Communist Forces Research Articles

Southeast Asia in International Politics: A 1975 Perspective

SEPTEMBER 1974 MARKED the twentieth anniversary of the United States' decision to join the Southeast Asia Collective Defense Pact (SEATO) which pledged to protect the nations of that area against aggression. Since that time, dramatic chances have taken place both in great power relations in Asia as well as among the states of Southeast Asia. The most startling developments occurred in the spring of 1975 when communist forces captured the Cambodian and South Vietnamese capitals and forced the United States to evacuate its nationals under humiliating circumstances. Although the swift collapse of twenty years of American policy in Indo-China will preoccupy the thoughts of scholars and statesmen for some years, it is well to review the major events of those twenty years before making a judgment about whether American policy has been a total failure there, or whether these twenty years may have bought valuable time for the other nations of the area to put their own houses in order. Furthermore, what can be said about the communist victories in the Indo-China states in terms of the impact on the balance of power in Asia?

South Vietnam: Detente and Reconciliation

OIUTH VIETNAMESE people have cause to feel that they are under greater pressure from the communist world now that detente is the order of the day than they ever were at the height of the cold war in the 1950s. Agitation to persuade the intellectual public of countries with open societies of the inherent wickedness of those Vietnamese who resist the communists actually increased after President Nixon's undertaking to withdraw American combat forces from Indochina; coordinated on principles similar to those some of us recall as the hallmark of the League against Imperialism in the 1920s and 1930s, the antiSaigon campaligns continue today after American withdrawal is complete, no whit abated in either frequency or virulence. The broadcasts of Radios Moscow and Peking preclude the possibility that the campaigns are started otherwise than with the blessings of Kremlin and Great Within. Detente is often reckoned to have begun with the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and has since moved down to control of conventional weapons; yet it evidently proved impossible for Dr. Kissinger to negotiate, on a more modest plane still, a limitation on the supply of conventional weapons to the two belligerents in Indochina-either impossible because Peking and Moscow declined, or futile because he knew in advance that they would not honour eventual undertakings, and, thanks to land frontiers and closed societies, could get away with extensive breaches of any. It is true that a limitation of a kind is written into the January ceasefire; but the relevant clause merely bans the introduction into South Vietnam of fresh munitions, beyond what is needed for replacement-it says nothing about introducing them into North Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia, whose frontiers with South Vietnam are all entrusted by another clause in the ceasefire, irreversibly, to the charge of the communist forces. Members of the International Control Commission endeavouring, in fulfilment of duties under a third clause, to gain some idea what movement was taking place across those frontiers have paid for their foolhardiness with their lives, unmourned by any outcry. One is reminded of Chinese condemnations of Britain for bad faith in the 1830s in declining to ban the export of opium from Bengal; that measures to prevent importation alone were bound to be ineffectual

The Suppression of Secret Societies in Post-Liberation Tientsin

On 15 January 1949 Tientsin fell to Chinese communist forces. As the first of the major treaty ports captured by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and with a population of over 1·8 million, it presented its new rulers with a vast array of complex problems, considerably greater than any they had previously encountered. One of the most important of these was the question of how to deal with the various socio-economic groups which dominated Tientsin society at the time of Liberation. Tientsin is a particularly useful case study in this respect, for not only was it the first major metropolis where strategies had to be devised to cope with this problem, but also the solutions worked out in Tientsin frequently served as models for other areas. Within Tientsin, perhaps the most powerful type of social organization was the secret society. This article begins with a brief survey of the general social situation, to put the secret societies into their proper context; it then details the Chinese Communist Party's strategy for handling Tientsin's secret societies and the problems which it encountered.

