— article helps to place m
perspective propaganda reports
carried by the daily pvress_ this
week, in which unnamed UN of-
ficers reportedly quote supposed

refugees from North Korea as

claiming that there had been riot-
ing in North Korean cities.

GENEVA

F FREE ELECTIONS were

held in southern Korea today.
they would certainly result in the
defeat of Syngman Rhee, aad
probably a Communist victory,
according to a remarkable series
of articles which has just been

published in Paris.

Five articles published not by
a Communist newspaper but by
the leading French capitalist paper
Le Monde, from its Far Eastern
correspondent, Robert Gullain,
paint a picture of indescribable
horror which the war has brought
to the Korean people.

It fully confirms the report of
the delegation to Korea, sponsor-
ed by the World Federation of
Democratic Women, which has
made such a big impression
throughout Europe and Asia.

The regime of that “terrible
old man,” Syngman Rhee, says
the Le Monde correspondent, is
detested.

“Would it not be best to re-
cognize this reality? Its princi-
pal characteristic can be defined

in afew words: It is a
police state.”

The whole Syngman Rhee ad-
ministration, the report continues
was linked to the police, was
governed ‘by rapacious clans lin-
ing their pockets with a corrup-
tion that is indescribable.

One example tells the story.
With the outbreak of war, the
Syngman Rhee army was virt-
ually destroyed; and had only two
good divisions left. What follow-
ed was a hasty conscription, 4
virtual kidnapping of all able-
bodied men, especially in the

_ central zones. And what hap-

pened to these conscripts is as
terrible as the massacres of the
civilian population.

After thousands had died on
the way south to the supposed
training areas near Pusan, | 400,-
000 finally arrived They. were
placed in 54 separate camps.

“They stayed there five
months doing nothing and dy-
ing of hunger and cold. Noth-
ing was organized for them:
not a plan, no instructors .,.-
no arms for this future army.
They had no clothing, no shel-
ter, and received a frightful
nourishment. These unfortu-
nates died in the camps like
flies. At the end of several
months, this ‘reserve army’ had
become a hungry horde, afflict-
ed with epidemics, dysentery,
tuberculosis.” ;

Finally the scandal broke, says
Robert Guillain, -lifting the veil
of why Syngman Rhee’s govern-
ment is so hated in the South.

It seems that the brigadier gen-
eral in charge of this proposed
army was a certain Kim Youn-
Keun, a favorite of the president.
He and several cronies had lined
their pockets with the 20,000,000
Wons allotted to this ‘reserve
army.’

“The rice that was destined
for the soldiers was sold on the
black market ..- - and the
funds for training, feeding and
clothing these South Korean
soldiers went: into Kim’s pri-
vate treasury.”

The outcry was sO terrific that
he was finally tried and_ shot.
But the story is a revelation...
and the finale is even more grue-
some. This “reserve army” was

©

Charges presented t

o the UN by the Women’s Internationa

1 Democratic Federation following on

on-the-spot investigation in Korea made by the delegation shown above, are fully borne out by this article.

simply thrown out in the gutter.
“The doors of the gates of
the camps were opened, and
they were sent once again on
the roads. For the most part,
these soldiers were skeletons.
They were abandoned without
resources, without rations ..°.

those who did not pass out in
the overcrowded hospitals of
Pusan, or who did not go wan-
dering through the south, made
their way back north. They
remained in groups, emaciated
and violent bands, singing the
Internationale. .. .”

After describing the Syngman

Rhee regime in these terms, the
French newspaperman turns to
the future, and asks what would
happen if there were an election
in southern Korea.
“When one poses this ques-
tion to Korean experts — he

Old spas, new stomachs

By PAT DOOLEY

KARLOVY VARY
ks ge ead of wealthy id-
lers used to visit Karlovy Vary,
the world-famous Czechoslovak
resort, to rid themselves of aches
and pains which, say the experts,
arose largely from overfeeding
and underworking.

The town’s medicinal springs
are famed for their curative pro-
perties. For centuries they have
gushed forth 440 gallons a min-
ute at a temperature of 167 de-
grees Fahrenheit. ‘

Many are the unpleasant gas-
tric ailments these waters are
said to help wash away. And in
the past there was no lack of
royal stomachs to check whether
the-waters really worked. Brit-
ain’s King Edward VII was 4
frequent visitor in the days when
the resort was known at Carlsbad.

But today men and women of
a different calibre linger in the
shadow of its ancient baroque
church and stroll in its famous
Colonnade, now dedicated to
Czech-Soviet friendship.

Karlovy Vary is no longer a
resting place for the world’s id-
lers. It is a recreation centre for
its workers.

Almost every hotel and pension
here now houses workers enjoy-
ing their holidays under the
‘Czechoslovak trade union recrea-
tion scheme and the National
Health Insurance.

This year more than 250,000
men and women will benefit in
this and similar centres.

Cost for two weeks’ holiday, in-
cluding fares, food, accommoda-
tion and sights, is 800 crowns—2
fraction of their wages of which
the lowest is 4500 crowns 4
month, (approximately $100).

Today these workers also drink
the waters from the quaint-shap-
ed beakers on which the handle
is used for a spout.

