Taiwan Today

Much has been said in recent months of the easing of international tension in the world. It has been pointed out that, with the Malenkov regime apparently adopting a more conciliatory attitude toward the West, there is genuine hope for the peaceful solution of many vexing international problems, and that since the conference in Geneva, a period of "peaceful co-existence" is within the realm of possibility, if not probability. In fact, the armistices in Korea and in Indo-China are being cited as examples of how peace, or at least the absence of war, could be achieved by diplomatic negotiations. There is a general feeling that a cessation of hostilities is, in any case, better than a continuation of war and that some plan of co-existence could perhaps be worked out with the Soviet Union, if we tried hard enough.

Coming as I do from a country which is far less able to wage war than yours, and the Chinese are never known to be a warlike people, I should be the last person to suggest war as a solution of all your and our problems. But coming also from a country which has lived through long periods of co-existence with the Communists and which was the first victim of Communist aggression in Asia, I must sound a word of warning to the growing optimism. I know that I am speaking this evening amongst friends, and you will want me, I am sure, to speak also as a friend and not as a diplomat. A diplomat, I am told, is often a person to be respected or to be treated politely, but not always to be trusted.

Let me then speak as a friend. And I would say first of all that world communism is still on the march, threatening the freedom and independence of peoples, not only along the periphery of the sprawling Soviet empire, but also in faraway places, as in the recent case of Guatemala, which is very far from Moscow but nearer to your country than mine. Communism is dedicated to the conquest of the whole world. It will not stop until that objective is fully achieved. These are of course platitudes, and there is one more of them. I must remind you that the Soviet Union is on a peace offensive, and has been for some time, with positive results.

In the Far East, it is well known that the armistice in Korea did not solve the problem of that distressed and devastated land. Korea is today not unified. It remains divided by an arbitrary line, with half of the country under the occupation of almost a million Chinese Communist troops. The best that we can say about Korea is that it remains in a state of armed suspension, and it is by no means certain which side now has the initiative. Renewed efforts to solve the problem at the conference in Geneva resulted in a complete deadlock. The people of Korea are in a state of high tension and agitation, for they are in full agreement with Lincoln that a country half slave and half free cannot stand.

What are the results of the Geneva conference? Let us admit that another country fighting for its freedom and independence has been dismembered. Like Korea, an arbitrary line, was drawn across the waist of Vietnam against the declared wish of the people. The representatives at the conference sat at the same table with the Chinese Communists as co-partners of peace, and by a stroke of the pen turned over to the Communists 77,000 square miles of land rich in natural resources and 12,000,000 helpless people. That the representative of the United States refused to sign the final agreement was perhaps the redeeming feature of the conference. But as the Vietnamese Ambassador to the United States recently put it, his country was first devastated by war and now mutilated by peace. This is the kind of "peace" desired by the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communists. It is in fact a nibbling aggression which is at the bottom of Soviet Union's peace offensive.

The conference in Geneva, far from making a contribution to peace as has been frequently claimed, has added to this troubled world another truncated country half Communist and half free. This presents another source of international tension which the Communists, we can rest assured, will never fail to exploit for all its worth. By inviting the declared aggressors to the conference table, the Geneva conference has legalized the fruits of aggression. At the same time, they have tacitly absolved the crimes of the aggressors. Such a process, I submit, can only serve to whet the appetite of the Communists. It is, in effect, a breeding ground for further Communist aggressions against the free and independent peoples in the vast area of Southeast Asia. Following the last war, the world has been heartened by the achievement of independence on the part of the colonial peoples of Asia. These peoples have not fought so hard for their liberation only to find themselves provinces of a Soviet empire. But this unfortunately seems to have been the case with Indo-China.

It is for this reason that the Chinese Government, which I have the honor to represent, refused to recognize the validity of the declarations of the conference in Geneva. It is our belief that to do so would be to underwrite Communist aggression and therefore does not serve the cause of peace. I am pleased to learn that this belief is shared also by many quarters in this country.

For it should be obvious by now that practically all the major problems confronting the free world today can be traced back to the expansionist program of world communism centered at Moscow. This is the root of all our troubles around the globe. Unless a firm stand is taken and an effective program is developed to combat this menace on a global scale, the free world will find that the Soviet empire, which has multiplied four times its size during the past nine years, will expand relentlessly on until the whole world is engulfed.

Apart from the Soviet Union, by far the largest area now under Communist control is the mainland of China. Communist-controlled China is Moscow's principal satellite and Stalin's proudest creation.

The Peiping regime, like all Communist regimes, is inseparable from the Communist Party in China, which according to its constitution, is a branch of the Third International. Mao Tse-tung and his comrades have made it amply clear that their affiliation with the Soviet Union, the motherland of world communism, is perpetual and indestructible. In order to make this doubly sure, there are now on the Chinese mainland some 100,000 Russian advisers and experts, directing and supervising every phase of Chinese life. Over 70 percent of them are to be found in the armed forces. The Russians teach Mao Tse-tung how to run the country. The Slave Labor Law recently promulgated by Peiping was admittedly drafted with the assistance of Soviet legal experts. Its basic concepts were derived from the monumental work, Manual Criminal Procedure, written by no less an authority than Andrei Vyshinsky. This law legalizes the vast network of slave labor camps all over the Chinese mainland, in which some 25,000,000 people considered politically undesirable by the Mao regime are inmates.

In 1953, the Mao regime announced its first five-year plan. A study of its contents shows that it is designed to form an integral part of the development of the Soviet empire as a whole. Practically all the heavy industries are situated in the northern provinces of China within easy reach and control of the Soviet Union.

In the spring of this year, Peiping announced the formation of a committee composed of handpicked Communists headed by Mao Tse-tung to draft a constitution for Communist-controlled China. The process was easily accomplished, for the draft constitution is almost a plagiarized version of the Stalin constitution of 1936. To all intents and purposes, the so-called "People's Republic of China" is just a different name for the so-called "Chinese Soviet Socialist Republic" created by Stalin himself in November, 1931. When adopted, the Mao constitution will be yet another attempt by the Communists to lend respectability to their tyrannical regime in China which they themselves labelled as a dictatorship.

