MILLIONS STILL FIGHTING

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5285, 23 December 1946, Page 2

MILLIONS STILL FIGHTING

' ♦ — — CHINESE CMi WAR COM MUjNilSM Y. CAPXTALISM ON GRANI> SOALE The greatest civil war in history is goingr ©n, in China. Nobody knows for certain how many men are fighting on the oper^tional fronts in North China and Manchuria. Current estimates of the strength of the Nationalist, or Kuomintang, Army vary from 2,500,000 to 5,000,000 men, ineluding divisions trained and equipped by; the U.S.A. during the Second World War. The CommuTiist army musters from 1,300, '000 to 2,000,000 regular, .guerilla, and partisan. troops, some equipped' with Japanese arms and ammunition. While the Chinese Nationalist Army has no Eisenhower or Montgomery, it has a number of eompetent field commanders, able tacticians and. strategists. The best all round is probably General Pai 'Chung-hsi, who was commanding the 13th Army "TO years after his graduation; from Paoting military aeademy in 1016. He is a mild-mannered, soft-spoken man, who looks more like a scholar than a successful commander, a patron of art and a good 'Moslem. Genieral 'Chen Gheng, 49-year-old Chief of .StafF, is among the brightest and slightest top-ranking generals. In unofficial quarters he is lis'ted high among the "men who could' sueceeci the Generalissimo." Pifty-year-old, bulky Fh Rso-yi is the rip-roaring general who- kept up the momentum of a speetacular dash to the relief Tatung, Communisfcbesiejged town in north Shansi, tc capture Kalgan. His reward, the Governorship of 'Chahar. •The Communist generals are 1 more coloorful crowd. The Japanest would gladly have saerifieed formations of crack troops for any one oi such battle-scarred Red commanders as Lin Piao, Nieh Yungchien, Yel Chien-ying. Mao Ts-tung and Chi Teh, supremely responsi'ble for Com munist strategy, used to lead 500, 00( Ohinese partisans in much the samc sort of warfare as Tito taught hu Yuigoslav guerillas. Mao Tse-tung is a shaggy-headed disciple of Marx. Chu Teh' looks more like a benevolent old "eowpuncher than the Communist "Generalissimo."

The Ghinese Communists put majoi responsibility for the continuation and and spread of the civil war -on American policy. In a rare interview in Yenan, Mac Tse-tung answered questions: Do yoi consider that American mediation :t China's civil conflict has failed ? Whai will be the result of American policj in China if it continues in its present form? Mao, who.speaks for more than l'Ot million chinese, said: "I doubt ver^ much that the policy of the Americar. Government can be called mediation. Judging from the fact that the hugc aid to Chiang Kai-shek by the United States 'has enabled him to launch civi. war on an unpreCedented large scale, the policy of -the American Government is to strengthen Chiang from all sides under cover of so-called 'mediation' and suppress the Ohinesfdemocratic forces, to make China hei colony through Chiang's policy oi slaughter." Feeling Against U.S.A. Answering the fuxTher questions; What will be the result of the civil war in China- How long will it last Mao said: "If the American Government gives up its present policy oi one-sided aid to Chiang and cari'ies out the agreement of the Three Power Conference in Moscow, civil war in China will certainly come to an ear-ly end', otherwise it will .possibly become a prolonged war." Feeling against American policy is running high in all Commomist areas. Yenan ealled upon UNO Assembly to request America "to withdraw all armed forces from China; to stop all military and financial aid to Chiang Kai-shek's regime of betrayal, dictatorship, and civil war; to bait lendlease operations; to recall the American Advisory Group which is undertaking to help Chiang' Kai-shek purSue civil war; to compensate Chinese for loss of life and property caused hy atrocities perpetrated1 hy American forces during the past year." Neutral observers find it 'difiioult to see how the presence of one division of American marines in North China represents mox*e than a very minor factor in the present situation. It is conceded, however, that without the initial support of American resources the Nationalist Arany cojxld never have recovered so xnuch of North Ohina or Manchuria -within the same period of timo. , ' There is no conclusive evidence of any military or material aid having passed from the Russian Communists to the Chinese Communists, who indeed disclaim any relations1 with' Moscow:. It is at the same timo an open socret that the Soviet strengthened. the Chinese Comiriunists mightily by leaving in their hands a substantial part of the vast military supplies * seized from the Japanese in the north- west. China's real crisis is economic. The huge peasant population lives clo.se to subsistence level — the land yield is xxot .sufficient in terms of the masses. The Gbvemment, faced with the feeding of an .outsize army, sometinxes levies" rents equal to 50 per cent. of the ci-op. Thirty per cent. of China's farmers are tena-nts; 25 per cent. are part owaie'rs; and 4.5 per cent. are owners. The Communist platform is that the land belongs to the tiller, The Commiunists also enforce their rent ceiling; and as u result of the agrarian reforms carried out 'by thern, to relieve the condition of China's oppressed. peasants the Communists have won much sympathy and suppox-t fx'om liberals who have no inclination

• owardis Conrxmunism. The same can 'hardly he said of the Kuomintang. Few of the doctrines t has preached within the last co^le of decades have been put into effect. The Kuomintang is still repeating the promises of 20 years a-go. China's Government to-day is spending 70 per cent. of all dis-buxse-ments on a war against Chinese. The great mass of China's people are weary or disgusted with' both the Kuomintang and the Communists.