Page 2
University Daily Kansan
Friday, Dec. 7, 1962
Weekend Warriors
This is a thank you note. It's addressed to some 14,000 members of the United States Air Force Reserve.
This past week President Kennedy said you could go back home. You hadn't been on active duty very long. He called you up during the Cuban crisis and now he's said you can go.
REMEMBER HOW it started? Perhaps you were one of those reservists who'd come in for your once-a-month weekend of training when the word came. On Saturday night you were an Air Force reservist. By Sunday morning, you were one of the "regulars." It was quite a switch.
Sunday night of Reserve Training Weekend they'd always played retreat. Then you were free to go back to being a civilian for another month. That Sunday night they played retreat but it sounded different. This was active duty.
They gave you a few short hours off right at first. You could go home . . . tell you boss . . .
somehow take care of your own business . . . say goodbye . . . do whatever had to be done.
THEN YOU WENT BACK. For how long?
The Cuban crisis was the big news in a jittery world. You'd left your civilian life behind. You were an Air Force cook . . . an aircraft mechanic .. perhaps pilot of a clumsy-looking twin-tailed C-119. For this you were paid. But your paycheck might look pretty small beside the one you'd been used to counting on.
No one knew. The orders read 12 months unless sooner released.
It wasn't glamorous or exciting. The Air Force Reserve is hardly ever glamorous, any way you look at it.
SOMETIMES YOU MAY look like heroes to us. Other times we've scoffed. "Couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag." "Why waste our money on Weekend Warriors?" Most of the time we probably just haven't thought about you much at all.
But you went ahead . . . served as you were told . . . got ready for whatever might have been in store.
It's over now, at least for the time being.
You're on your way home. But just a minute there. We'd like a word with you . . . Thanks!
—Elaine Blaylock
Chiang Fell 13 Years Ago
By Dennis Branstiter
The fall of the Nationalist government on the Chinese mainland 13 years ago may have been the most significant single event since World War II.
By December of 1949 the seesaw battle that began during World War II finally ended. The Communist revolutionaries under Mao Tse-tung finally gained enough momentum to push Chiang Kaishek's shattered army off the mainland to its last-stand stronghold, the island of Formosa. Since the communists had virtually no navy, let alone enough equipment to launch a large-scale amphibious landing, the scant stretch of water between Formosa and mainland China was sufficient defense at the time.
THE NATIONALISTS HAD known for months that they could not hold the mainland against growing Communist strength as more and more Chinese began to climb on the Communist band wagon. On July 16 the Nationalists organized the Supreme Council under the Generalissimo and began
The Nationalist leaders were not the only ones to see the proverbial handwriting on the wall. In August the United States Department of State issued a 1,054-page white paper announcing the end of all aid to the Chinese Nationalist government and blaming the Nationalists for squandering an estimated $2 billion in aid.
to prepare for withdrawal to Formosa.
According to Secretary of State Dean Acheson's own summary of the paper:
"THE GOVERNMENT and the Kuominating . . . had hunk into corruption, into a scramble for place and power, and into a reliance on the United States to win the war for them. . . Its leaders had proved incapable of meeting the crisis confronting them, its troops had lost the will to fight, and its government had lost popular support. History has proved again and again that a regime without faith in itself and an army without morale cannot survive the test of battle. . . (They) did not have to be defeated; they disintegrated."
Among mumbles about sand in rat holes and good money after bad, the State Department decided to mark off $2 billion to experience.
DAVID COPPERFIELD, by Charles Dickens (Signet Classies, 75 cents).
It is a platitude, almost, to praise "David Copperfield," especially when people have been doing it for 110 years and when almost everyone you talk to says he read the book when he was in high school. Well, I didn't. And, though the characters and the situations are flavored somewhat by profound recollections of the 1935 movie (Edna May Oliver, W. C. Fields, Lionel Barrymore and Freddie Bartholomew), this extraordinary novel still comes alive all by itself.
It is like "Tom Jones," "Vanity Fail" or "War and Peace" in its depth and multiplicity and amazing characterizations, which live on in one's mind long after the book has been completed. Sentimentality it has aplenty, and contrivance as well. Agnes Wickfield is too good to be true, and Uriah Heep too bad.
But these are minor quibbles (and one can't help being greatly pleased when Micawber gives Uriah his long-needed comeuppance). One remembers the great storm that brought death to both Ham and Steerforth, Aunt Betsey Trotwood driving donkeys off the green at her Dover cottage, Micawber's loud pontificating and prolific letter-writing, silly Dora and her dog Jip, the vile Murdstones and so on.
