794A.00/2–851
Memorandum of Conversation, by Burton Kitain of the Office of British Commonwealth and Northern European Affairs
| Participants: | Prime Minister S. G. Holland1 |
| Mr. A. D. McIntosh, Permanent Secretary of External Affairs | |
| Sir Carl Berendsen, New Zealand Ambassador | |
| Mr. George Laking, Counselor | |
| FE—Mr. Dean Rusk | |
| FE—Mr. J. Emmerson2 | |
| NA—Mr. U. A. Johnson | |
| BNA—Mr. L. Satterthwaite3 | |
| BNA—Mr. B. Kitain |
Before commencing the main subject of the conversation, Mr. Rusk wanted to clarify a point with respect to Formosa made in his previous conversation with the Prime Minister.4 Mr. Rusk indicated that Formosa had a political as well as a military significance for the United States. In its latter context Formosa in Communist hands would provide a springboard for attack on the Philippines. As a political consideration, however, it must be remembered that Formosa was actually in the hands of the people we had in mind at Cairo. Whatever might be thought of Chiang Kai-shek, the vision of thousands of Chinese being executed by the Communists because of their friendliness toward the United States weighed heavily in our thoughts. It is therefore important to separate the fact of the physical possession of Formosa from the political problem of its entry into the United Nations, recognition of the Peiping regime, and the eventual disposition of Formosa.
The Prime Minister stated that he was extremely interested in learning American thoughts concerning sanctions against Communist China. Mr. Rusk stated that it was difficult to explain to the American public the present state of “half-war, half-peace”. We do not, however, desire war with China. Our attitude is to have the question dealt with in the United Nations in order to remove the focus of prestige considerations [Page 1571] from Washington while taking measures designed to make the aggression unprofitable to the aggressors. Although it is hard to hurt an area as large and sprawling as Communist China, we feel that there are nevertheless certain items of a strategic nature (armaments, petroleum products, capital equipment, strategic metals, etc.) which, if cut off completely from the Chinese, would raise the cost of aggression. We prefer to have imposed an embargo of selected items with which everyone would cooperate rather than a general embargo to which all would not subscribe. Mr. Rusk indicated that the United States agreed that this matter should be approached with care and we believed that the Collective Measures Committee served the purpose of a governor to prevent precipitous action and give our friends an opportunity to air their views.
Mr. Rusk stated that we favored dropping discussion of Chinese Communist membership in the United Nations for the present and that there be no further recognitions of the Peiping regime, although some of the recognitions already granted might be useful in maintaining direct contact with Peiping. Finally, Mr. Rusk pointed out that the restraint with which the United States had acted in not attacking the Manchurian “safeaven” could not be continued were the Chinese Communists to launch a full-scale air attack on the United Nations Forces. The Prime Minister agreed, but hoped that an opportunity would exist for an expression of the views of the countries participating in Korea before such action would be taken.
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- Prime Minister Sidney G. Holland of New Zealand visited Washington from February 5 to 10.↩
- John K. Emmerson, Regional Planning Adviser in the Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs.↩
- Livingston Satterthwaite, Deputy Director of the Office of British Commonwealth and Northern European Affairs.↩
- For a memorandum of Rusk’s conversation with Prime Minister Holland on February 6, see p. 155.↩