CHINA AND THE COLD WAR

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 887, 3 August 1956, Page 5

CHINA AND THE COLD WAR

Sir-Your correspondent Mr. James Bertram, writing under the heading "China and the Cold War," is righthe knows his Mao T'se-tung -; my quotation did come, as he suggests, "from some years back." But I have nothing to detract. The fact is that the same quotation about the impossibility of remaining neutral in the cold war was quoted recently and with warm approbation by Chen Po-ta, who, as a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, and as VicePresident of the Institute of MarxismLeninism in Peking, is presumably in a much better position than either of us to speak for the Chinese Communists. Mr. Bertram is also right in understanding me to recommend recognition of China "on grounds of logic and ‘knowing your enemy. " I also hold, in view of the size and importance of China and the apparent stability and strength of her Government, that Communist China must eventually be admitted to the United Nations, But such developments will not necessarily reduce the devotion of the Chinese Communists to the cause they have quite frankly espoused. "The Chinese Revolution is part of the World Revolution," says Chen Po-ta. Liu Shao-chi and others appear to share his view. Chen has also published his view that "the conclusions reached by Comrade Mao Tse-tung... are being verified by the activities in the countries of South-East Asia." I should like to think that "a negotiated peaceful solution" to the Formosa question could be reached. If such a solution is to be reached, I suggest. that the Chinese attitude is so positive and so clear that it will be reached only on Red Chinese terms, ie., with the "liberation of Taiwan." Perhaps the Americans will have other ideas. In any case, Mr. Bertram and I appear to agree on Peking’s desire to relax tension. We differ on the nature of other aims and objectives. I reiterate that my view concerning China’s loyalty to "the Socialist camp headed by the Soviet Union" (a well-used phrase in China and one prominently displayed on May Day banners) is not based on a forgotten saying of Mao Tse-tung but on a mass of evidence. The early post-revolutionary fervour is still evident in Peking. Perhaps it will weaken or mellow. I agree that may depend in part on Western and, in particular, on American policy.

ANGUS

ROSS

(Dunedin).