51. Memorandum from McGhee to Rusk, September 131
SUBJECT
- Anticipatory Action Pending Chinese Communist Demonstration of a Nuclear Capability
Problem:
To consider early action we might take to minimize the impact on US and free world community interests of a first Chinese Communist explosion of a nuclear device.
Discussion:
If Communist China could detonate a nuclear device as early as 1961, as has been estimated,2 we should consider now what actions should be taken in anticipation of the event, instead of later in reaction to it. The initial impact will be primarily psychological with secondary political and military efforts deriving from it. This establishes the psychological field as and deserving immediate attention.
[Typeset Page 149]It is envisioned that Communist China is likely to get at least one type of psychological dividends from its explosion: (1) Many Asians are likely to raise their estimate of Communist China’s current and future total military power relative to that of their own countries and the capabilities in the arms of the US; and (2) they are [Facsimile Page 2] likely to see the accomplishment as vindicating claims that the Communist method of organizing a [illegible in the original] state’s resources is demonstrably superior. Both reactions are likely to contribute to feelings that communism is the wave of the future and that Communist China is, or soon will become, too powerful to resist.
It will not be possible to prevent the [illegible in the original] to Communist China of such dividends, but it may be possible by advance action to reduce them.
All things are comparative, and Communist China compared first of all with the other countries of Asia. If another, but non-Communist Asian state detonated a nuclear device first, a subsequent and a consequently [illegible in the original] anticlimactic Chinese Communist explosion would not carry a comparable implication of Communist superiority or make quite as [illegible in the original] impact as [illegible in the original] fast China’s growing power.
According to one estimation India’s nuclear program is sufficiently advanced so that it could act [illegible in the original] have [illegible in the original] enough fissionable material to produce a nuclear explosion. While we would [illegible in the original] to limit the number of nuclear powers so long as we lack the capability to [illegible in the original] the [illegible in the original] eight to predict that First Asian one be India and then China.
Nehru was quoted as saying, upon his arrival in Belgrade August 31 and to [illegible in the original] evident of the Soviet decision to resume weapons tests, [illegible in the original] against nuclear tests at any time in any place.” The same day an official spokesman in Delhi was quoted as making the latest exaggerated statement: “We are against all tests and explosions of nuclear material except for peaceful purposes under [illegible in the original] conditions.” Given the context and taken together, these statements suggest that it would be difficult to get Nehru to agree to any proposal for an Indian nuclear test in the near future, and that the chances of its acceptance would depend upon the extent to which it met rather narrow criteria.
[Facsimile Page 3]Nevertheless Nehru might be brought to see the proposal as being in India’s interests. If accepted and implemented, it should help forestall Communist China’s using nuclear blackmail against India; reduce its ability to frighten neighbors of India whose security is important to that country; and minimize the usefulness to the Communist Party of India of a demonstrated Chinese nuclear capability which otherwise [Typeset Page 150] could be cited as evidence that communism, as practiced in China, is superior to India’s mixed economy.
Preliminary exploration within the Department (with officers in FE, S/AE, NEA and INR) has elicited concurrence with the idea, [illegible in the original—Latin] that it would be desirable if a friendly Asian power beat Communist China to the punch, and it has turned up no likelier candidate than India.
But officers have raised a number of reservations and doubts besides those alluded to already: (1) India might require considerable technical assistance in order to explode a nuclear devise before Communist China does; (2) there appear to be legal [illegible in the original] to the supplying of such assistance by either the British or ourselves; (3) we are not good at keeping such things covert, whereas the explosion could be expected to have utility only in proportion as it appeared to be an Indian accomplishment; (4) there probably would be considerable difficulty in finding a practical peaceful use for such an explosion, and fall-out from it would be open to the usual and valid objections, including ones related to the fears which could arise or be created among an ill-informed and partly superstitious populace; (5) alternatively meeting the requirement of “controlled conditions” for an experimental explosion might present problems; (6) Pakistan could be expected to resist most adversely to an Indian explosion which might [Facsimile Page 4] subsequently be exploited against it, and to be highly resentful of any outside instigation and assistance, known or surmised; and (7) an Indian explosion would provide the Chinese Communists basis for urging that the USSR increase its assistance to the Chinese Communist nuclear program.
The idea has also been discussed with Ambassador Galbraith, who is strongly opposed to any US approach to Nehru. He thinks the chances are roughly only one out of fifty that Nehru’s reaction would not be the negative one that we are seeking India as an atomic ally. He sees the calculus of prespective benefit inherent in the one chance as outweighed by the harm implicit in the other forty-nine. He also thinks his British and Canadian colleagues would be unwilling to make such an approach to Nehru. Ambassador Galbraith recalled that Dr. Wiesner is expected soon to take a trip to Pakistan, when he might also visit India. He said, in this connection, that he would at most be willing that Dr. Wiesner, in the course of conversations with Dr. Bhabha, Chairman of the Indian Atomic Energy Commission, raise the matter of the prospective Chinese Communist nuclear explosion and ask what effect if any it will have on India’s program in the atomic field. Presumably any further initiatives in the matter, if the idea germinated in Dr. Bhabha’s mind and bear fruit, would have to come from the Government of India, when we could decide what the US response should be [Typeset Page 151] within the framework of something more concrete than we now have to work with. (Dr. Wiesner, incidentally, might now be able to resolve some of the technical and legal doubts raised in the foregoing discussion.)
While nothing else would have as much prophylactic value as a prior atomic explosion by a free-world Asian state, a covertly-conducted information program might achieve some effect in reducing the psychological impact of the first Chinese Communist nuclear explosion. Assuming as we do that the Chinese Communists are fully committed to acquiring nuclear capabilities, publicity about their program probably would not have important effect on their [Facsimile Page 5] [illegible in the original] or race of progress. It might provide them with an argument with which to press their Soviet ally to give increased assistance, but this would seem unlikely to weigh heavily among the factors considered by the Soviets in determining where their own [illegible in the original] is the matter lay.
A covertly-waged informational program might be used to [illegible in the original] and drive [illegible in the original] points of which the following are illustrative:
(a) India [illegible in the original] nuclear deployment programs [illegible in the original] have been detected rather as peaceful uses of atomic energy.
(b) Observers are puzzled by the [illegible in the original] of the Chinese Communists, who have been engaged in an effort which started in 1950, thus far to explode a nuclear device of their own. Since several other powers pioneered the way, [illegible in the original] requirements for producing such an explosion have been widely [illegible in the original]. Communist China has scientists, including ones [illegible in the original] abroad, of requisite capability; the essential new materials and suitable testing areas.
(c) It accordingly can only be speculated that Communist China (1) has organized its effort poorly, or (2) realizes that nuclear weapons are not ones which will contribute to realization of its expansive aims [illegible in the original] since world opinion, which will condemn all aggression in proportion as it can be identified as such, will tolerate aggression with nuclear weapons even less than aggression by conventional armed forces.
Recommendations:
1. That you authorize appropriate officers in the Department to explore with other agencies and the [Facsimile Page 6] White House representatives who have expressed an interest in the general idea, the matter of Dr. Wiesner’s sounding out Dr. Bhabha.
2. That, regardless of the decision on or [illegible in the original] of (1), you approve in principle the proposal for covert dissemination [Typeset Page 152] in media throughout the Far East of suitable material designed to reduce the impact of an initial Chinese Communist nuclear explosion, authorizing FE and S/AE to explore it with CIA and to have it put into effect if exploration discloses that it would appear useful and feasible.