CDKW00486 - The Internationalist View

In this March 1952 letter from the Canadian Mission in Tokyo, A.R. Menzies details his present understanding of the United Nations progress and objectives towards an armistice in Korea. Though the situation on the ground appeared to be improving, outstanding issues including prisoner-of-war negotiations presented protracted issues in any negotiations. However, Mr. Cordier, the executive assistant to the secretary general of the United Nations, believed the Americans were willing to hold the ceasefire even if negotiations were slow and does not state any concerns about the willingness of China or North Korea to wait; his largest concern was that growing inflation and the upcoming June election in South Korea would reignite tensions locally. The other fascinating insights in this letter come from the discussion of the various UN groups and task forces - UNKURK, UNKRA, and UNCACK - working together and, in some cases, working so independently of each other and the UN Secretariat that Menzies inquired if the UN command structure may change. All throughout its text, this document contains reminders that the UN was still in the fledgling stages of its existence, and thus many decisions about the close of the Korean conflict involved these structural concerns in equal measure to traditional questions of warfare.