Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume XIX, South Asia

243. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in the United Kingdom⁰

Washington, January 21, 1963, 6:23 p.m.

3827. Eyes Only Ambassador. There follows for your information message dated January 21 which President has sent to Prime Minister Macmillan:

“Dear Friend:

Since the second round of Kashmir talks has ended as successfully as we could expect, should we not go ahead with the air defense team as scheduled. We will send it on the 24th. Indeed, I see advantage in announcing the visit before the 23 January Indian Parliament debate on the Colombo proposals.¹ Our people are in touch with yours to this end.

I am still persuaded that adding to Indian confidence vis-à-vis the Chinese is more likely to help promote a Kashmir settlement than to make the Indians more intransigent. It appears to us that Nehru is unlikely to settle Kashmir with too obvious a gun at his back.

By the same token, we feel strongly here that Pakistan’s rather transparent flirtation with Peiping is harming rather than helping its case. Ayub may merely be giving the Indians an excuse to argue that to make concessions to the Pakistani would be humiliating under these circumstances. I hope you will join us in persuading Ayub that if he wants us to help him settle Kashmir, he must refrain from tactics which make it even more of an uphill climb. Above all it seems to us unwise for him to send Mohamed Ali to Peiping at this juncture, and it would seem prudent for us both to tell him so.²

Sincerely,

John F. Kennedy”

Rusk

0. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 791.5/1-2163. Secret. Drafted by McGeorge Bundy and approved in S/S by Edward S. Little. Repeated to New Delhi and Karachi.
1. The Colombo proposals were a set of proposals issued on December 12, 1962, at Colombo, Ceylon, by the Conference of Six Non-Aligned Afro-Asian countries in an effort to promote a peaceful settlement to the border dispute between India and China. The six countries were Burma, Ceylon, Ghana, Indonesia, Cambodia, and the United Arab Republic. For text of the proposals, which called for negotiations with the existing de facto cease-fire as a starting point, see American Foreign Policy: Current Documents, 1962, p. 1025.
2. Macmillan responded on January 22. He wrote Kennedy that he concurred in the proposal to announce the dispatch of the air defense team to India, and he agreed that there were dangers in Ayub’s policy of “flirting with the Chinese.” He too felt it was important to emphasize to Ayub that such tactics were harmful to Pakistan’s interests, but he did not think that Ayub could be expected to abandon a border agreement with China that had already been negotiated in principle. (The text of Macmillan’s letter was repeated to London in telegram 3861, January 22; Department of State, Central Files, 791.5/1-2263)