only, Bush pledged his honor on Nixon's committment to "two Chinas.""I know for a fact that the
President wants to see the policy implemented," said Bush, apparently with a straight face, addingthat he had discussed the matter with Nixon and Kissinger at the White House only a few days
before. Bush said that he and other members of his mission had lobbied 66 countries so far, and that
this figure was likely to rise to 80 by the following week. Ultimately Bush would claim to have
talked personlly with 94 delegations to get them to let Taiwan stay, which a fellow diplomat called
"a quantitative track record."
Diplomatic observers noted that the US activity was entirely confined to the high-profile "glass
palace" of the UN, and that virtually nothing was being done by US ambassadors in capitals around
the world. But Bush countered that if it were just a question of going through the motions as a
gesture for Taiwan, he would not be devoting so much of his time and energy to the cause. Themain effort was at the UN because "this is what the UN is for," he commented. Bush said that his (^)
optimism about keeping the Taiwan membership had increased over the past three weeks. [fn 12]
By late September, Bush was saying that he saw a better than 50-50 chance that the UN General
Assembly would seat both Chinese governments. By this time, the official US position asenunciated by Bush was that the Security Council seat should go to Peking, but that Taipei ought to (^)
be allowed to remain in the General Assembly. Since 1961, the US strategy for blocking the
admission of Peking had depended on a procedural defense, obtaining a simple majority of the
General Assembly for a resolution defining the seating of Peking as an Important Question, which
required a two-thirds majority in order to be implemented. Thus, if the US could get a simplemajority on the procedural vote, one third plus one would suffice to defeat Peking on the second (^)
vote.
The General Assembly convened on September 21. Bush and his aides were running a ludicrous all-
court press on scores of delegations. Twice a day there was a State Department briefing on the votetally. "Yes, Burundi is with us...About Argentina we're not sure," etc.) All this attention got Bush an (^)
appearance on "Face the Nation", where he said that the two-China policy should be approved
regardless of the fact that both Peking and Taipei rejected it. "I don't think we have to go through
the agony of whether the Republic of China will accept or whether Peking will accept," Bush told
the interviewers. "Let the United Nations for a change do something tha really does face up toreality and then let that decision be made by the parties involved," said Bush with his usual
inimitable rhetorical flair.
The UN debate on the China seat was scheduled to open on October 18; on October 12 Nixon gave
a press conference in which he totally ignored the subject, and made no appeal for support forTaiwan. On October 16, Kissinger departed with great fanfare for China. Kissinger says in his (^)
memoirs that he had been encouraged to go to China by Bush, who assured him that a highly
publicized Kissinger trip to Peking would have no impact whatever on the UN vote. On October 25,
the General Assembly defeated the US resolution to make the China seat an Important Question by
a vote of 59 to 54, with 15 abstentions. Ninety minutes later came the vote on the Albanianresolution to seat Peking and expel Taipei, which passed by a vote of 76 to 35. Bush then cast the (^)
US vote to seat Peking, and then hurried to escort the ROC delegate, Liu Chieh, out of the hall for
the last time. The General Assembly was the scene of a jubilant demonstration led by third world
delegates over the fact that Red China had been admitted, and even more so that the US had been
defeated. The Tanzanian delegate danced a jig in the aisle. Henry Kissinger, flying back fromPeking, got the news on his teletype and praised Bush's "valiant efforts."
Having connived in selling Taiwan down the river, it was now an easy matter for the Nixon regime
to fake a great deal of indignation for domestic political consumption about what had happened.
Nixon's spokesman Ron Ziegler declared that Nixon had been outraged by the "spectacle" of the