The Communist Peiping regime is oppressive at home. At the same time, it is aggressive abroad. An oppressive Communist regime cannot exist without a strong police force. And no Communist regime can find justification for its measures of control and regimentation enforced within its borders except by reason of the requirements of war abroad or the necessity of maintaining security at home.

Herein lies the reason why the Communist Peiping regime intervened in the war in Korea and aided the Vietminh rebels in Indo-China. For the same reason, that regime is plotting the conquest of free peoples in other parts of Southeast Asia. A Communist totalitarian regime is not only a tyranny at home, as I have just said. It is a menace to international peace, to the kind of peace we understand and want.

In 1933, Hitler established the Nazi regime in Germany in place of the liberal and democratic Weimar Republic. This enabled him to rebuild the German Army by forcing the people to sacrifice butter for guns. In Nazi Germany, as in Fascist Italy and militarist Japan, the ruthless suppression of human rights and individual freedoms was the prelude to aggressive war.

Out of the horrifying lesson of the Second World War, a new concept was evolved. This new concept was embodied in the Charter of the United Nations adopted at San Francisco. In the Preamble, the peoples of the United Nations express their determination, not only "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war", but also "to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small."

The United Nations has been an effective instrument for the maintenance of peace primarily because of the obstructionist tactics so persistently and cynically pursued by the Soviet Union and its flock of satellites. It is significant to note that these States are the only members of the United Nations with a totalitarian form of government.

The United States has always pursued a policy based on the concept that the prerequisite for peace and security in Asia is a free and independent China. Twice in our generation, China and the United States have been comrades-in-arms to resist aggression and to defend the peace. The ties which bind our two peoples are founded upon a century and a half of close and cordial relations in commerce, in Christian missionary work and in cultural exchange.

Our good neighborliness is not built entirely upon sentimental reasons. Both our peoples have long realized that a democratic and peace-loving China is an essential condition for a peaceful Asia. By reasons of geographical location and historical tradition, China occupies the center of the Asiatic stage. One of the foremost American authorities on Asia, Congressman Walter H. Judd of Minnesota, once compared the landmass of China to the palm of the hand, with areas such as Korea, the Philippines, the Indo-Chinese peninsula, and the Indian sub-continent, as the thumb and fingers of the hand. No comparison is more apt and more meaningful.

The landmass of continental China, the palm of the hand, is today under the domination and control of a group of men whose dedicated mission in life is to keep China and to turn the whole world Communist. The mainland of China today is neither free nor independent. It is a Soviet satellite par excellence. As such, it is neither peaceful nor peace-loving.

As long as the Communists remain in control of the Chinese mainland, the free peoples of Asia, from Japan and Korea in the north, through the Philippines and down to Thailand in the south, are constantly threatened by Communist infiltration and subversion and outright military conquest. Even as the declarations of the conference in Geneva are in the process of implementation, Ho Chih-Minh's agents are swarming into Southern Vietnam, and Communist fifth columnists are busy fomenting unrest in Laos and Cambodia. Even as Peiping is echoing Moscow's protestation of peaceful co-existence and easing of international tension, Chinese Communist guns and planes are shelling the islands of Quemoy and Tachen along the China coast. With the Soviet delegates propagating the message of peace and presenting a front on their behalf in New York, Mao Tse-tung and Chou En-lai are crying for what they call the "liberation" of Formosa. Under such circumstances, peaceful development in any of these areas is well-nigh impossible.

The Chinese Communist designs against Free China on Formosa represent a further attempt on the part of the Soviet Union, through its puppets in China, to complete the subjugation of the Chinese people.

Faced with the global menace of world communism, the free world at first sought to confine communism within its borders at the time. This policy came to be known as the policy of containment. It was adopted at a time when communism had overrun the three Baltic States, all the States of Eastern Europe, East Germany, North Korea, Outer Mongolia, Northern Vietnam, and a substantial portion of the Chinese mainland.

The march of events subsequently shows that containment as a policy is far from being adequate to stem the Communist tide. In Greece, military operations with substantial American aid were required to put a stop to the attacks of the Communist guerrillas, and they were stopped partly because Tito's Yugoslavia chose to break with the Cominform at a strategic moment. In China, the Communists, supported and supplied by the Soviet Union, went on to overrun the whole mainland. In Korea, the Communists resorted to open aggression which was brought to a stalemate only after the free world, particularly the United States and the Republic of Korea, had paid an enormous price in human lives and equipment. In Indo-China, the Vietminh rebels marched relentlessly on until the Kingdom of Vietnam became helplessly truncated.

In all these instances, the implementation of the policy of containment, whether successful or not, required the employment of considerable physical force which was tantamount to war. After all, communism has never been installed in any country through the ballot box, as it works in this country and in mine. In every Communist country today, the agents of Moscow have imposed themselves upon the people by armed rebellion, in most cases with the direct participation of the Soviet Red Army.

I do not imply by this that the free world has exhausted every peaceful method to combat Communist expansionism. There are many alternatives and substitutes to physical force which remain to be employed. There are good indications that some of them can be fairly effective.

The basic concept which must first be grasped is that communism either as an ideology or a system of government is never wanted or freely chosen by the peoples of the World. The case of the anti-Communist prisoners of war in Korea is testimony to the hatred and aversion with which the Chinese people on the mainland are forced to live under the present Communist rule. As the distinguished American author, Mr. Eugene Lyons puts it, these peoples are the "secret allies" of the free world. The problem resolves itself into providing the incentive and opportunities for these "secret allies" to play their part in the common endeavor to rise and overthrow their Communist overlords. Given a fifty-fifty chance of success, it can be safely assumed that the Communist world will burst into flames.

