ITH Chiang Kai-shek’s last-ditch stand in Taiwan destined n

¥ is stepping up plans t
Union. Consequently, one of the

French colonialists and their puppet

led by Ho Chi-minh. ,

Now nobody has ever attempted
to depict the ex-playboy Bao Dai
aS any less discredited and de-
spicable than he is; indeed, Ameri-
can publicists have gone out of
their way to warn that he is not
in any sense a satisfactory figure
to use as a front for imperialist
Schemes in Viet Nam.

Like Chiang Kai-shek, however,
he is the stray that imperialism
must clutch at. As a result the
American publicists are now work-
ing overtime trying to convince
the American — and British and
French—people that, bad though
he is, Bao Dai is a worthwhile
risk,

USS. state departmen

ot to last very long, the United States
o establish war bases in Asia for use against the new China and the Soviet

t’s principal concerns now is to work through

Bao Dai in an attempt to crush the Viet Nam people’s government

The perfectly open way in which
this is being done provides an
object lesson in the cynicism and
utter lack of moral principle
which have become the distin-
guishing features of contemporary
imperialist high policy. Thus @
correspondent of the New York
Hierald-Tribune in a despatch pre-
paring the American people for
the aid which America is to give
to Bao Dai writes:

“The French government speaks
of (the agreement that has been
signed between France and Viet
Nam) as ‘independence for Viet
Nam’ but it is difficult to believe
that the sophisticated negotiators
at the various ministries take the

phrase seriously. . . -« Whatever
the phraseology of the texts, cer-
tain- brute facts stand out: the
French Army, some 130,000 strong,
remains in French Indo-China: the
Quai d’Orsay makes diplomatic de-
cisions for its colony. . . The Em-
peror of the colony, Bao Dai, ex-
ists as emperor only because he is
supported by French arms; under
such circumstances it is hardly to
be expected that he will resist any
suggestions that the French may
care to make. All this scarcely

squares with the idea of independ-
ence.”

The correspondent admits that,
in spite of a three-year imperialist
war which has cost the French
government millions of doflars

the French “hold the centre of
the larger cities and perhaps 10
percent or 15 percent of the coun-
try as a whole.”

However, the writer goes on,
France plans to reconquer the
country in three stages.

The first stage was the grant-
ing of a sham “independence.”
The second stage was to get Bri-
tish and U.S. recognition of the
Bao Dai remnant.

The final stage will be to call
upon Britain and the U.S. to aid
Viet Nam. The appeal will be “a
reasonable one,” the correspond-
ent says, and a “difficult appeal to
resist.””, He then works up to the
climax of this incredible justifica-
tion for a naked imperialist war
to rob 90 percent of the people
of Viet Nam of the right to free-
dom and independence.

Where, in the annals of crimin-
ology, is there anything to beat
the following:

“All this may sound intensely
Machiavellian in the telling, but it
can hardly be said to be s0. For
one thing it is almost undisguised.
French officials make it clear that
this is their program: that it is
the only way they have found in
which they can keep their colony
and still benefit from the aid of
the Anglo-Saxons. If the arrange-
ment promises to work out for
France’s economic benefit, it is no
less true that it is for the entire
West's political benefit.”

Already the U.S. has paid $37,-
000,000 from Japan’s gold reserves
to Bao Dai. The plan under
which Chiang Kai-shek’s defeat-
ed troops have crossed the border
into Viet Nam to fight the forces
of Ho Chi-minh’s government was
American-inspired.

But the people of free Viet Nam
are under no illusions. Armed
struggle has brought them to their
present victories and they will
continue to fight until the last
French mercenary and former
Paris criminal has been driven
from their country. And the
people of France, too, are now
joining forces with them on a
scale hitherto unknown, despite
the French parliament’s decree,
rammed through despite vigorous
opposition from Communist depu-
ties, of hard labor in chains for
those daring to fight for peace—
for world peace is a vital issue
in the imperialist campaigns to
deny freedom to the colonial
peoples of Southwest Asia.

eens

By JACK WODDIS

HEN the Malayan war be-

gan in June, 1948, Labor
government spokesmen in Brit-
ain said it would be over in a
couple of months. But 19
months have gone, the casual
ty list grows, the cost mounts,
and the official pronounce-
ments become more gloomy.

Now comes the announce-
ment of the high commissioner,
Sir Henry Gurney, that the
fovernment of Malaya is to
Mobilize all civilian resources
for the war.

This announcement is not
only clear testimony to the
strength of the Malayan Na-
tional Liberation Army. it is a
sharp warning to the British
People,

Already the war, in terms of
money, resources and British
lives, hag placed terrible bur-
dens on the British people.

