Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXVII, Mainland Southeast Asia; Regional Affairs

121. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in the United Kingdom¹

Washington, March 22, 1964, 6:06 p.m.

6108. Secretary has arranged secure phone conversation with Butler Monday morning.² London should deliver following letter immediately to FonOff. Other addressee posts invited to comment and may draw on parts of analysis in any consultations that take place prior to further specific instructions.

Text of letter:

Dear Rab:

In preparation for our phone conversation tomorrow, I am sending you a rather detailed picture of our thinking on the Cambodian situation, both its underlying aspects and the immediate problems we face.

1. Let me first review our analysis of the underlying situation.

(a) Sihanouk has one legitimate objective—to underscore and reaffirm his territorial integrity and neutral status under the 1954 Accords. However, he also has two objectives that are much harder to accommodate. He wants to pillory the South Vietnamese (and indirectly the US) for their various incursions into Cambodian territory, even though these in fact have little to do with basic respect for either his territorial integrity or his neutral status. And he wants to rub the noses of the Thai in the series of treaties (and the ICJ decision) that established the Thai-Cambodian border and that were, in Thai eyes, imposed by the French.

(b) In South Viet-Nam, General Khanh and Foreign Minister Quat, in contrast to their predecessors, have shown a strong desire to work out their problems through negotiation. They were immediately forthcoming on Sihanoukʼs suggestion of a quadripartite conference, and have behaved admirably both in sending the present delegation to Phnom Penh speedily for bilateral talks and in apologizing and offering compensation for the Chantrea incident.

In general, the GVN is clearly ready to do everything it can to iron out its border problems with Sihanouk and would also like to work toward some form of bilateral policing of the border, which would help to control the use of Cambodian territory as a supply route and sanctuary for the Viet Cong. In this connection, we must recall that they do have a legitimate grievance; the evidence is now unmistakable that Cambodian territory has been used increasingly for both purposes. In this, I must say that our sympathies are wholly with them.

On the other hand, the prospect of a Geneva Conference is still anathema in Saigon, unless it could be based on agreements previously reached through the bilateral or quadripartite route. To Saigon, where the whole question of neutral sentiment is naturally acute, the prospect of a Geneva Conference, however distinguished in fact from that in 1954, must inevitably be interpreted as the harbinger of neutralization for South Viet-Nam itself. In short, Saigon would be deeply upset if a Geneva Conference were now convened, and I must say that we could not blame them. After all, keeping Khanh afloat is surely the very first order of business at the moment in the whole area.

(c) While the Vietnamese aspect is predominant, we must naturally also take account of the Thai position. We have kept in close touch with them, and there is every indication that they would be receptive to a Cambodian overture for resumption of relations and bilateral talks that might follow a successful outcome of the present Cambodian/Vietnamese discussions. Alternatively, they have continued to be willing to negotiate in the quadripartite framework, although they could hardly do so on the basis of Sihanoukʼs proposals and would probably also continue to have insuperable objections to Phnom Penh as a site. If it should come down to a question of a quadripartite conference either with no specific proposals as a basis or on the basis of proposals appropriately tailored from your British text, of January 9,³ I think that the Thai could be persuaded to accept. At the same time, however, they too have all along been most reluctant to attend a Geneva Conference unless the result were quite clear in advance. They fear, with some reason, as Sihanoukʼs proposals indicate, that there will be a major job to prevent any agreement from endorsing the obnoxious French-imposed treaties, and that this task can only be tackled in a smaller forum and not in the highly fluid situation of a Geneva Conference. This is not to say they do not accept the present boundaries de facto.

(d) Weighing the attitudes of these key parties, we still conclude that the best way to proceed is to give every encouragement to the present RKG-GVN negotiations. These may then lead to a second bilateral discussion between the Cambodians and the Thais, and Sihanouk has within the week dropped hints that he would accept this in the light of the difficulties he immediately encountered in dealing with Hanoi. Thereafter, or perhaps alternatively, the next move might be a quadripartite conference. However, the injection of a Geneva Conference, or even the flat-footed prospect of one, would almost certainly disrupt this preferred sequence and throw us all off. As we have indicated to you previously, the plain fact at the moment is that neither the Thai nor the Vietnamese would come to such a conference under present circumstances, and we ourselves would have great difficulty in doing so without their participation.

My understanding was that you and Couve and I had agreed that we should try to find a common position on the results of a large Geneva Conference before we agree to hold one. On this I gather that the Cambodians have said that your draft could be the subject of discussion in such a conference along with their own proposals. But we have not seen the Cambodian proposals for a Geneva Conference. We are not interested in a Geneva Conference which will merely resolve itself into acrimony, pressure on Saigon and Thailand, and an even more formal pretext for Sihanouk to link himself with the communist North. Those results can be achieved without a conference, and we want no part of contributing to them by participating in a conference which produces those results.

Moreover, by the time we got through, our position in Cambodia itself could not but be worsened, and it is difficult to see what the practical benefits would be for Cambodia.

2. Now, as to the present status:

(a) Although our fingers are crossed, it looks now as if the Chantrea incident had not disrupted the bilateral talks in Phnom Penh. We still have a live horse in the race.

(b) On the quadripartite front, we have given a cautious response through the French, which they, and perhaps you as well, think will not materially help the situation. However, we simply did not feel that we could now explicitly withdraw our proposals without pulling the rug out from under both Saigon and Bangkok. Frankly, we were also a little leery of using the French channel to the full, partly because their interests in Cambodia do not wholly coincide with yours and ours and partly because the message has on occasion shown a tendency to be garbled, with our views melded with French initiatives and no clear distinction.

