Up & Out

Over the bleak, barren hill of Changkufeng on the Siberian-Manchukuoan border seven weeks ago snarled the fighting forces of Japan and Russia. Moscow claimed the whole hill was in Soviet territory when the scrap started. But when a truce was finally arranged between Soviet Foreign Commissar Maxim Litvinoff and Japanese Ambassador Mamoru Shigemitsu, Japan was left with her present firm hold on the westward slope of Changkufeng. Russia agreed to submit final ownership to arbitration, thus gave up her previous absolute claim to Changkufeng. For this truce Japan last week was ready to pay off in kudos. Tokyo dispatches prophesied the forthcoming promotion of Ambassador Shigemitsu to the highest rung in the Japanese diplomatic ladder, Ambassador to London.

Not so lucky was Russia's Assistant Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Boris Spiridonovich Stomoniakov, for years the top Soviet authority on the Far East, and adviser to Commissar Litvinoff on the Changkufeng dispute. In Moscow last week it was officially announced that Old Bolshevik Stomoniakov, who joined the Communist Party in 1902, was kicked out of his Foreign Office job on August 7--the day when 110 Soviet tanks, 40 warplanes, heavy Russian field artillery and some thousands of Red Army troops were beaten back after Soviet Far East Marshal Vasily Bluecher had hurled them in a major offensive to recapture Changkufeng Hill. Mr. Stomoniakov, as. Moscow's ace Far East expert, had presumably been advising Commissar Litvinoff to stand firm and await a Russian victory. After Stomoniakov was fired, Commissar Litvinoff quickly came to terms with Ambassador Shigemitsu, who had proposed the truce in the first place. It became effective at noon on August 11--just four days after the secret ousting of Stomoniakov.

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