Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, China and Japan, Volume XIV, Part 1

CA files, lot 59 D 228, 306.11 file

No. 118
The Ambassador in the Republic of China (Rankin) to the Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Robertson)

top secret
official–informal

Taipei, June 30, 1953.

Dear Mr. Secretary: In two Secret despatches (Taipei’s 657, June 18 and 660, June 19, 1953) covering the recent Taipei visits of Admiral Radford and a CINCPAC staff group, the Embassy has reported a series of tentative agreements between United States and Chinese military representatives concerning increased coordination in the defense of Formosa. The nature of certain organizational proposals made by CINCPAC representatives during their visit, and the exclusion of the Embassy from significant policy discussions, as well as failure fully to inform the Embassy of their outcome, are developments which lead me to write this letter. My purpose is not to complain about the past but to point out certain gaps in coordination between CINCPAC and the Embassy and to suggest ways of bridging them.

Although Admiral Radford has himself endeavored to keep us informed during his visits here, several instances have come to the Embassy’s attention in which CINCPAC as an organization seems intentionally to have by-passed the Embassy on questions of considerable policy significance in our relations with the Chinese Government. Topics of correspondence and direct negotiation between CINCPAC and the Chinese about which the Embassy was not consulted have included: (1) blockade of the China coast; (2) preparation of a contraband list and plans for its utilization against vessels engaged in trade with Red China; (3) an agreement on the exchange of intelligence; (4) proposals for a Sino-US combined staff organization on Formosa; and (5) plans for establishing a new military liaison office on Formosa with direct access to President Chiang at the pleasure of CINCPAC.

Questions related to plans for blockading the China coast have taken the form of correspondence between the Ministry of National Defense and CINCPAC via MAAG, Formosa. MAAG was instructed by CINCPAC not to release the information to the Embassy.

The contraband list proposal has been similarly treated in past correspondence and was the subject of considerable discussion between members of the CINCPAC legal staff and the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs during the former’s May–June 1953 visit while I was in Washington. An Embassy officer who inadvertently learned of this a week ago was asked questions he was unable adequately to answer because he had not been informed of the substance of previous exchanges with CINCPAC. He was told by the Foreign Ministry that CINCPAC had requested the Ministry to supply a list of questions concerning contraband search and seizure operations and their various ramifications, especially those of a political nature since the Chinese had indicated some concern in this regard.

The question of broadening the exchange of intelligence between United States and Chinese agencies was taken up by CINCPAC and Chinese military staff members during the recent joint discussions here. The Embassy was not only not consulted but learned of the results (reported in Taipei’s despatch 660) only by chance and apparently against the sanction of CINCPAC. The latter would not even permit MAAG to pass information on the new agreement to the Army Attaché to answer a specific telegraphic request from the Department of the Army. Furthermore, the Embassy’s service attachés, who presumably will have to put the new intelligence procedure into effect, were totally uninformed and left in the embarrassing position of not being able to converse intelligently with their opposite numbers in Chinese military intelligence. The latter had taken part in the discussions and were fully apprised of the new basis for exchange of intelligence.

As you know, we have been seeking for more than a year to gain access to Chinese Communist prisoners taken in Nationalist guerrilla raids. The discussions between CINCPAC representatives and the Chinese military on exchange of intelligence might well have provided a good opening to gain Chinese cooperation in this regard, if an Embassy representative had been present to exploit the opportunity.

So much for the past. General Chase personally has sought to keep the Embassy informed of what he considers to be policy discussions with the Chinese. MAAG, where it was free to do so, has also consulted the Embassy on policy problems, prior to contact with the top levels of the Ministry of National Defense, and has readily accepted our advice. But CINCPAC as an organization may view the Embassy largely as a place where official courtesy calls are made and incidental questions of narrow political or protocol nature are to be cleared. Questions which can in any way be labeled military policy, strategy or operations—no matter how broad their potential or actual policy implications in other fields—seem in danger of being considered outside the Embassy’s province, or at best are to be mentioned only in terms of vague generalities when referred to the Embassy.

There are several reasons why it would seem timely now to clarify CINCPAC practice. We are soon to have a new Commander-inChief, Pacific.¹ A third military establishment (i.e. in addition to MAAG and the Attaches) may be inaugurated in Taipei for purposes of operations, strategy, planning and close liaison with the Chinese Government. As indicated by Admiral Radford in his brief reference to the subject (Taipei’s despatch 657), this new office would be headed by an officer senior to the Chief of MAAG and would on occasion serve as a pipeline from CINCPAC to the President of China. The following quotation from Section IV of the recent report of a committee of CINCPAC representatives and Chinese military (see Enclosure 1 to Taipei’s despatch 660)² suggests CINCPAC’s conception of this pipeline:

“Matters of a strategic or policy nature would be properly coordinated by the Commander-in-Chief, Pacific, and appropriate Chinese authority”.

It goes without saying that United States representation on Formosa should continue on the teamwork basis which has typified Embassy relations with MAAG and MSA here to date. These agencies have been most cooperative in observing the function of policy coordination that rests with the Ambassador. Any new agency which CINCPAC may establish must be brought into the fold, if we are to operate intelligently and to avoid presenting the Chinese with the opportunity—of which they are ever ready to avail themselves—to play one agency against another.

I have analyzed the problem at considerable length. These are my suggestions:

(1) That the Department of Defense be left in no doubt as to State’s insistence upon policy coordination at the mission level.

(2) That CINCPAC should be instructed to keep me fully informed on all matters related in any way to policy, including those which lie entirely within the scope of military policy or strategy as long as they have any bearing on our relations with the Chinese Government.

(3) That our Service Attachés who have on-the-spot experience and large staffs should be utilized as they are in other countries for all military intelligence work, including that provided for in the recent agreement (see Enclosure 1, Taipei’s despatch 660).

(4) That the arrival on Formosa of a new United States military command in charge of operations, planning and liaison under CINCPAC direction should be preceded by a clear-cut directive (such as the one under which MAAG was established) placing responsibility for policy coordination in the hands of the Ambassador. Any approaches by this command to the President, or to non-military Chinese officials, should be arranged through the Embassy and the latter should be fully informed of the matters discussed.

I have had extensive experience with problems of this kind over a period of years. It is my considered opinion that the chief of a diplomatic mission cannot carry out his duties effectively unless the principle is established that he has a right to know everything about American governmental activities affecting the country to which he is accredited. In actual practice there will be many details about which he need not be informed. But he must have the authority to decide whether he wishes to be told this or need not be informed of that. If such decisions are to be left in the hands of individuals in the various agencies of our government, we might as well give up all idea of coordinating the conduct of our foreign relations.³

Sincerely yours,

K. L. Rankin

1. Adm. Felix B. Stump.
2. Not printed.
3. No reply to this letter has been found in Department of State files, but a letter of Aug. 4 from Rankin to Admiral Stump, confirming points discussed by them in a conversation in Taipei on July 30, stressed the need for each to keep the other fully informed. (Rankin files, lot 66 D 84)