After a Truce, What?

The U.S. and its U.N. allies are pledged, 90 days after a truce is signed at Panmunjom, to sit down at a political conference with the North Korean and Chinese Communists. The Panmunjom conferees, unable to agree on an agenda for the political conference, wrote it down months ago only as "the Korean question, etc." The "etc." seems likely to stretch over all the complex problems of the Far East. In a general settlement, what might the U.S. give and take?

One day last week the New York Times front-paged an answer. "The Eisenhower Administration," reported the Times's Washington Correspondent Anthony Leviero, "is willing to accept a settlement in Korea based on a boundary at the narrow waist of the peninsula." This seemed to mean that the U.S. was ready to give up the U.N.'s declared objective (October 1950) of a "unified, independent and democratic" Korea. Leviero went on to say that the administration wants to persuade the Chinese Communists to stop sending arms to warring comrades in Indo-China in return for a U.S.-French "guarantee that Indo-China would be governed by native leaders." As to Formosa, the Administration is considering a "United Nations trusteeship for that strategic island, with the creation of a republic of Formosa as the ultimate goal." This seemed to imply 1) recognition of Red China, and 2) dropping of U.S. support for a return of Chiang Kai-shek to the China mainland.

Other reports from Washington gave similar versions of a "new policy." None of the reports named sources.

Ike Upset. The stories rocked the White House and Capitol Hill. The President's office was harried by alarmed calls from Congressmen and U.N. representatives. To White House newsmen, Presidential Press Secretary Jim Hagerty hurriedly issued a strong denial: "The reported Administration policy on Formosa and Korea is without foundation in fact." The Administration, he continued, had neither 1) considered a U.N. trusteeship for Formosa, nor 2) reached any conclusion about a partition of Korea.

California's Senator William Knowland, a stanch supporter of more aid to Nationalist China, was not satisfied with Hagerty's denial. He requested a special meeting with the President; as he came away, newsmen besieged him. Said Knowland: his talk with the President had left him "entirely satisfied." He had also checked with Secretary of State Dulles, who had told him that the Times story did not represent the Secretary's point of view. There was no new policy, insisted Knowland.

Thinking Out Loud. In their own defense newsmen told how the story was inspired. A high official in the Eisenhower Administration had been invited to a confidential dinner and discussion with select Washington correspondents. He talked for background and not for attribution; that is, correspondents might report his views but must not name him as their source. The high official had done some thinking put loud, had been led on by questions into speculative comments. At no point had he laid down his observations as Administration decisions; he had, however, reflected the indecision and uncertainty of the Administration as it faces up to the sequel of a truce at Panmunjom. The Times's Leviero, not present at the meeting, wrote his story from the notes of a colleague who had attended.

Newsmen who did not attend the dinner named the source: Secretary of State John Foster Dulles.

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