And always the hero himself, even though he is somewhat ineffectual at times, standing by observing when he should be acting. This belated first reading proves why "David Copperfield" has been one of the most-loved of all novels. Incidentally, the editor of this volume has used the original text, and there are several fairly long segments that have not appeared in subsequent editions.—CMP
THE STATE DEPARTMENT was split on this question. W. Walton Butterworth, assistant secretary of Far Eastern affairs, favored a "wait - until - the - dust - settles" strategy. On the other side, policy-planner George Kennan thought the United States should spend more money to try to regain the initiative and block the spread of Communism in Asia.
What should the United States do next?
At first Acheson leaned toward recognition of Communist China, but President Truman was adamantly opposed to this move. Acheson later shifted to the "wait-until-the-dust-settled" policy.
After conferring with Gen. MacArthur and spending three weeks in eastern Asia, New Jersey Sen. H. Alexander Smith recommended a four-point plan:
- Give the $75 million already appropriated by Congress to oppose the spread of Communism in China to a committee of generals and admirals.
- Give strong governmental support to Nationalist China.
- Never recognize the Mao Tsetung regime.
- Occupy Formosa with United States troops.
- Ambassador-at-Large Philip Jesseup and two associates, Colgate University President Everett Case and Rockefeller Foundation ex-President Raymond Fosdick, outlined yet another plan:
- Assume that nothing could be or can be done to help the Nationalists.
- Provide economic and military aid to the remaining non-Communist Asian countries.
- Persuade India's Prime Minister Nehru to give up his neutral third force dream and side with the West.
- Headed by Gen. Omar Bradley and Gen. J. Lawton Collins, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff also threw their weight against further help for the Nationalists. They felt Formosa had no outstanding strategic importance even though it lay on a line between Japan and the Philippines.
- Go slow on recognition of Communist China.
The British also wrote off the Nationalists, but they went one step further—recognition for Communist China. Although the British offered to consider non-recognition if the United States would agree to defend Hong Kong from Communist invaders, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff said no. Britain decided that protecting Hong Kong was reason enough to recognize the Mao Tse-tung regime.
President Truman remained steadfastly opposed to recognition for the Communists. And his position found quick support from 21 senators, who signed a petition against recognition.
(The second part of this article will appear Monday.)
"Those Barn parties are wearing me out."
Tanganyika Free One Year Sunday
By Walter Bgoya Tanganyika sophomore
On Dec. 9, 1961, Tanganyika became an independent sovereign state within the Commonwealth. Britain and Tanganyika have remained friendly and Britain has aided the country in its efforts to fight against poverty, disease, ignorance and corruption.
A YEAR AFTER this change, Tanganyika is becoming a republic. As such, she will no longer recognize the Queen as head of the state but as the head of the Commonwealth. To many western political commentators on African affairs, this step will offer another opportunity to "Congolize" the political situation in Tanganyika. Tanganyika is becoming a republic to make the people realize their responsibilities better.
Our people must build a pride in their country and forget such ideas as the English national anthem, Queen's Day, etc. It is with this in mind that our government sets forth to establish an African state and not a model of colonial activity.
Our President will be an executive, one with some powers that will seem undemocratic to the Anglo-Saxon world. Yes, and as in other African republics we cannot sacrifice the safety of our state by allowing another "Katanga" led by stooges and implements economic exploitation. We won't give opportunity to the Senator from Louisiana (currently traveling in East Africa) to confirm that we cannot govern ourselves without political instruction from Western experts.
Political stability has been maintained. A policy of Africanization in the civil service has progressed well. There still remains a single strong party—Tanganyika African National Union—and while allowing opposition, our first President has declared that parochial parties will not be tolerated.
WE ARE DETERMINED to keep harmony between races and he who has discriminatory ideas can expect nothing short of being expelled from the country. Six have already been expelled. Our constitution gives the basic freedoms to every citizen no matter who. We remain a democracy in our interpretation of it. We believe in a foreign policy of non-committment to either power. We believe in a united Africa, and plans for a Federation of East Africa are under way.
We believe in a peaceful world and the contribution of each nation, small or big, to this goal; with this we ask support of other nations. If there is none we still aim high.
Daily Hansan
University of Kansas student newspaper
Founded 1889, became biweekly 1904, triweekly 1908, daily Jan. 16, 1912.
Telephone VIking 3-2700
Extension 711, news room
Extension 376, business office
Extension 376, business office
BR
Member Inland Daily Press Association, Associated Collegiate Press. Represented by National Advertising Service, 18 East 50 St., New York 22, N.Y. News service; United Press International, Mail subscription rates: $3 a semester or $5 a year. Published in Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon during the University year except Saturdays and Sundays, University holidays, and examination periods. Second class postage paid at Lawrence, Kansas.
It H the c
"If er we
P for r
He ment ningt ficers
He becau ..
Bo claim KU on M 28.