Cambodia: The Cost of Survival

Research Article| February 01 1972 Cambodia: The Cost of Survival Peter A. Poole Peter A. Poole Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Far Eastern Survey (1943) 12 (2): 148–155. https://doi.org/10.2307/2643076 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Twitter LinkedIn Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Peter A. Poole; Cambodia: The Cost of Survival. Far Eastern Survey 25 January 1943; 12 (2): 148–155. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/2643076 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAsian Survey Search This content is only available via PDF. Copyright 1972 Regents of the University of California Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Laos: The Forgotten War Widens

In 1969, the most significant change in Laos was the widening of the forgotten war, notre guerre oubliee, as Prime Minister Souvanna Phouma calls it. Both the Royal Lao Government (RIG) and the Pathet Lao (PL) expanded their military operations, each attempting to influence the internal power balance as well as the external forces, so important to the future of the country. The prevailing ground rules, established when government and Communist forces resumed fighting in 1963, were that the Communist forcesNorth Vietnamese and Pathet Lao-take the initiative during the dry season (generally October to May), followed by ripostes during the wet season by RLG forces, with U.S. air support. The war in Laos was not on the scale of the larger, grinding war in South Vietnam, but rather consisted largely of small unit attacks on isolated positions, struggles for certain tactical mountain-top and road control positions in sparsely populated highland areas, ambushes, and hit and run encounters in some valley sites. The RLG retained control over the Mekong Valley regions, where the bulk of the lowland Lao live, and they held certain adjacent mountain areas and a few scattered sites within enemy territory which they could reach only by aircraft. The Communist forces controlled the northern and eastern segments of the country, including all territory which borders on Communist China and North Vietnam, covering regions inhabited largely by highland minorities. The widened war in 1969 made it clear that these ground rules of engagement had been significantly altered.

The Vietnamese in Sydney

Australians of Vietnamese origin form one of the largest and most visible migrant communities in Sydney. Vietnamese is the fifth most commonly spoken community language in Sydney other than English, and ranks above Italian. Arriving as refugees and family reunion migrants in the wake of the fall of Saigon to advancing communist forces in 1975, the Vietnamese were the first large group of Asian immigrants to settle in Australia after the end of the White Australia policy, and the first significant group to arrive after the advent of official multiculturalism.

Vietnam: Approaching the Asian‐pacific century with confidence

Abstract It has been twenty years since the fall of Saigon to Northern Communist forces on 30 April 1975. From that time, Vietnam has slowly, but steadily clawed its way back into the international mainstream, a trend prompted by the revival of the Vietnamese economy which has gained strength from a movement away from Communist economic ideology. The author, who recently paid an extensive visit to Vietnam, examines the process of development and the opportunities and difficulties that arise from it.

A Note on Economic Trends in Indonesia

Contrary to prevalent impressions, certain indicators suggest that Indonesia did not orient her national economic system in all dimensions along the lines of a Communist model during President Sukarno's tenure. While reliance on domestic and international Communist forces kept increasing, a monetary policy persisted which strengthened the private sector of the economy, the country's bourgeoisie. Specifically, credit allocations by the Central Bank of Indonesia-an agency of governmental policy-imply a noticeable shift toward private enterprise economy with the share of the public sector shrinking. In order to detect changes in attitude toward the private sector versus the public sector several approaches were considered: (i) analysis of the composition of gross domestic capital formation by the type of purchaser as private sector or public sector; (2) analysis of employment by the private sector versus the public sector; (3) analysis of consumption expenditures by the private sec-

President Kennedy and the Neutralization of Laos

SoonAfter John F. Kennedy became President, difficult foreign policy decisions had to be made. Even before he assumed the burdens of office, he knew an early judgment would be required concerning United States policies vis-à-vis Laos. Throughout 1960, Communist forces in Laos and their allies won numerous military victories and the Laotian Royal Army was unable to check their advances. The United States and other SEATO members were understandably disturbed. They now had to contemplate a total Communist victory with all its potentially painful and embarrassing consequences. These consequences worried President-elect Kennedy and prior to his inauguration, he and his advisors began systematically examining all their policy alternatives; they found that none were really attractive.

