RETURN TO BARBARISM
THE letter of apology which the Chinese deputy Foreign Minister sent on July 26 to the British Chargd d'Affaires in Peking began with an expression of rejoicing at ' the easing of international tension through the recent holding of the Geneva conference.' The Chinese contribution to this ' easing of tension ' in the past week has consisted of one attack by fighters on a British Skymaster airliner, resulting in the loss of ten lives, one attack by fighters on an American aircraft searching for survivors, one ' inspection ' by fighters of a French civil aircraft 75 miles off Hainan island, and one message from the Canton airfield that any aircraft, except one Sunderland, searching for survivors of the attack on the Sky- master would be fired on without warning if they approached land. It was, of course, the sheer barbarity of the Canton message which removed any lingering doubts that the Chinese Government might manage (by means of apologies, explana- tions, compensation and great forbearance on the part of the Governments representing the victims) to avoid responsibility for the actions of its servants. Nothing short of the disowning of that message, the punishment of those who sent it, and the complete abandonment of the policy which appears to lie behind it can now suffice to restore the more cordial atmos- phere which, it is said, was created in Geneva. In the mean- time we can only believe that the iron curtain which surrounds the Communist area in Asia is quite as thick and even more dangerous than that which outs Europe in two.
But first a word concerning the doubts as to the true res- ponsibility for the acts of barbarity off Hainan island which lingered so long in certain quarters in this country. The doubters were not silenced until Mr. Eden revealed, at the end of his statement in the Commons on Tuesday, the final infamy of the Canton message. Until then it might have been assumed from the questions asked by Labour members that the Americans were more to blame for their indignant reaction to the behaviour of the Chinese fighter-pilots than were the Chinese_ themselves for their obviously murderous intentions. There seems to be no end to the idiotic assumption that the Americans arc always wrong and the Communists always right, or, to the sinister willingness of so many Labour MP's to play the Communists' game of splitting the West. Let us at least hope that the end to all that is now approaching, before the poison penetrates any further and still worse mistakes are made through a belief that there is more to be gained by the appeasement of Communists than there is by being patient with Americans whose reactions in the face of barbarism happen to be sharper than ours.
That is not to say that we have to start a war with China right away. It is not even to say that we have to make up our minds to a continuous series of shooting incidents along the coast of China. It may still be possible to secure the necessary apologies and compensation. If the note of regret in the Chinese deputy Foreign Minister's letter of July 26 can be maintained and intensified, and if the possibility of a repetition of the Canton message can be wiped out, then we can go back to the basis of firm dealings with the Peking Government with the object of establishing genuine peace. But it should be plain enough now that the road to be travelled is a long and hard one and that soft words alone are no substi- tute for firmness of purpose. The Communists employed both at Geneva, and got what they wanted. Off Hainan this week (as earlier in Korea and the Berlin corridor) they have used something else—murder in cold blood. They must somehow be shown that this barbarity will not be tolerated.. So far the Americans have gone further to make that clear to them than we have.
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