International Affairs: A Survey

By Prof. M. VENKATARANGAIYA, M.A.

Everyone has welcomed the cease-fire talks in Korea. But there is as yet no knowing as to how far these talks will succeed, and whether they will lead to un armistice and to a final peace and settlement of all those outstanding issues which have been responsible for the outbreak of the Korean war. It needed a whole year of terrible warfare involving loss of the lives of several hundreds of thousands on either side, and of devastation and destruction over large areas of the country before the two parties could think of a cease-fire, even though attempts for the same purpose have been made on more than one occasion previously by India and several other States. But the statements that are being issued by responsible spokesmen even after the ceasefire talks have started, show that they are not quite sure that all this would lead to peace. It is, therefore, necessary for every intelligent person to understand the true nature of the talks, the circumstances that have brought them about and their relation to developments–present and prospective–in the other parts of the world.

The ceasefire talks are not political in character. They might at the most bring to a stop the fighting that has been going on. Those who are acquainted with the events in Indonesia after the Dutch and the Republicans agreed to ceasefire and with the events in Kashmir, even though for nearly two years there has been a cease-fire there, will hesitate before concluding that the ceasefire in Korea will necessarily lead to peace. The talks themselves have been necessitated not so much by the heavy losses sustained by both parties as by a feeling on the part of the United States that such losses were not worth while in an area like Korea. There was in the first place the inexhaustible man-power of China, and the Americans knew that it would take several years before they could crush it to an appreciable degree. In the second place the view gained increasing strength not only among Americans, but also among the British and their other allies associated with them in the North Atlantic Union, that a long war in Korea would considerably weaken the defences of Western Europe and such a weakening would place them at a serious disadvantage in a global war with the Soviet Union for which they continue to make active preparations. For, it is the considered view of the Anti-Soviet bloc now that the ultimate scene of warfare between it and the Soviet bloc would be Western Europe and that it is the events in that area that would finally decide its outcome. It was therefore in their opinion unwise to waste their resources in Korea–a secondary or a subsidiary theatre of war.

What exactly the motives of the Communists–the North-Koreans, the Chinese and the Soviet–are which have induced them to propose and accept cease-fire talks is much more difficult to explain. It is only possible to guess about them. It may be that they have come to realise that the war was going against them in Korea, that in spite of the superiority of their numbers they were poor in equipment, and that it would become increasingly difficult for them to overcome the growing armaments on land and in air brought by the Americans with their inexhaustible industrial and scientific resources As a matter of fact the war became a testing ground as to which factor would ultimately decide the issue–superiority in numbers and superiority in arms, Another circumstance which might have influenced the Communists seems to be that the Soviet is now perhaps anxious to create trouble in some other part of the world–the Middle East or Yugoslavia–and be ready to divert its men and resources to those areas. For, it should not be forgotten that today it is in the hands of the Soviet that the initiative lies and that the Anglo-American bloc has to follow, as it were, the path indicated to them by the Soviet. They are not as yet in a position to take the initiative themselves.

The Americans have made it clear that the cease-fire talks have nothing to do with the problem of Formosa or the seating of Communist China on the bodies of the U.N.O.–two matters which have come of fundamental importance to China. Until there problem solved to the satisfaction of the People’s Government of China there cannot be a real peace in the Far East and American policy is not yet directed to a solution on these lines. A cease-fire therefore in Korea might be followed by a Communist invasion of Formosa. Besides this there is the cold war between Soviet Russia and the United States and there is nothing to indicate that either party is prepared to end that war.

There is one point however in regard to which the conviction of the Anglo-American bloc is now much stronger than what it was before the Korean war started. It is now their firm belief that the Communist group can never be brought round through peaceful negotiations unless the negotiations are ed up by irresistible military force. The Marxists emphasize even in internal polities that no great change can be brought about unless it be through revolution, bloodshed and violence. The same is their creed so far as international politics are concerned. If at all they yield it is to superior physical force that they will yield. It was because the Americans gave substantial military aid to Greece and Turkey, and also because they showed that they had irresistible strength in supplying Berlin with all its needs, that the Soviets gave up their attempts to coerce Turkey and Greece and their blockade of Berlin. If after one year of war they are willing to talk of cease-fire the Americans believe that it is due to the Communistic realisation that their enemies have more armaments than they themselves have.

