Darkmoon: Eighth Army Special Operations in the Korean War (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1995); Arthur W. Galston, "Science and Social Responsibility: A Case Study," Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 196:4 (1972), pp. 223-35; and Arthur W. Galston, personal communication to author.

18U.S. Department of State, ed., Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952-1954, vol. 15, Korea, part I (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1984), p. 844.

19Ibid.

20Quoted in John Ellis Van Courtland Moon, "Biological Warfare Allegations: The Korean War Case," The Microbiologist and Biological Defense Research: Ethics, Politics and International Security, R.A. Zilinskas, ed., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 666 (1992): 53-83.1992, p. 69.

21 See The Problem of Chemical and Biological Warfare, vol. 1: The Rise of CB Weapons, (Stockholm: Almquist and Wiksell, 1971), esp. pp. 162 and 210; vol. 2: CB Weapons Today (Stockholm: Almquist and Wiksell, 1973); The Effects of Herbicides in Vietnam: Part A: Summary and Conclusions (Washington, DC: National Academy of Sciences, 1974); Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. House of Representatives, 91st Congress (1 st Session), ed., Report: 1st Session, 8 August 1969 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1969); J.B. Nieland et al., Harvest of Death: Chemical Warfare in Vietnam and Cambodia (New York: The Free Press, 1972).

22❝Le Comité International de la Croix Rouge et le Conflit de Corée," Recueil de Documents, vol. II: January 1-June 30, 1952 (Geneva: ICRC, 1952), pp. 84-109.

23Quoted in Moon, "Biological Warfare Allegations," p. 69. 24The resolution "requested the International Committee of the Red Cross, with the aid of such scientists of international reputation and such other experts as it may select, to investigate the charges and to report the results to the Security Council as soon as possible; called upon all governments and authorities concerned to accord to the International Committee of the Red Cross full cooperation, including the right of entry to, and free movement in, such areas as the Committee may deem necessary in the performance of its task; requested the Secretary-General to furnish the Committee with such assistance and facilities as it might require." Goldblatt "Allegations of the Use of Bacteriological and Chemical Weapons in Korea and China," p.

214.

25These are summarized in some detail in the Goldblat, "Allegations of the Use of Bacteriological and Chemical Weapons in Korea and China."

26 Maarten Schneider, "Bacteria As Propaganda Weapon," International Spectator (Netherlands Institute of International Affairs), 8 May 1957.

27 Mose Harvey, "Briefing on Soviet Developments Following the Death of Stalin (April 24, 1953)," p. 459, in US House of Representatives, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Selected Executive Session Hearings of the Committee, 1952-56, vol. 14 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1980).

28 Novosti Press Agency and Krasnaya Zvezda, 13 September 1982 and 12 February 1983.

29 Milton Leitenberg, "Biological Weapons, International Sanctions, and Proliferation," Asian Perspective 21:3 (Winter 1997), pp. 7-39, especially pp. 23-27; Milton Leitenberg, "The Desirability of International Sanctions Against False Allegations of Use of Biological Weapons," The Monitor: Nonproliferation, Demilitarization, and Arms Control 3:4/4:1 (Fall/Winter 1997

1998), pp. 39-46.

30Report of the [United Nations] Secretary General, Chemical and Bacteriological (Biological) Weapons and the Effects of Their Possible Use (New York: United Nations, 1969).

31A problem of judgment is introduced, however, by the fact that even official Soviet government statements at the very highest level exist that run counter to unquestionable fact regarding instances of CBW use: In an official Soviet comment on President Dwight D. Eisenhower's "Atoms for Peace" speech at the United Nations on 8 December 1953, the Soviet government drew attention to the 1925 Geneva Protocol by stating: "The fact that not a single Government engaged in the Second World War dared to use chemical and bacteriological weapons proves that the aforesaid agreement of the States against chemical and bacteriological weapons had positive significance." US Department of State, ed., Documents on Disarmament: 19451959, vol. I: 1945-1956 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1960) p. 402. That contention was unquestionably wrong: Japan had used both chemical and biological weapons in China during World War II, which the USSR knew, not least through the trial it had held in Khabarovsk in 1949.