3

Typical of these men and
women were the four with whom
I travelled in the train from
Prague.

There was 55-year-old, burly
Karel Ponec, who had worked for
34 years in a coalmine. He earns
14,000 crowns a month—approxi-
mately $312: j

One of the best workers in the
Benes Mine at Ostrava, he came
highest in work on a peace bri-
gade launched last November.
So he gets his holiday free.

His socialism is of no recent
date. To prove it he did ssome-
thing of which I am sure the
late King Edward would never
have approved. He peeled off his
coat and pulled up. his shirt, re-
vealing a broad tattooed back on
which two naked ladies support-
ed scrolls and a banner inscribed:
“1915, Workers of the world
unite.”

Next was blue-eyed, 30-year-old
Anna Mateykova, who during the
Nazi occupation ‘fought for a year
with the partisans.

Smoothing the creases from her
dress Anna told me how she
could well afford a holiday in
Karlovy Vary. She had two of
her four children with her:
Milam, aged three, and five-year-
old Dusan, who listened wide-
eyed to my foreign tongue.

Anna’s husband is a building
worker erecting houses for miners
at Ostrov. His monthly wage,

she said, was 18,000 crowns —

approximately $370.
He is a shock-worker. His ex-

ceptional pay was earned, said

Anna, not: by overtime, but by
special work because of increas-

ed skill, better disposition of raw
materials and the use of labor-
saving methods. 3

“This is an, extra three-weeks
holiday for me also,” piped up
Frantisek Smutny, 50, who sat in
the corner clasping his broad
hands with their broken finger-
nails.

Frantisek has been a building
worker for 35 years, is married
and has five children. His aver-
age wage, he said, was 7,000
crowns a month—about $150.

But he was ill and with 38-
year-old, bald-headed Antonin
(ada, a french polisher, he had
been sent to the spa for a free
holiday and treatment by his doc-
tor. Both of course, received their
pay as well. —

“Ti bet they had some forms
to fill in,” I can hear sceptics
murmur. Quite right there was
a form to be completed.

It bore 13 questions asking the
patient to report candidly upon
his return regarding conditions in
the spas. Were they satisfied with
the treatment, food, the service,
routine, doctors, nurses and of-°
ficials ?

Had they been asked for sug-
gestions to improve the service
and would they like to make any
now, and did they wish to extend
their stay? :

Such conditions are not un-
usual. They are now generally
enjoyed by the workers here in
Czechoslovakia, since they finally
rooted out the remnants of re-
action in 1948 and took power
into their own hands under the
leadership of the Communist
party. 2 :

For them this is the real aim
of socialism; good food, better
housing, economic security, ex-
tended health and cultural facili-
ties and peace.

By JOSEPH STAROBIN

writes this passage from Tokyo
—one obtains replies which are
varying in pessimism. Every-
one is in agreement, however?
that southern Korea would vote
against Sygnman Rhee. Many
believe that the results would
indirectly favor the Commun=
ists. Some even envisage that
elections would give a Com
munist majority.”

It is his opinion that the people
would vote against the Sygnman
Rhee government because of “the
omnipresence .of: the police, the
corruption of officials, the pbru-
tality of the youth formation, the
misery and the inflation.”

Moreover, says the Le Monde
correspondent, the division of the
country as the result of an ar-
mistice, would be intensely Um ,
popular. “Anti-foreign feeling:
and especially anti-American feel-
ing would not be diminished at
all.” :

For what the Korean people
want more than anything is t?
be left, to themselves, to achieve
their unity as a nation, Despite —
the misfortunes of the war, Guil-
lain writes, “one feels among
the Southern Koreans a general
regret which often expresses it-
self out loud in the’ followin’
way: “Ah, if only we had unite
the country in time. Communis™
would have been much better fol
us than this war and the com
tinuation of the foreign occuPp?
tion. It would have been better
for us that we had not been ‘de
FONGeG’.- 5 Aes

eo ‘

Completing this portrait of
Korea today, which is such ®
devastating rebuttal of all the
propaganda poured out through
the Camadian daily press, the
Le Monde correspondent notes
ever-growing guerilla movement
throughout southern Korea.

“This guerilla movement ha®

not ceased with the war; i
is almost everywhere; and
action is intensified, better 0
ganized than before the wat
and better equipped. This gue!
illa movement is led not onl¥
by the elements of the North
who had besieged Pusan e3f"
ier, and then withdrew to th?
mountains, but by numerous
southerners who have beco™
maquis. . 3.” '

What about the longer run?
This newspaperman forsees tha
in the event of an armist
southern Korea will remain *
American protectorate, but
does not have much confiden®?
in that.

For the strongest desire of the
whole Korean people ramain®
unity, he says, and the with
drawal of foreign troops. :

Thus, concludes this report?
(who has no sympathy with
munism, of course) any fu
American occupation is going
face the same fate that the Jap
anese did for thirty years. TH
effort to keep southern Ko A
from its normal course t0
Communism is going to be
expensive difficult, thankless
constantly facing the mountif®
current of Korean nationalis™ ,

“Look at the map...» thes
are the final words of the

ture
to

Ja

_ article, 4

4
PACIFIC TRIBUNE — OCTOBER 19, 1951 — PAG™a