S/P Files: Lot 64 D 563
Memorandum on the Substance of Discussions at a Department of State–Joint Chiefs of Staff Meeting1
Present
| General Bradley | Mr. Matthews |
| General Collins | Mr. Nitze |
| General Vandenberg2 | Mr. Merchant |
| Admiral Sherman | Mr. Berry4 |
| Admiral Davis | Mr. Ferguson |
| General Bolte | Mr. Marshall |
| Admiral Blandy [Duncan?]3 | Mr. Tufts |
| General White | Mr. Villard5 |
| Admiral Lalor | Mr. Lay |
| Colonel Carns |
[Here follows a discussion of the situation in Korea and of policy differences between the United States and the United Kingdom.]
Formosa
Mr. Nitze: We have one more question. It concerns the plans for a naval show of force. I understand that a task force is going through the Formosa Straits and down to Hainan. Does the JCS have a view on the desirability of this?
Admiral Sherman: We have given them a job to do—to get some photographs for reconnaissance purposes. The best way to get these is to use aircraft from naval vessels. It is not so much a show of force as a demonstration that we are still on the job that was assigned to us last June. Last summer the ships were there often. During the winter [Page 1617] they have been away. Now spring is coming and it is essential to go back on a tour through the area.
Mr. Matthews: Are these only U.S. ships?
Admiral Sherman: Yes, the U.K. takes no part at all in the Formosa operation.
General Bradley: We can’t maintain our position up north without any action in the south.
Mr. Nitze: The way this thing is handled will have an important effect in our discussions with the British. If it looks like a development of the MacArthur policy, we will be building trouble for ourselves.
Admiral Sherman: Nothing happens except that we go down there. We would not go while the Korean situation is bad.
Mr. Matthews: Did they go all the way to Hainan before?
Admiral Sherman: No, they don’t have to go that far in order to get reconnaissance photographs.
Mr. Nitze: We agreed that air reconnaissance should go forward. Has that shown anything?
Admiral Sherman: There has been very little, if any, air reconnaissance so far. What we want to do is send in fast photographic planes combined with naval operations. We haven’t had anything there except patrol boats.
General Bradley: The photographic reconnaissance from the air has not started. If we don’t do this, we will have to abandon the directive of last summer.6
General Collins: I think we should do it and not tell the British anything about it.
Mr. Merchant: The British were in fishing yesterday. They informed us that a British cruiser had been sent on a diversionary sweep.
Admiral Sherman: They are creating a straw man. The U.K. is not a party to the Presidential Directive.7 If they want to discuss this matter, that is all right, but we should not let them nibble it to death by tactics like this. Any interference from them on our sending of ships to Formosa would require us to get a change in the Presidential Directive.
Mr. Nitze: That is not the problem. We have got to face, however, the political problems involved in a show of force. The normal movement of ships down there is one thing, but a show of force is another thing altogether.
[Page 1618]General Collins: I did not know that we were going as far as Hainan.
Admiral Sherman: I think the project is to go to the Formosa straits and to fly planes to Hainan.
General Bradley: It has to do with the possibility of an invasion of Indochina from Hainan.
General Collins: The French think that they can take care of any invasion from Hainan. I did not know of any show of force in the area of Hainan.
Admiral Sherman: It is not a show of force. It is a routine operation to carry out the Presidential Directive. It is not a show of force any more than Ridgway’s operation is a show of force.
General Collins: They are not going to invade Formosa from Hainan, are they?
Mr. Nitze: I think we have got to be straight with our allies on this one.
Admiral Sherman: We have no allies so far as the Formosa operation is concerned.
Mr. Nitze: If we get hit in Japan and Formosa, we want it to be clear that this is because of a Chinese Communist initiative and not an initiative of ours. If we are not clear on this we will not have any allies. The operation should not appear to be a show of force. It should appear to be a continuation of our previous operations.
General Bradley: Is there anything to be gained by going to Hainan?
General Collins: That is the question. The French think they can handle anything from Hainan. If we are doing anything to check up on a possible invasion of Formosa in accordance with the Presidential Directive, then we should go ahead with that.
Admiral Sherman: I will be glad to revise the directive. General MacArthur sent in a recommendation and we agreed with it, with some minor revisions.
General Bradley: I think it should be limited to shipping for an invasion of Formosa. I think it should be related to their positions on the China coast.
General Collins: Perhaps we can do something in terms of longitude for a change instead of parallels.
Admiral Sherman: I will bring in a proposal on it.8 I would be [Page 1619] worried if we permitted ourselves to be restricted regarding the Formosa operation.
Mr. Matthews: If it is just a resumption of previous operations now that the weather has changed, that is all right.9
[Here follows a discussion of several unrelated matters.]
- The source text represents a State Department draft, not cleared with any of the participants.↩
- Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg, Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force.↩
- Burton Yost Berry, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs.↩
- See footnote 10, p. 1536. No other record of the meeting has been found to permit checking the names of those present.↩
- Henry Serrano Villard of the Policy Planning Staff.↩
- The reference is apparently to a JCS directive to General MacArthur in the summer of 1950 to conduct, under certain limitations, photographic reconnaissance of the China coast; see Lay’s memorandum to the National Security Council, August 2, 1950, in Foreign Relations, 1950, vol. vi, p. 406.↩
- President Truman’s directive of June 27, 1950, ibid., vol. vii, p. 202.↩
- Later in the meeting, Admiral Sherman circulated a draft telegram, which, with a slight revision of phraseology, was approved and sent to General MacArthur as JCS telegram 87549, April 4, 1951: “Operation contemplated by your C 58575 and approved by JCS 86789 [see p. 1608 and footnote 3 to C–58575, p. 1609] should be so limited as not to include Hong Kong or points southwest thereof” (CA Files: Lot 59 D 228).↩
- A Seventh Fleet task force carried out the mission on April 11 and 13; see James A. Field, Jr., History of United States Naval Operations: Korea (Washington, Government Printing Office, 1962), p. 344. The Joint Chiefs of Staff later reported that the operation had been carried out without incident, except that some anti-aircraft fire from coastal batteries had been encountered (Record of the Actions Taken by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, p. 103). In the course of the operation, the Commander, Seventh Fleet, paid a visit to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek in Taipei; see Navy telegram 140300Z from Taipei, April 14, 1951, p. 1629. For related documentation, see the memoranda of conversation, April 5 and April 19, pp. 296 and 369.↩