THS FAR EAST TOWARD CLARIFICATION OF WESTERN POLICY

Press, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 26662, 22 February 1952, Page 6

THS FAR EAST TOWARD CLARIFICATION OF WESTERN POLICY

IBv WALTER UPPMANN <n the “New York Herald Tribune"} (Reprinted by Arrangement.)

Although no one intended it or planned it, we have recently participated in a most extraordinary event. The Prime Minister of Great Britain has sought what amounts to a vote of confidence on the same subject botn from his own Parliament and from the Congress of the United States. Mr Churchill in Congress was not a foreign statesman making an address. He was speaking in the manner of a political minister trying to win a majority to support him. Two weeks later Mr Churchill had to go before his own Parliament for essentially the same purpose. Nothing quite like this has ever happened before—that the head of a government should recognise that he needs the support of two legislatures on two sides of an ocean. It is a spectacular demonstration of how rar in fact the two democracies are now enmeshed the one with the other. That this has happened at all is likely to be remembered much longer than precisely what did happen, than exactly what Mr Churchill said ana did not say, than just what he meant and did not mean. The right judgment, I imagine, on Mr Churchill s two speeches, on this first, rather haphazard experiment in mutuality, is that of Dr. Johnson when he heard that a woman had preached a sermon. It was “like a dog walking on its hiqder legs,” he said. “It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” The reason it was not done very well is, as “The Times’’ of London said after Mr Churchill’s statement to Parliament, that “the policies of Britain and the United States are still far apart, and that no real agreement has been reached except to wait upon events, strive for a truce and to consult together in an emergency." No Real Agreement Undoubtedly "The Times” is right that there is no real agreement about the Far East. The question is whether a real agreement is impossible. I do not believe it is impossible. With lucidity and the courage to speak plainly on both sides of the Atlantic, agreement, which is so desirable and indeed so necessary, should be quite possible. Agreement is possible, I would contend, because the vital interests of the United States and Great Britain do not conflict in the Far East. There is nothing that is British in the Far East which we want. There is nothing American that the British want. Our disagreements do not arise because our interests conflict, much less because our ideals and principles are opposed* Our disagreements must be due then to a muddle of cross-purposes which the two governments have not cleared up. The muddle will have to be cleared up soon, now that Admiral Joy has written to the chief of * the North Korean delegation proposing that negotiations begin on the fifth and last item on the agenda. This item calls for a recommendation by the military commanders to the governments about a final political settlement in Korea. The muddle, which cannot be cleared up in Korea but only in Washington, is whether the United States will negotiate a political settlement with Red China. This is the crucial question in the Far East: is it our view that we can never make a peace with Red China, that, as with Nazi Germany, our policy is the elimination of the regime, that toward*Mao’s govern-

ment our terms are unconditional surrender and the restoration of th* Nationalists?

To this question there has been na clear answer in Washington, and it £ impossible to say what is the American answer to this question. For since th* Korean War began there has been a kind of tacit understanding in the in. terests of national unity that the question should be kept in the back, ground, and that every one who is to act responsibly must talk ambiguously It was like this during the war in the public discussion of subjects like un. conditional surrender, the so-called Morgenthau plan, and the issues in. volved in the occupation and partition of Germany. The frank discussion of these issues was as taboo and as confused as is now the subject of whether we mean to fight Red China until it is overthrown, or whether we are prepared to negotiate with it and to co-exist with it if we can.

Negotiating with Red China The Far Eastern issues which I trouble our relations with Britain would resolve themselves quickly enough if the American government could make it plain that its policy was not unconditional surrender and that it was prepared to negotiate a ■ peace with Red China on all the issues of the Far East. This has nothin* ! to do with agreeing to the Chines! i demands. It has to do only with the willingness to discuss the terms on which agreement might be reached. If this is our policy, then what is the answer to the question: shall we recog. nise Red China? The answer is “certainly not” while we are at war but “yes, when and if we have negotiated and ratified an acceptable treaty of peace.” Shall Red China be represented in the U.N.? The answer is “not while she is at war with the U.N. In Korea, not while there is the threat of war on the Indo-Chinese frontier but yes, if and when, Red China :nak« peace with the U.N.” What about Formosa? The proper answer is that the future of Formosa can be settled only in a treaty of peace which covers an Far Eastern issues. Until then, we shall protect and neutralise Formosa. Not Appeasement There is not much doubt that if this were the declared American attitude, our disagreements with Britain would become easily manageable, and so in fact would our differences with our allies in Europe and with the large independent nations of Asia. Nor la there much doubt that the great maaa of the American people would support a policy which is so prudent, so reasonable, so fair —if only it were stated plainly to them. There is no great number of Americans who really want to go crusading in China, or to fight, if not a world war then at the least a very much bigger war than the Korean, for the purpose of changiM and the social order Before anyone blows his top about this being appeasement of an aggressor, let him recall what was his state of mind, let us say seven years ago. about making peace with Germany and with Japan, w'nat would he have said

then, how would he have felt then, if he had had a crystal ball in which he saw himself rearming the Germans and the Japanese and proclaiming them the indispensable defenders of freedom, democracy and civilisation! Let him then reflect on how impermanent are the emotions, and now little they can be trusted in determining the great policies of great nations.