When John F. Kennedy took office as the U.S. president in early 1961, he was perturbed by the old problem -- China policy, and found it increasingly difficult to follow the old track of containment, blockade and confrontation. It was, first and foremost, because China was, after all, a big developing country, exercising an increasingly important influence on both global and Asian-Pacific regional affairs. Without its participation and active role, many international issues, including the Southeast and Northeast problems that were deeply disturbing the United States, arms races and nuclear dissemination, could hardly be settled. It was certainly not a permanent solution to adopt the “ostrich” policy of ignoring the reality. Another reason was the consideration of U.S. national interests. Needless to say, it would be better to build a fruitful and constructive relationship with China than to proceed with the existing cold-war confrontation. American politicians began to realize that maintaining a long-standing tense and antagonistic relation with China and endeavoring to isolate it had brought more negative consequences than positive ones to American interests. It would benefit both nations, even the entire world, if normal relations – even though a sort of “cold working relation” temporarily -- were built between the two powers through contact and dialogue. [1] After elected, Kennedy, when examining the U.S. China policy, admitted: “No one was doing very well with the Communist China in their present isolation.” [2]
Was there indeed any change in the U.S. China policy during the three years of Kennedy’s presidency? Scholars in China and abroad differ in opinion. [3] This author holds that comparing with the preceding eight years of the 1950s when D. D. Eisenhower was in office, it was a period pregnant with changes in the American China policy. The influences of McCarthyism were receding; the perspectives of non-government research institutions were changing; the public opinion was shifting, and the inclination of government officials in charge of the U.S. China policy was also altering. [4] The Kennedy Administration had envisaged certain measures to make gradual policy changes while beginning to put some of them in exploratory action. Also, he explicitly expressed his intention to improve relations with mainland China. He told his aides he would make some policy modifications during his second term of presidency. It might have been possible if he had not been assassinated abruptly.
Before his death, however, Kennedy did not make any substantial progress in adjusting the U.S. China policy. The causes were multi-sided and complicated. One of the major restrictive factors was the influence of relationships between China and its surrounding countries and regions. In this regard, the Taiwan authorities played a quite seriously interfering and obstructive role in the peace-making process of the U.S. and China, the two great powers that affected the overall situation of world peace. Hence, the US-Taiwan relations became an important obstacle to the normal development of Sino-American relations. This author has published a monograph about the disputes between the United States and the Taiwan authorities on the question of “counterattacking the mainland”, so this article will not deal with this subject again. [5] Nor will it discuss China’s relations with the United States, India, Vietnam and Laos because other scholars have published monographs on the topic. This article only explores the United States, against the overall backdrop of considering the adjustment of its China policy in the early 1960s, compelled the Taiwan authorities to withdraw its troops from the “Golden Triangle” region bordering Burma, Thailand and Laos, and to give up its defense of the offshore Chinese islands, including Quemoy and Matzu.
Kennedy’s Deliberation of Adjusting the U.S. China Policy
As a U.S. senator, Kennedy had rarely made any public criticisms or proposals regarding American foreign policy. But, in the October 1957 Issue of the quarterly Foreign Affairs, he published A Democrat Looks at Foreign Policy, arguing that the global structure was changing from the US-Soviet bi-polar confrontation to multi-polar coexistence, and China and Europe were becoming the new centers of political power, and criticizing the failure of American foreign policy to make timely response to such changed relations between big powers. He also criticized the U.S. China policy was too stiff, too rigid, and suggested making a reassessment of such policy. In the mean time, however, he acknowledged it was an unwilling choice for the United States not to recognize new China at the time. [7]
After Kennedy took office, a series of pressing problems topped his agenda: (1) Should the U.S. continue to compel Chiang Kai-shek to surrender the offshore islands that were liable to trigger military conflicts? (2) What approach should be taken to the serious food shortage suffered by the mainland? (3) Should the American strategy to China’s U.N. membership be changed? (4) Should the United States open negotiations with the Mongolian People’s Republic and let it enter the United Nations in order to set a new model of relationships with the Communist countries in Asia? (5) Should the United States grant entry visa to Thomas Liao, the exiled leader of the Taiwan independent movement who at the time lived in Japan? (6) Should the China Volume of the already compiled 1943 U.S. foreign relation collection containing a large amount of U.S. official criticisms of the KMT administration be published?
How these problems should be handled concerned whether the existing China policy must be adjusted, and to what direction the future transition should move.
