Chou En-lai went to Hanoi for four days in March and returned to Peiping brandishing a big stick in the direction of the United States. All kinds of terrible things would happen to the Americans, said the Hanoi-Peiping joint communique, if they dared to push into North Vietnam or possibly even into the Laos panhandle area where the Ho Chi Minh trail terminates in a score or more branches.
However, there was no specific mention of armed intervention by the Chinese Communists in the words of the junketing "premier" or his Hanoi hosts. Reports of the possible dispatch of "volunteers" to Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia came from such places as Budapest, Paris and London - none from Peiping or Hanoi.
Opinion in Washington, Tokyo and Taipei held that the last thing the Maoist regime wanted was confrontation with the United States. There was virtual unanimity in the view that Chou's trip was to provide a lift for sagging North Vietnamese morale. Some sources, including Moscow, speculated that Hanoi would receive increased armaments and supplies under a revised aid agreement with Peiping.
The Chinese Communists apparently had expected the United States to show greater concern about Chou's first trip outside the mainland in five years. When Washington didn't push the panic button, People's Daily and other Maoist publications carried a strange editorial which said, in effect, that if the United States wasn't scared it should be, and that Peiping meant exactly what it said. This threat, too, was generalized and contained no specifics.
Peiping's second satellite was launched during the month, but the regime didn't get around to announcing it for nearly two weeks after the United States told of tracking the orbit. The U.S. Defense Department said that know-how for firing of intercontinental ballistic missiles could be involved in the satellite launching. The Chinese Reds apparently were trying to obtain port facilities in Ceylon, possibly for the basing of a new missile tracking ship to operate in the Indian Ocean. Any ICBM test shots from the Chinese main land presumably would be southward into those waters.
Thirteen provincial Chinese Communist Party committees had been established as of late March. The new ones were in Canton, Shensi, Chinghai and Kwangsi. Prognostications were for a meeting of the "people's congress" in Mayor June. Presumably all 29 provincial-municipal-autonomous region committees would have to be completed by that time. Like the old, new groups were dominated by military men. Most of the first secretaries were also chairmen of the provincial revolutionary committees.
Peiping confessed that efforts to rebuild the Young Communist League, which had a membership of 25 million before the "cultural revolution," were going poorly. An article by a workers' group of the Shanghai municipal party committee accused "leading cadres" of neglecting reconstruction of the league.
YCL was scrapped during the "cultural revolution" and its two publications suspended. The reasons, as stipulated by Red Flag, were failure of members to pay attention to the thoughts of Mao Tse-tung and recognize importance of the class struggle. Attempts at rectification subsequently included the establishment of branches at basic levels. But the Chinese Communists assailed the leadership for going about the task in a "light-hearted" way.
So far only Heilungkiang has managed to set up a branch at provincial level. Recalling extremism of the "Red Guards," the PLA apparently is approaching rehabilitation of even reformed "young generals" with a good deal of caution.
Schoolchildren have been compelled to take long hikes in recent months. Mainland sources said marches in the Peiping area were of up to 20 miles a day. Children carrying packs and traveling in long columns were seen in Shanghai, Hangchow, Canton and other places. Trips last as long as three weeks for the older children, who stay in schools along the way. Younger children go out on day-long trips.
One Canton middle school sent a hiking team to Mao's birthplace at Shaoshan in Hunan, a distance of several hundred miles.
These new marches are more tightly organized than those of the Red Guards in 1966 and 1967. Schools take the initiative and groups are of platoon size. Children are expected to pay their own way. If they cannot, schools make loans to be paid back in installments.
The marching is directly connected with war preparedness and reflects Mao's insistence that the younger generation must be tougher physically and ideologically. Some military training is involved. Middle schools of Kwangtung province engaged in a training scheme known as the "One Thousand Miles Warfare Campaign."
Workers also have been marching. Such hikes were said to have been made compulsory in Canton. Some last for several days. The Chinese Communists apparently have not realized the irony of pulling workers out of factories and away from their benches at the same time they are demanding higher quality in industrial products. An article in Red Flag warned against the widely held view that "as long as production increased and the plan was fulfilled, it does not matter very much if quality deteriorates a little." Also under attack is the attitude that "if production is to be increased, it would be difficult to guarantee the quality, and if fine quality is to be ensured, it would not be possible to increase output."
The Maoist publication warned that those who go in for high output without regard to quality are acting contrary to the interests of socialism and the people.