The Western powers are determined to maintain and even to strengthen their superiority in arms and equipment. Responsible leaders in the United States and Britain have been proclaiming that there will be no relaxation of their efforts at increasing their armaments. General MacArthur was recalled not because of any differences of opinion in this regard but because he wanted to carry the war into Manchuria and into the Chinese mainland, while President Truman and his advisers felt that such a course would adversely affect their global strategy which had Western Europe for its centre. In giving evidence before the Congressional Committee, Acheson stated: “We need to use the time we have to build an effective deterrent force. This requires us to create sufficient force-in-being both in the United States and among our allies to shield our great potential against the possibility of a quick and easy onslaught and to ensure that our allies will not suffer occupations and destruction, and of this shield we need to have the potential that would enable us to win a war. This is the measure of the force as we approach it.”

Replying to the dissident Labour group in Britain led by ex-ministers Bevan, Wilson and Freeman the British Under-Secretary for War–Woodrow Wyatt–recently stated: “Britain would let down all Europeans if it reduced its rearmament plans now. “The Russians had 25 divisions under arms, compared with Britain's ten. They had four million men under arms compared with Britain’s 750,000. They could mobilise eight million more immediately...Our accelerated arms programme is designed to ensure that by the time the Russians are likely to have a stock-pile of atom bombs we, with the other countries of the West, shall have armed forces strong enough to deter them on the ground.”

President Truman, General Marshall and General Bradley of the United States have also issued a warning against any talk of the reduction of arms. They have all been persuading the Congress to vote more billions for defence.

All this goes to show that it will take a long time before production is diverted to civilian requirements and before there is an appreciable fall in the prices of the essential consumer goods.

It is because the cease-fire in Korea is not regarded as bringing about a peace-settlement in the Far East and the end of the cold war, the United States has become keen on concluding a treaty with Japan and bringing her into the anti-Communistic fold. The terms of the proposed draft treaty have been published; and they are to be considered finally at a conference to be held in San Francisco in September next. Britain, Australia and New Zealand which have expressed serious apprehensions about Japan once more becoming a highly industrialised and an aggressively imperialist power, have been brought round by the United States and it looks as if they would agree to the draft treaty. Under this treaty Japan is to be a fully Sovereign State. She will not be asked to pay any reparations. No restrictions will he placed on her armaments or her industrial development. The only loss she will sustain is the loss of her oversea possessions and islands.

All this looks highly just, fair and equitable. But what exactly is the motive behind this liberality? The United States has realised that if Soviet and Chinese expansion is to be arrested it can only be achieved through the full use of Japan’s resources. Japan has been the most industrially developed Asian country; the military skill and strength of the Japanese are too well-known. There is also the strategic position of the country in a war between the United States and the Sino-Soviet bloc. With Japan neutral and weak or fighting on the side of Communism it would be impossible for the United States to defeat China or Soviet Ru8si& in the East. A strong and resurrected Japan is considered to be a lesser evil from the American standpoint, especially because the draft treaty provides for the stationing of American troops in and around Japan by mutual agreement. But how far all this will work as planned by the United States is uncertain. Without a large export trade the growing population of Japan–nearly hundred millions–will not be able to get food and raw materials. With China closed to her she will have to find markets in South East Asia and the Middle East and would thus become a competitor of Britain and India–a situation which would be naturally resented by them. There would be no outlet for this growing population in Australia so long as she follows her “white Australian policy.” And then what guarantee is there that the Japanese would work as satellites of the United States? That might be possible if the government in Japan continues to be a government of the “Right” with Fascist tendencies, but such a government is sure to provoke the leftist groups and pave the way for & Cornrnunistic revoultion–the very thing that the United States is anxious to avert.