The Origins of the Cold War in China

P RESIDENT TRUMAN on December i5, 1945, instructed General George C. Marshall to proceed as soon as possible to China in order to see what he could do to halt hostilities between Chinese Nationalist and Communist forces which were erupting throughout the country, especially in the north, at a frightening rate of increase. There was every reason to believe that the people of China were in grave danger of being defrauded of the peace of which more than a generation of war and civil war had deprived them. The President, in strong terms, expressed the American hope that once hostilities had ended all factions in China would compose their difficulties by political means and work for a strong, united and democratic China. Although General Marshall was not a mediator, he could use his good offices to this latter end. The President, in conclusion, made it clear that no American aid of any kind would be forthcoming until peace had been restored. It was only twenty-seven months later that the President, on March Ii, I948, publicly reaffirmed for the last time that his directive of 1945 was still American policy toward China; but, when questioned as to whether the United States still favored a coalition with the Chinese Communists, finally declared bluntly in his customary fashion that did not want any Communists in the Government of China or anywhere else if we could help it. Since that pronouncement no American politician or prominent public figure who wished to avoid oblivion has taken issue with this policy or dared to suggest that there might be an acceptable alternative in any situation to uncompromising and intractable American opposition to Communist influence or power wherever it might appear. The March II statement, which received little attention at the time, was not of course the first indication that American hostility to Communism was hardening rapidly. The stalemate over Germany, the reaction to the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia, the Greek-Turkish Aid Program, and the Kennan thesis on containment all had left little doubt that the United States was drawing a line in Europe which it was prepared to maintain at any cost. Any lingering suspicion on this point was soon to be dispelled by the Marshall Plan and NATO. What President Truman did on March II, which deserved more attention than it received at the time, was to extend the anti-Communist policy to the entire world. Little more than two years later the same

Recent Developments on Formosa

Ever since the conquest of the mainland by Communist forces, the foreign policy of the Republic of China has revolved about a single goal: recovery of the mainland. Recovery of the mainland is, in fact, the reason d'être of the Chiang Kai-shek régime; should the government ever admit doubts about its ability or desire to return, the entire basis for KMT rule would be irrevocably undercut. It is therefore not surprising that, in the last two years no less than in the more distant past, the theme of an imminent return has dominated the pages of Formosa's newspapers, with new evidence being brought forward regularly to demonstrate that the mainland régime is on the verge of collapse. The cultural revolution has brought about important changes in the “return” theme. It has not reduced its relevance, but seems to have induced recalculations in ROC official circles over the timing and nature of the mainland recovery operation.

Thailand and Seato: A Ten-Year Appraisal

Research Article| December 01 1964 Thailand and Seato: A Ten-Year Appraisal Donald E. Nuechterlein Donald E. Nuechterlein Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Far Eastern Survey (1935) 4 (12): 1174–1181. https://doi.org/10.2307/2642551 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Twitter LinkedIn Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Donald E. Nuechterlein; Thailand and Seato: A Ten-Year Appraisal. Far Eastern Survey 19 June 1935; 4 (12): 1174–1181. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/2642551 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAsian Survey Search This content is only available via PDF. Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Soviet-Indian Relations-Neutralism and Communist China

frontiers last year, it has become increasingly evident that armed clashes in desolate Ladakh region have far greater international significance than local incidents that occurred in past in this strategically important area. As skirmishes between Indian and Chinese Communist forces developed into larger-scale military operations, it appeared that objectives of Chinese attacks in direction of Aksai Chin, the white desert, were not limited merely to securing a supply route designed to consolidate Chinese positions in Tibet. In addition to strengthening their military posture, Chinese Communists quite obviously expected to gain considerable psychological and diplomatic advantages from their Indian venture. The principal non-military objectives of their undertaking included humiliation of India and discrediting of neutralism, which over past years had remained principal element in shaping of Indian policies. The Chinese efforts to weaken India's prestige in uncommitted world, particularly in Southeast Asia, not only affected India's status as largest, and morally most influential, neutralist country; they also created a situation in which complex question of relations between a neutralist country, such as India, and great powers engaged in socalled cold war acquired a new, and considerably increased, significance. The question that arose in wake of Chinese