Permit me here to spend a few minutes to refresh our minds on the Chinese prisoners of war in Korea. These Chinese Communist soldiers captured by the United Nations Command were given a choice of returning to Communist-controlled China or of going to Free China on Formosa. The opportunity proffered was not presented in the most favorable light. According to the Korean Armistice Agreement, the prisoners of war had to go through grueling sessions of brain-washing. The Communists were threatening them with dire reprisals to their families and loved ones. Nevertheless, when the final count was taken, over 80 percent of the prisoners chose the road to freedom and to return to Free China. Among those who chose to be repatriated, a goodly number of them were originally Communist secret agents. The drama of their return to Formosa, which I witnessed, was as heartening as it was meaningful. In these days when the Communists have been chalking up one victory after another, this is the one battle which they did not win. Significantly, it was a battle over the minds of man.

As with the people of China, so will it be with the peoples in every Communist state of the world. During the Second World War, more than half a million Russian soldiers even chose to join the ranks of Hitler. Thousands upon thousands of Russians, Germans, Czechs, Bulgarians, Rumanians, Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, are daily finding their way through the Iron Curtain. The June 17 riot in East Germany was a milestone in man's struggle against the dark forces of tyranny. Recently, a majority of crew members of the two Polish ships captured by my Government sought political asylum in Formosa. Some of the crew members of the captured Soviet ship, Tuapse, did likewise.

The first thing the free world can do to kindle hope in the hearts of the victims of Communist tyranny is to tell them that they have not been forgotten. The free world must try to convey to them that we have not made the assumption that Communism has come to stay in their part of the world and that every attempt will be made to uproot it.

Many agencies, both governmental and private, have done a remarkable job along such lines, from radio broadcasts to the floating of balloons. Yet at the same time, political decisions made and announced from time to time in the chanceries of the free world which to the peoples behind the Iron Curtain might be taken as measures pointing in a different direction. The policy of containment, for instance, clearly carried the implication that the main concern is to prevent communism from spilling over the Iron Curtain and that no finger will be raised to free the peoples who are already behind it. The phenomenon of some of the top leaders of the free world making one pilgrimage after another to the Mecca of Communism in Moscow and Peiping must leave the oppressed peoples with the impression that their Communist masters are demi-gods to whom the whole world pays homage. Above all, the constant talk of "peaceful co-existence", of seeking a modus vivendi of live and let live, clearly demonstrates to the oppressed peoples that the world is going to be permanently divided into two parts, and that those who find themselves in the Communist part are forever abandoned to the wolves. In their hearts, they may be "secret allies" of the free world. But how can they remain so when the other side is not prepared to play its part?

It has been a favorite tactics on the part of the Communists to outrage the world by some unexpected and typical examples of hostile intent. The most recent illustration is the barbaric treatment of the 13 Americans now known to be held by the Chinese Communists. I do not know whether there are more Americans held by the Communists. But I am certain that the Chinese Communists have chosen this moment to make this announcement for some definite purpose. They may be trying to pave the way for something to come. Or they may be trying to forestall something which may be brought about against their interests. Whatever may be their motive, it is certain that they know all too well that this announcement will shock the free world. That they have deliberately chosen to shock us and to antagonize the whole American people is significant. But will Malenkov or Mao Tse-tung go to war on an issue like this? No. Are they trying to tease the American people just for the purpose of getting them all excited? No. My personal feeling is that they are creating a situation for some neutralist country to step in and mediate, and in the process of mediation they would present some counter-proposal in order to exact concessions. It is in cases like this that I personally feel that we must take and persist in the judicious attitude, which I am pleased to observe is being done by the United States Government. By judicious I mean what in our civilized code of conduct is right.

In the past, the Communists have gained much by injecting extraneous political elements in cases in which they are legally and morally in the wrong. It would cheer the hearts of the millions behind the Iron Curtain and in the slave camps to know that the Soviet Union, this big Communist brother with the whip, is condemned and will continue to be condemned. The impression that the free world is strong, that it does not tolerate such acts, and that it will not give away any political concession in settlement of such outrageous violations of the recognized international code of conduct, is vital as our front line defense in this cold war.

I would go one step further in stating that, if co-existence with the Communist world is to be our policy for the moment, let us be doubly assured that we shall not suffer further losses in terms of human lives or territories and populations to the Communists. In short, the Communists must not be allowed to make any gain of whatever nature.

Alongside with what I have just said, one of the things the free world can do is to demonstrate by example what freedom means and what it brings. Permit me to take my country as an example. Free China today consists of the island of Formosa and its adjacent islands. A free government elected by the people now operates in Taipei. It is a government under the close scrutiny of a legislature elected by popular suffrage. The people on Formosa are well fed and well clothed. During the past three years, a system of land reform was carried through which enabled the farmers to own the land they till, thus doing away with some of the worst evils of landlordism so widespread in Asia. With the aid of the United States, a program of economic development has brought a measure of well-being to the people which is unprecedented. An American visitor recently stated that Formosa is "one of the most prosperous areas in Southeast Asia."

As a result of such developments, Formosa now stands as a rallying point for the 13,000,000 Chinese overseas and for the vast multitude of Chinese on the mainland. It is the symbol of the Chinese people's resistance against Communism and Soviet imperialism. This symbol is important because the people on the mainland know that their brothers are fighting for their liberation, and they know what to expect when it is achieved.

In this instance, as in so many instances, the United States has been playing a leading part. The oppressed peoples are fully aware that the leading nation of the free world is taking a deep interest and contributing a generous share in promoting the welfare of their people. This is heartening news to them, and it will go a long way toward hardening their will to fight for their own freedom.

On the international scale, a number of extremely important steps can be taken. The United Nations Charter provides for three kinds of sanctions against aggressor nations, diplomatic, economic, and military. The free world will contribute much to the cause of peace if the United Nations, having declared the Communist Peiping regime the aggressor in Korea, should go one step further in declaring that no consideration whatsoever will be given to the move to have that regime admitted to the United Nations. The unanimous resolutions barring that regime from the United Nations, adopted by the Congress of the United States, and the petition bearing more than one million signatures of American citizens to the same effect, are having an enormous effect upon the down-trodden people of Communist China. The effect will be redoubled if the United Nations itself takes a similar stand.

