Adventuristic Progress

He who brags without shame will find it difficult to live up to his bragging.

--Confucius Less than three months after" shamelessly promising a vast industrial expansion in 1953, the Chinese Communists were finding that old Confucius was right after all. The Peking People's Daily accused everybody in sight of a "deviation of adventuristic progress," i.e., of rushing into projects without proper planning.

Items:

P: One electrical plant cannot be built this year because of a shortage of foreign drawing paper (for the blueprints).

P:A machinery works at Anhwei promised a big expansion program, despite the fact that the existing plant had twice been flooded and was practically useless.

P:"Certain comrades lack a practical spirit, do not take into account their resources and strength in drawing up plans, and proceed only from subjective aspirations." In a speech at Peking last week, Vice Chairman Chia Tofu of the government's Economic and Financial Committee confessed: "On the whole, our industrial foundations are very weak and our industrial technique backward." Sixty per cent of all Chinese industry is now state-owned, Chia boasted, but obviously the state is having a hard time finding managers who know their jobs. Chia announced a new set of production goals, but did not compare them with the more grandiose targets proclaimed earlier. This year, said Chia, machine-tool production will increase 4.6% (not 34%'as announced in February), petroleum 29.1% (instead of 42%). Peking had promised earlier to build or enlarge 21 steel mills and 24 machine-tool works in 1953; according to Chia. only four steel mills and ten machine-tool plants will be built or expanded.

More than an admission of foolish bragging was involved in the change of goals. The self-criticizing article in Peking's People's Daily amounted to a remarkable revelation of the hand-to-mouth nature of the entire industrialization program. Besides sloppy planning, the People's Daily admitted poor designing, serious shortages of skilled labor, general delays in delivery (presumably from Russia), and what was called "poor geological data." The pattern of cuts in mineral production and Chia's announcement of a 500% increase in "prospecting and development operations" indicates that China is a long way from getting tooled for production. Light industry has not even announced its targets lor this year.

The People's Daily announced that all industrial designing will how be supervised by Soviet technicians, and spoke of a general redistribution of Russian interpreters. Delays of delivery from Russia might indicate that Moscow is parceling out its supplies slowly to make sure that China does not grow too self-sufficient too fast. A likelier explanation is that Russia has some priority problems of its own, and that the Trans-Siberian Railroad is overburdened because of the Korean war and the U.N. blockade of China.

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