Bright Idea Against the background of the Korean truce-talks General
Mark Clark's, offer of 100,000 dollars to any Communist pilot , who deserts with his MiG '15 seems to me ill-timed. The prisoner of war problem, which is the main obstacle to a truce, is basically a problem of " face." The Chinese and the North Korean authorities take the minimum of humani- tarian interest in the numerous men from their armies held captive by the United Nations; but they conceive—and quite rightly—that it will look bad-if a great many of them persist in their refusal to go home when they are set free. To add, at this juncture, the possibility of a similar affront to Communist amour propre is surely irresponsible. If one or more pilots do desert—and certainly under the Nationalists the Chinese Air Force, which because of its freedom from Customs restric- tions was heavily involved in the black market, had a keen commercial sense—the .occurrence, and its inevitable exploita- tion in the world's Press, can hardly fail to exacerbate the Communists. From an operational point of view, even if it produces no tangible results, the ruse was worth trying; but
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