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

Eisenhower Library, Dulles papers, “Telephone Conversations”

No. 422
Memorandum of Telephone Conversation, Prepared in the Department of State¹

[Washington,] December 1, 1954—4:48 p.m.

Telephone Call to the President

The Sec. said Formosa took up practically all of his press conference so it left the other thing pretty much untouched. The Pres. will probably get it tomorrow.² The Sec. said what he said over the phone³ is wonderful to say. The Pres. asked what if they press as to the exact status of the prisoners. Both are worried about this. The Pres. suggested he say it seems probable the plane landed in such circumstances they can say they are not prisoners of war. The Sec. said that will put some people in the position of not telling the truth. Some were not in uniform nor in Korea. They agreed it was a funny business about the other plane as it evidently shouldn’t have been so used. 13 were aboard to drop leaflets. Arnold had no business to be there. He was back here before doing that and told everything. They agreed it is a terrible situation. The Sec. said he thinks the Pres. is high enough up to shove some of it back to the Sec. Some is actually a matter of the War Dept. records. The essential thing said the Sec. is they agreed by the Armistice to return all prisoners of war. They have acted in a deceitful way. They supposedly gave all names at Geneva but didn’t give the names of civilians. The Pres. can say it was brought out now to make it more difficult with our allies.

1. Apparently prepared by Phyllis Bernau; the initials “pdb” appear on the source text.
2. The President was scheduled to hold a press conference on Dec. 2.
3. According to a memorandum of a telephone call from Eisenhower to Dulles earlier in the afternoon, the President “asked about his taking the line that the easy road would be to be belligerent and get involved in a war—that would rally everyone behind him—it would also mean killings etc. And it would insure the death of those prisoners. We are taking the way of patience, persuasion, argument etc. We have to keep the cards close to us and play them as we see fit.” Secretary Dulles replied that “it sounded 100% right” and said “he had expected to take much that same line.” (Eisenhower Library, Dulles papers, “Telephone Conversations”)