Taking Stock

Last week members of the U.N. Security Council bowed to the intransigence of Red China's General Wu Hsiu-chuan (see WAR IN ASIA) and wound up their discussion of the Korean and Formosan questions. Fatalistically, the representatives of the free world heard Russia's Jacob Malik veto a resolution ordering Communist China to end her intervention in Korea.

Now the way was open to take the problem of Chinese aggression into the veto-free U.N. General Assembly. To find out what the U.S would ask of the Assembly, U.S. Delegate Warren Austin hurried to Washington, spent two hours taking stock with Dean Acheson. This week Austin joined with delegates of five other powers to ask that the Assembly take up the question of "Intervention of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China in Korea."

The key word was "intervention." Those who still hope to appease Red China want to use the word "intervention," and those who favor trying to punish China for what it is doing in Korea want to use the word "aggression," as correctly describing China's action.

U.S. hesitation to demand clear-cut action from the U.N. stemmed partly from fears that: 1) the General Assembly would refuse to pass a strong resolution against Red China, or 2) many nations would abstain from voting on a strong resolution, thereby making it nearly meaningless even if passed. At Lake Success and in Washington, U.S. diplomats were busily polling and exploring other nations' views. As the week ended, the U.S. had not worked out a clear-cut view of its own.

This week U.N. Secretary General Trygve Lie decided to hold a small dinner party. On the guest list were General Wu and U.N. delegates from Britain, Sweden, Israel and Pakistan. The process of conciliation had not yet gone so far that anyone quite dared to ask a U.S. representative to break bread with General Wu.

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