This is the crux of the whole question. If the United States is really anxious to arrest the growth and expansion of Communism, it is not enough that she enters into military alliances with reactionary governments as she has been doing these years. She must encourage and aid liberal regimes–even Socialist regimes–which can carry out land reform, protect the interests of labour and mitigate the evils of capitalism and plutocracy. She must boldly take up the cause of nationalism in Indo-China and other countries where Colonialism still prevails. Communism finds a breeding place in Japan and in other countries of Asia, primarily because of the acuteness of the economic problem and the poverty and degradation of the masses of people. A treaty with Japan is to be welcomed, but to think that such a treaty as is contemplated by the United States will stem the tide of Communism is a misreading of the situation.

A corollary to treaty with Japan as proposed by the United States is a Pacific Defence Pact into which she has now agreed to enter with Australia and New Zealand. Such a pact is the only way in which she could persuade these two countries to agree to the terms of the draft treaty with Japan. This guarantees the aid and support of the United States against any attack that either Japan or China and Soviet Russia might make on Australia and New Zealand. It is drafted on the lines of the North Atlantic Treaty. It will become the nucleus of a wider Pacific Pact. It still further strengthens the tendency and the need of Australia and New Zealand to align themselves more and more with the United States than with the British Commonwealth, however strong their sentimental attachments to the latter. Canada has already been brought very close to the United States. This Pacific Dafence Pact brings Australia and New Zealand also closer to that country. All this is bound to have its ultimate repurcussion on the Commonwealth. It is bound to result in a new political entity being organised in due course,–an English-speaking Anglo-American League, with the United States occupying a central place in it. This will also affect the membership of India, Pakistan and Ceylon in the Commonwealth. The Pacific Pact therefore has wider implications than what appear to be on the surface.

The proposed treaty with Japan has also to be read along with the new orientation in the policy of the occupation powers towards Western Germany. There is as a matter of fact a close parallel between Western Germany and Japan today. Britain, France and the United States waged the second world war against them. One of the objects of the war was to prevent the revival of militarism in these countries and also arrest their industrial progress, without which no militarism can flourish in the contemporary world. But all this has now been abandoned by the three victorious powers, and the reason is that they find in Soviet Russia and her Communism a more dreadful enemy than in Germany and Japan with their potential Fascism. They have now come to the conclusion that without the man power and the material power of Western Germany it would be impossible for them to defend Western Europe against any Soviet attack and realise the objectives of the Atlantic Pact. It is this conclusion that is responsible for the proclamation recently issued by them that the state of war with Germany had come to an end. More important than this is the new understanding arrived at by them that they would treat the West German State as a fully sovereign State with a status equal to their own. There is now every prospect of the West German Government agreeing to raise adequate military forces and fight alongside of the other Atlantic powers against Soviet Russia. The closer the re-approchement between the Western powers and Germany the greater becomes their chance of arresting Communists expansion. It is in this direction that they are moving.

It looks ironical that the democratic States which, during the second world war and in the years preceding it, looked upon Germany and Japan as the most anti-democratic and the most aggressive of States, to be suppressed for all time, should now embrace them as their most friendly allies and make preparations for a war against Soviet Russia, their former ally, for whose survival they used a substantial portion of their resources between 1940 and 1945. But such has always been the course of human history. There are no permanent friendships and permanent enmities in the political world. It is all a matter of expediency.

