Tears for the Valiant

At the age of six, Peng Teh-huai attacked his schoolmaster with a stool. Three years later, young Peng deliberately kicked over his grandmother's opium, which was cooking on the stove, and was banished from the family. Last week, at 48, Peng Teh-huai, as the second ranking general of Communist China, was still going strong. He was basking in kudos from the Communist Central Committee for the "brilliant victory" he had scored over a Nationalist force at Ichuan, 60 miles southeast of Yenan.

Nationalist intelligence had learned a month ago that General Peng was ready to "establish merit" in the northwest. Nationalist planes, based at Sian, were alerted to watch for Red movements. Late in February, near Hangcheng, 5,000 Reds were spotted crossing the Yellow River in dozens of junks. The force headed for the Yellow Dragon mountains in southeast Shensi, where they joined another 4,000 Communists. Down from north Shensi came more. By month's end, General Peng had 60,000 troops.

A fortnight ago, at Yenan, Nationalist General Hu Tsung-nan decided to beat the Communists to the punch. Two army divisions, under Generals Liu Kan and Yen Ming, marched south. West of Ichuan they met the Red force. Six hours later the Nationalists had suffered 20,000 casualties. Only 2,000 soldiers escaped. Both General Liu and General Yen lay dead.

The news from Manchuria was almost as bad as the Shensi catastrophe. Kirin, a fat prize with its huge Hsiaofengmen hydroelectric plant (power source for Changchun and Mukden industries), fell to the Reds. Then, after an eleven-day onslaught, the Reds took Szepingkai. Only Mukden and Changchun held out. When they fell, 300,000 more Red soldiers could plunge south into the heart of China.

In Nanking, the government mourned. The "valiant action" at Ichuan would be "sung and wept over in history [as] ... a demonstration of the revolutionary spirit of sacrifice of the national troops. . . . Such spirit . . . will insure that Communist bandits will be exterminated."

The tears were understandable. But it would take more than a spirit of sacrifice to stop the Red march in China.

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