Nor were things going well at the "May 7" cadre schools established to rehabilitate erring cadres and provide refresher courses for old cadres already back on the job. The "New China News Agency" disclosed that "counterrevolutionaries" had once gained control of the May 7 school of the Foreign Language Publishing and Foreign Language Bureau in Peiping. There were hints that similar situations developed at other schools.
Considering that these schools are attended principally by those opposed to Mao, the difficulties are not surprising. NCNA said "class struggle" had been neglected and that cadres should participate in labor to terminate their bourgeois and revisionist outlooks. Class enemies were blamed for trying to sabotage the schools and influence the thinking of cadres.
Authority over the schools must be strengthened, the Maoists asserted, so as to make certain that Mao thought reigns supreme and that class struggle is continuous.
Following is the February 20-March 19 record of Chinese Communist affairs and related matters:
February 20
Refugees reaching Hongkong said the Chinese Communists were exacting forced farm labor from primary school children. "It was hell on the Chinese mainland," said a father of seven. "We do not want our children to grow up illiterate." Spokesmen for the 26 refugees in four families said small children were forced to work five to six hours a day. "In classrooms," said one, "they learn only Mao thoughts, yell slogans and sing Mao songs."
Reports from the Chinese mainland said courts closed or paralyzed during the "cultural revolution" had not been reopened. Justice is in the hands of the "people's liberation army," said travelers arriving in Hongkong. Accused are first denounced at so-called "people's meetings," then handed over to the garrison commander for sentencing and punishment.
Newspaper reports in Tokyo said Japan had sought talks with the Chinese Communists at the ambassadorial level but had been rebuffed. The contact was said to have been between Minister Nobuo Matsunaga of the Japanese Embassy in Paris and Chinese Communist "ambassador" Huang Chen. The Japanese Foreign Ministry admitted that Matslinaga had met Huang.
Government sources in Vienna said Austria would open recognition talks with the Chinese Communists. Approval was given by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Parliament.
February 21
Peiping charged the Japanese were embarked upon a course of "one China, one Taiwan so as to create two Chinas." The "New China News Agency" dispatch said Japan was pursuing such a policy in order to reoccupy Taiwan. These claims came as two Japanese political groups visiting Peiping strove to improve relations with the Chinese Reds.
February 22
Newspaper reports in Hongkong said emergency measures had been invoked in the Chinese Communist city of Wuchow in Kwangsi province bordering North Vietnam after the South Vietnamese thrust into Laos. Wuchow is a transshipment center in the movement of war materials from Red China to North Vietnam.
NCNA quoted Kuo Mo-jo, honorary president of a Chinese Communist association dedicated to "friendship" with Japan, as listing these obstacles to an improvement of relations: (1) collusion with the United States and hostility toward Peiping, (2) the policy of "one China and one Taiwan" and (3) establishment of a Japan-Taiwan-Seoul liaison committee to exploit oil resources off the Chinese mainland.
Hundreds of thousands were turned out in the streets of Shanghai to welcome Prince Norodom Sihanouk, the deposed Cambodian chief of state, who has taken up residence in Red China.
February 23
Hongkong sources said the PLA chief of staff was injured in an assassination attempt in Kwangtung February 10. Huang Yung-shek was said to have gone to Canton for a meeting on the military situation in Indochina. Reportedly he was attacked by anti-Maoists while traveling between Canton and Tsung-fa county.
NCNA said Peiping and Hanoi had signed a supplementary agreement on economic and military aid.
February 24
Peiping announced the establishment of a Communist Party committee in Canton. The municipal congress was said to have been held between February 5 and 12.
British Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Anthony Royle summoned the Peiping "charge d'affaires," Pei Tsien-chang, for a 20-minute meeting. The subject was not announced.
Addressing the Upper House, Foreign Minister Kiichi Aichi said Peiping had shown no interest in diplomatic dialogue with Japan. He said that Japanese ambassadors had been instructed to seek contacts with Chinese Communist representatives and that these had been made in Paris and other capitals from time to time without result.
February 25
Peiping reported a Peiping reception on the occasion of the Soviet armed forces' day for the first time since 1965. NCNA said "leading members of the departments concerned" attended the 53rd anniversary observance of the army and navy of the U.S.S.R.
February 26
U.S. sources said the Chinese Communists were negotiating for the purchase of between US$80 million and US$120 million worth of U.S. jet airliners. One report said the planes would be purchased and delivered through third countries.
February 27
Vice President and Premier C.K. Yen of the Republic of China said the basic policy of Chinese mainland recovery will never change, "no matter how the international situation may change." He said the ROC would stand firm to combat appeasement and eradicate the source of troubles in Asia and the world.
