The Yangtse Incidents- Compensation Demand: Communists And Britain

Greymouth Evening Star, 27 April 1949, Page 6

The Yangtse IncidentsCompensation Demand: Communists And Britain

NANKING, April 26. | The Chinese Communist radio in, Peking today broadcast a demand that the British Government should pay compensation ,and apologise to the Communists for last week’s incidents involving four British warships on the Yangtse river. The broadcast accused Britain of intervening in the Chinese civil war, and of causing 252 casualties among the Communist troops. It demanded the punishment by Britain of the forces responsible. The Chinese Communist radio last night accused British naval, units of joining forces with the Kuomintang in shelling Communist positions on the north bank of the Yangtse, but it admitted that the Communists did not know that the four “attacking” ships were British until after a British protest. The radio boasted that the Communists had defeated “a combined Chinese and British naval force.” Vice-Adihiral A. Madden, second in command of the Far East Station of the Royal Navy, said in Shanghai today: ‘I fully realise how anxious the general public must be to learn what we propose to do about the Amethyst, but it would be very difficult for me to say anything at this time, because the danger of misinterpretation is great and might prejudice the safety of those who still remain on board. Their safety is and must continue to be my chief concern at the moment.”

Warning To U.S. “The Communist victories in China threaten to take all Eastern Asia out of the orbit of the free world, and m so doing, to reduce still further-the needs for its survival,” says the New York Times in a leading article. “What is more, they enlist in the Communist cause a new and unexpectedly effective fighting force which is expanding the frontiers of Soviet domination and tipping again in favour of Russia the world balance of power and the strategic advantage which the North Atlantic Treaty was intended to restore. “In short, having lost the mitiati-

tive in Europe, the Soviet has seized the initiative of the Far East. That fact calls for new decisions on the part of the West. One direction, in which these decisions should go is indicated by a message from the United States 'Military Governor in Germany (General Lucius Clay) to a meeting of the Associated Press m New York, in which he said that the only sure way to peace was the formation of an association of the free nations of Western Europe, which would include democratic Germany. , n „ r . “What holds good for Western Europe and Germany is also relevant to the free nations of the Pacific and Japan.” A Third World War?

Events in the Far East were driving the United States into a third world war for more surely and more swiftly than events in Europe, said Major-General Claire Chennault, former commander of the 14th United States Air Force in China, at a press conference in New York. General Chennault said it was time for the United States to accept lead- i ership -in world-wide resistance to Communism. If the present trend m China continued, people on the Pacific Coast of America could be sure that a third world war would begin with the Pacific dominated by the Communists. , “A new military and economic menace has arisen in the Pacific, far more powerful than the menace of Japan, which we fought the Pacific war to eliminate,” General Chennault added. ’ “Vigorous Protest' The United States State Department today instructed its military attache in Nanking to lodge ‘a vigorous protest” with the Chinese Communist military against a violation of the residence of the American Ambassador to China (Dr. Leighton Stuart) early this morning. The embassy, in a telegram from Nanking, gave the following details:—“The Ambassador’s residence was violated at 6.40 a.m. today by 12 armed Communist soldiers, who went to the Ambassador’s room and entered* ' “The Ambassador was not quite awake, and the soldiers’ appearance in his bedroom was something of a shock. While they did not threaten him, the first soldier to enter the room spoke in loud and angry tones. Those that followed were more civil. They said they had come ‘to look around.’ , , , . ... “The soldiers wandered about the bedroom, inspecting its contents ana making remarks to the effect that all this would eventually go to the people to whom it should belong anyway.” ~ , The embassy’s telegram said that the soldiers had entered other rooms, threatening the people in them with their guns, and inspecting the contents. They finally left _ the house without removing anything. India And Communists LONDON, April 26. India has decided to establish conI sular relations with the Communist i regime in China, says the New Delhi correspondent of the Daily Telegraph* . ■, j i This step is officially described as 1 “an acceptance of facts.” Formal de facto recognition of the Communist regime may follow. The Indian Ambassador, with his staff, is remaining in Nanking.