Attack (Cont'd)

The Communists were pouring masses of men and supplies into a new build-up for a second strike at the U.N. forces. Unless the Chinese decide to throw in their air power, their strategy is almost certain to be the same as before--trying to swamp the U.N. forces by weight of numbers. Last week the U.S. Eighth Army was confident it could again stand up to the Reds' massed attacks, would again exact heavy casualties for expendable ground.

Pentagon officers, fired with optimism (and zeal for the Truman Administration's wait-and-see policy in Korea), freely predicted that the Chinese Reds would soon be exhausted and would sue for peace. But even with exhaustion, the Reds had another choice. They could stop spilling their own blood, retire beyond the waist of Korea, around the 40th parallel, and sit there.

At the latitude of this week's fighting, the Chinese are cramped and the allied line is protected at both ends by the sea. Above the waist, where the peninsula widens out toward the 700-mile frontier line, the Chinese would have plenty of room and Van Fleet would not have enough men. If the Chinese decide to move north, the U.N. forces would be sentenced to an indefinite and costly stalemate.

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