Washington sources said the Republic of China disagreed with President Nixon's conclusion that the Chinese mainland was developing a "calmer" mood. ROC Ambassador to the United States Chow Shu-kai said, "We violently disagree that the mainland has achieved stability and is a unified entity. From our point of view, the situation on the mainland is still obscure and fluid."
Peiping is the string-puller behind Hanoi aggression, said Dr. Wei Yu-sun, spokesman of the ROC Foreign Ministry.
February 28
Dinmuhamed Kunayev, first secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan and an alternate member of the Soviet Politburo, warned Red China that the U.S.S.R. would react violently to any aggression. He was addressing a congress of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan at Alma Ata near the Chinese mainland border.
Chou En-lai told Edgar Snow, the pro-Peiping American journalist, that the Chinese Communists had recovered from economic setbacks of the "cultural revolution" period. The "premier" said industrial production was US$90,000 million and agricultural output US$30,000 million in 1970. By contrast, the Japanese Foreign Ministry put the mainland gross national product for 1970 at US$75,000 million and grain output at between 220 million and 230 million tons. Foreign trade was estimated at US$4,300 million.
Peiping said it had launched its biggest tanker, a 10,000-tonner. The Republic of China has completed a 100,000-ton tanker and has another under construction.
Efforts to rebuild the Young Communist League, which claimed a membership of 25 million before the "cultural revolution," were not going well, Radio Peiping confessed. "Leading cadres" were accused of neglecting their tasks in reconstruction of the YCL.
March 1
Prime Minister Eisaku Sato said Japan would like to have "contacts" with the Chinese Communists but not at the expense of the Republic of China. He told a Lower House budget committee that Japan had signed a peace treaty with the Republic of China, that the latter was a member of the United Nations and that Japan could not follow a policy of expediency. As for the Chinese Communists, he said they had not responded to Japan's overtures. About 10 visitors from the Chinese mainland get to Japan in a year, he added, compared with the 3,000 Japanese who go to continental China.
Peiping accused the Japanese of plotting to send troops to South Korea for aggressive purposes. This is one of the goals of Japan's new militarism, said an NCNA dispatch.
U.S. intelligence sources were reported to believe the Chinese Communists are ready to begin deployment of medium-range ballistic missiles. The total could be between 80 and 100 MRBMS with ranges of 1,000 miles or more and 20-kiloton warheads (Hiroshima size) by the mid-1970s, the sources said. Information for this assessment was said to have come from satellite photos.
Japanese and U.S. sources said the Chinese Communists would not involve themselves in Indochina combat and risk confrontation with the United States. Intervention may be expected only if the Chinese mainland is directly threatened or the fall of Hanoi appears imminent, the sources said. Chinese Communist forces in Indochina were estimated at 10,000 in North Vietnam (down from a maximum of 50,000), 10,000 in Laos (and increasing) and smaller numbers in Cambodia serving as supply officers and advisers.
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations George Bush said U.S.-China policy in the world organization was still under review but that no decisions had been made. He said there were "large and small realities" in the "agonizing reappraisal." He implied that the United States was not going to give up either its relationship with the Republic of China or stop trying to reduce tensions with the Chinese Communists.
Peiping and Japanese "memorandum traders" renewed their two-way commercial agreement for 1971 at volume of some US$69 million, about the same as last year. Most Japanese-Chinese mainland trade is conducted through so-called "friendly companies."
March 2
Japanese who signed the "memorandum trade" agreement with the Chinese Communists denounced their own government for "collusion with U.S. imperialism and reviving militarism." They also supported Peiping claims to Taiwan. Chinese Communist signers reaffirmed the policy of not trading with Japanese firms which have relationships with the United States, the Republic of China or South Korea. Peiping said it would not trade with any company which declined to recognize Taiwan as Chinese Communist territory. Speaking for the U.S. State Department, Robert J. McCloskey said the United States had not reached any conclusions in its view of China policy. The press officer said no decisions had been reached "on how the issue of Chinese representation will be pursued next fall so far as the U.S. government is concerned."
Deposed Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia said that U.S. moves in Indochina could spark a world war because the Chinese Communists would not stand idly by. He was speaking at a mass rally in Nanking. He charged President Nixon with "megalomaniacal madness." After a two-week tour of the mainland, Sihanouk spoke of the extensive war preparations he had seen.
