WHAT TO SEE IN CHINA

London's influential and liberal Economist had a few words of parting advice for ex-Prime Minister Clement Attlee and his fellow Socialists as they set forth on their junket to Communist Peking. Excerpts:

I HAVE been exposed to lots of eyewash in my time, and I know it when I see it," remarked the Leader of the Opposition. In his time Mr. Attlee has undoubtedly shown that he can recognise eyewash. But in the past it has not been his custom to submit meekly to serving the purposes of a propaganda machine that is hostile to him, his party, and all that he stands for. The Labour delegates have presumably reconciled themselves in advance to the fact that during their tour they will be photographed, filmed, recorded for radio, and exhaustively written up by the worldwide Communist "disinformation" net work; that their simplest expressions of thanks to their hosts will be represented as prostrations before the might and glory of Mao Tse-tung's regime; and that if they venture to comment unfavourably on anything they see, no breath of that criticism will reach the millions behind the iron curtain. They presumably think this is a price worth paying in order to see Peking's peepshow.

It is easy to guess what their hosts will be anxious to show them . . . Mr. Attlee. Mr. Bevan and their companions will visit "model villages" and "mutual aid" farms . . . they will relax beside peaceful lakes, and they will be shown films depicting 'the regime's progress and its peaceful intentions . . .

Yet, if the Labour delegates confine themselves to viewing these exhibits their passage money will be wasted . . . As a start, they might well propose a call at the office of the Supreme People's Procurator, a functionary who controls an extensive apparatus concerned with the punishment of those who neglect their work or "sabotage" production or construction. They might try to attend one of the trials of workers conducted by the "comrade tribunals."

When they are shown over state factories, the trade union delegates might well ask their interpreters to construe the new code of labour discipline. It forbids workers to talk or otherwise waste time in working hours, to arrive late or "stroll around"; it requires them to try to overfulfil their norms; and the last eight of its 22 sections are devoted to punishments. Workers, says this code, should be made to apologise for their mistakes publicly; if their products are defective, up to one-third of their wages will be deducted. There is, of course, no right to strike in China now.

Factory work is, indeed, so attractive in People's China that it is sad to read in the People's Daily of July 11th that many parents still think it better for their children to get secondary education than to pass directly from primary school to workbench. Castigating these outworn ideas, the official Communist newspaper warns parents that only a few children can go to secondary schools, and that the party and government will show them that juvenile labour is "equally glorious" . . .

Mr. Attlee and Mr. Bevan are not likely to get a close look at Mao's now enormous army. But they might find time to glance at the People's Daily leading article of July 24th, which emphasised that modern armed forces could not be built up without heavy industries, and to reflect on the wisdom of meeting all Peking's demands for British heavy machinery. They will doubtless hear much of the claim, advanced a few weeks ago by the Chinese trade mission to Britain, that -L-100 million worth of trade could be done between the two countries in the coming year if strategic controls were abolished. The impression left by Mr. Tsao in London last month was that Britain would have to accept remarkable quantities of preserved eggs, bristles and feathers.

How does this "peaceful" government mean to use "the second largest army in the world," which it says it will aim to build? Commander-in-Chief Chu Teh, in his Army Day speech last week, promised that Formosa will soon be liberated. The Labour leaders can read for themselves that under the new Peking constitution the millions of Chinese in Siam, Burma, Indonesia and Malaya, "neglected" by earlier governments, will now be "protected" by Mao Tse-tung's regime. This hardly squares with Chou En-lai's simultaneous protestations to the Burmese and Indian prime ministers about peaceful co-existence and noninterference.

There are many other matters to which the Labour leaders might direct their curiosity. They might--if they can --seek out Kao Kang, who was the much-lauded ruler of Manchuria until this year he committed the unpardonable sin of "standing up against the party." Mr. Bevan should find this an enlightening interview. They might contrast the official announcement at the end of June that, "for the first time in many centuries," the peasants along the Huai river could now live without fear of floods, with the devastation that has since struck the area. They might raise the question of the brutal treatment and forcible indoctrination of British prisoners taken in Korea. But perhaps their most interesting quest would be to seek out their own opposite numbers in China--the leaders of the "democratic parties," which are still allowed a tenuous existence owing to their propaganda value--and, without asking such foolish questions as how these parties viewed their chances of coming to power during this year's "elections," to inquire precisely how their party platforms differ from that of their Communist rulers. This should be an instructive glimpse of the "new democracy" at work.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.