32A.M. Arkhangel'skiy et al., Bacteriological Weapons and How to Defend Against Them (Moscow: Military Publishing House, 1967), JPRS Translation #42,361, 28 August 1967.

33In 1985, on the 40th anniversary of the end of World War II, the Novosti Press Agency published a small book, Recalling the Past for the Sake of the Future: The Causes, Results and Lessons of World War II. Pages 112-113 of the book reviews Japan's wartime BW program and the use of BW by Japan “in China and Mongolia." No mention is made of the Korean War at all.

34 E.I.Smirnov et al., Voini i epidemii [Wars and Epidemics] (Moscow: Moscow-Medicine, 1988).

350

"China Mulls Toxic Arms Ban, "Washington Times, 20 September 1984, p. 5.

36 Chen Jian, "China's Strategies to End the Korean War," conference paper, CWIHP Conference on New Evidence on the Cold War in Asia, University of Hong Kong, 9-12 January 1996, quoting from Shen Zonghong and Meng Zhaohai, A History of the Chinese People's Volunteers' War to Resist America and Assist Korea (Beijing: PLA Publishing House, 1988), p. 7, and Qi Dexue, Chaoxian Zhanzheng Neimu [The Inside Story of the Korean War], p. 280-no source or date. The author would like to thank Hang Zhou for the translation of the Chinese documents.

37

Shu Guang Zhang, Mao's Military Romanticism: China and the Korean War 1950-1953 (Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press, 1995); Chen Jian, China's Road to the Korean War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994).

38 Telegram, CPV Headquarters to the CMC, 28 January 1952, cited in Yang Dezhi Memoirs, p. 101, and in Jiang Yonghui Memoirs, p. 465; quoted in Shu Guang Zhang, Mao's Military Romanticism, p. 181; Chen, China's Strategies.

39Memorandum, Nie Rongzhen to Mao and Zhou Enlai, 18 February 1952, cited in Qi Dexue, Chaixian Zhanzheng Neimu, pp. 280-282; quoted in Shu Guang Zhang, Mao's Military Romanticism, p. 182.

40 "Mao Zedong Comments on Nie Rongzhen's Report About the Large-Scale Airdropping of Insects Carrying Bacteria by the Enemy in the Korean Battlefield," 19 February 1952, Jianquo Yilai Mao Zedong [Anthology of Mao Zedong's Manuscripts Since the 1949 Founding of the People's Republic], vol. 3 [1/ 1952 to 12/1952] (Beijing: The Central Press of Historical Documents, 1989), p. 239.

41Memorandum, Zhou Enlai to Mao, cited in Qi Dexue, Chaixian Zhanzheng Neimu, p. 282; quoted in Shu Guang Zhang, Mao's Military Romanticism, pp. 182-183.

42Nie Rongzhen, "Report on American Invaders Using Bacteria Weapons and Our Responsive Actions, "Nie Rongzhen junshi wen xuan [Selected Military Papers of Nie Rongzhen], (Beijing: People's Liberation Army Press, 1992), pp. 365-366. Most of the memorandum actually deals with other issues, such as pre-planned vaccines and gas defense for Chinese troops, anticipation of nuclear weapons use by the United States.

43Halpern, "Bacteriological Warfare Accusations," p. 43. 44Jon Halliday and Bruce Cumings, Korea: The Unknown War (New York: Pantheon Books, 1988), pp. 184-185.

45 Quoted in Cookson and Nottingham, A Survey of Chemical and Biological Warfare, p. 62.

46Theodor Rosebury, "Biological Warfare: Some Historical Considerations," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 16:6 (June 1960), pp. 227-236.