Chou En-lai told visiting Japanese traders that the Chinese Communists would not invade any other country. No countries were mentioned. Chou noted with apparent satisfaction that President Nixon had recently referred to the Peiping regime as the "People's Republic of China."
Two executives of Britain's Hawker-Siddeley aircraft company left London for Peiping to discuss the sale of Trident airliners. The Chinese Communists already have four medium-range Tridents purchased secondhand from Pakistan last year.
March 3
Red China launched its second space satellite into an egg-shaped orbit, the North American Defense Command reported. The launching was from Shuang-Cheng-Tzu. No mention of size or broadcasts was made. Orbital time was reported as 106 minutes. The first Chinese Communist satellite was launched April 25, 1970, weighed 381 pounds and broadcast "The East Is Red" from a tape. Twelve hours after the new launching, Peiping had made no announcement. The first launching also was reported tardily.
Hanoi said Chinese residents of North Vietnam were increasingly participating in the Indochina war. There are between 300,000 and 400,000 Chinese in North Vietnam, according to North Vietnamese estimate.
Representative Thomas P. O'Neill, Democratic whip in the House of Representatives, said the danger of Chinese Communist intervention in Indochina was increasing.
Chou En-lai met in Peiping with John Denson, the British charge d'affaires, amid reports that the Chinese Communists were preparing to launch a new push for United Nations membership.
Thai Foreign Minister Thanat Khoman said a Foreign Ministry committee was studying problems involved in trade with the Chinese Communists. He said Thailand was not ready to consider such trade and pointed to Premier Thanom Kittikachorn's recent statement opposing the idea.
Austria's parliament authorized Foreign Minister Rudolf Kirschschlaeger to open diplomatic recognition talks with the Chinese Communists.
Refugees from the Chinese mainland told of anti-Mao letters and articles disseminated through the mails in Shanghai, Tientsin, Canton and other places.
Three "full ministers" appointed by the Peiping regime were identified as Sha Fong in agriculture, Yang Chieh in communications and Pai Hsiang-kuo in foreign trade. Yang is a former army man. The "forestry ministry" has been incorporated in agriculture and the "railway department" in communications. Names mentioned for the "foreign ministry" post which Chen Yi has never officially vacated are "deputy foreign ministers" Chi Peng-fei and Chiao Kuan-hua and central committee member Keng Piao, who recently was recalled from Albania.
Wei Kuo-ching, who was denounced by Chiang Ching's radicals during the "cultural revolution," returned to view as head of the Chinese Communist Party committee for the Kwangsi Chuang Autonomous Region. Kwangsi has 8 million Chuangs, largest minority group in China, out of a population of 24 million.
March 4
President Nixon said that as long as the United States has anything to say about it "Taiwan will not be expelled from the United Nations." He said improved relations with the Chinese Communists would not be sought at the cost of friendship with the Republic of China.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Marshall Green told Ambassador Chow Shu-kai that President Nixon's references to the "People's Republic of China" in his State of the World report did not mean de facto recognition of the Peiping regime. Chou pointed out to Green, who is in charge of East Asian and Pacific affairs, that the free Chinese people strongly object to such usage. Green said the terminology had no particular significance and that it had been employed by both John Foster Dulles and William Rogers. "I think we are trying to be civil in our discourse to avoid unnecessary abrasions;' Green said.
Prime Minister Sato told the Diet that the Chinese Communists should stop meddling in Japanese affairs if they hope to improve relations. He said the government has no idea of abrogating its treaty with the Republic of China "as long as I remain in office and Taiwan exists."
March 5
Taiwan sources said the Chinese mainland had returned to warlordism. New party committees are dominated by military men, the sources said, and the PLA is seeking economic as well as political power.
Peiping remained silent on its second satellite. The U.S. Defense Department said the orbital booster might imply intercontinental ballistic missile capability.
Han Suyin, a pro-Communist writer, said in Paris that the time had not yet come for Red Chinese "volunteers" to enter Indochina but that Peiping's warnings should be taken as seriously as those made before the 1950 intervention in Korea. She predicted that Kowloon and the New Territories would revert to mainland China in 1998 and that Victoria Island would then be of no use to the British.
South Korea deplored Japan's acceptance of the Chou En-lai trade principles in the new "memorandum" agreement with Peiping.
Japan approved entry of a four-man advance party for Chinese Communist table tennis players and said the 56 members and officials of the team would be admitted for participation in the world championships at Nagoya.
Peiping signed an aid agreement with Nepal. The Chinese Communists agreed to give Nepal 2½ million rupees and provide workers to repair the 85-mile Katmandu-Kodari highway.
