of their own governments, so the foreign troops under the name of United Nations in Korea, they are all foreign troops. And now I am going to talk about using some terms of procedure of meeting.

ADMIRAL JOY: You haven't yet finished with the item of foreign troops. GENERAL NAM IL: Don't interrupt, I have the floor.

About the terms. On discussing cease fire today, one side is the Korean People's Army and the Chinese Volunteers, and the other side is the United Nations forces. The term "Communists" is not proper here because you are not handling with the Communist but with the Korean People's Army and the Chinese Volunteers. It is simple to define the term "foreign troops." By "foreign troops in Korea," we mean those troops who are not Korean troops, who are not the troops composed of the Koreans.

ADMIRAL JOY: Of foreign troops not composed of Koreans. That is what you mean?

GENERAL NAM IL: Troops in Korea which are not Korean troops. They are the foreign troops.

The next day at Kaesong saw a continuation of the dispute regarding the nature of an agenda. I opened the question:

ADMIRAL JOY: We do not believe you understand yet what we mean

by an agenda. We wish to specifically define it again. An agenda is merely a list, in order, of subjects to be discussed. Is that your understanding of an agenda?

GENERAL NAM IL: We know fully what an agenda means.

The senior delegate of the other party asked me if I clearly understood the term "agenda." By agenda it is meant the items that will be discussed at a meeting, ordered items which will be discussed at a meeting and which must be considered first when the agenda is being formed. What are the important problems to be discussed at a meeting? Then the important problems must be discussed first. That is to say what kind of problems should be discussed and what are the central problems; then the central problems are discussed first.

ADMIRAL JOY: When I use the term "agenda," I am referring to a group of items which are general questions-general items such as the demilitarized zone. You, however, are in fact talking about one line [the 38th Parallel] when as a matter of fact there are many lines—many possible lines.

GENERAL NAM IL: We have showed you our line. What are the possible lines for you?

ADMIRAL JOY: We do not suggest any line yet because that is getting into the substance of that item of the agenda.

GENERAL NAM IL: As for a line, we proposed a concrete line.

ADMIRAL JOY: As I understand it, you do not wish to broaden the question of a demilitarized zone.

GENERAL NAM IL: May I ask what you imply by "broaden”?

ADMIRAL JOY: To make it more general.

GENERAL NAM IL: Our proposal is general.

ADMIRAL JOY: Referring again to your item on the agenda, we cannot agree to have any specific line on the agenda as you propose. GENERAL NAM IL: You do not agree?

ADMIRAL JOY: We will agree to place on the agenda an item calling for the establishment of some demilitarized zone. The location and limits of that zone can be discussed later when the substance of the item is taken up. I would like to re-emphasize that the work of this meeting on the agenda is not to determine solutions of problems, lines, etc., but to formulate an agenda-in other words, to state the problems to be discussed at later meetings.

GENERAL NAM IL: We cannot consider the 38th Parallel line as an imaginary line. The 38th Parallel line had existed and the war broke out right on that line. Therefore, it is the principle that the question of the cease fire must be concluded also on the 38th Parallel line. Therefore, this must be on the agenda.

Discussion between Nam Il and me flowed with all the speed of a stiff concrete mix. Each statement by Nam Il had to be translated into English and Chinese; each statement I made had to be rendered in Korean and Chinese. The actual power in the Communist delegation, shrewd Chinese General Hsieh Fang, watched proceedings broodingly. Occasionally he passed a terse note to Nam Il, who invariably seemed to comply with the instructions contained therein. These two men, Nam II of North Korea and Hsieh Fang of Red China, were the source of all actions by the Communist delegation, with the Chinese taking an increasingly dominant role as time passed. Between them they provided unplumbed depths of cunning and deviousness as they sought to fasten upon the Korean Armistice Conference their "loaded" agenda.

They failed. The agenda finally adopted, after ten plenary sessions of bitter argument, contained no conclusions. It read as follows:

1. Adoption of the agenda.

2. Fixing a military demarcation line between both sides so as to establish a demilitarized zone as a basic condition for the cessation of hostilities in Korea.

3. Concrete arrangements for the realization of cease fire and armistice in Korea, including the composition, authority, and functions of a supervisory organ for carrying out the terms of cease fire and armistice.

4. Arrangements relating to prisoners of war.

5. Recommendations to governments of countries concerned on both sides.

Despite the success of the United Nations Command delegation in preventing inclusion of Communist "conclusions" in the agenda, in retrospect it is clear that we made a grave error in forming the agenda, a mistake which ultimately cost us dearly. We failed to foresee the use that the Communists would make of the chronological order of the

agenda items. By allowing the item on "Establishment of a Demarcation Line" to precede all others, we opened for the Communists a road to a de facto cease fire prior to agreement on other substantive ques tions. By agreeing to discuss the position of the truce line first, we permitted the Communists to insist that this question had to be settled before other agenda items were explored. On orders from Washington we eventually agreed to a provisional truce line with a thirty-day time limit, thereby giving the Communists a respite from United Nations Command military pressure. This allowed the Communists a sorely needed breathing spell in which to dig in and stabilize their battle line. Consequently, they were able to haggle and delay in respect to subsequent agenda items, free from the compulsion of impending military disaster.