47 Halpern, "Bacteriological Warfare Accusations," pp. iv, 2630, 71-79.

48Communist Bacteriological Warfare Propaganda, OIR/CPI Special Paper No. 4, June 16, 1952, Unclassified, pp. 24-25. 49Schneider, "Bacteria as Propaganda-Weapon." 50Stephen L. Endicott, "Germ Warfare and 'Plausible Denial:' The Korean War, 1952-1953," Modern China 5:1 (January 1979), pp. 79-104. Rev. Endicott's judgment was that his "Personal investigations reveal undeniable evidence [of] largescale continuing American germ warfare on [the] Chinese Mainland," and that "[t]he evidence can readily convince any impartial and unbiased person."

51Descriptions of both men appear in Chapter 17, "Korean War," in Williams and Wallace, Unit 731, esp. pp. 255-263.

52Leitenberg, "Allegations of the Biological Warfare in China

and Korea: 1951-1952," p. 258.

53 Cookson and Nottingham, A Survey of Chemical and Biological Warfare, pp. 307 and 62.

54 Jaap van Ginneken, "Bacteriological Warfare," Journal of Contemporary Asia 7:2 (1977), pp. 130-152.

55Halliday and Cumings, Korea, p. 185.

56

Letter from Joseph Needham to Jeanne McDermott, quoted in The Killing Winds: The Menace of Biological Warfare (New York: Arbor House, 1986), p. 169. In a letter to Stephen Endicott in 1979 (Endicott, "Germ Warfare and 'Plausible Denial," p. 86), Needham also repeated that he maintained his earlier position on the allegations.

57 Williams and Wallace, Unit 731, pp. 235-285.

58 Albert E. Cowdrey, "Germ Warfare' and Public Health in the Korean Conflict," Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 39 (April 1984), pp. 153-172.

59 Henry A. Kissinger, Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy (New York: Harper and Bros., 1957), p. 376.

60 Alice Langley Hsieh, Communist China's Strategy in the Nuclear Age (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1962), p. 4. 61 Mark A. Ryan, "Nuclear Weapons and Chinese Allegations of Chemical and Biological Warfare," Chinese Attitudes Toward Nuclear Weapons: China and the United States During the Korean War (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1989), pp. 104-138. Ryan probably exaggerated the number of individuals in China that need to have been involved in the deception in the field (and was so advised by this author in 1988 after reading his manuscript).

62 Ibid., p. 104.

63 Van Courtland Moon, "Biological Warfare Allegations: The Korean War Case," pp. 53-83.

Władysław Gomułka to Moscow, that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev first publicly announced his intention to turn over the Soviet Union's control functions in Berlin to the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Khrushchev's speech was the prelude to his letter of November 27 to the Western powers, in which he demanded that they enter into negotiations for a German peace treaty and on the issue of transforming West Berlin into a demilitarized, "free" city. If sufficient progress were not made within six months, Khrushchev threatened to sign a separate peace treaty with the GDR and to grant it control over the transit routes to Berlin.2

Recently-declassified minutes of a meeting between Gomułka and Khrushchev on November 10, the day of the Soviet leader's speech, shed light on the immediate prelude to the ultimatum of November 27. They tend to confirm Hope Harrison and Vladislav Zubok's main assertions in their recent studies about Khrushchev's goals in provoking the crisis: to differentiate himself from his ousted opponents, to counter the Federal Republic of Germany's (FRG) expanding role in NATO, and-above all else to gain international recognition of the GDR.3 The minutes highlight in particular the key role of the shifting nuclear balance in Khrushchev's thinking and provide insight into the evolving relationship between Khrushchev and Gomułka.