March 6
Washington sources said the Republic of China had advised the United States that Peiping would not moderate hostility as a result of a U.N. seat or U.S. concessions. The ROC was said to have expressed concern that the United States was moving toward a "two Chinas" policy.
Peiping attacked President Nixon's State of the World report as an "exposure of the aggressive ambitions of U.S. imperialism and its weaknesses."
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Marshall Green said the world was too small "not to have mainland China involved in its international discourse and in the resolution of its problems."
Prime Minister Sato said relations with the Republic of China were close and that Japan would adhere to its peace treaty with the ROC to keep the international faith. He was commenting on reports that former Foreign Minister Aiichiro Fujiyama, just back from mainland China, had said the Japan-ROC treaty would have to be scrapped in order to normalize relations with Peiping.
March 7
Kyodo news service said the Japanese Foreign Ministry was studying tactics to defend the position of the Republic of China in the United Nations General Assembly at the fall session. One suggestion was to invoke Article 18 of the Charter providing for a two-thirds majority for the expulsion of a member.
Chou En-lai was reported to have told former Japanese Foreign Minister Aiichiro Fujiyama that the Peiping regime did not want the Japanese Communist Party to play a part in the Japanese Parliamentary League, which is seeking the recognition of Red China. Presumably the Chinese Communists think they can win more support in the Japanese Diet without the endorsement and help of overt Communists.
The United States should remove its military presence from Taiwan but continue to honor defense commitments to the Republic of China with air and sea power, said political scientist A. Doak Barnett, who favors the admission of Red China to the United Nations. He said Peiping would reject U.S. endorsement of "two Chinas" as a gimmick to bar Chinese Communist membership. He suggested a formula of "one China and two U.N. seats."
Peiping dispatched Chen Tan as its first "ambassador" to Equatorial Guinea.
Chinese Communists claimed that U.S. warships and aircraft had harassed their fishing vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin. Two vessels were boarded, searched, sabotaged and plundered, the broadcast said. NCNA said a U.S. plane intruded into airspace over Kwangtung, Yunnan and Kwangsi.
Hongkong census takers said Communist households refused to be enumerated unless they joined in singing Mao songs.
March 8
Chou En-lai and two Chinese Communist military leaders, Yeh Chien-ying and Chiu Hui-tso, visited Hanoi for four days (March 5-8). It was the first trip of the "premier" outside the mainland in five years. The United States had no immediate comment. Reports in Budapest connected the Chou visit with possible Chinese Communist military intervention in Laos.
Peiping established a provincial Chinese Communist Party committee in Shensi. The provincial congress met in Yenan from' February 28 to March 5 with attendance of 808 delegates. Elected to the committee were 68 members and 29 alternates, headed by Li Jui-shan, who also is chairman of the provincial revolutionary committee.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Taipei said Sun Chi-chou had been kidnapped by Chinese Communist agents in Geneva. He was on his way from the Chinese Embassy in Dakar, where he was a first secretary, to the Chinese Embassy in Saigon. Swiss police said he defected.
March 9
Chou En-lai returned to Peiping from his meeting in Hanoi with North Vietnamese leaders. The Chinese Communists said he was welcomed by a crowd of 3,000 including the PLA chief of staff, Huang Yung-sheng, and Prince Norodom Sihanouk, deposed ruler of Cambodia.
Hanoi reported "complete unanimity" of views with Peiping in the wake of Chou's visit. North Vietnamese in Paris said Peiping and Hanoi had made "complete preparations" to cope with U.S. moves in Indochina.
Taiwan sources said Chou went to Hanoi to bolster the sagging morale of the North Vietnamese.
U.S. Secretary of State Rogers said the Chinese Reds might give North Vietnam more military hardware but would not become directly involved in the fighting. He said the Chou trip was "to give some comfort to the North Vietnamese because they have been suffering some setbacks."
London also ruled out anything more than supplies and propaganda in consequence of Chou's trip.
Peiping said that Chou declared in Hanoi, "We are determined not to let the United States have their own way in Indochina." He also said the Peiping regime was "ideologically and militarily prepared to put out of action" any attacker.
