Is Red China On Verge Of Collapse?

Chronicle (Levin), 17 December 1949, Page 5

Is Red China On Verge Of Collapse?

Received S-.turday, 12.30 a.m. NEW YORK, Dec. 16. Chinese Communists are raeing to get their Police State consolidated and to end the civil war before internal opposition to their regime stiffens, says Fred Hampson, chief of the Associated Press staff in China, in a dispatch from the Sir John Franklin oif Shanghai. He adds:, " Their hnge armies, growing bnreaucracy, costs of the war and reorganisation have im-' posed upon them the same burdens fhat: .crus^ed their Kuomintang bnemihsf'L s -i is rampant again, prlce m^ptrpis have broken down, ari(l discorlteht is widespread both irn the cities and the countryside. Upemplojyment is at a dangeronsly high' level. Worried farmers sell the. irice they ordinarily stockpile •against the off season beeapse they are afraid of commandeering by the military. There are reports already of food shortages in some dist?icts. . • • The- Cornmunist Newsagency in

a - dispatch from Peiping on Deeember 4 admitted that the Reds were in sprious economic and financial difficnlties. The dispatch, obvionsly coming from informed quarters, concluded with a statement of the leader, Mao Tse Tmig. "Our situation can be generalised as follows : There are difficulties, but there are ways and means, and there is hope."1 ■ v . Mao 's statement is a startlihg warning. When the Communists entered Shanghai their dollar was quoted at 300 to one' American dollar. On Deeember 12 one American dollar brought 16,500 Commirist dollars, and up to 20,000 on the blackmarket. "In the last three months 1 a'sked , dozens of Chinese of all walks of life to give me their estimate of the percentage of Chinese who favour the Red regime outside of the party mem•bers. The answers' ranged from 60 to 90 per , cent against the .Communists." /