University Faculty, “Memoradum for President-Elect Nixon on U.S. Relations with China,” November 6, 1968

Rousselot:
Mr. Speaker, the recent official reversal of our policy toward Communist China is a matter of grave concern to me. The following memorandum, which is dated November 6, 1968, and was first reprinted in ''Tactics" on February 20, 1969, clearly outlines the steps to be taken to "balance” our relations with this Communist dictatorship. The memorandum is addressed to "President-Elect Nixon," and it is my understanding that Dr. Henry Kissinger personally delivered this memorandum to Mr. Nixon, just after his election to the Presidency in 1968.

I urge my colleagues to carefully study this document. The effect it has obviously bad on our policy toward Communist China is startling, Dr. Kissinger's "advice" so closely parallels the position taken in this memorandum that I cannot overemphasize how important it is that each Member realize that as early as November 6, 1968, at a time when we were most deeply committed 1n Vietnam, the plan which is being followed today to appease Communist Chinese aggressors was being presented to the President:

Memorandum for President-Elect Nixon on U.S. Relations with China

(The signatories: Jerome Alan Cohen, professor of law, Harvard, chairman; John K. Fairbank, director, East Asian Research Center, Roy Hofheinz, assistant professor of government, Dwight Perkins, professor of economics, Edwin O. Reischauer, professor of history, Benjamin I. Schwartz, professor of history and government, James Thomson, assistant professor of history, Ezra Vogel, professor of social relations, all of Harvard; A. Doak :Barnett, professor of government, Columbia, and Lucian Pye, professor of government, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.)(Except for one professor each from Columbia and MIT, they are all from Harvard. The J. F. Kennedy School of Government put it across.”) November 6, 1968

As scholars in the field of East Asian studies who have completed a year of private discussion of America’s relations with East Asia under the auspices of the Institute of Politics of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, we write to give you our thoughts to the pivotal issue of United States relations with China."

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