619. Letter 34 from Johnson to McConaughy1
As I told you, I am staying down over this weekend until the next meeting to get some dental work done, so that I also have an opportunity to write you at a little leisure today.
I have received your Letter No. 43 and entirely agree that the first two paragraphs of the May 11 draft are very clever and adroit. However, I think that they are much more vulnerable in the last paragraph both from the negotiating and public position, particularly as we had previously accepted their December 1 version of that paragraph. As I indicated in my 1902, it seems to me we are faced with two broad courses of action. We can continue to take our previous broad position that the Communists have in effect agreed to renounce force and that the problem revolves around the self-defense clause, or we can take the position they refuse unconditionally and unambiguously to renounce force with respect to the Taiwan area. The latter is, of course, the actual fact and you will note that in the last two meetings I have been concentrating heavily upon that aspect. The former course has some obvious advantages but it is open to a great deal of public confusion over the actual issue and does not give us as clean and clear a public position as the latter course. A good example of this is the lead editorial in the London Times of May 24 which states that the Chinese Communists are willing to make a general declaration of renunciation of force, but that the issue revolves around its application to Formosa with the added American proviso that Taiwan and its government must have a right to collective self-defense. I think that we should regard the whole matter from the standpoint of the public position we will desire to take when the matter next [Facsimile Page 2] becomes public. There is, of course, much to be said for maintaining the public position that the Chinese Communists have in effect renounced force and leaving up to them the onus of denying it. While it leaves us in the disadvantageous position of not being able to present a clean-cut and simple issue, it does serve the purpose of reducing public impression of “tension” in the Taiwan area. These are just some random thoughts on which I would appreciate the trend of the Department’s thinking.
While it would be very useful to get back to our April 19 draft as a basis of discussion, it is easier said than done and I fear I have not thus [Typeset Page 1000] far been too successful. Nor do I expect to be successful. The only real way that I can be successful in forestalling their going to the public and keeping things rolling along here would be to counter their drafts with drafts of our own or being given some flexibility in impliedly or specifically discussing changes in their drafts and thus keep the situation fluid and confused. My flatly rejecting his drafts and he flatly rejecting my drafts does not give me very much room for manuveuring.
I greatly appreciate being consulted on our proposed action in regard to Chinese prisoners and yesterday sent off my thoughts in my 1928. I should perhaps have made it clear in there that my thought with regard to not giving publicity to the matter applies only to the initial stage and a suitable period to see what response it brings from the Communists. I also think that we ought to wait and see what the actual results are in terms of numbers, etc. before giving it any public buildup. If the results are justified and response from the Communists is not satisfactory, we could then profitably pull out the stops on publicity.
With regard to the fourth paragraph of your Letter No. 43, I should think it would be preferable to have O’Neill wait on any note not only till we see if Clifford and Phillips are released and until we see what results our action with regard to the Chinese prisoners seems to be producing. I would hope that at the minimum it would produce fairly prompt action on the part of the Communists to tell O’Neill that he can see the remaining American prisoners. If it does not, then I believe [Facsimile Page 3] O’Neill should by all means follow up with a full representation which would point up the disparity between the United States and Communist actions.
[text not declassified]
As I wrote Bill Sebald from Prague, I have for many reasons accepted an invitation to give the commencement address at the Nurnberg Army High School on Thursday, June 14. If you are agreeable back there I am thinking of skipping the meeting for that week unless, of course, there are developments which would make this clearly undesirable. In view of Wang’s previous requests to which I have agreed, I think that I could do this without any special implications being read into it by them. I have not decided whether I would do it by canceling the meeting by telephone as he has done or by putting it to him straight at the previous meeting. Let me know if you have any thoughts or views on this.
Regards to all.
Sincerely yours,
American Ambassador
- Source: Department of State, Geneva Talks Files, Lot 72D415. Secret; Official–Informal. Johnson signed the original “Alex.”↩