A comparative study of Soviet and Chinese press propaganda on the closely related problems of Mao Tse-tung's position as a Communist theoretician and the relevance of the Chinese revolution for revolutions in other colonial and semi-colonial countries may add to a further understanding of the controversial field of Sino-Soviet relations and serve as a background against which pertinent aspects of current propaganda might be better understood. Differences in viewpoint on these questions may represent latent, but nonetheless vital, tensions in the relations between Soviet and Chinese Communist leaders. In fact, a deterioration in Sino-Soviet relations, for whatever cause, may quite probably be signalized first in divergent assertions regarding theoretical matters.

“The United States Government,” President Harry S. Truman announced on 5 January 1950, “will not pursue a course which will lead to involvement in the civil conflict in China.” Historians generally agree that President Truman meant what he said. American policy after the summer of 1949, writes Tang Tsou, was “to avoid, as far as possible, any further involvement in the Chinese civil war and to allow events in China to unfold themselves.” The Truman administration ruled out the use of force to prevent the fall of Formosa; non-recognition of the Communist government was adopted as “a temporary measure,” due to Republican pressure and the hope of gaining concessions from Peking. The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950, observes Lyman P. Van Slyke, “brought to a sudden end the policy that the administration had followed for two years, and committed us once again to involvement in the Chinese civil war.” The United States assumed a protective role towards the remnants of the Nationalists on Formosa and became the implacable foe of Peking. This article, a study of a commercial airline's participation in a major diplomatic and legal controversy during the last phase of the Chinese civil war, will suggest that there is reason to doubt, or at least to modify, the traditional interpretation of American policy towards China between late 1949 and June 1950.

The Cultural Revolution severely shook the organizational structure of China. In its aftermath came a general weakening of the administration and a loosening of control. As a result the country has experienced an intensification of the tendencies towards a cellular economy. The forces, already strong, which encouraged individual localities and enterprises to develop on self-sufficient autonomous lines, have received a new accession of strength. At present the country seems composed of a myriad of small discrete units, although there are at work technical forces which, it would seem, ought to be breaking down this cellular arrangement. This article looks at the emphasis on self-reliance and self-sufficiency, enquires into certain consequences of these trends and hexamines and speculates on the manner in which the separate units of the Chinese economy relate to each other economically.

As opposed to the practice of the early 1960s of expressing dissent through plays, short stories and literary forums, by 1962 and 1963 dissidence was expressed through discussions on Chinese history. Like the literati of old, Chinese intellectuals used their interpretations of history as criticisms of the regime, and the regime used contrary interpretations as rebuttals. While these debates were in actuality a subtle struggle over policy, they touched on some fundamental questions as to the dynamics of the historical process, the role of traditional values and the nature of man. They were conducted with a degree of sophistication and balance that had not been exhibited since the Communists had come to power.

When, in late 1924, the Vietnamese communist Ho Chi Minh, then known as Nguyen Ai Quoc, arrived in Canton as an interpreter to the Comintern mission to the Kuomintang led by Michael Borodin, Vietnamese nationalism was at a watershed. Since the beginning of the century, armed resistance to French colonial rule had been led by the famous scholar-revolutionary Phan Boi Chau. For over two decades he and a small band of determined followers had been the only organized force in Vietnam opposed to French rule. By the mid 1920s, however, it became apparent that Phan's movement was nearing a dead end. More the activist than the theoretician, more impetuous than patient, he had given little thought to organization, ideology, and long-term planning, and after a series of serious setbacks, he was forced to watch his movement begin to disintegrate. His arrest by French authorities in Shanghai in 1925 was only symbolic of the waning influence of his movement in Vietnam.