CDKW00218 - Canada Aims to Avoid General War

By December 1950, UN forces were nearing the north end of the Korean peninsula as they chased the North Koreans past the 38th parallel. However, External Affairs “was disturbed by Rusk’s [Dean Rusk, the Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs] remarks” that the US would be willing to bomb past the Manchurian border into China. The Canadians had already warned the Americans in mid-November that such a move would be unacceptable without the prior and specific authority of the United Nations. Not unlike Ottawa’s previous desires to delineate that support in Korea did not indicate any defense of Formosa, the Canadians were eager to avoid a general war and in particular eager to keep the communist Chinese out of the conflict in Korea.