Another diplomatic sanction which can be employed is the expulsion of the Soviet Union from membership in the United Nations. Article 6 of the Charter provides that members as having "persistently violated" its principles may be thrown out. The Soviet Union has more than qualified for expulsion. Still another step which can be taken is for the nations of the free world to withdraw diplomatic recognition from the Communist regimes behind the Iron Curtain. These steps, if taken, will have the most devastating effects upon the stability of the Communist regimes which are already having a hard time controlling the people.

During the past few years, the free world has been enforcing an economic embargo on strategic materials against the Iron Curtain countries. Of late, there has been a tendency to relax the embargo, which should be welcome news to the Kremlin indeed. The Communist regimes in Europe and Asia are having a hard time managing their domestic economies. The Marxist doctrines which they follow simply do not work, and no amount of regimentation can make them work. There is no reason whatsoever why the free world should try to bail the Communists out of their self-created difficulties. On the contrary, an embargo of the most stringent nature should be imposed so as to compel them to deflect a portion of their resources now employed in preparation for new wars to peaceful uses.

There is a vague feeling that, by opening up trade with Communist China, one can get to know how the people behind the Bamboo Curtain live and to impress upon them how much better off we are. This may be sound reasoning but certainly poor tactics in dealing with the Communists. I do not wish to take up too much of your time here discussing this question. But I must say that anything that goes to strengthen the Communist economy will serve to perpetuate the Communist control. Besides, with the existing pacts which the Chinese Communists have with the Soviet Union, there cannot be much business left over for the free world, certainly not enough to balance up with the political gain to be derived by the Communists from such trade.

These measures which I have just outlined are not measures of war. They are only some measures we might adopt short of war. Let us build up our defences to meet any challenge which the enemy may launch. While doing that, let us also undertake measures to prevent war by making it difficult and risky for the warmongers to make it.

Speaking to an American audience, I cannot conclude without saying that, in this global struggle for freedom, the American people have been most generous in their contributions in terms of money and technical assistance. Those of us who have profited from such aid are indeed grateful. But your resources are nevertheless limited. It seems to me essential that in order to achieve the best results with your limited resources, your aid should be directed to certain strategic areas with the greatest possible speed. For any form of aid to be effective against possible Communist aggression, it must be adequate and soon for the purpose.

We are engaged in a common struggle against the forces of evil. I can assure you that the peace-loving people of China are with you all the way. We are now trying to rebuild a free and independent China. We have faith that, no matter how difficult our task may be, the basic goodness of the Chinese people will ultimately emerge triumphant. When that day comes, with a free and independent China regaining her place in the center of the Asiatic stage, there will begin to grow out of the present chaos a more permanent peace based on the concepts of freedom and free economic and cultural cooperation.

Statement by Dr. C.L. Hsia on Land Reform in Taiwan before the Second Committee of the Ninth U.N. General Assembly,
November 12, 1954

Since 1949, the Chinese Government has carried out in the province of Taiwan extensive programmes of rural land reform to achieve the triple purpose of reducing rentals on agricultural land, of assuring security of tenure to the peasants and of providing opportunity for the cultivators to acquire ownership of land.

Beginning from August this year, after having completed its programmes of rural land reform, my Government has launched out in a new direction and initiated a programme of the reform of urban land.

In view of the great importance many delegations attach to the question of rural land reform, the experience of my country in this endeavour may be of interest to the Committee.

Competent observers agree that the conditions of the peasant have never been so good as they are in Taiwan today. Like all other social phenomena, this improvement in the conditions of the Chinese peasant cannot be attributable to any single cause alone. It cannot, to be sure, be wholly due to rural land reform. Still rural land reform has played an important part in this improvement. Today I propose to examine, on the basis of our own experience, the various routes via which land reform contributes to the general result.

It may be recalled that rural land reform in Taiwan was accomplished in two stages. The first stage from 1949 to 1953 was concerned with the reduction of rural land rent and the second stage with the implementation of a land-to-the-tillers programme.

Our reduction of rural rent was on a moderate scale only, being from a prevailing average of 54% to a new maximum of 37.5% of the farmers' output. The reduction resulted in an increase of 16.5 % in the tenant-farmers gross income. But the tenants usually spent large sums on rents, irrigation fees, seeds and fertilizers. If we make allowance for these expenses and consider the tenants' net income only, then the increase would amount to no less than 55 to 65 % of their net income. An increase of this order could not but have profound effect on the peasants' standard of living and willingness to produce, as I shall presently show.

But our rent reduction programme was by no means confined to rent reduction. It was, in fact, a composite programme. Besides reducing rent, it brought other benefits to the tenants, among the most important of which was giving the tenants security of tenure.

About a year after the launching of the rent reduction programme, a Cabinet investigation team was appointed to make an on-the-spot survey of the results of rent reduction. The Cabinet investigation team reported a 30 % increase in the output of rice immediately after rent reduction and the increase has continued ever since. It was readily admitted that the increase was not all creditable to the rent reduction. Nevertheless rent reduction was a pivotal factor in the situation.

If I were to pinpoint the specific elements in our rent reduction programme which were responsible for increased output, I would say that rent reduction, by giving a larger share of the crop to the tenants, was in itself a spur to increased production. Then the security of tenure was also conducive to increased agricultural output; for with the tenure secured, peasants were more ready to make long-term capital expenditures on the land now that they were provided with the means to do so. But according to our experience, the most important factor boosting output was the fact that the amount of rent was fixed for each and every piece of land except during bad harvests when it can be reduced. The amount of rent being fixed, all increases in output would accrue to the peasants as a reward for their efforts and as an incentive to further exertions.

The increase in output gave a second boost to the income of the peasants, the initial boost being provided by the rent education itself. Increases in incomes naturally would lead to improvements in the livelihood of the rural population. The effects were almost instantaneous, for not long after rent reduction the Cabinet investigation team already mentioned was able to report cases of conspicuous improvements in the peasants' standard of living.

In nearly every village visited, they saw newly-built or newly-repaired farmhouses. Village farmers were all neatly dressed. Whereas their principal starch food was the potato, most of them now eat pure rice.