Civilian Loyalties and Guerrilla Conflict

It is not surprising that Western statesmen and students of politics everywhere have recently begun to give major attention to what are variously termed guerrilla warfare, irregular warfare, paramilitary operations, la guerre révolutionnaire, insurrectional warfare, resistance movements, and other, allegedly military, doctrines. Of course, irregular armed struggles are not a unique feature of mid-twentieth-century politics; however, they have occurred with great frequency in our time and, more important, they have resulted in baffling victories over vastly better armed, better trained, and more numerous forces. President Kennedy, in response to the apparent superiority in military doctrine possessed by Communist forces in Asia, has ordered the rapid expansion of United States “guerrilla and counter-guerrilla forces.” On a more prosaic level, the publication in a national Sunday-morning newspaper of excerpts from a celebrated pamphlet on guerrilla warfare by Mao Tse-tung suggests that “guerrilla warfare,” along with “massive retaliation,” has entered the popular Cold War vocabulary.

Rewriting Chinese History: Interpreting the Past in the People's Republic of China

The environment in which the writing and teaching of history in the People's Republic of China has taken place, notwithstanding certain common features, differs in several respects from the experience of the Soviet Union. Unlike Russia, where "it was almost a decade after the revolution before the Bolsheviks were in a position from the point of view of staff and organization to exert a decisive influence on the historical profession," in post-1949 China, history has been from the beginning as much under party control as any other feature of the intellectual scene. But this control has not taken the form of a Pokrovsky, who almost single-handedly dictated to the Soviet historical profession until his death in 1932 and posthumous disgrace. Nor have historical disputations in Communist China been marked by the personal vilifications, accusations, and counter-accusations such as were endemic in the Soviet Union after the death of Pokrovsky. Only during the anti-rightist campaign of 1957 were a number of historians severely attacked, and even this was only a minor sideshow to the main spectacle. In part the relative calm is explained by the fact that a significant number of prominent historians were already fully committed to the communist cause prior to 1949. I might mention Wu Han, a Ming specialist, who was active politically during the war and in 1948 left his post at Tsinghua University to join the communist forces in Manchuria. Others include, of course, Kuo Mo-jo, now president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences; the archaeologist Yin Ta; Fan Wen-Ian, director of the third office (Modern History) of the Institute of Historical Research; Chien Po-tsan, Hou Wai-lu, Lü Chen-yü, and Pai Shou-yi. And even among those historians who were not committed politically, Marxist modes of historical thinking had made considerable inroads during the 1920's and 1930's.

The China Problem Today

No change in the last decade rivals that which has taken place in the situation of China. The military victory of the Chinese Communist forces on the mainland in 1949-50 and the removal of the Nationalist government to Taiwan have created a radically different milieu in which the China problem must be viewed today. Four elements in this situation are of key importance: the direction of developments within Com munist China as the Peking regime seeks to impose its coercive, high-speed program of modernization and social transformation on the Chinese people in an environment far different from that confronting the Bolsheviks in Russia in the 1920's; the benefits and liabilities derived from mainland China's special relation ship to the Soviet Union; the changes and pressures in China's Asian environment; and the influence of American military and political power on Chinese developments. Russia and the United States both exercise immediate and direct influence on China's domestic and international position, but neither can fully control the evolving relations between China and her Asian neighbors. In this area, signs of flexibility and change have appeared during the past decade. Committed to its Russian connection and opposed to all signs of neutralism within the Communist orbit, Communist China has been unable to yield to the appeals of Asian neutralism but has sought to find some ac commodation with it favorable to its own ends.

Environment, Communication, and Status Change Aboard an American Aircraft Carrier

In the spring of 1951, the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Dauntless, operating against Communist forces in Korea, developed problems in feeding her crew and disembarking the liberty party. At sea, the chow lines were long, slow-moving and in a state of confusion. Because it kept men from their jobs, this was a potential threat to the efficient operation of the ship and contributed to lowered morale. In port, the process of disembarking the liberty party degenerated into a confused melee which hindered in-port routine and further contributed to lowered morale.1 The second problem was resolved rather simply but, in the period of the writer's service aboard the Dauntless, no solution was found to the chow line situation.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization

The fifteen countries members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) were represented by their defense ministers at a conference held in Paris from October 10 to 12, under the chairmanship of Lord Ismay (Vice Chairman of the North Atlantic Council and Secretary General of NATO). The meeting, which was attended by the Standing Group and the Supreme Commanders, was a preliminary to the full ministerial session, to be held in December; it was the first occasion on which the NATO defense ministers met in Council without the foreign or finance ministers. A communique issued at the close of the meeting stated that the meeting had primarily been for the exchange of information, and that the ministers had heard statements on the strategic situation and on western defensive arrangements from General Sir John Whiteley (United Kingdom), Chairman of the Standing Group, and from his colleagues on the Standing Group, General Joseph Lawton Collins (United States), General Jean Valluy (France), General Alfred M. Gruenther (SACEUR), Admiral Jerauld Wright (SACLANT) and several other officers. Following these statements, a useful exchange of views between the defense ministers took place, the communique concluded. It was reported that many of the speakers had concurred in the view that the military potential of the Soviet Union was steadily increasing, especially in the areas of atomic weapons and submarines, that the recently announced decision to reduce the armed forces in the Soviet Union and some of the people's democracies did not modify the potential of communist forces, and that it was therefore indispensable to intensify the NATO military effort, which so far had not met expectations for it.

The Missionary Exodus from China

SEVEN YEARS AGO Protestant missionaries in China numbered slightly over four thousand. Though this was less than half the peak number reached a quarter of a century earlier, it represented a substantial achievement in the rehabilitation and support of mission work only three years after an exhausting war. But by 1948 the Chinese Communist forces were on the march; between December of that year and the end of 1949 the Red Army and its blue-clad Propaganda Corps had swept from the eastern end of the Great Wall across the entire country to the borders of Tibet. Before this so-called Liberation, half the Protestant missionary population evacuated their stations, usually upon the advice of their field organizations or with their approval. Some of them did so because of poor health, approaching retirement age, insufficient language or too brief an adjustment in a strange land, or concern for children under unpredictable conditions. A few had suffered years of Japanese internment and judged it unwise to face another such experience. In some areas-but rarely--Chinese Christian leaders or home mission societies advised withdrawal in advance, lest foreigners prove to be a liability rather than an asset to the Church in China. For the most part, the Roman Catholic missioners, numbering well over three thousand, under more centralized discipline, were ordered to remain at their posts, and one group which arrived in Formosa was reported to have been sent back to the mainland to hold the fort. Three of those priests who returned were later imprisoned. The two thousand Protestant missionaries who stayed in Red China did so for a variety of reasons: commitment to their task, indifference to political change, curiosity, loyalty to their Chinese colleagues, desire to render service as long as possible, hope that somehow the Communists would modify their attitude toward religion and Western imperialism when they came to responsibility and power. For a yearmore or less, depending on geographical location-their choice seemed

Review: The River and the Gauntlet: Defeat of the Eighth Army by the Chinese Communist Forces, November, 1950, in the Battle of the Chongchon River, Korea, by S. L. A. Marshall

Book Review| February 01 1954 Review: The River and the Gauntlet: Defeat of the Eighth Army by the Chinese Communist Forces, November, 1950, in the Battle of the Chongchon River, Korea, by S. L. A. Marshall The River and the Gauntlet: Defeat of the Eighth Army by the Chinese Communist Forces, November, 1950, in the Battle of the Chongchon River, KoreaS. L. A. Marshall George Harmon Knoles George Harmon Knoles Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Pacific Historical Review (1954) 23 (1): 89–91. https://doi.org/10.2307/3635089 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Twitter LinkedIn Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation George Harmon Knoles; Review: The River and the Gauntlet: Defeat of the Eighth Army by the Chinese Communist Forces, November, 1950, in the Battle of the Chongchon River, Korea, by S. L. A. Marshall. Pacific Historical Review 1 February 1954; 23 (1): 89–91. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/3635089 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentPacific Historical Review Search This content is only available via PDF. Copyright 1954 The Pacific Coast Branch, American Historical Association Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.