What I do want to do is take whatever steps are most likely to demonstrate the concern that
America feels. And I think I've done that. I'll be looking for other ways to do it if we possibly can.This was the wimp with a vengeance, grovelling and scraping like Chamberlain before
the dictators, but there was more to come. As part of his meek and pathetic response,
Bush had pledged to terminate all "high-level exchanges" with the Deng crowd. With this
public promise, Bush had cynically lied to the American people. Shortly before Bush's
invasion of Panama in December, it became known that Bush had despatched the two
most prominent Kissinger clones in his retinue, NSC chairman Brent Scowcroft and
Undersecretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, on a secret mission to Beijing over the
July 4 weekend, less than a month after the massacre in Tien An Men. Bush regarded this
mission as so sensitive that he reportedly kept it a secret even from White House chief of
staff Sununu, who only learned of the trip when two of his aides stumbled across the
paper trail of the planning. The story about Scowcroft and Eagleburger, both veterans of
Kissinger Associates, spending the glorious Fourth toasting the butchers of Beijing was
itself leaked in the wake of a high-profile public mission to China involving the same
Kissingerian duo that started December 7, 1989. Bush's cover story for the second trip
was that he wanted to get a briefing to Deng on the results of the Bush-Gorbachov Malta
summit, which had just concluded. The second trip was supposed to lead to the quick
release of Chinese physicist and dissident Fang Lizhi, who had taken refuge in the US
Embassy in Beijing during the massacre; this did not occur until some time later.
During a press conference primarily devoted to the ongoing Panama invasion, Bush
provided an unambiguous signal that the inspiration for his China policy, and indeed for
his entire foreign policy, was Kissinger:
There's a lot of going on that, in the conduct of the foreign policy or a debate within the US
government, has to be sorted out without the spotlight of the news. There has to be that way. The
whole opening to China would never have happened...if Kissinger hadn't undertaken that mission.
It would have fallen apart. So you have to use your own judgment. [fn 18]The news of Bush's secret diplomacy in favor of Deng caused a widespread wave of
sincere and healthy public disgust with Bush, but this was shortly overwhelmed by the
jingoist hysteria that accompanied Bush's invasion of Panama.
Bush's handling of the issue of the immigration status of the Chinese students who had
enrolled at US universities also illuminated Bush's character in the wake of Tien An Men.
In Bush's pronouncements in the immediate wake of the massacre, he absurdly asserted
that there were no Chinese students who wanted political asylum here, but also promised
that the visas of these students would be extended so that they would not be forced to
return to political persecution and possible death in mainland China. It later turned out
that Bush had neglected to promulgate the executive orders that would have been
necessary. In response to Bush's prevarication with the lives and well-being of the
Chinese students, the Congress subsequently passed legislation that would have waived
the requirement that holders of J-visas, the type commonly obtained by Chinese students,
be required to return to their home country for two years before being able to apply for
permanent residence in the US. Bush, in an act of loathsome cynicism, vetoed this bill.