Office of the Historian

59. Telegram From the Embassy in the Republic of China to the Department of State1

Taipei, October 19, 1964, 11 p.m.

328. Met President this afternoon [1 line of source text not declassified].2

[less than 1 line of source text not declassified], present were President, Madam and interpreter. President asked if I had any news for him. I stated that at Saturday meeting with FonMin I had passed all available information and guidance on ChiCom atomic event and on Soviet change of leadership.3 I said no developments but we were evaluating carefully statements of Izvestia and Pravda and world reaction. I then gave him sanitized version of State and CIA analysis.

I then asked him if he could give me any views these two events I could pass USG.

President passed by specific comment on Soviet shift and concentrated on ChiCom event.

President stated that event of such far reaching importance that he had been unable up to the present to make any detailed or specific statement or comment. He stated however that he would like to pass to me “as US Ambassador and friend” his own personal views on impact on Asian peoples. He said that psychological reaction was enormous and far reaching. He said it was a turning point in the attitude of people of this part of the world and that their views on world affairs would henceforth be different from those of the past. He said the psychological effect could not be overestimated.

President stated that Americans at home and abroad were not capable of truly appraising the psychology of Asian people. He said this event [Page 113] required special efforts by US to see the change in its true light and urged that we do all possible to this end.

I said the US was studying the situation with all resources in Asia and at home. I agreed with inadequacy of Americans in true appraisal of Asian thought and stated that we respected his judgement more than any other in his position as true leader of Chinese people.

President then said that Asia henceforth would never be the same as it was in the past. He said the United States and the Republic of China should at this point reevaluate their policy toward Mainland China based not on the past but the present and future and work jointly for a new solution. This latter point emphasized by the Madam.

Wright
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, DEF 12–1 CHICOM. Secret. Repeated to Hong Kong, Tokyo, and CINCPAC for Polad. Received at 1 p.m.↩
  2. [text not declassified]↩
  3. On October 15 Khrushchev was removed as Chairman of the Council of Ministers and replaced by Alexei N. Kosygin.↩