Chaos

"The need for a trial, which could have had but one result, was a thing nobody thought of. . . . The Public was invited to do with the Prisoners as they pleased. In consequence many a helpless prisoner was slashed with penknives and spat upon as the group tramped their sorrowful way to execution. . . . Five rifles spat their leaden charge. Five bodies ln turn wilted to rise no more. . . ." Thus the South China Morning Post of Hongkong described, last week, the typically Chinese epilogue to an ugly two-day uprising at Canton, fomented by Soviet Russian Communists. The sole eye-witness account of this revolt to be cabled to the U. S. came from U. S. Consul at Canton Jay C. Huston. Cabled he: "Control of Canton was seized by so-called workers and soldiers, numbering about 5,000. The police were disarmed. . . "The rebels, who were comprised of the riffraff of the city, linked themselves up with certain robber bands from the country districts. "The movement, which was reported as frankly Communistic, was led by Russians. . . . For 48 hours the city was given over to general looting and large sections were burned. "Troops were rushed back to Canton and succeeded in crushing the rabble revolt about 11 a.m. on the morning of the the third day. . . ."

"Soldiers are still mopping up the city and executing suspects and looters by the wholesale." Critical readers of this despatch wondered why the forces of law and order were described by Consul Huston in such vague terms as "troops" and "soldiers." Whose troops? What soldiers? Very probably the harassed Consul did not know--perhaps no one knew. All that remains in Canton by way of "government" is a fluid group of military men whose leaders constantly bottle up one another. Their "troops," however, still retain the discipline and weapons needed to mop up a "rabble" led by "Russians."

At Shanghai a group of Chinese who still call themselves the "Nationalist Government" went through the mummery, last week, of breaking off relations with Soviet Russia. Their famed Chiang Kaishek, onetime Nationalist generalissimo and conqueror of half China said: "I intend to exert my full strength to bring peace within the Nationalist territories in order to enable the re-oranization of the Nationalist government and provide for the active resumption of warfare against Marshal Chang Tso-lin [Dictator of North China], who must be eliminated before China will become peaceful"