The suspicion that Soviet anxiety to have cease-fire talks in Korea might only be a prelude to the creation of trouble in some other area of the world is strengthened by developments in Iran. The dispute that has arisen between the governments of Iran and Britain on the subject of the nationalisation of Irani oil industry has reached a critical stage, and there are apprehensions that it might lead to warfare in the Middle East, even though all responsible statesmen are telling the world that there is no likelihood of any such danger. No one denies the right of Iran to nationalise any of her industries if she considers that it would be more profitable for her than the exploitation of her oil resources by a foreign concern like the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Even Britain has recognised the validity of the principle of nationalisation. But there are certain legal and political issues that deserve consideration in a calm and cool atmosphere, which of course has become prominent by its absence. The oil company has invested large sums of money in the concern. It has the legal right conferred upon it by the Iranian Government to run the concern for another four to five decades. Although the company itself is technically a private organisation, the British Government is naturally interested in it. It is one of the elementary duties which every government owes to its citizens that it should safeguard their legitimate interests at home and abroad. There is therefore nothing surprising in the British Government intervening in the matter and regarding it as a dispute between two States and not a mere domestic dispute between the Government of Iran and a private company. The question of the amount of compensation that the company is entitled to get in the event of nationalisation has not been fully settled or even examined. It is one thing to take over an industry owned by the citizens of the State without paying compensation to them or paying only nominal compensation. For, in such a case the right to ownership only changes hands from one section of the citizens to the whole body represented by government. It is, however otherwise when the concern is owned by foreigners. In addition to this there is another complicating factor. Britain depends on Iran for  a substantial supply of her oil and there is no knowing what will happen to this source if the industry is nationalised. And in these days of active rearmament preparations, the cutting of any source of oil supply is certain to prove fatal.

But neither Britain nor Iran has cared for any kind of reasonableness in the settlement of the issue. Iran is against any negotiated settlement. She has rejected the decision of the International Court. Britain has sent units of her fleet to the Persian waters to keep watch over the situation and to see that the lives of her citizens, who happen to be employed as experts in the oil refineries, are safeguarded. This has provoked the Russians who have, under the Agreement of 1921, the right to send their forces into Iran if British forces enter the country from the south or from any other direction. It is in this atmosphere that the United States President has sent his personal envoy, Mr. Harriman, to bring about a peaceful settlement. He is doubly interested in the issue. The Americans themselves own petrol concerns in Saudi Arabia; and they have interests in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East along with the British. If nationalisation becomes an accomplished fact in Iran it will be made use of in Saudi Arabia and in other parts of the Middle East. It is, therefore, necessary from the American standpoint that a reasonable and peaceful settlement of the question is brought about in Iran. In addition to this the danger of Iran becoming a centre of warhas anyhow to be averted. Riots have already broken in Teheran. The extremists are active; and the scene is highly favourable for exploitation by the Communist-minded Tudeh party which like other Communist parties is under the influence of Soviet Russia. Iran, therefore, threatens to become a scene of civil war just like Korea, and the Korean ceasefire talks will lose all their significance if the British and the Americans are compelled to intervene in the Iranian war to prevent its becoming a Communist satellite. Strategically the Middle East is of even far greater importance than Korea in a war against Soviet Russia and this makes the Iranian problem serious.

One other complicating factor in the Middle East is the strained relations which Britain has towards Egypt. There is now a move on the part of all the Middle East countries to act in concert. Such moves have been made in the past but they were not much of a success. But there is some prospect of greater unity at present. Even Iran has joined the forces opposed to Israel. All this makes a negotiated settlement between Britain and Iran much more important than what it would otherwise be.

There have been rumours that on the Iranian question some differences exist between the United States and Britain. It is, however, not known what the nature of these differences is. On the attempts of the United States to include Fascist Spain in the European Defence Union also, there are substantial differences between the view-point of the two countries. It is best that these differences disappear so that concerted action on the part of all democratic nations might become possible.

This survey therefore may be concluded by pointing out that the creation of a world of peace and plenty depends in the immediate future on a peaceful settlement of the issues in Korea and Iran, of the conclusion of a satisfactory peace treaty with Japan and Germany, and the recognition of the right of Communist China to Formosa and to a seat on the Security Council. But there are as yet no indications that all the parties to these issues are prepared to understand each other’s point of view, and think of a possible compromise. The problem of creating one world appears to have become much more complicated now than in 1946–at the close of the world war.

Bombay, July 18.