U.S. Defense Secretary Melvin Laird said the Chinese Communists constituted the principal military threat in Asia. He expressed doubt, however, that the regime could wage operations on more than one front at a time. In his defense statement to Congress, he estimated the Chinese Communist army at 2.5 million men organized into 140 combat divisions. Air power consists of more than 4,000 planes he said, and the navy includes more than 40 submarines and an unspecified number of guided missile patrol boats. ICBM operational capability is only a year or two away, he said, but the earliest possible deployment date is 1973. Red China could hit such cities as Tokyo, Manila and Singapore with intermediate range missiles, Laird asserted, and could conduct offensive operations against South Korea, the Republic of China, Southeast Asia or India. He revealed that Red China is producing the TV16 Badger, a Soviet-designed medium-range bomber with a range of 1,500 miles and return carrying full payload. With normal load and aerial refueling, the range is 2,650 miles.
Malaysia Prime Minister Tun Razak said neutralization of Southeast Asia would not be possible unless Red China were admitted to the United Nations. Malaysia has proposed Southeast Asia neutralization to be guaranteed by the United States, U.S.S.R. and Peiping.
Pro-Peiping Japanese announced plans for a Chinese Communist trade fair in Japan in the fall.
March 10
Peiping and Hanoi announced a joint communique in the wake of the Chou En-lai visit to North Vietnam. The document pledged "all necessary measures" by Peiping, "not flinching from even the greatest sacrifices," if the United States "expanded the war in Indochina." The communique said that common measures also had been agreed upon to oppose the United States in South Vietnam and Cambodia.
The United States is not planning any military action which would threaten Red China, said State Department press officer Robert J. McCloskey.
Peiping would send "volunteers" to Vietnam if requested by Hanoi, said Prince Norodom Sihanouk in an interview published in Paris.
Peiping said the United States was stationing U2 high-altitude reconnaissance planes and B52 bombers at Utapao in Thailand. Quoting the Thai Communist radio, the Chinese Reds said dozens of B57s had been stationed at Ubon and new military airports build in Chiang Mai province.
March 11
President Chiang Kai-shek told Miens Thomason, the chief of United Press International, that the United Nations would be signing its death warrant if it admitted Red China. Peiping, he said, would "do everything within its power to sabotage the world organization."
People's Daily warned the United States Peiping means business about intervention in Vietnam. "We mean what we say and what we say goes," said the Maoist paper. "We give the Nixon government a warning: Be careful about your own necks if you should act recklessly."
The Republic of China's Executive Yuan said any and all schemes to seat the Peiping regime at the United Nations should be rejected. The Chinese Communists "do not represent the Chinese people on the mainland and the so-called China representation issue should not exist at all." Article 18 of the U.N. Charter dealing with the admission of new members and the explusion of old members is not applicable, the Cabinet statement said. The Republic of China also opposes revision or amendment of the Charter. The trouble with the U.N., the statement said, does not arise from the Charter, but is a question of whether all member nations will abide by the Charter and discharge their obligations faithfully.
London sources speculated that unless the Russians responded to Chou En-lai's mission to Hanoi, the U.S.S.R. would find itself farther out of the picture in Southeast Asia. Russian influence in North Vietnam was said to have been on the wane for some time, despite the fact that virtually all of Hanoi's sophisticated weapons come from the Soviet Union. At the same time, Hanoi has not shown open preference for Peiping and in the past has carefully balanced almost every major policy move involving the Soviets or the Chinese.
Commenting on Peiping's second satellite launching, the New York Times said: "It would be in error to draw farreaching conclusions about (Communist) China's overall economic and technical strength from Peking's progress in weapons and weapons-related engineering. It is evident that over the past decade Mao Tse-tung has been trying to insulate a small group of scientists and their activity in weapons development from the general turmoil of the Cultural Revolution as well as from the inadequate supply of practically everything in normal Chinese (mainland) economic life. That effort has apparently been successful.
"But a nation's power and prosperity also require highly developed and extensive industries producing the steel, the electricity, the oil, the machinery and the modern consumer goods which are the stuff of contemporary industrial civilization. Despite some improvements in recent years, all these industries in (Communist) China are still far behind the levels of the United States and the Soviet Union as well as of several (other) important countries."
March 12
U.S. sources said some American companies have started to do business with the Chinese Communists. These companies, which are trading through intermediaries, were reported to include General Motors, Monsanto and Hercules (chemicals), American Optical, Sperry Rand and Cummins Engine.
Washington sources said that the U.S. review of China policy did not mean consideration of diplomatic recognition for Peiping. The core of the U.S. position, the sources said, was expressed in this portion of President Nixon's State of the World report to Congress: "I wish to make clear that the United States is prepared to see (Peiping) play a constructive role in the family of nations. The question of its place in the United Nations is not, however, merely a question of whether it should participate. It is also a question of whether Peiping should be permitted to dictate to the world the terms of its participation. For a number of years, attempts have been made to deprive the Republic of China of its place as a member of the United Nations and its specialized agencies. We have opposed these attempts. We will continue to oppose them."