Another example was the Ta-chao Village. In this village there was a total of 140 tenant families out of a total farm population of 200 families. After the rent reduction, out of the 140 tenant families 25 had their sons married, seven built new farmhouses, 20 had their houses repaired, and 40 bought buffaloes.

A third case was concerned with rural health. In former days, tenants were prevented by poverty from visiting doctors when they fell ill. Now their medical expenses increased side by side with their income. In one village the death rate was reduced from 13.20% to 10.40% in a period of two years.

Rural education was also benefited by the rent reduction. The number of children attending schools was increased in every village visited by the Cabinet investigation team. In Chuang-wei Village where tenants amounted to 70 % of the local population, the number of children attending school increased 44.75 % over a period of two years.

The instances I have just quoted were the rule and not exceptions. A second check-up on the results of the rent reduction programme was carried out last year, this time by the Joint Sino-American Rural Reconstruction Commission under the direction of an expert from the Mutual Security Agency. This second survey also showed that the rural people generally had a favourable impression of the rent reduction programme, which was mentioned everywhere as of benefit to the tenant-farmers. The main benefits reported were the increase of livestock production, the increase of agricultural production, and improvements in dwellings and in the general status of the tenants.

I may add that many rural families in Taiwan now possess a radio, a luxury undreamt of by the farmers only a few years back.

I now turn to the political effects of our rent reduction programme. Our experience reinforces the belief that rent reduction, with its consequential improvement in the livelihood of the masses, provides an effective barrier to the spread of Communism.

According to their confessions, Communist agents arrested by my Government conceded that the rent reduction programme in Taiwan was a success. They mentioned in particular seven points of success as follows (I am quoting from Vice-President Chen Cheng's An Approach to China's Land Reform): (1) Tenure rights have been well protected. (2) The restriction of land rental by law eliminates unreasonable demands by the landlords. (3) The improvement of the farmers' economic conditions has resulted in the creation of more owner cultivators. (4) Concentration of landownership has been discouraged. (5) Capital will be diverted to productive channels and will not be used by the landlords for speculation in land. (6) As their economic life has been improved, the farmers now have better understanding of the political situation. (7) The success of the programme has given the farmers an incentive to produce more.

In spite of all the lip service the Chinese Communists have paid to land reform, Communist agents and underground workers in Taiwan were now directed to wreck our rent reduction programme in an attempt to undermine the government's prestige and thus decrease the people's confidence in the government. Here are some quotations from Communist documents seized by my Government: 'Work of organization should be shifted from the urban areas to rural areas', 'Mobilize the farmers' and 'Our first objective is to sabotage the land rent reduction programme: The first step is to spread propaganda against the programme, and the second step is to split the farmers and to induce them to antagonize the landlords and the government'.

But the Communist agents arrested also admitted that they found it extremely difficult to win the farmers although they had tried every possible means. This proves that our rent reduction programme was not only an economic achievement but it was also significant socially and politically.

Rent reduction in Taiwan had a further effect which I have not yet mentioned. I refer to the fact that it depressed the price of rural land by some 20 to 60%, and thus facilitated the creation of peasant ownership, to which subject I now turn.

The creation of peasant ownership, or the land-to-the-tillers programme, was carried out in 1953. Under the programme each landlord was allowed to retain three hectares of medium-grade land, or their equivalent, for his own subsistence. All lands in excess of the retention limit were to be purchased by the government at prices equal to 2.5 times their average annual yield. To avoid inflation, the government's purchase price was not paid in cash but in stocks of government-owned industries and in government bonds redeemable in rice and sweet potatoes, the main agricultural products of the island.

The Government then sold at cost the lands thus requisitioned to the cultivators who were allowed 10 years to pay in 20 semi-annual installments. With the proceeds received from the cultivators, the government redeems the bonds issued to the original landowners.

Under the land-to-the-tillers programme, the peasants are being relieved of rent payments; but, as new landowners, they have to assume responsibilities, which formerly belonged to their landlords, for the land tax and the National Defense Contribution, besides making installment payments for the price of their land. But the law has specifically laid it down that the peasants' total burden under the new land-to-the-tillers programme, including the installment payments for the land, must not exceed their former burden under the rent reduction programme. This has, in fact, been the case. And beginning from the eleventh year, when the peasants will have completely paid off the price of the land they bought, their obligations will be confined to the household tax, the land tax and the National Defense Contributions, and will add up to only some 10% of his gross income as compared with the present burden of around 37%. This would represent a further great improvement in the economic conditions of the peasants pregnant with economic, social and political significance.

After land reform, our next most urgent rural problems are the furnishing of more rural credit and the further promotion of agricultural output by the application of scientific knowledge.

Our experience shows that rent reduction and the creation of peasant ownership did not involve my Government in large amounts of outlays in cash. True, its administrative expenditures increased as the direct consequence of land reform. But it did not have to lay out large amounts of cash for the purchase of land which was paid for in bonds and stocks. A similar practice was followed by Japan, the Republic of Korea, Italy and Egypt, according to the Secretariat's report on the Progress of Land Reform. But supplying credits for agricultural improvements and reclamation projects may entail large cash outlays on the part of governments. It is here that international financial assistance becomes useful and necessary. My delegation endorses, therefore, paragraph 2 of ECOSOC resolution 512 (XVII) C, concerning loans for agrarian development projects.

In the field of technological improvements, we have agricultural experimental stations, besides a Joint Sino-American Commission on Rural Reconstruction which I have already had occasion to refer to. This latter Commission is financed by American economic aid funds and manned by American and Chinese personnel. It is doing valuable work in the fields of seed multiplication and extension, crop breeding, pest control, soil fertility, agricultural implements, irrigation, and animal husbandry.

So far I have been dealing with rural land reform. In August this year, the Chinese Legislature passed a set of new regulations, entitled the "Regulations Governing the Equalization of Rights in Urban Land", thus ushering in a new era in land reform affecting urban land.

