Fateful Triangle. Tanvi Madan
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Strait—not just as a message to Beijing, but also to Moscow and perhaps to prepare the ground domestically in case of war.173 These public statements did not help their cause with Nehru. Indian officials were aware of US concerns about credibility.174 And the prime minister was not entirely unsympathetic to Eisenhower’s difficulties related to dealing with Jiang.175 But he continued to believe that Washington’s China policy was “basically wrong”—and the longer it stood, the harder it would be to change.176
By mid-April, Nehru felt that the American attitude on the offshore islands had “toned down a little.” He disapproved of Dulles’s indication that the issue should be brought up at the UN, seeing it—correctly—as an American attempt to tie its allies’ hands. He did believe, however, that the US was restraining Jiang from attacking the mainland and would itself not attack.177 Little did he know that this was when Eisenhower and Dulles were proposing Taiwanese withdrawal from the offshore islands—in exchange for a US blockade and mining of the Strait and placement of nuclear weapons in Taiwan.178 Before those US-Taiwanese discussions bore any result, however, Zhou made a surprising move.
At Bandung, the Chinese premier refused to renounce the use of force to reclaim Taiwan but indicated a willingness to talk directly to American officials.179 Nehru had been frustrated with Beijing’s “good deal of stubbornness,”180 but this changed to approval after Zhou’s overture. The Indian embassy in Beijing believed the offer was the effect of the Bandung conference—and validation of the Indian approach.181 Dulles, on the other hand, claimed that it was the result of US saber rattling, especially of the nuclear kind.182
Dulles publicly reiterated American support for Taiwan and uncertainty about China’s intentions, but noted that the US was open to testing Chinese sincerity.183 Nehru thought the initial US response was unhelpful but, nonetheless, a step forward.184 Glad that the US had not rejected the overture outright, he expressed his belief to Soviet leaders that Eisenhower, at least, wanted to respond positively. Furthermore, he appreciated that the president and Dulles saw Krishna Menon after the latter had traveled to Beijing. Nehru had dispatched him to Washington to encourage the US leadership to respond favorably to the Chinese invitation. Nehru approvingly noted Krishna Menon’s observation that Eisenhower and Dulles were “receptive,” albeit to different degrees.185 Speaking to Indian diplomats, he also highlighted the president’s lack of encouragement to Jiang.186
Krishna Menon’s meetings had a more beneficial effect on Nehru than on Eisenhower and Dulles, who did not think that the Indian envoy understood the US viewpoint.187 Despite the administration’s desire for clarity from China on the possibility of a ceasefire and a peaceful Taiwan solution, Dulles had never been keen on Krishna Menon’s visit. The secretary of state certainly did not want Krishna Menon to be an intermediary, even though he was interested in what the Chinese had told the Indian envoy.188 Furthermore, there were key differences between the administration and Krishna Menon on potential negotiations with China. Krishna Menon recommended that China and the US discuss the big issues (Taiwan, offshore islands) and then turn to smaller ones (including American POWs being held in China). Eisenhower disagreed, noting that the question of imprisoned American POWs was not a minor issue for the US and had to be addressed first.189
The Problem of Prisoners: Major or Minor Issue? (1955–1956)
The prisoner question was another source of US-India debate. India was no stranger to the issue of American civilian and military prisoners detained in China after 1949—it had acted as an intermediary, including as late as 1954. Like its predecessor, the Eisenhower administration had not welcomed the Indian role. It tried to sidestep India, working instead through the UN secretary-general Dag Hammarskjold to secure the release of the prisoners.190 The Indian refusal to send an official to accompany the secretary-general to Beijing on the grounds that China would think India was taking the US/UN side did nothing to alleviate the impression that Delhi’s sympathies lay with Beijing. Nor did the Indian ambassador in Beijing’s assertion that the US needed to cease its “bluster” because China would make no concessions under pressure to change that impression.191 Zhou’s indication that India was one of the two countries that China would accept as an intermediary—the other being the Soviet Union—only cemented the view.192
India was not, however, backing Beijing on this question. Officials did find steps like US-led condemnation of China at the UN to be unhelpful to resolving the situation.193 But Nehru understood from his own officials, as well as other world leaders, that the US was serious about the prisoner issue.194 So the prime minister had urged Zhou to meet with Hammarskjold.195 After meeting Eisenhower and Dulles, even Krishna Menon came to understand the resonance of the issue in Washington and recommended that Delhi suggest to Beijing that it release at least some prisoners as a goodwill gesture.196 And Nehru subsequently raised the issue with Zhou in Bandung.197
US officials remained unconvinced about India as intermediary, but Delhi nonetheless played a role. After Bandung, India announced that Krishna Menon would visit Beijing to discuss the prisoner issue. US officials were keen to ensure he knew that he did not have a “mandate” to speak for the US.198 China did agree to release four detained airmen after Krishna Menon’s visit, which Nehru took credit for.199 The Indian envoy told John Sherman Cooper, former senator and new ambassador to India, that Beijing did not release all the airmen because of public opinion and the desire to assess the response to that first step.200 Thus, when Krishna Menon subsequently met Dulles and Eisenhower, he urged them to take steps to reassure China.
Dulles, however, pointed out that the US had already taken such steps. Even during the Korean War the US had ceased fire first, despite some domestic opposition. Furthermore, since then, the US had facilitated the Taiwanese withdrawal from one of the offshore islands, ensured that the MDT did not cover the offshore islands, and restrained Taiwan from attacking airbases on the mainland. Washington was also considering changing operating instructions for US aircraft so that their flights were less provocative, and trying to make repatriation for Chinese students easier. Dulles stressed that a war with China was not desirable. He recognized that it would not remain limited, with the possibility of Soviet involvement and the use of nuclear weapons—and even if the US emerged victorious, it would be left holding the bag in China.
Krishna Menon thought, however, that the US could do more, by allowing US citizens to visit China, urging Taiwan not to follow a “scorched-earth” policy on the offshore islands, and not setting preconditions for negotiations. Dulles, on his part, did not want to negotiate prematurely even though he had detected a change in Chinese attitude. China was using American prisoners as bargaining tools and expected to be rewarded for bad behavior—if Washington acceded, China’s image in the US would only deteriorate.201
These US-India discussions on China followed a familiar path. Krishna Menon insisted that China wanted to improve relations with the US. Dulles retorted that there was scant evidence of this desire. He reminded the Indian envoy that after Bandung he had made an unconditional offer to negotiate with the Chinese.202
Indeed, the Indian intermediary efforts had an unintended impact—they partly resulted in Eisenhower and Dulles coming to see a Sino-US exchange of “commissioners” as a preferable option. They wanted to establish communications between China and the US without using third-party representatives. Dulles felt Krishna Menon had only “mix[ed] up the channels of communication” and “crossed wires,” causing the situation to “slip … backwards.”203 US concern only intensified when different messages seemed to emanate from Beijing from the various channels being used; Washington was left not knowing whom to believe.204 But the need to communicate persisted, given the “uneasy calm” in the Taiwan Strait and the possibility of Moscow otherwise insisting on China’s inclusion in the four-power summit due to be held in July in Geneva. China’s release of some American airmen created better conditions for a direct dialogue.205 Besides, by July 1955, Dulles was “fed up with all the intermediaries.”206
Dulles