A Dilemma for the U.S.

THE U.S. has expended a fair amount of political capital in its effort to wheedle, cajole or otherwise secure support for its "Two China" policy. Yet that policy is ridiculed not only by the U.S.'s foes and even some of its allies, but also by the two Chinas themselves --each of which claims, for the record at least, to be the one and only legitimate government of China.

Would it be better, as critics like former State Department Under Secretary George Ball contend, just to get the agony over with quickly by quitting the fight to save Taiwan? Is the seat that Chiang Kai-shek's regime has held in the U.N. for the past 26 years really worth all the trouble?

Only a few years ago, it might have been much less trouble to save the seat. If the U.S. had proposed dual representation of Peking and Taipei in the mid-1960s, say, it would almost certainly have won overwhelming U.N. approval. Of course, Mao Tse-tung and his lieutenants have long said that they would never join the U.N. while Chiang's Nationalists remained members, and they are men who mean what they say. But even if Peking had refused to join right away, the U.S. would have been safely out from under its outdated China policy, and the moral burden would have fallen more clearly on Peking for refusing a proffered seat. But unfortunately, the U.S. missed its opportunity.

Supporting dual U.N. representation for Peking and Taipei may be the best policy alternative available to the U.S., but it has many liabilities. If it succeeds, its effect may be to keep Peking out for another year. Thus even some pro-American delegates suspect that they are being used to achieve this result and help Richard Nixon cement his relations with U.S. conservatives in advance of the 1972 election. If the American effort fails, the U.S. loses prestige. Yet the plan has a sort of perverse virtue in that it offers neither total victory nor total defeat to any of the principals involved. As Hudson Institute Futurologist Herman Kahn approvingly describes it, the policy amounts to "a limited doublecross of everyone."

The alternatives are poor. Openly fight Peking's entry for another year? That would completely negate the Administration's laudable moves toward a limited rapprochement and could torpedo Nixon's trip to Peking. Put Taiwan over the side? A precipitous U.S. abandonment of the regime, simply because Peking demands it, would be instantly recognized as shabby and immoral. Moreover, by placing in doubt the value of a U.S. commitment, it would send destabilizing shivers through all of Asia. There is no guarantee that it would improve relations with Peking.

It is sometimes argued that it is useless for the U.S. to go all out for Taiwan this year, inasmuch as Peking will almost certainly have enough U.N. support to ensure the ouster of the Nationalists next year. But that argument and those assumptions could easily be upset by new developments, perhaps arising out of Nixon's trip. It is also argued that in view of Chiang's insistence (along with Mao's) that Taiwan is not an independent entity but a province of China, there are no "legal grounds" for the U.S. policy. The issue, in this view, is not one of expelling a member, but deciding which of two claimants to a single seat possesses authentic credentials. The U.S. argues that the Taipei regime governs a population of 14 million --a larger "reality" than any of the latest U.N. entries.

Unhappily, as Sinologist Doak Barnett points out in his book, A New U.S. Policy Toward China, Washington faces a dilemma. "Every possible course of action," writes Barnett, "involves some undesirable costs and risks." There is, in short, no easy solution.

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