CHINA AND THE WAR II
By IRENE WARD, M.P.
IT is rather difficult to give a well balanced description of the Chinese people on the basis of a, stay of some weeks in Chungking and a limited amount of intensely difficult travelling. But the majority of pre-war visitors knew China only from the coastal strip and the Treaty Ports, and I imagine that most of the Chinese now concerned with governmental affairs had little or no previous knowledge of the interior. The way they have against tremendous odds turned Chungking, with all its drawbacks, into a capital city and built up the necessary machinery to carry on the central direction o fthe war as well as the Government there
is impressive and inspiring. • Perhaps the greatest single difficulty in Free China is the lack of communications ; they are almost non-existent. There are no railways, few and quite impossible roads, very infrequent and quite irregular air-communications between a few towns, primitive air- fields, and in addition no reliable telegraphic, postal or telephone services and vast distances to cover. A professor engaged on a scientific mission for the Chinese set off by truck, carrying his petrol with him. This is really the only means of travel. He broke down some hundreds of miles from Chungking and telegraphed back for spares. The telegram took one month, and his rescue, in all three months. Such is travel in China. At a Small Arms School run by the Americans for the training of Chinese officers I was told it was not unusual for the cadets to walk four hundred miles to reach the school, and that for some of them to die before they got there was nothing out of the way.
The main method of transport is by river craft of a very primitive type, needing gangs of trackers to haul them along. They were a picturesque sight and sang haunting songs. In addition to the junks, coolies toiled ceaselessly, moving stuff from one place to another. I never was in a road in China, however remote, which was free from an almost endless procession of human beings. Coolies carried coal, raw cotton, grain, or pushed pigs on small wooden barrows with solid wheels which squeaked. Occasionally I saw a rickshaw or a chair, a mode of transport used by the prominent or well-to-do Chinese from the local towns and villages. Sometimes a bus would lumber by, with passengers clinging on by their eyebrows to the roof, the engine or the wings, and it was not uncommon to see one overturned in a paddy-field.
Free China is a vast agricultural country with few industries, and completely isolated from the developments of modern life. The cultivation is very remarkable. Every available acre of land is made use of, and I was tremendously impressed by the industry of both the men and women of the agricultural community. Into this quiet backwater with its teeming millions, driven by the Japanese, came the Chinese Government and a considerable section of the educated population. Chungking itself had been completely destroyed by enemy bombing and rebuilt almost entirely of bamboo and plaster. It is magnificently situated on high hills on the banks of the Rivers Yangtse and Chialing. Life is primitive and abnormally expensive. The Generalissimo and his Ministers had to face tremendous problems in organising the war and at the same time establishing the machinery of Government. Access to the outside world depended on a single air-route regarded as the most dangerous flight in the world. No heavy machinery, vehicles or weapons of war could be flown in. Indeed it was only possible to bring in a small supply, quite inadequate for China's needs, of drugs, scientific instruments, machine-tools and up-to-date books on technical subjects. All the time thousands of the intellectual youth of China, boys and girls, were streaming in through the enemy lines, enduring great hardships, demanding educational facilities. The position which confronted the political leaders might well have daunted any but the bravest and most determined. China might have disintegrated, which would have entirely altered the position in the Far East to the detriment of the United Nations. The toughness and strength of the Chinese character was admirably demonstrated at a critical period, and the Generalissimo and his Ministers began the re-organisation necessary to control China's destiny from Chungking. The rebuilding of the bombed city, the provision of vast shelter-accommodation in the rocks, was carried out by human labour without the aid of machinery, a truly stupendous task ; but perhaps most remarkable of all was the transfer by river boat of whole factories from Occupied China and their re-establishment in Free China. The newspaper-presses were erected in caves in the rocks. Remarkable as this achievement was, it was only possible to provide a fraction of the production essential. There were, for instance, no aircraft-factories, or works producing modern weapons of war, but the Chinese did their utmost to face up to their difficulties and showed a wonderful genius for improvisation.
On the educational front there is an almost more remarkable story to tell. The universities which in pre-war days served centres of Chinese life sucn as Chungking, Kunming and Chengtu have stretched their accommodation beyond the limit to house refugee universities. Indeed, in Chengtu a famous missionary university with a really magnificent. campus houses four refugee Christian universities. As can easily be imagined, the conditions under which both professors and students work are almost intolerable, and nothing that I saw in China impressed me so much as the spirit of the educational world. Quite apart from the living quarters, which were overcrowded and lacking in light and heat or comfort of any kind, food was often very scarce and under-nourishment was only too prevalent among both professors and students. In spite of
these gruelling conditions, at one university where for the next term there were just over boo vacancies, over i0,000 applications
had been received. Of course most of the refugee universities had lost their entire libraries and equipment, abandoned in flight from the enemy.
I found the Chinese much interested in our social services. Their Government had started one or two very interesting experiments, though they were on a very small scale, but of course under the, existing circumstances any comprehensive scheme would be quite impossible. I was glad to find a number of capable Chinese women,
notably those connected with Madame Chiang's own organisation and the Y.W.C.A., who were interesting themselves in modern thought with regard to nutrition, child welfare, training of the p:ob!em child, etc. Once the war' is over and normal conditions restored I foresee in China great progress in social organisation. The way the Chinese have taken advantage of American and British education, both for men and women, shows an encouraging capacity for absorption of the benefits that the Western World has to offer.
The educated Chinese, being realist in outlook, are interested in the differences in the British way of waging war to their own. One of the qualities of the Chinese people I admired most was that one could discuss any subject, however controversial, with perfect freedom. They know that all classes in Great Britain are in the Services, whereas in China there is practically only a peasant army. They argue, and I think with great force, that the intellectual com- munity in China is so small that in the interests of the future of China it should not be unduly depleted.
I found it fascinating to have seen intimately a nation with such possibilities for the future in the throes of creating a political system. The .character of the Chinese people, which is individualistic and independent, should make the introduction of a form of Chinese democracy relatively easy, but like every country which has gone through a fairly recent political emancipation, China today, instead of a political system based on the principles of free thinking and discussion, has only one party, and the discipline and training which has been such a feature of the political systems of the totali- tarian states is rigidly enforced. Friends of China of all countries, and many of the Chinese themselves, regret the need for the Chinese to buy their political experience by the adoption of the expedients of other countries. China is, however, master of her cwn destiny, and we must just watch the tale unfold. It is under- stood that a free political system is to be introduced as soon as the _ war is over, and it is only fair to say how complicated are the internal issues which face the Government and what wisdom is required to solve them. What is important is that when this world struggle is over each of the Great Powers should emerge with a unified internal public opinion, so that the common purpose as outlined in the Atlantic Charter can be achieved.
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