Editorial Note
The mass escape of North Korean nonrepatriate POWs occasioned a number of high-level communications which were either made public at the time or which have been released subsequently. Foreign Minister Pyun set forth the militant South Korean position in a letter to Clark, June 18, a copy of which is printed in the Department of State Bulletin, June 29, 1953, page 906. Also in that same Bulletin, page 907, is the text of a message from Clark to Rhee, which was written on June 18, but is dated by the Bulletin as June 20. President Eisenhower sent Rhee a message, drafted with the assistance of Dulles and other major foreign policy advisers, which is printed verbatim in Eisenhower’s Mandate for Change, pages 185–186. Both Eisenhower and Clark in their respective messages berated Rhee for abrogation of his promise not to take unilateral action without first consulting the United Nations Command. Eisenhower [Page 1200] stated that unless Rhee accepted United Nations Command authority to conduct the hostilities and bring them to a close, “another arrangement” (unspecified) would be necessary.