634. Letter from Osborn to Clough1
After talking the last meeting over with Bob Ekvall, I had worked up a paragraph or two on renunciation for possible inclusion in the Ambassador’s “comment” telegram. When I showed the draft to the Ambassador, his reaction was, while agreeing with the analysis, to doubt the utility of putting it in the telegram. He suggested I send it to you in a letter, and so I am enclosing it.
I would certainly agree with the Ambassador that the Department appears to face the possibility of a resort to the public by Wang with equanimity. It is also true that if in fact the CHICOMS do go to the public on the basis of the May 11 draft, they will not be in too strong a position. Even Wang seems to realize this, and that is probably why he has been making such determined efforts to lure us into making textual criticisms. His tactic would possibly be to then table a new draft apparently meeting our objections without really doing so. This would put Peiping in a stronger public position than the May 11 draft alone.
Possibly Wang may have another try or two at getting us to talk textually. If this fails, Peiping may decide to go to the public anyway. If Peiping takes the issue to the public solely on the basis of the May 11 draft, the CHICOMS are going to have a hard time convincing people this draft represents a really sincere effort to reach agreement on a meaningful renunciation of force. Accordingly they might stress, rather than the draft itself, Wang’s repeated offers to consider alternative suggestions, and our “obstinate” refusal to offer any. They might even, as a minor gambit, play Wang’s trick of “assuming”, since we [Facsimile Page 2] concentrated our objections on the time limit clause, that the United States had no objections to other parts of the draft. This would not fool most intelligent observers, but it might injure feelings on Taiwan.
Alternatively, Peiping might decide that the May 11 draft is completely unsuitable as a basis for a public position, and Wang might be instructed to table a new draft, even in the absence of textual comments from our side. Our failure to take this new draft as the basis for discussion would bring on a threat to go to the public, and this time it would be genuine.
[Typeset Page 1025]These various possibilities have probably occurred to you in CA, and are probably being taken account of in planning our strategy in the talks, insofar as they are worth taking account of at all. This might be a good place to say again that in writing you these letters I am not attempting to force the pace of things, request answers to questions, or urge any particular direction of policy with regard to the talks.
Since we have been relying on the services of one of the ConGen officers for the note-taking spot, we have been working up the long telegrams on the basis of my shorthand notes, thoroughly cross-checked with the long-hand notes and Bob Ekvall’s notes of what Wang really said in Chinese, as well as approved by the Ambassador. In dictating off the telegrams to the secretary I have tried to comply with a recent instruction from the Department calling attention to excess verbiage in our previous traffic. I hope I have not been condensing to the detriment of intelligibility. If so, don’t hesitate to tell me.
Regards to Walter and all in CA.
Sincerely,