The Defense Rests

Dean Acheson had spent the morning in his secluded Georgetown study poring over the latest arguments of his critics, digesting the bristling headlines and editorials. When he rose at luncheon to speak to the 500 Washington newsmen, guests and Congressmen jammed into the National Press Club ballroom, he propped only a few notes on the lectern before him. Then, summoning the brightest of his lawyer's talents, he launched last week into his case for Asia. It was as close as a Secretary of State could come to a shirt-sleeved defense of policy.

"I am frequently asked," he began, " 'Has the State Department got an Asia policy?' And it seems to me that that discloses such a depth of ignorance that it is very hard to begin to deal with it. The peoples of Asia are so incredibly diverse and their problems are so incredibly diverse that how could anyone, even the most utter charlatan, believe that he had a uniform policy which would deal with all of them?"

Wringing Hand. Two patterns are clear in Asia today, he said. One is "a revulsion against . . . misery and poverty as the normal condition of life"; the other is "the revulsion against foreign domination." Then he rolled with ball-bearing ease into his own theory of China's complex postwar struggles. It included the familiar State Department apologia for its own miserable failure in China: nothing the U.S. could have done, he said once more, could have changed things one iota. "What has happened in my judgment is that the almost inexhaustible patience of the Chinese people in their misery ended. They did not bother to overthrow this [Nationalist] government. There was really nothing to overthrow. They simply ignored it throughout the country . . . The Communists did not create ... a great force which moved out from under Chiang Kaishek. But they were shrewd and cunning to mount it, to ride this thing into victory and power . . ."

But the Chinese would now find themselves deceived. Russia, using Communism--"the most subtle instrument of Soviet foreign policy . . . ever devised"--is the new imperialist in Asia. Already Soviet Russia was proving the point in China by absorbing the northern "provinces" of Outer Mongolia, Manchuria, Inner Mongolia and Sinkiang. "I should like to suggest," said Acheson, "that this fact ... is the single most significant, most important fact in the relation of any foreign power with Asia . . .

"We must not seize the unenviable position which the Russians have carved out for themselves. We must not undertake to deflect from the Russians to ourselves the righteous anger and the wrath and the hatred of the Chinese people which must develop. We must take the position . . . that anyone who violates the integrity of China is the enemy of China and is acting contrary to our own interest."

So, in effect, the U.S. policy for China is: we're sorry to see you go, but we're not at all to blame. Now you must get out of it as best you can, by yourself.

The Iron Hand. In sharp contrast, Acheson then staked out a second Asian area in tougher language. The nation's defense, said he, rests on a North Pacific frontier running along the Aleutian Islands to Japan and down through the Ryukyu Islands (Okinawa) to the Philippines. In case of attack on this line, he said, the U.S. would defend all these positions. (For Korea, hanging perilously close to the most naked of Russian ambitions, the Secretary offered only a vaguer acknowledgment of "responsibility.")

In effect, the U.S. policy along the island frontier is: Bear, Keep Out.

The Helping Hand. For the third sector of Asia--the uneasy non-Communist nations of Southeast Asia, India and Pakistan--Acheson had cold words and measured promises: "The direct responsibility lies with the peoples concerned . . . You cannot sit around in Washington or London or Paris or The Hague and determine what the policies are going to be in those areas." The U.S. would offer aid--generally along the lines of the careful yardstick set down recently by State's Counselor George Kennan (see box).

In effect, the U.S. policy for the countries of Southeast Asia is: yes, you shall have some candy--one piece at a time--but you must earn it, and then say please. And you mustn't spoil your dinner. To the Communists, the U.S. also said: we're fond of Southeast Asia, but not prepared to fight for it.

"The United States, in my judgment," said Acheson, "acts in regard to a foreign nation strictly in regard to American interests or those wider interests which affect American interests ... I am not in the slightest bit worried at all because somebody can say, 'Well, you said so and so about Greece, why isn't all this true about China?' I will be polite. I will be patient and I will try to explain why Greece is not China, but my heart will not be in that battle."

Acheson sat down and pocketed his spectacles amid the chair scraping and applause of a rising ovation. Forensically, it was a brilliant performance: an advocate's skilled case for the defense. As the outline of a policy, one basic flaw weakened it: a negative attitude which accented the hazards instead of emphasizing the opportunities. There was little in it for Americans to rally to. The U.S.--unlike the defense--could not afford to rest.

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