Khrushchev's Goals

On the weekend of 8 November 1958, Gomułka received a draft of Khrushchev's proposed speech for the friendship rally on Monday. He was reportedly shocked. Although the GDR and the Soviet Union had sent notes to the Federal Republic and the Western powers in September calling for a German peace treaty and interGerman talks on reunification, there had been no mention of Berlin. Only days before the Polish foreign minister, Adam Rapacki, had renewed his proposal for a nuclear weapon-free zone in Central Europe to embrace both German states, Poland, and Czechoslovakia. The underlying goals of the initiative, the "Rapacki Plan," were to prevent West German access to nuclear weapons and to provide the basis for détente and disarmament in Europe. A relaxation of tensions between the two blocs would have allowed Poland more room for maneuver in its

domestic and foreign policies, especially with regard to trade and cultural relations with the West. In contrast, Khrushchev's Berlin gambit presaged an increase in tensions between East and West. Although it might have been aimed indirectly at preventing West German access to nuclear weapons, the central goal was to gain Western recognition of the GDR. Khrushchev's Berlin ultimatum meant, in effect, that the struggle within the Eastern bloc between Poland and the GDR over what was to come first in Soviet-bloc foreign policy-regional disarmament or recognition of the GDR-had been decided in the East. Germans' favor.7

In the session on November 10, Gomułka let Khrushchev do the talking. When the Soviet leader asked Gomułka if he had read Moscow's latest "suggestions" regarding Berlin, he said that he had. "We understand," Gomułka said, "that they are aimed towards liquidating the western part of Berlin." Khrushchev quickly countered, "It is not that simple." The announcement on Berlin was only the "beginning of the struggle." Moscow intended to hand over its control functions in Berlin to the East Germans, and this would force the West to speak directly with the GDR-leading, in effect, to its recognition. The Soviet leader also suggested other possible reasons for his gambit. He tried to differentiate himself from his former opponents in the struggle to succeed Stalin by citing their policy towards the German question. Both KGB Chief Lavrentii Beria and Soviet Communist Party Central Committee Secretary Georgi Malenkov, Khrushchev declared, had favored a Soviet withdrawal from Berlin and the GDR in 1953.8 In the same year, Khrushchev had justified Beria's removal and execution by pointing to his German policy. Similarly, in June 1957, he had vindicated his purge of the "anti-party group" of Malenkov, Vyacheslav Molotov, and Lazar Kaganovich from the Soviet leadership by citing their opposition to credits for the GDR. To help assure Gomułka's support, Khrushchev now alleged that his former opponents had even wanted to alter Poland's western border, the OderNeisse Line. Having differentiated himself from his opponents, he also brought up the issue of the FRG's membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an alliance "clearly directed against us." Bonn's membership in NATO, he declared, violated the Potsdam Agreement. It thus provided Moscow with a justification to renounce the existing arrangements for Berlin, agreed

upon at Potsdam, especially since the West was using West Berlin as an “attack base” against the Soviet Union.

Nuclear Brinkmanship and the West's Reaction

Khrushchev sought to calm the Polish delegation's fears about the possibility of war over Berlin by underlining the altered strategic balance since 1953. The West would not risk a war over Berlin, he suggested, because the Soviet Union had the hydrogen bomb and the means to hit the U.S. As Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov point out, Khrushchev believed that the Soviet threat to use nuclear weapons during the Suez Crisis exactly two years earlier had played a crucial role in forcing Great Britain and France to back down. His "nuclear-missile romanticism"10 also led him to believe that in order to avoid nuclear confrontation, the Western powers would have to acquiesce in East German control over the transit routes to Berlin. (In his meeting with Gomułka, Khrushchev did not mention the possibility of a negotiated settlement with the West over Berlin or a peace treaty.) "If a conflict results," Khrushchev told Gomułka, "they [the West] know full well that we are in a position to raze West Germany to the ground. The first minutes of war will decide.... Their territory is small-West Germany, England, France-literally several bombs will suffice..." Although a war "might drag on for years," the Soviet Union could also launch a nuclear strike against the U.S. "Today, America has moved closer to us," Khrushchev told Gomułka, "our missiles can hit them directly."

Since war was no longer an option for the West, Khrushchev predicted, they would resort to some form of economic blockade against the GDR and Berlin. This time, however, unlike 1948-49, it would be the Soviet Union that would provide the residents of West Berlin with food. Since France and Great Britain-Khrushchev and Gomułka agreed did not really favor German unification, they would not necessarily put up much resistance. Indeed, Khrushchev predicted-incorrectly, as it turned out—that French President Charles de Gaulle would not actively support West Germany during a crisis over Berlin." De Gaulle, he said, feared the Germans; if they attacked any country in the future, it would be France, not the Soviet Union. "De Gaulle," Khrushchev adjudged, "is a realist, a military man; he completely understands the danger to France."

