Kinmen, one of the island outposts off the coast in the Taiwan Straits, which has come under Communist artillery fire since September 3, must be defended with all the resources Free China and her friends can command. After winning some cheap diplomatic and propagandistic victories first in and then in Indochina as a result of allied disunity, the puppet Peiping regime is again making a bid for fresh laurels by launching this newest offensive against Kinmen. In the short space of five years since the bogus regime was set up, it has engaged in two aggressive wars outside of its borders and, thanks to the lack of effective leadership on the side of the free nations, has been handsomely rewarded with the northern halves of and . In both the previous cases, the free nations were naive enough to have believed that the signing of an armistice or agreement would end the Communists' aggressive designs for good and that an era of peace would automatically ensue. But as events actually turned out, the interval between the signing of the Korean armistice on July 27, 1953, and the intensification of the Indochinese war at Dienbienphu with the active support of the Chinese Communists for Ho Chi Minh early in the current year was only a little over six months.
What is still more astonishing, the interval between the signing of the Indochinese agreement at on July 21 and the beginning of the Chinese Communist bombardment of Kinmen on September 3 was less than one month and a half. These facts show not only that the Mao Tse-tung gangsters are ever hatching and carrying out aggressive plans, but also that they are doing it at an accelerated pace. To expect the Communists to be satisfied with what they have already acquired by fair means or foul and to cease encroaching upon the free world would be to expect the impossible. They will never stop pushing for ward their grandiose schemes of world domination and conquest, unless they are forced to.
This latest attack against Kinmen by the Chinese Reds must and can be repelled. Nothing must be left undone to repel it, because it represents but the first step in the puppet regime's attempt to expand its influence and power into the Pacific. If Mao Tse-tung could obtain a foothold in the straits, as he is undoubtedly trying to do, he would not stop until he had converted the into a Communist lake. Therein lies the danger to , the , and the as well as to the Republic of China. Since the United States is committed to the defense of the chain of islands stretching from Japan in the north through Okinawa and Taiwan down to the Philippines, it would be far better for her to prevent the offshore islands such as Kinmen and Tachen, which serve as a sort of protective screen for the main chain of islands to be defended, from falling into Communist hands instead of taking a stand later on when the enemy should be pounding at the main line of defense. While we are confident that, given adequate assistance short of involving America in an all-out war, the armed forces of the Republic of China will be able to defend Kinmen against the Chinese Reds, a clear and unequivocal statement by the American Government, that Kinmen and other offshore islands would be defended by the Seventh Fleet would have a surprisingly stabilizing effect and deter Mao Tse-tung from carrying out his rash plans. We welcome the news as reported by the New York Herald Tribune on September 14 that the Eisenhower administration has ordered the U. S. Seventh Fleet to give "full logistic support" to the defenders of Kinmen. We also welcome the additional information that "These instructions, which were issued a short time ago through the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Office of Naval Operations, do not rule out a more active role for American forces at a later date."
In this connection, we should like to point out that the defense of Taiwan, the Pescadores, and whatever offshore islands the American Government might eventually decide to include within the defense perimeter of the Seventh Fleet is a matter which concerns only the Government of the Republic of China and the United States as the friend of the Chinese people and the acknowledged leader of the free nations in the present global struggle between Communism and democracy, and has nothing whatever to do with the country of which Winston Churchill is the titular head. We say this, because all Free Chinese were surprised to read a UP despatch from dated September 13, saying that "Prime Minister Winston Churchill's government stepped up consultations with the on the explosive situation." The same news item also reported that "A Foreign Office spokesman denied reports today that Britain may bring a plan for the neutralization of Formosa before the UN General Assembly, opening in New York September 21 ... It believed however that Britain might support such course if it were to be taken up by the UN." Stripped of diplomatic language, these passages just quoted mean, in plain English, that the British Government is trying to prevent the United States from taking active steps to help Free China in the defense of Taiwan and other islands, and that, in spite of the Foreign Office spokesman's "denial," the British Government is planning to make a proposal to place Taiwan under United Nations trusteeship.
For the benefit of Winston Churchill and other similarly muddled-headed politicians, let it be said once for all that the 450 million Chinese people on the Chinese mainland, the 13 million in Taiwan, and the 12 million scattered all over the world will not stand any such nonsense as the British Government has in mind; that the Chinese people's will to be free can be smothered neither by Mao Tse-tung nor by the British appeasers; and that for the British to pull Uncle Sam's legs and prevent, him from opposing further Communist expansion in the Far East will end by making the American position and that of the free world as a whole untenable. It is to be hoped that the American Government, on its part, will see the folly of the British proposals, will reject them as they deserve to be rejected, and will go ahead resolutely with the task of resisting any further Communist encroachment on free territories in cooperation with the Government and people of the Republic of China.