The Gisborne Herald. IN WHICH IS INCORPORATED "THE TIMES." GISBORNE, MONDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1947. AMERICAN FACT-FINDING IN CHINA

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22464, 20 October 1947, Page 4

The Gisborne Herald. IN WHICH IS INCORPORATED "THE TIMES." GISBORNE, MONDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1947. AMERICAN FACT-FINDING IN CHINA

JjAST week China’s danger of absorption into the Soviet orbit was stressed by General Wedcmeyer, President Truman’s fact-finding envoy. General Wedemeyer is convinced that most Chinese do not want to become Communists, but that, being realists, they passively accept any form of Government providing food and shelter. The chief trouble seems to be that, although on the Nanking side Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek himself is a sincere and worthy leader, his efforts at unity and political justice are to a depressing extent being hindered by subsidiary influences within his own ranks. In the north the Chinese Communists have not hitherto been Communists in the true Soviet sense, and for a long time the Kremlin did not actively support them. Now, however, the American soldier-envoy says that Soviet propaganda and Soviet support of the Chinese Communist movement have intensified the difficulties of establishing order throughout the country. It is all too apparent that the Nanking Government cannot regain the confidence of the Chinese people without carrying out drastic political and economic changes, including the removal of many incompetent and corrupt officials. An American commentator recently stated that "Washington’s earlier readiness to support Chiang Kai-shek against a Communist rebellion has been progressively tempered as the true character of the Kuomintang dictatorship has emerged. Sympathy has given place to impatience, and Chiang’s protracted failure to initiate any real reforms has been increasingly criticised. Coupled with the latest cabled news, this information gives the impression that the United States actually faces a serious dilemma in China. On the one hand, it is reluctant to abandon a bulwark against the extension of Communist, and hence Soviet, influence in the Far East; on the other, the mounting evidence of a popular revolt against the present regime renders continued backing of the National Government distasteful both to "Washington and American public opinion. General Wedemeyer’s findings will have added weight because he was regarded as sympathetic towards Nanking. The National Government had consequently hoped for a more favourable report than that of Mr. George Marshall, who laid the charge that the Kuomintang was “dominated by reactionaries determined to preserve their own feudal control of China.” Hitherto the Nanking Government has appeared to rely on American fears of Soviet expansion, and has lost no opportunity to allege Russian support of the Chinese Communist armies or to advertise Russian intervention in the border provinces. At home, what at first seemed a promising move towards broadening the Government’s basis was quickly followed by repressive measures against liberals. If, as a result of General Wedemeyer’s report, the United States now proclaims that it is not prepared to bolster any longer an inefficient and one-party Administration, it may force the abdication of the Kuomintang “old guard.” If he acts quickly, Chiang still has sufficient prestige and influence with China’s masses to redeem the situation.