Khrushchev, it seems, had not yet decided to leave open the possibility of a negotiated settlement with the Western powers over Berlin. When Gomułka brought up the option of talks with the West, Khrushchev replied that Moscow was not planning a diplomatic approach to the Western powers. It would simply withdraw its representative from the Allied Control Commission, recall its military commander from Berlin, and hand over control of the access routes to the East Germans. By the time of his "ultimatum" on November 27, however, Khrushchev decided to leave open the possibility of a negotiated

settlement on Berlin and a peace treaty, so as long as sufficient progress was made within six months. 12 He rescinded and renewed the deadline two more times before he finally abandoned it in October 1961, two months after the construction of the Berlin Wall.

The Polish-Soviet Relationship

The minutes also provide insight into the evolving relationship between Khrushchev and Gomułka. Only two years before, in October 1956, Khrushchev had flown to Warsaw on the eve of the Polish United Workers' Party [PUWP]'s 8th Plenum to confront the Polish leadership about Gomułka's return to power. 13 In contrast, in November 1958, he talked openly with Gomułka about the ostensible differences within the Soviet leadership over Poland's western border, the Oder-Neisse Line. Not surprisingly, he suggested that he, Khrushchev, had always supported the Oder-Neisse Line and it was others-Beria and the "feeble" Malenkov-who had committed the "stupidity" of refusing to recognize it. Khrushchev's statement was particularly ironic because it was he who had made veiled threats against the Oder-Neisse Line in two meetings with Gomułka in 1957. At the first meeting, in May 1957 in Moscow, Khrushchev had used the border issue to force Gomułka to renounce his demands for compensation for Moscow's economic exploitation of Poland during the Stalin era. At the second meeting, in August 1957, he had pressured Gomułka to curb the reforms in Poland and combat "anti-Sovietism." Gomułka had responded in October 1957 with a crackdown in Poland. He had ordered the closure of the Warsaw student newspaper, Po prostu, the leading organ of the Polish reform movement.16 When students protested the decision, they were brutally rebuffed by Poland's internal security forces. Then, in November 1957, Gomułka had ordered a purge ("review") of the PUWP's membership, which led to the dismissal of leading "revisionists." By the time of his meeting with Khrushchev in November 1958, Gomułka publicly supported Khrushchev's Berlin gambit, despite his private reservations. In return, the Soviet leader sanctioned-both in his speech on November 10 and more importantly, during a visit to Poland in July 1959-Poland's right to follow its own path to socialism. 18

14

15

17

The excerpt below comes from the former Polish party archives, now a part of Archiwum Akt Nowych (AAN), or the Archive for Contemporary Documents, in Warsaw.19

Minutes from the Discussion between the Delegation of the PRL [People's Republic of Poland] and the Government of the USSR," 25 October - 10 November 1958

[Excerpt from session on 10 November 1958.]

Khrushchev: He turns to the German question and quotes the recent statement of [U.S. Secretary of State John Foster]

Dulles on the matter of Berlin.2 20

If a conflict results, they know full well that we are in a position to raze West Germany to the ground. The first minutes of war will decide. There the losses will naturally be the greatest. After that, the war might drag on for years. Their territory is small-West Germany, England, France-literally several bombs will suffice, they will decide in the first minutes of the war. We recently conducted tests, and we have such [delivery] vehicles that at the same strength they use ten times less fuel, so in the same space we can produce ten times as many bombs.