In one sense, urban land reform is the logical consequence of rural land reform. It is a well-known fact that rural land provides an attractive object for the investment of surplus funds from both the city and the country. Under the rural rent reduction programme agricultural land no longer constituted a

profitable object of investment and under the land-to-the-tillers programme, agricultural land ceased to be an object of investment altogether except for its tillers. Under such circumstances urban land reform is necessary as a measure to prevent the diversion of surplus funds from rural areas to the cities for speculation in urban land.

In the second place, the relatively high price of urban land constitutes an obstacle to the development of industry and commerce by tying up a disproportionate part of the enterpriser's capital. Cases are known that in Taiwan enterprisers intending to establish factories or business in the urban districts had been deterred from doing so by the high price of land which also made it increasingly difficult for people to buy land for residential construction purposes, thus aggravating the housing problem in the cities.

Thirdly, the price of urban land is not only high, but it is rapidly increasing. Increases in the price of urban land are, in most cases, unearned increments, having little or nothing to do with the efforts of the landowners but entirely owing to the growing concentration of population in the urban areas since World War II and to the development of industry, commerce and public utilities. Being unearned, the increased value of the land rightly belongs to the public and should be appropriated for the public's benefit. "Unearned increments to the public": this was one of the doctrines expounded by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, Father of the Republic of China, who was inspired in this respect by the works of the famous American economist Henry George. Today it happens to be the eighty-ninth birth anniversary of Dr. Sun who attached great importance to land reform in his political programme.

Thus the objectives of our urban land reform are (1) to prevent speculation in urban land; (2) to make land available at a reasonable price for industrial and residential construction; and (3) to carry out Dr. Sun Yat-sen's doctrine of "Unearned increments to the public".

To attain these objectives of urban land reform, the principal means are the land value tax, the land increment tax and the statutory limitation of the size of individual holdings.

The land value tax has three schedules of rates. A flat rate of 0.15% applies to all land for industrial use. Progressive rates ranging from 0.15% to 6.5% apply to all other urban land under resident owners, while urban land under absentee ownership will be subjected to twice the rates applicable to resident owners.

The land increment tax is assessable on the increased value of land and payable on its transfer for reasons other than succession. Increased value due to improvements by the landowner are deductable for the purpose of the land increment tax, which applies to the unearned increments only.

The land increment tax is also on a progressive scale, with rates ranging from 30 % of the increased value through 50 %, 70 % and 90 % to 100 %. It is stipulated that the proceeds from the land increment tax will be used exclusively for the construction of low-priced and low-rent residential houses and for such social welfare purposes as caring for the young and the old, social relief and public health.

A further section in the Regulations Governing the Equalization of Rights in Urban Land limits the total

area which any owner can hold to one hectare. Area in excess of one hectare the owner is required to sell within a period of two years. Failing to do so within the stipulated period, it may be requisitioned by the government for resale to people who intend to use it.

Thus the main instruments for our urban land reform programme are (1) the land value tax. (2) the land increment tax. (3) the limitation of the size of individual holdings. With these instruments we hope to prevent speculation in urban land, to promote the more rational use of urban land and to implement the "unearned increments to the public" doctrine.

Statement by U.S. Secretary of State John F. Dulles During His Visit to Taiwan, March 3, 1955

Taiwan is the area where today the Chinese Communists most actively press their aggressive designs. At first, the Chinese Communists were armed aggressors in Korea. Then they intensified their support of armed revolt in Vietnam and armed aggression against Laos and Cambodia. Now they say they will take Taiwan by force. Thus they openly threaten armed attack against an area which the United States is committed to help to defend.

The Chinese Foreign Minister and I have today exchanged the instruments of ratification which bring into force our Mutual Defense Treaty with the Republic of China. That is the treaty which the United States Senate approved on February 9 by a vote of 64 to 6. We have had the first meeting of consultation under Article IV of that treaty, which calls for periodic consultations for implementation of the treaty.

The result of our consultation is to assure closer and more effective cooperation for the defense of the treaty area.

It is not possible at this time to state explicitly how that defense will be conducted. The treaty area, in so far as regards the Republic of China, cover Taiwan and the Pescadores and armed attack directed against these islands. Public Law 4 to January 29, 1955, enacted with virtual unanimity, gives the President of the United States authority to use the armed forces of the United States for securing and protecting Taiwan and the Pescadores and the protection of such related positions now in friendly hands and the taking of such other measures, as the President judges appropriate to assure the defense of Taiwan and the Pescadores.

Pursuant to this authority, the United States continues to evaluate the words and deeds of the Chinese Communist regime to ascertain whether their military actions, preparations and concentrations in the Formosa area constitute, in fact, the first phase of an attack directed against Taiwan and whether the United States must proceed on this assumption. If so, it cannot be assumed that the defense would be static and confined to Taiwan itself, or that the aggressor would enjoy immunity with respect to the areas from which he stages his offensive.

The decision as to the use of the armed forces of the United States and the scope of their use under Public Law 4 will be made by the President himself in the light of the circumstances at the time and his appraisal of the intentions of the Chinese Communists.

Since, however, the Matsu and Quemoy Islands, now in friendly hands, have a relationship to the defense of Taiwan such that the President may judge their protection to be appropriate in assuring the defense of Taiwan and the Pescadores, our consultation covered also these coastal positions of the Republic of China.

It is the ardent hope of the United States that the Chinese Communist will not insist on war as an instrument of its policy.

As President Eisenhower said, 'We would welcome action by the United Nations which might bring an end to the active hostilities in the area.' The United Nations is exploring the possibility of a ceasefire, as are also other peace-loving nations.

I have, however, made clear that the United States will not enter into any negotiations dealing with the territories, or rights of the Republic of China except in cooperation with the Republic of China.

The Chinese Communists constantly profess a love of peace. They now have a chance to practice what they preach. The United States and the Republic of China have no alternative but to stand firm.

