congress, 125 World War II, 44, 46, 93, 140, 184; Chiang Kai-shek, 116; Decolonization, 93–94; Eisenhower, 7, 9, 11, 41, 47; Gruenther, 20; Lodge, 33; MacArthur, Douglas, 34; Smith, Walter Bedell, 19 World War III, 29, 75, 81, 180 Wuhan, 141

Index | 295 Xiamen, 71, 145 Yale University, 9 Yeh, George, 76, 91, 144, 152, 166 Yoshida Shigeru, 126 Young, Kenneth, 117, 162 Yugoslavia, 57, 105 Zagoria, Donald, 110 Zhou Enlai: Ambassadorial talks, 96–97, 101, 107; Bandung Conference, 93, 95,

101, 16n18; Dulles, 28, 64, 96, 98, 162–163, 196n16; Geneva Conference, 28, 202n8, 206n56; Kissinger, 158, 215n14; Peaceful coexistence, 57; Soviet Union, 107–108, 154, 244n130; Taiwan Strait crisis (1954), 79, 215n14; Taiwan Strait crisis (1958), 148, 154, 155; Two Chinas policy, 158; US attack on China, 57–58; US blockade of China, 87; US Congress, 165; US relations, 66, 93, 98–99, 207n3 Zubok, Vladislav, 108