After Molotov

Two years ago Communist power meant the Red Army. After V-E day, Communist power meant Molotov, who in U.N. and in the Council of Foreign Ministers strove to freeze into international acceptance (and, where feasible, to extend) the Red Army's conquests. Now that the Russian diplomatic drive had been checked, it was Molotov's turn to fade into the background, making way for the next--and the most serious--phase of the Communist effort to control as much of the world as possible. Propaganda and organization, reaching into every field of human activity, characterized the new emphasis.

U.N.'s charter and the terms of the treaties with the beaten nations were the rules in the contest between Russia and the West, not the contest itself. That would be fought far from U.N.'s sober committee rooms. If anti-Communist Moslems and Hindus could not agree, Communism would gain in India (see FOREIGN NEWS). If the anti-Communist Chinese Government could get transportation going, Communism would be set back. If Communist parties and other projections of Moscow's will were able to hamstring non-Communist governments or to divide peoples, that would represent Russian gains just as surely as boundary lines drawn on a map.

Sometimes resistance to Communist pressure would be as direct and ruthless as that at Maragha in Persia, where four men accused as leaders of the Communist-inspired revolt in Azerbaijan province were hanged (see cut) as examples to others who might be tempted to follow the Russian line.

But Maragha's solution would not avail against the subtler and more important Communist methods. Last week's news brought into new prominence three old Communist techniques (see below) that the world needed to understand more clearly, because future Communist efforts would be exerted along these and parallel lines.

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