Address Delivered by the American Assistant Secretary of State,
Mr.Walter S. Robertson, on U.S. Far Eastern Policy before the
Chamber of Commerce of Greater Philadelphia,
January 13, 1955

It is an honor and a privilege to speak to this distinguished group tonight, to have the opportunity of sharing with you some of our most critical problems. For the problems which I shall discuss briefly with you are not just the government's problems. They are your problems and my problems — American problems, Free World problems"— problems demanding the utmost in wisdom, courage and patience, if in their solution we are to preserve the fundamental values upon which this nation was founded and became great.

Last year, in a press conference the President remarked that he thought we ought to "talk less about American leadership in the world, because we are trying to be a good partner." Looking back at the year just past, it seems to me that a sense of growing partnership among the free nations, rather than perhaps over-dynamic leadership by anyone of them, was the significant new element. A compelling example of this approach by partnership was the whole dramatic episode of the collapse of EDC and the way the West European nations moved in concert to fill the vacuum created by that collapse. This, as Secretary of State Dulles said and said again, was a European story. He took with him, to those fateful meetings last fall at London and Paris, no overall plan to shore up the damage done. But we were, he said, more than willing to consider favorably any workable plan that was proposed by the nations most gravely concerned.

The result is history now. With Great Britain and Germany and France all making notable concessions, in this spirit of partnership, a new plan for a Western European Union was developed which in many concrete ways represented an improvement on the EDC plan. The Free World breathed again.

The Manila Treaty last September was another example of this spirit of fellowship. There, you will remember, eight nations, Asian and non-Asian, signed a pact against aggression and subversion which put heart and hope into Southeast Asia and served notice on the Communist bloc that the ranks of the free nations — old and new — were closing.

In thinking over what I wanted to say to you tonight, and in the light of this growing emphasis on a partnership of nations, I decided to brush up on a legal definition of what a partnership actually was, in the business sense of the term. Mechem's "Elements of Law of Partnership" was my guide, and I relearned several interesting facts from my business days which I think are applicable here. Complete good faith, fair dealing and honesty on the part of each partner is, as I am sure you all know, the basic requirement.

Each has full and equal responsibility for the partnership and each has a right to a share in the benefits. Among the subheads I learned again that "duty to consult", "duty to devote himself to the advancement of the firm's interest" and "duty to conform to the partnership agreement" figured prominently.

Now running through all this was that old legal coverall, "unless otherwise specified", which is woven out of a lot of "ifs", "buts" and "whereases": But nonetheless there is good solid truth here. What holds true for a business partnership also holds true in considerable degree in a political-military-diplomatic partnership among nations.

I would be something less than honest with you if I did not make it very clear that this increasing cooperation in the Free World is based on necessity. Let me go on record, for this is the premise upon which my whole report to you tonight is based:

The tactics of the Communist world may vary but the threat remains the same.

The present tactic has been an all-out peace offensive, with a central theme of coexistence. Because the world, both the Free World and the slave world, longs for peace, this siren song of coexistence is making some headway among neutral nations, among some of our allies and perhaps even with some Americans. But let me remind you that the word means many things to many men. To us it means tolerance and the right to live as you please. To the masters of the Communist world it means in the end one world all right, but what a world. A police state, a silent world of subjugation where no free voice is ever heard.

Now in the decade since World War II the slave world of the Soviet has greatly increased in power. To it has been added, by imperialists of the same brutal stripe, the vast manpower and potential of Communist China. Historical hindsight is easy, I'll grant you, but at the risk of this kind of rear-window wisdom, I still say that there never was any real doubt but that this would be so. Even back in the early 1940s when those bemused books were coming out of China assuring us that the Chinese brand of communism was at heart an agrarian reform movement, the handwriting on the wall, written in red, soon to be written in blood, was very clear. Mao Tse-tung, the present head of the regime, was writing of himself:

"I am a Marxist dedicated to communizing China and the rest of the world under the leadership of Moscow."

Many years ago, Lenin is reported to have written: "First we'll take Eastern Europe, then the masses of Asia, then we will surround America, the last citadel of capitalism. We shall not have to attack. She will fall into our lap like an overripe fruit." And now this same dedication to the Communist ideal has just been reaffirmed in a recent speech by Liu Shao-chi, the Chinese Communist Party's principal spokesman:

"The Soviet road is the road all humanity will eventually take, in accordance with the laws of development of history. To bypass this road is impossible. We have always believed that Marxism-Leninism is universal truth."

Now let us see what the disciples of Lenin have done with the blueprint he bequeathed them. In Europe the roll call of once-free nations now in slavery is a long and melancholy one; Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary, East Germany, Albania, in short, Eastern Europe. In Asia the list is shorter but the area--from the waters of Alaska to the South China Sea--is a vast one. Today the Communists hold the mainland of China with its 600,000,000 units of manpower and North Korea, and they are threatening to take Southeast Asia by way of Indochina. The tactics vary--open aggression, mass murder, ruthless regimentation, infiltration, subversion. The goal remains the same.

This Janus-headed empire contains over one-third of the human race. One face, at present the bland, soft-speaking one, looks toward Western Eurore. The scowling one, in the image of Mao, and the shadow of Malenkov, looks out upon all Asia from an interior position of great force and power.

The Communist conquest of China has given the Communist tyranny a firm Asian base. From this base major resources are available or might be brought to bear in or on every country in the Far East. We have recently seen such Communist pressures applied with tragic consequences in Indochina. By common boundaries — the flow of trade-cultural affinities — the presence of Chinese populations — every country in Asia is touched in some way by Communist China.

The Chinese Communists and, for that matter, the other Asian Communists such as the Vietminh, may have points of conspicuous physical difference from the Russians, but as Communists they are all identical, and it is as Communists that they think of themselves. To true Communists, the international Communists, it is in terms of Communist doctrine alone that the world and all that goes on in it are to be regarded.

If we understand what the Communists are, it is apparent that there are no grounds on which to appeal to them unless from a position of strength we can make them pause and heed us. Every basic Communist interest is predicated upon our progressive defeat and final destruction. The only way we can "get at" "them is through manifesting the power to defend our rights and interests. When they encounter sufficient opposition, they call off the attack, as they did in Korea.

