National Security Archive Update, December 11, 2003
No Support for Taiwan Independence, Nixon Assured China in 1972;
New Documents Reveal Origins of Current U.S. Policy;
Nixon Trip to China Now Fully Declassified
For more information contact:
William Burr – 202 / 994-7032
http://www.nsarchive.org/NSAEBB/NSAEBB106/index.htm
Washington D.C. 11 December 2003 - Newly declassified documents posted today
on the web by the National Security Archive show that President Nixon assured
the People's Republic of China during his historic 1972 trip to Beijing that
the U.S. would not support, but could not suppress, the Taiwan independence
movement.
These assurances, made in secret and not repeated in public for 25 years, are
the basis for President Bush's current statements opposing independence for
Taiwan - a constant in U.S. policy ever since Nixon. The documents posted
today complete the delayed declassification of the Nixon trip materials, and
include discussions revealing China's anxiety over the possibility of
Taiwanese independence - contrary to Henry Kissinger's memoir account that
they "spent very little of our time" on Taiwan.
During Nixon's trip, Kissinger also gave the Chinese a top secret intelligence
briefing on Soviet forces arrayed against China. In their detailed memoir
accounts of the trip, neither Nixon or Kissinger mentioned this briefing, now
declassified in full and included in the posting today.
The documents include:
* Premier Zhou Enlai's claim that Washington had let pro-independence
politician Peng Meng-min escape from Taiwan, to which Nixon and Kissinger
denied that Washington had given any help and assured Zhou that they opposed
Taiwanese independence.
* Nixon's repeated assurances to Zhou that Washington would discourage any
Japanese "military intervention" in South Korea or a Japanese role in Taiwan.
* Kissinger's detailed run-down of Soviet forces along China's borders,
including ground forces, tactical aircraft and missiles, strategic air
defenses, and strategic missiles, with special attention to nuclear weapons.
Kissinger on Taiwanese independence:
"I told the Prime Minister that no American personnel ... will give any
encouragement or support in any way to the Taiwan Independence Movement ...
What we cannot do is use our forces to suppress the movement on Taiwan if it
develops without our support."
--Kissinger to Nixon and Zhou En-Lai, 24 February 1972
Kissinger on intelligence briefing:
"none of our colleagues know that we have given you this information and
nobody in our government except for the President and these people here know
that we have given you this information. The intelligence people do not know
that we have given you this information."
--Kissinger to Chinese, 23 February 1972
The documents and analysis are available on the National Security Archive
website at
http://www.nsarchive.org/NSAEBB/NSAEBB106/index.htm