The Kaesong Farce
Relations between responsible Powers can hardly sink much lower than they have over the alleged bombing of the Kaesong demilitarised area. The curious invitation by the Communists to General Ridgway to send his representatives back to inspect the damage which had failed to impress them when they first saw it is hardly worth even the elaborately offensive reply which it received. If this bomb crater, like the craters in so many wartime bomb stories, gets bigger as time goes on, then perhaps the reasonable thing would be to try to forget it. Exchanges on the " You're another " basis hardly fall even within the rules of "-military courtesy "—that language of the duelling-ground which was used at the Kaesong talks before the Communists broke them off. If the talks are to be resumed then the Communists must make the next move. The suggestion that they are post- poning making that move in the hope of gaining a bargaining counter at the San Francisco conference does not hold water, for there is very clearly no intention of making bargains with Mr. Gromyko. And General Ridgway has already made it more than plain that he is not going to make any concession merely to induce his Communist opposite numbers to behave with the minimum of reason and courtesy.