Speaking on a Hungarian television program, Valentin Zorin, Soviet historian and commentator, expressed the opinion that the U.S.S.R. would help the Chinese Communists militarily in the event of their involvement in the Indochina war. He said the Moscow-Peiping military assistance and cooperation agreement had never been legally invalidated and said that those who were trying to bury the pact were "too rash." He said that the U.S.S.R. is not especially afraid of Red China's nuclear capability because it is not yet accompanied by missile development.
March 13
Chou En-lai made these economic progress claims in an interview with Edgar Snow: steel production of from 10 to 18 million tons annually in the last five years, petroleum production of 20 million metric tons in 1970 (he claimed self-sufficiency), 14 million metric tons of fertilizer and 8,500 million meters of cotton cloth last year. Grain output of 240 million metric tons in 1970. Chou said grain reserves of 40 million metric tons had been accumulated. Peiping's last official grain production figure was 270 million tons in 1959.
Kuwait said it would enter into diplomatic relations with Peiping. The Chinese Communist "ambassador" to Iraq was in Kuwait to talk with the foreign minister.
March 14
Red China accused the United States of "intensifying its subversive, aggressive and sabotage activities against the independent African countries." The article by Hong Fei carried by NCNA said: "It has been U.S. imperialism's consistent policy to maintain and expand its colonial interests in Africa by offering money and guns to suppress the African people's struggle for national liberation. Last year U.S. imperialism engineered subversive plots in the Sudan, the People's Republic of the Congo, Somalia and other countries. After these criminal plots had been smashed, it brazenly supported the Portuguese colonialists in their naked aggression against the Republic of Guinea." The propagandist charged that the United States trains and equips Portuguese troops and gives South Africa US$35 million worth of military aid annually.
Foreign Minister Kiichi Aichi said that the peace treaty with the Republic of China has no provision for abrogation and expressed doubt that Japan could find any legal means for terminating the agreement, as demanded by the Chinese Communists.
Peiping announced the establishment of a CCP committee in Chinghai. The 13th provincial-level group was set up at Sining in a congress held from March 3 to 11. Liu Hsien-chuan, vice commander of the PLA for the Lanchow military region, was named first secretary.
March 15
Forty-seven per cent of Americans oppose Red Chinese membership in the United Nations, according to a Louis Harris poll. Thirty-seven per cent were in favor. Forty-eight per cent favored U.S. opposition to the spread of Red Chinese influence in Asia.
Lt. Gen. Yeh Hsiang-chili, director of the Second Section of the Kuomintang Central Committee, said the Chinese mainland is ruled by a military dictatorship and that the PLA is bringing all aspects of Chinese Communist life under its control.
U.S. intelligence sources reported the Chinese Communists were trying to lease port facilities in Ceylon. The move was believed connected with plans of the Peiping regime to conduct intercontinental ballistic missile tests extending into the Indian Ocean.
Norman Barrymaine, a British journalist who spent 20 months in Chinese Communst prisons in 1968-69, said Peiping may have 1,000 ICBMs by 1980. "Peiping is obsessed with nuclear status and is determined at whatever cost to its economy to go ahead with the production of nuclear weapons," he said. The regime has every intention of trying to achieve "some sort of military balance with the United States and the Soviet Union," he added, calling attention to the test explosion of a three-megaton warhead of a weight suitable for delivery by an ICBM.
NCNA said early rice was being sowed in the Yangtse River basin and that transplanting was under way in Szechwan, Chekiang, Hunan, Kiangsi, and Fukien. The agency boasted that 2 million persons had been turned out for compulsory labor in the cities and counties of the Wenchiang administrative area on the Chengtu plain in Szechwan. NCNA said that in four months "they straightened out a series of ditches built on the basis of the petty peasant economy so as to meet the needs of developing large-scale socialist agriculture." This appeared to be another shot in the growing campaign against private plots and independent farming.
March 16
Peiping has declined Japan's proposal to settle trade accounts in reminpi, a Japanese businessman returning from the Chinese mainland said in Tokyo. Most Japanese accounts are currently settled in British pounds sterling. Japanese business interests sought settlement based on Chinese Communist money in the hope of increasing trade volume. Peiping has approved reminpi in the settlement of balances with Switzerland, Britain, France, West Germany and Canada.
