Sombre Comment In Britain: May Be Long Struggle

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 July 1950, Page 6

Sombre Comment In Britain: May Be Long Struggle

LONDON, July 3.—A rather sombre view of events in Korea is taken by English weekly papers. “Whatever the outcome, there will be bloodshed, civilian suffering, international tension, and many searchings of heart,” says the Economist. “This may be another Spain,” says the Economist, “and if so, the struggle must not be expected to be over quickly or to be devoid either of dangers or of humiliations. “It is the crucial test of the United Nations. It is also a test of the Soviet Union’s will to peace.” Another Risk

The Economist believes that whatever may be the risks of picking up the challenge that the Communists have thrown down, they are smaller and hardly even more immediate than the risk of not doing so. It has no doubts about the correctness of the United Nations in their action, which it describes as “a heartening spectacle.” “The leaders of the free world have shown that they have the will to resist aggression and that they are ready to run risks now io stop militant Communism from picking off its victims one by one,” the Economist says. “Whatever happens in Korea, the warning has gone out —to the East German Bereitschaften (Soviet zone militarised “police”), io the Cominform conspiring against Marshal Tito, and to the would-be ‘liberators’ of South-east Asia.” The New Statesman and Nation is not so satisfied on the score of the action taken. It remarks: “Jumping the legal gun by a matter of five hours, America announced its intention to protect Southern against Northern Korea and also formally declared its determination to prevent any attack on Formosa, at the same time warning the Kuomintang rump against continuing their blockade of Communist China. Attitude To Formosa

“By this unilateral action in taking over Formosa, which should by universal consent be returned to China, the Americans have weakened the basis of legality on which they stand and have shown that the underlying issue in. the Pacific is the rivalry of two Great Powers.

“Yet, as the Korean conflict was presented to them, Britain and the other members of the Security Council could see no alternative but to accept America’s lead, however apprehensive they might be of its outcome.”

Asking, “Will America’s protective action bring wax’ nearer or give us a chance of peace?” the New Statesman and Nation remarks: “This depends on the attitude of the West to the social problems out of which

Communism is able to advance. It is

only too possible that the upshot of the American action in Southern Korea will merely be to build what Mr Acheson might properly call a ‘position of weakness—that is, a strategic point which from the military

point of view is hard to defend, which is based on no popular support, and which is just as vulnerable to the ideological attack of Communism as the present South Korean regime of Dr Syngman Rhee.'

“The Communist offensive in Korea has, in short, given American imperialism just the opportunity it desired. Some American imperialists now see before them the prospect of opposing Communism by force all ovex’ the world, and presumably of finally scoring a great military victory against China and the U.S.S.R.”

The 38th Parallel The Spectator, after remarking that the North Korean Army must be persuaded or forced back to the 38th parallel, says: “When that has been done, we shall only find ourselves once more facing a series of familiar but unpalatable facts,. Considered as a frontier, as distinct from the temporary dividing line between the American and Russian forces which it was meant to be, the • 38th parallel is unsuitable to the point of ideocy. The Koreans do not wish their country to be divided into two for the convenience of the Great Powers, “The artificial arrangement which has existed in Korea since the war simply cannot be treated as permanent. If the Russians decide to intervene to cut short the war—and there can be no doubt that their intervention would be decisive—they would still have to take part in the positive task of putting the country of Korea on to a reasonable footing. But if they managed to do that, we should 'at last be on the road to world-wide co-op-eration and good would indeed have come out of evil. The problem of Korea is a microcosm of the problem of the world as a whole.”