They may even retreat as they did in Iran in 1946. The Communist movement, though fanatical in dedication, lacks that suicidal element of fanaticism that colored the pre-war movements of militant German and Japanese nationalism. The Communists are intensely practical. They have epithets just as scurrilous for comrades who lose out by going too fast — as for those who lose out from lack of zeal. In fact, the sin of the Communist arch-traitor--Trotsky--was the sin of wanting to push the revolution too fast. The point of this is inescapable.

It is the Asiatic face of this great conspiracy that I propose to discuss with you tonight in some detail, for it is the area in which my own responsibilities within the Department of State lie.

What is our policy? How do we propose to meet the ever-present threat of Communist aggression there, knowing it for what it is? What progress is being made in the spirit of partnership which I defined in my opening remarks?

Let me make one more generalization before I go into particulars. Corollary to the basic premise of the constancy of the Communist threat is another and far more awful truism. The slave world as well as the free possesses the nuclear weapons by which to destroy the whole world as we know it.

Bearing this ultimate threat in mind, as indeed we must, the overall policy of the United States with regard to the Far East may be described as two-fold.

One dominating aspect is the reduction of the power and menacing influence of the USSR and Communist China there, and the prevention of further expansion of Communist power.

The other is the encouragement of stability and strength in the area, through the cooperative association of free and independent nations.

The basic principle of a good business partnership, as we have seen, is "good and great confidence and trust." The establishment of such a climate of confidence and trust has been equally basic to our policy in the Far East, both in the prevention of further Communist expansion and in strengthening the bonds of the free nations in the threatened areas.

The complicating factor here has been the old ghost of colonialism, for the great driving force throughout Asia is the determination of the free peoples there--many of which have recently become independent--to maintain their freedom. They fear Russia and Communist China, but paradoxically they still in some instances mistrust us too.

This was very well described by a United States information officer reporting from Seoul the other day:

"Too many people in Asia believe that on the question of colonialism they only have a choice between two tigers — and even if they concede that one of them is a red tiger, they suspect the other carries stars as well as stripes. Most Asians will admit that the United States tiger is a kinder one, but many believe this only means that while he picks their pockets he pats them on the head and possibly returns a penny change."

I will grant you that the United States record on colonialism is a powerful refutation of this ancient charge. Our good faith in giving the Philippines full independence as soon as they were ready for it is a case in point in that area itself.

But the truth is not widely known, and Communist propaganda is everywhere distorting, perverting, poisoning...

I have mentioned the Manila Treaty as an example of good teamwork and increased security. But something else happened at Manila last year that was equal in importance. The eight nations who met there signed the Pacific Charter which proclaimed in unmistakable terms the rights of self-government and independence for all nations ready to assume the attendant responsibilities.

This has helped to disperse the lingering doubts, but there is a long way still to go. Words are not enough. First of all the word must be spread in an area where communication is often exceedingly difficult and uncertain. The same applies to the Manila Treaty itself. It is a beginning of a defensive alliance designed to meet the defense needs of Southeast Asia. On February 23, the Manila Treaty nations are meeting at Bangkok to discuss how to give practical effect to the provisions of the treaty. The fact that this meeting is in the capital city of Thailand, an ancient, independent Asian country, is both suitable and symbolic. The free and equal partnership is growing. The duty to consult, which as we have seen is part of such a partnership, is being fulfilled.

So far I have dealt almost entirely in generalizations as vast as the great Asian land-mass with which they are concerned. I would like to consider more specifically the situation in the Far East. For the bowl of rice of the evening I would like to give you a few hard facts about the progress here.

Moving from north to south, let's first have a look at Japan. Our principal effort comes under the "full and equal responsibility" clause in the definition of a partnership. Increasing assumption of Japan's responsibility for her own defense is one of the goals. We have a security treaty with Japan which provides for the stationing of U.S. forces in Japan and assumes that Japan will build up her defense potential over a period of time.

The most obvious fact about that island nation of 88,000,000 people increasing more than 1,000,000 per year is that it must trade to live. Japan must import over 22 percent of its food requirements and practically all of its raw materials. If Japan cannot make a living doing business with the free nations, she will do business with the Communists, rather than starve. Doing business with people strengthens other ties with them. Japan can remain on the side of the Free World only if there are adequate trade possibilities for her within the Free World.

This brings me to the second phase of our partnership with Japan. What is good for one partner is good for both. There is, I know, some fear of the competition of Japan, but how much better the competition of free nations than the costlier struggle with an augmented Communist despotism. There is scarcely need to remind you that Japan is one of our best customers, especially for such agricultural products as cotton and wheat and rice, barley and soy beans as well as coal and petroleum and many manufactured goods--automobiles, industrial machinery and chemicals. In fact, almost one-third of Japan's imports come from the United States, while we buy only about one-sixth of her exports. In 1953 Japan's deficit in trade with the U.S. amounted to approximately $523 million, about one-half of its total trade deficit. So it is to our selfish interest to let Japan earn dollars in the United States, as well as to assist her to increase market opportunities in other nations of the Free World.

The United States will begin negotiations in February at Geneva for the purpose of bringing Japan into the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. We have taken the initiative in this matter because we feel that Japan's full accession to the general agreement would be the biggest single step which could be taken to increase her trade with the Free World. In addition to negotiations with Japan on tariff concessions, the U.S. will consider granting some concessions to third countries which negotiate with Japan, if such concessions will assist in the expansion of Japanese exports to third countries.

Moving southward the big step with the Republic of China has, of course, been the mutual defense treaty now awaiting congressional approval. A measure of the success of this treaty is the fact that Peiping radio and press is still beating the drums against it, calling it "grave provocation" and a sign of imperialist American interference in domestic affairs. By this we know that we have touched the Communists on a sensitive spot. The treaty now awaiting Senate ratification closes the gap in our island chain of defenses in the Pacific. Our mutual defense pacts now include: Japan, Korea, Formosa, the Philippines, Australia and New Zealand--defensive alliances to be further bolstered and supplemented by the Manila Pact upon ratification. It is our firm conviction that the treaty with the Republic of China will prove to be a stabilizing factor in the Pacific,