(c) Meanwhile, Sihanouk has made loud noises both about the UN and a Geneva Conference. Our UN people are fairly hopeful that the Secretariat will seek to dissuade any actual Cambodian complaint in the light of the Vietnamese admission and apology—and, I might add, our own admission of the presence of US personnel and our formal expression of regret, which we conveyed to Phnom Penh last night and will probably announce during the course of the day.

As to Sihanoukʼs March 23 deadline, we believe that this had been largely overtaken by events, and that in any event his present disillusionment with Hanoi is genuine and he would not in fact resort to any drastic action if we let the date pass at least briefly without some initiative. Nor do we see quite what his action could be at this point.

However, we fully recognize that you have a specific problem in not being upstaged by the Russians. Your position of January 28th that more adequate preparation needed to be made before a Geneva Conference does now need something that you can point to, and, although the existence of the bilateral talks can be a large part of that something, I agree that we should be trying to give you more ammunition than the sum total of the bilateral talks and our explanation of our quadripartite position through the French. But, basically, I hope we can all live with a measure of illicit peace-mongering by the Russians for the sake of the larger interest and for the sake of the Vietnamese in particular and to a lesser extent the Thais. They have deep and concrete interests, and I may say that we do also. We think for the moment these outweigh the difficulties you may experience, both domestic and external, in holding the line.

3. Let me finally throw out some thoughts on possible initiatives and actions to keep the situation from deteriorating and to move it in the right direction.

(a) Our communications to Sihanouk have been in disrepair ever since November, and we have noted your Embassyʼs suggestion that we consider a high-level emissary. We think such a move would now be premature, although we are willing to move as fast as the Cambodians. We are ready to send a high-level emissary when the Cambodians will receive him, but as you know Sihanouk gave no response to our suggestion in this direction early this month. We could also act to strengthen our representation in Phnom Penh. As you perhaps know, our Ambassadorʼs illness has now proved to be more serious than originally thought, and we will get a strong replacement on the ground as quickly as possible.

(b) I think we urgently need a further review of various possible texts that could emerge in a quadripartite forum and perhaps thereafter be put through a Geneva Conference. The French are sending a medium-level man to Washington this coming Wednesday, and perhaps we should confer with you at the same level either concurrently or separately and either here or in London. I also have in mind that you and Couve and I had a useful session on this in Paris in December. Carrington, Couve and I could do so again at Manila in mid-April, but perhaps events will not wait that long, and we should consider following the medium-level discussions by my sending someone, perhaps Bill Bundy, to London and Paris in the week after Easter.

(c) To keep the pot from boiling over, we could conceivably be more forthcoming as to the conditions for a quadripartite conference. One possibility would be to announce flatly that we were ready to attend a quadripartite conference with no conditions whatever; however, I would have to caveat this one as to location, because our soundings in Bangkok make it abundantly clear that the Thai would not accept Phnom Penh.

A second possibility would be to firm up the very general message we sent through the French, that we might be willing to negotiate on the basis of your British proposals, appropriately tailored to the quadripartite framework. We would have to leave ourselves leeway to propose change in order to meet Thai and Vietnamese desires, but a message to this effect could well be conveyed through your channel and would fit fairly well into the framework you have created by your excellent note to Sihanouk earlier this week.

(d) In all the above, a fruitful outcome for the talks between the Cambodians and the Vietnamese remains a vital underpinning. We have found that Khanh and Quat need little urging on this front, but we will continue to point out to them how vitally important it is to have these negotiations succeed if we are to avoid overwhelming pressures for a Geneva Conference, of which, as I have said, they see the danger clearly.

To sum up, I think it is possible that your and my approach to these issues differs somewhat because of our different situations. We are heavily engaged in South Viet-Nam and are taking casualties every week in an effort to keep that country from going communist. Further, the Thais obviously rely more heavily upon our bilateral commitments than upon the general structure of SEATO in which they think non-regional members will be negligent of Thai security. Our regional stakes in Southeast Asia are so great that it is not easy for us to cooperate with the non-regional members of SEATO at the expense of South Viet-Nam and Thailand.

I do not see how the United States can come to a general Geneva Conference without Saigon and Bangkok. Since Sihanoukʼs initiative was aimed at both these countries, I do not see how a conference could produce any worthwhile result unless they were present. You may believe that we have unlimited influence in Saigon and Bangkok, but this is simply not the case. Were we to try to drag these two countries kicking and screaming to a Geneva Conference, the situation in Saigon might well collapse through fear of neutralization and Thailand might well decide that we are wholly unreliable and that their only course is to make their peace with the communists in the North. This is the heart of the matter as I see it, and should not be glossed over by purely procedural considerations as to whether it is congenial to have a conference. If the issue is whether an unbalanced Sihanouk will irrationally turn to the communist North, we must balance this against the impact of a complete loss of morale in South Viet-Nam and Thailand.

With warm regards. Yours ever,

Dean Rusk

Rusk

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, POL 1 CAMB. Secret; Immediate; Exdis; Verbatim Text. Drafted and approved by William Bundy, cleared in draft with U. Alexis Johnson and in substance with Rusk. Repeated to Bangkok and Paris Eyes Only for the Ambassador.
2. See Document 122.
3. In telegram 649 from Phnom Penh, January 9, the Embassy stated that the British draft statement on neutrality appeared “virtually identical with ours quoted in Deptel 410.” (Department of State, Central Files, POL 27–13 CAMB) Telegram 1039 to Bangkok, repeated to Phnom Penh as 410, January 4, contained the U.S. draft neutrality agreements. (Ibid.)