Secretary of State William Rogers said the Chinese Communists do not feel threatened by U.S. support of South Vietnamese operations against the Ho Chi Minh trail in Laos.
Hongkong sources said Peiping can be expected to ignore the lifting of U.S. restrictions on travel to the Chinese mainland.
Peiping announced its second satellite launching almost two weeks late. The announcement said the 487-pound satellite had transmitted scientific data between March 3 and 15.
March 17
Chou En-lai said the United States would eat "bitter fruit of its own making" if it ignored Chinese Communist warnings against military moves north of South Vietnam.
Prime Minister Eisaku Sato said the Japanese government ignores Chinese Communist threats. "Whatever Peiping broadcasts say, we will continue our free democratic government. To us who live in a democratic state the broadcasts are nonsense," he said.
Vice Foreign Minister H.K. Yang of the Republic of China told the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Legislative Yuan that continued appeasement of the Chinese Communists would lead to World War III. He said the appeasement psychology results from fear. Reporting on a trip to Africa and the Middle East, he said ROC relations with Gabon, where he attended independence ceremonies, and Turkey and Iran are excellent.
British engineer George Watt, who was imprisoned by the Peiping regime for three years on false spy charges, returned to Hongkong from London "to fight the Chinese Communists on their own doorstep." He described mainland China as "without civilization." Released last October, he said he would go to the mainland border to see "the Union Jack flying. It was the most beautiful sight when I crossed the border to Hongkong."
Japanese International Trade and Industry Minister Kiichi Miyazawa said the Export-Import Bank would consider financing of industrial plants for export to the Chinese Communists on a deferred payment basis. He said the consideration would be given on a case by case basis but that no such applications had been made in the last year.
A Japanese organization advocating relations with Peiping said 100 workers from the Osaka area would visit the mainland this year.
March 18
Peiping promised the United States years ago that it would not intervene in the Vietnam war, according to a monograph published in Moscow by nine students of the Far Eastern Institute of the Academy of Sciences. The article said that the Chinese Communists had sought to promote a war between the United States and the Soviet Union. When this failed, they began to seek a virtual alliance with the United States, the authors said.
Commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Paris Commune, People's Daily charged the Soviet Union was a "dictatorship of the bourgeoisie" and a "prison for millions of working people." The editorial said: "With its leadership usurped by the Soviet revisionist renegade clique, the Soviet state is no longer an instrument with which the proletariat suppresses the bourgeoisie. It has become a tool with which the restored bourgeoisie suppresses the proletariat." The same article called on "oppressed peoples of the world to seize political power with the gun and achieve proletarian revolution." This can never be done through elections and parliamentarism, the Maoists said.
March 19
Moscow said the Chinese Communists would not send a delegation to the 24th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party opening March 30. Peiping sent a full delegation to the 22nd Congress in 1961 but not to the 23rd Congress in 1966.
Chou En-lai apologized to the British charge d'affaires in Peiping, John Denson, for the sacking of the British mission in 1967. He said the "bad elements" responsible had been punished, In reality the mob, which burned down the building, manhandled British women and beat up British men under orders from those directing the "cultural revolution." Britain said the Chinese Communists paid for rebuilding of the newly reopened mission building.
Red China told Toyota Motors to stop doing business with the Republics of China and Korea if it wanted to make sales to the Chinese mainland. Toyota had sought approval to attend the Canton trade fair. The company was said to have relations with Shinjin Motors in Korea and Liu Ho in Taiwan.
Two seamen detained in the Chinese mainland for more than seven years on spy charges reached Hongkong. The Japanese consulate said Shigeru Nakama and his brother, Takeo, were from Okinawa.
Arriving in Hongkong was a 60-member Peiping table tennis group on its way to the world championships in Nagoya. Only 22 were players – 11 men and 11 women. The others were coaches and officials.
The United States has not fully exploited the schism between the Chinese and Russian Communists to the full extent possible, John Scott, assistant to the publisher of Time, told the American University Club and a meeting of U.S. and Chinese businessmen in Taipei. He said that the Communist powers will not fight a war, because Russian military leaders think such a conflict would be catastrophic. Russia is 50 years behind the times in supply and distribution of consumer goods, he said, but occupies an advanced position in space and military equipment. He said the U.S.S.R. is milking its satellite system by selling Eastern European countries basic commodities at inflated prices and taking their manufactured goods at low prices. Political and military pressures keep the system from falling apart, he said.