For the young British con-
Scripts sent out to the jungles
of Malaya to protect tin and
rubber profits, this war is dis-
astrous,

After only a few weeks’
training they are shipped out
to Singapore. No more leave.
Straight off the ship into cat-

tletrucks and up to the battle
lines,

Tefused to give precise details

The government has steadily.

of the cost of the Malayan war
to date, and it has allowed to
circulate the idea that the war
is costing about $90,000 a day—
about $30,000,000 a year,

In fact, the remittances to
the troops in Malaya alone
come to $150,000,000 a year. If
one adds to that the money for
equipment, plus $15,000,000 a
year which the British govern-
ment is sending to the Malayan
government as a contribution
to the emergency expenses, it
means that the war is costing
the British people something
in the neighborhood of $300,-
000,000 a year, and has probab-
ly already cost not far short of
$450,000,000.

With that money, wasted to
preserve the old order in Ma-
laya, the British Labor govern-
ment could tabolish its decision
to charge “2 shilling on the
bottle” for prescriptions under
the National Health scheme
(which will only bring in $30,-
000,000 a year); it could restore
full transport for school chil-
dren; build hundreds of health
centers, schools and hospitals,
and thousands of houses.

e *
For the Malayan people the
war has indeed been a terrible
experience.

Over 10,000 have been jailed,

Dollars for Britain mean

10,000 banished, thousands
killed and wounded. The Ma-
layan people have seen their
humble homes and belongings
destroyed and burned.

Every day the regime of re-
pression gets tighter, Politics
have been banned recently in
schools. It is now illegal to dis-
play the flag of New China.

There are restrictions on the
teaching of Chinese in the
schools, and on the entry of
Chinese books into the country.

Last November new labor de-
erees were introduced, under
which employers will keep a
complete dossier of every em-
ployee, containing his name,
photo, fingerprints, name of de-
pendents. The Malayan people
have experienced this kind of
thing before—under Japanese
fascist organization. ;

Meanwhile, conditions of the

' people are deteriorating. Near-

ly half a million are unem-
ployed. Overcrowding in Singa-
pore is now five times that of
Bombay, itself one of the most
overcrowded cities in the
world; close on 200,000 people
‘are living in filthy slums.

Two out of every three chil-
dren in Malaya get no school-
ing. Tuberculosis is striking
down thousands, especially in
Singapore. Living costs, al-

death in

ready several times above pre-
war, have soared since devalu-
ation.

Yes, for the people of Britain
and Malaya the war is a disas-
ter. But for big business there
is still a steady flow of profits.

Malayan Tin Dredging, Ltd.
recently announced a working
profit of $624,000 and a divi-
dend of 50 percent. Southern
Malayan Tin Dredging, Ltd., a
working profit of $984,000 and
a dividend of 60 percent. Ayer
Hitam Tin Dredging, Ltd. a
working profit of $516,000 and a
dividend of 65 percent.

J. H. Rich, chairman of the
Tronch Mines, Ltd., in an-
nouncing recently a dividend
of 55 percent, explained: —

“No serious difficulties with
labor were experienced, and it
ig significant that this happy
state of affairs should have ex-
isted when so far as our labor
was coneerned there were no
trade unions in existence, due
to many of them having dis-
appeared on the introduction
of the government’s emergency
regulations,”

It may be a “happy state of
affairs” for the coupon clippers
and for the American rulers
who are displaying an increas-
ing interest in Malaya as a fur-
ther base for their war plans
and a market for their surplus

schools, and hospitals, and for
_the

being used than the French

goods. But it is the very re-
verse for the British lads dying

in the jungle, for the British
people who want homes,

Malayan people . whose
country has been turned into
a camp of death, poverty and
disease. .

The longer this war lasts, the
heavier the burdens that the
British people will have to
bear.

The Malayan People’s Na-
tional Liberation Army, formed
in February last year through
coordination of the various
guerrilla detachments, grows
stronger every day. An increas-
ing number of Malay peasants
are entering the struggle
alongside the Malay Chinese
workers.

Every report from Malaya
reveals the increasing skill of
the National Liberation Army,
and its growing confidence in
ultimate victory.

Their strength is revealed in
the inability of the government
to find a substantial basis for
a puppet government, and in
the fact that a larger number
of armed forces (regular
troops, armed forces, planters)
per head of the population are

are using in Vietnam or the
Dutch in Indonesia.

1

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—MARCH 17, 1950—PAGE 5