There were some among us who believed that we would have to withdraw from Berlin. Beria proposed this, and he was supported by "feeble" Malenkov. They believed that we should give up the GDR and Berlin. That was in 1953. What would we have accomplished after that? They did not even recognize the border on the Oder and Neisse, so that would have been complete stupidity. They would not have even recognized the Western border of Poland, but had pretensions to Gdynia and Gdańsk. We have to defend the border on the Elbe. Are we supposed to give up a population of 18 million in the GDR for nothing, without a fight? That's stupidity. We should fully support Ulbricht and Grotewohl. The FRG simply offered us gold, dollars, so that we would not support the GDR. They simply asked - how much do you want [?] Of course we rejected this, we do not negotiate on such questions.

You know about our latest suggestions with regard to Berlin.

Gomułka: We know. We understand that they are aimed towards liquidating the western part of Berlin. Khrushchev: It is not that simple. I am only announcing that matter. That is the beginning of the struggle. Our announcement in our presentations is only the beginning of the action. Undoubtedly it is an exacerbation of the situation. The GDR will aggravate the issue of transport, especially military, and they will have to turn to them on matters of transport. Of course an exacerbation will result.

Gomułka: It is understood that in the longer term a situation cannot continue in which in the interior of one state, the GDR, stands another state-West Berlin. It would be different if the unification of Germany were a close prospect and that was possible at the time of Potsdam, when it was considered a temporary status— until the unification of Germany. But currently the situation is different and such a prospect is lacking. Such a state of things cannot be maintained. There is not even a single state in the West that would support the unification of Germany. Even France and England do not wish that upon themselves.

Khrushchev: And France and England are afraid themselves of whether we might not give in on this issue. In 1956, they were full of happiness, they thought that Poland had perished as a socialist state. They were mistaken, but even if it had come to pass, even if we had

had some difficulties in Poland, it would not have saved them. We would have gone through Czechoslovakia, through the Baltic Sea, but we would have never withdrawn from the GDR. We would not allow the GDR to be swallowed up.

Gomułka: Do you intend to address the three states [i.e., Western powers] about liquidating the status of Berlin?

Khrushchev: No. My declaration today should be understood in such a fashion, that we are unilaterally ceasing to observe the agreement on Berlin's status, that we are discontinuing to fulfill the functions deriving from our participation in the Control Commission. Next, we will recall our military commander in West Berlin and our [military] mission. [East German Premier Otto] Grotewohl will ask the English and Americans to leave, along with their missions. Our military, however, will remain in the GDR on the basis of our participation in the Warsaw Treaty. Then the capitalist states will have to turn to the GDR on matters relating to Berlin, transit, and transport. They will have to turn to Grotewohl, and he is firm. And that's when the tension begins. Some form of blockade will result, but we have enough foodstuffs. We will also have to feed West Berlin. We do not want to, but the population will suffer from it.

Ignar:21 That political stance is of course right, as long as you say that it will not cause a war. If not, then it is correct and I, in any case, think so.

Khrushchev: War will not result from it. There will be tensions, of course, there will be a blockade. They might test to see our reaction. In any case we will have to show a great deal of cold blood in this matter.

Gomułka: They might try different forms of blockade. That might play a part in the summit meeting. Khrushchev: According to the Potsdam agreement, the FRG should not join any alliance against the countries with which Germany fought. But they joined NATO, which is clearly directed against us. That is clearly in conflict with the Potsdam agreement. West Berlin is there to be used as an attack base against us. They are turning to blackmail. Five years ago—that was different. Then, we did not have the hydrogen bomb; now, the balance of forces is different. Then, we could not reach the USA. The USA built its policies upon the bases surrounding us. Today, America has moved closer to us-our missiles can hit them directly.

Gomułka: What about de Gaulle?

Khrushchev: He will not actively support them. De Gaulle fears the Germans. During a meeting in Moscow with the French (Guy Mollet), we said to them: Why would the Germans attack to the east? There they will meet the greatest resistance, there it will be difficult for them. Hence, they will certainly attack to the west. De Gaulle understands that if the Germans start looking for weak spots they will attack France, because if they want to attack the USSR, they will have to go through Poland. De Gaulle is a realist, a military man, he understands