THE TABLET September 6th, 1958. VOL. 212. No. 6172

'H : "71B LET

Published as a Newspaper

A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Regina et Patria

FOUNDED IN 1840

SEPTEMBER 6th, 1958

NINEPENCE

The Coloured Immigrants: A Question o f Numbers

The T.U.C. Thinks Again: A F a i lu re in L eadership

Christianity in the United Arab Republic: E gypt and the Copts

Oliver Cromwell Reconsidered: On his T ercentenary. By J. J. Dwyer

Ralph Vaughan Williams: A T r ib u te . By Rosem ary Hughes

The Russian Experience: Boris P a s te rn ak ’s Dr. Z h ivago. By K a therine Hunter-B la ir

Critics' Columns : Notebook : Book Reviews : Letters : Chess

THE STAKES IN ASIA

P R E S ID E N T EISENHOWER has left the Chinese

Communists in no doubt that if they attack Formosa, or its outlying islands, the United States will fully and effectively support Chiang Kai-shek. The American Government is not letting itself be confused, and we hope the British Government will maintain solidarity with the United States, to offset the support Mao has secured from Russia.

. Whenever it suits them. Communists pay no attention whatever to arguments based on history or geography or law, and they are the last people who are entitled to be listened to when they invoke such arguments to justify an invasion of Formosa. To Communists it is not States th a t matter, but Communist Parties, and the map of Asia does not show to them a number of sovereign States, but just populations for the control over whom Communists and anti-Communists are engaged in a perpetual tug-ofwar. Formosa is a part of this area held by the antiCommunists, whom the United States and Britain are everywhere supporting.

Even if this were not the reality of the situation, it is a bad claim that majorities make, that they have a mystical right to coerce minorities for the sake of creating a larger political unit than would otherwise exist. Where majorities and minorities are intermingled, and separation is impracticable, the majority must rule. But where the minority is geographically grouped, it should be allowed to have its own regime. This general principle is obviously the most humane, and the one th a t best prevents wretchedness and hatred, and. even if the mainland of China were not under a Communist Government, any other Government there should leave Chiang Kaishek and his followers alone.

The Americans are often criticised in this country for keeping Nationalist China in the seat permanently reserved for China in the Security Council. But this rests on a clear-eyed recognition that, if the Chinese Communists came, they would not come to the United Nations with any more intention of keeping to the spirit of the Charter than the Russians and their satellites have shown. They have disqualified themselves, and it would be folly, seeing what sustained injury the United Nations has suffered from the Russian veto in the Security Council, to let the Chinese Communists come to play the same game. Merely considering the United Nations, it would be reasonable to leave th a t chair empty, because Chiang Kai-shek cannot pretend to be one of the Great Powers, and his representative is inevitably thought of as a second vote for the American delegate. Nationalist China remains there because it is fe tte r to let the anomaly go on than to give the impression th a t the United States was growing tired of Formosa, and weakening in its support of the anti-Communists in Asia.

This support will become more and not less important as Communist China becomes increasingly the one great military Power in Asia. A t present that power is contained, and the fact that Formosa exists has an immense effect in fortifying the morale of China’s many small neighbours. That is why we must expect the Chinese Communists to go very far in their attempts to destroy Chiang Kai-shek, whose existence causes them to lose face and holds up their forward march. Hitherto they have seemed frightened of the United States, and that has been the most comforting thought to the smaller countries who might otherwise be gathered firmly into the Communist world. Quemoy may seem a small place, but what is at stake is the future of Asia. Mr. Stevenson’s Summit Talks

What the Communist mentality is, alike in Peking and Moscow, has just been vividly brought home to Mr. Adlai Stevenson in Moscow by M. Khrushchev, who talked to him for two and a half hours, realising that Mr. Stevenson may well occupy Mr. Dulles’ position