In the end, the second principle of Communist negotiating methods, that of "stacking" the agenda, was frustrated. I must, in honesty, hasten to add that this outcome was not principally the result of negotiating skill on the part of the United Nations Command delegation. Rather, it was the result of our unmistakably firm refusal to agree to inclusion of Communist conclusions in the agenda, and to the crucially important fact that the United States Government backed the United Nations Command delegation to the hilt in this attitude. Probably most of all, the result was the product of the heavy pressure which had been exerted on the Communist armies by United Nations Command offensive operations prior to the conference.

[The New York Times Magazine, October 30, 1966. Copyright © by The New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission.]

WHAT IT'S LIKE TO NEGOTIATE WITH THE CHINESE* By Arthur H. Dean

(Representative of the United Nations Command and the United States as Special Ambassador and chief negotiator at the postarmistice Panmunjom meetings)

The U.N. delegation was quartered in the U.N. army camp at Munsan-ni, near Panmunjom. When we arrived in October, 1953, we were met by Lieut. Gen. William K. Harrison Jr., who had helped to negotiate the cease-fire that summer. He kindly explained the procedures which had been adopted during the armistice negotiations, and made available the services of his Chinese interpreter, Col. Robert Ekvall, and his Korean interpreter, Lieut. Kenneth Campen. General Harrison also gave me a sealed envelope which he told me to open in the privacy of my tent. It was inscribed: "How to Negotiate With the Communists." Inside, was a sheet of paper with the single word: "Don't."

Panmunjom is some 35 miles from Seoul, the South Korean capital, across the Han River in rugged country. Its name means "The Inn With the Wooden Gates." Actual wooden gates, flanked by sentry boxes, led into the international compound. The Communist guards were deliberately provocative, allowing the points of their bayonets to fall as far forward as possible without actually cutting the clothes of the Americans who had to pass between them. Learning to make the passage without flinching was an interesting experience, though not precisely fun.

Within the compound, men in varied uniforms wandered about among drab tents, Quonset huts and flimsy buildings of wood, thatch or pressed-mud panels. Blue-helmeted U.N. troops, bearded Sikhs under the command of India's Lieut. Gen. K. S. Thimayya, who was in charge of the prisoner-of-war exchange, North Korean military policemen in dark, Russian-style uniforms, Chinese soldiers in earthcolored baggy pants, or exaggerated cavalry breeches with broad stripes, and officers in smart dress uniforms from Sweden, Switzerland, Poland and Czechoslovakia swarmed about the compound. South Koreans in green fatigues handled maintenance.

Although the firing had stopped, there was an uneasy feeling throughout the demilitarized compound that anything could happen.

*NOTE BY SUBCOMMITTEE STAFF.-The Korean Armistice was signed at Panmunjom on July 27, 1953. What was supposed to follow was a "political conference of a higher level of both sides to settle through negotiations the questions of the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Korea, the peaceful settlement of the Korean question, etc." This is an account of the talks that were intended to set up the Korean "political conference"-which has never taken place.

There was no fraternizing between the two negotiating sides. A broad metal band extended across the compound, and into the fields, hills and mountains on either side, delineating the 38th parallel, the cease-fire line. It cut through the hut built by the Communists for the negotiating sessions.

Inside, a green baize table was directly over the 35th parallel, and a crease ran down the middle. The United Nations side could not step across to the North Korean and Chinese Communist side, and vice versa. Not even the ash trays placed along the edges of the crease were used by two smokers from the opposite sides simultaneously.

The negotiating sessions started each day, except Sunday, at 11 A.M., and were supposed to end at 2 P.M. Actually, they often lasted for four, five or six hours. No meals, coffee, tea or other refreshments were served, and once the negotiators sat down no one left the table, except pursuant to voted adjournment.

No individual could speak personally to anyone on the other side. There could be no exchange even of ordinary amenities at the start or end of a meeting; the Chinese stared ahead, frozen-faced, ignoring our presence. It was forbidden to ask them, or the North Koreans, over to the U.N. side for a drink, a meal, or a conversation.

A worse place for peaceful negotiations could not have been found. There was no way in which the normal tensions of difficult diplomatic negotiations could be relieved, and no way in which private negotiations or suggestions could be carried out.

The press, however, was free to roam. Whenever I went to see General Thimayya or the heads of Swiss or Swedish contingents of the Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission (which had been appointed to oversee the truce), a large contingent of newspaper, television and radio reporters gathered outside and wanted to know immediately what had been discussed. In particular, one Australian newspaperman, a Communist sympathizer named Wilfred Burchett, carried information to the Communist side.

Although the Communists had agreed that there would be no press present at the official sessions, I took the precaution of sending out scouts and found that radio transmitters and TV and movie cameras had been installed inside the negotiations hut. Also, the flags of the Chinese People's Republic and North Korea had been placed side-byside with the American flag, along the green-baize crease, implying legal recognition of the Communist regimes and equal status with the United Nations. At my insistence, the flags were removed before I would enter. The U.N. did, however, in order to get the conference moving, agree to let the press be present for the opening formalities on Oct. 26, 1953.

So the Chinese Communists, who generally pointedly ignored the North Koreans (who were always "me, too"), read a long statement in front of the press. Then they tried to win a major concession of substance by insisting on their procedure and order for enumerating the agenda-that is, the order of their discussion.

The battle of the agenda is fundamental to Communist negotiators because they believe they can humiliate the other side and win or lose