According to the declassified U.S. government files, in the early months of Kennedy’s presidency, the U.S. policy towards new China was largely to maintain the contact channel of Warsaw Negotiations and tried to solve the Laotian conflict through the Geneva Conference with a view to expanding the contact a little more; meanwhile, it was awaiting an opportunity to drag China into the nuclear control talks. Restrictions could be eased on such problems as food trade and journalist exchanges. Nevertheless, in his first term of presidency he had no intention to take dramatic steps leading to the normalization of relationships between the two nations. Towards Taiwan, his administration continued to comply with the 1954 Mutual Defense Treaty and its Notes of Exchange – providing large-scale aid to promote the island’s social and economic development and defending the island by force. At the same time, it was trying to persuade Chiang to withdraw his troops from the offshore islands close to the mainland. Regarding China’s seat in the United Nations and other international organizations, the United States continued to support Taiwan while exploring the possibility of a “two-China-seats” plan. But its primary objective was to block by all means New China’s entrance into the U.N. in a short time to come.
There was no lack of proposals for changing the China policy from within and without the new administration. Nevertheless, high-ranking staff involving in policy-making differed in opinion. At the time, China stood in a difficult position both in its domestic economy and in the international Communist Movement. In the eye of American politicians this was high time for them to adjust its policy towards China. The problem remained to be how to determine the orientations: easing relations with or increasing pressure on it.
R. W. Komer, aide to the National Security Council, suggested that Kennedy, taking the opportunity of just assuming his office, face the existence of the New China squarely and alter the U.S. China policy, in his own words, “We must disengage, as skillfully as we can, from unproductive aspects of our China policy.” He also suggested that the U.S. adopt a “two-China” position at the United Nations, and persuade the KMT to withdraw from the offshore islands. [9] Komer and his colleagues, Deputy Secretary of State C. A. Bowies and U.S. ambassador to India John Kenneth Galbraith, all claimed that from a long-term point of view the United States should use India and Japan as a main force to contain and counterbalance China. They also argued that it was not necessary to over-evaluate Taiwan’s role and thereby dared not say “no” to Chiang Kai-shek.
But more people thought it undesirable for the new administration at its very initial stage to send a “poor symbol toward a new policy vis-a-via Red China”. Former President Eisenhower was representative of such conservative perspective. Likewise, obstructions from Congress and the public were quite strong. [11]
The United States had the necessity to adjust its China policy, yet it was not apt and possible to make any immediate and obvious change. This mental dilemma was highly evident in a private talk between two of the top decision makers. According to Secretary of State Dean Rusk’s recall, in the early May of 1961, he had a private talk with Kennedy. He asked Kennedy if he wanted the Department of State to explore the possibility of modifying the China policy. The couple then roughly outlined the following options: (1) Adopting a so-called “two-China” policy by recognizing the two Chinese political powers. (2) Endeavoring to help achieve a compromise between Beijing and Taibei through secret, behind-the-scene maneuvers. (3) Remaining idle to see how things were going to develop. They both realized that for years the U.S. China policy had practically failed to reflect the real situation in Asia. This notwithstanding, Kennedy excluded any change in the U.S. China policy. The reason lay in the fact that Kennedy won the presidential elections by a very narrow margin, feeling that he was not authorized powerfully enough by the American people, thereby he must be very prudent about issues that might trigger hot political debates domestically. And any change in the U.S. policy towards China would become a fuse for such debates. For instance, before leaving office, his predecessor Eisenhower had warned him that he would strongly oppose the new administration’s any attempt to recognize Beijing or to admit the mainland into the United Nations, although on the whole he would support Kennedy’s foreign policy. And he professed he would stand out to speak if necessary. [12]
In addition to realistic political considerations, the bi-polar confrontation in ideology and social system between the two cold-war blocs likewise restrained Kennedy’s action. Just as Dean Rusk admitted, “Our position is not just because of public opinion, but is based also on the strategic situation and the attitudes of our Far East allies. We recognize this position in itself constitutes an obstacle to normalization of our relations with Peiping.” [13]
Under such a strategic pattern, the United States could do little to improve its relations with China, at the most making some sort of exploratory move to the “two-China” direction. One of the starting points of the “two-China” perspective was to make Taiwan an example of “democratization” and “modernization” for the developing countries in Asia, and let it compete with the socialist China. While explaining to Chiang Kai-shek the essential measures to realize the strategic target of the Cold War, Kennedy said, “In the long run, the free world can best meet the challenge of Communism by strengthening its democratic institutions and making them more responsive to the aspirations of the people of the world.”