The Wilmington morning star., 1946-01-29
Interpreting
The News
By JAMES d. WHITE
Associated Press stair Wri'cA

- ASSOCldtcu Z ACSS o
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 28-(P)--
Flying a longer, more perllous
route than normally, the United
States Ambassador to Moscow, W.
Averell Hartman, has arrived IN
Chungking on his way PACK ~
Washington.
It NAV be assumed that he brings
with him the latest and most au-
thoritative Soviet attitude toward
recent events in East Asia.
He has had long conferences
with both Generalissimo Chang
Kai-shek and the special American
envoy to China, Gen. George Z.
Marshall.
Here are some recent events
involving Russia's relations with
China (and indirectly with this
country which may bear on what
he has to say:
First it is American initiative
which primarily is responsible Tor
Chinas position today as a big-flSe
power. AS a party to this concep-
ton. Russia negotiated a settle
ment with China over critical is
sues, although in doing so Russia
gained roughly the equivalent OF
the maximum Czarist economic
penetratin in Manchuria of fifty
years ago.
However, China's inability to
get her troops into Manchuria to
take over promptly from the Rus
slams (wt1o captured it from the
Japanese) resulted in two things.
First, the Chinese Communists
complicated the question by TAX
ing certain ports and lines Of COM
munications. Secondly, the Chin
ese government twice asked the
Russians to delay their evacua-
ton of Manchuria. They now are
scheduled to leave around the end
of this week.
In the midst of these delays
certain unidentified Chinese Off
cials limited that the Russians were
making additional demands for
economic concessions in Manchur-
ia. The Russians neither confirm
ed nor denied this-if true it prob
ably would have constituted vio-
lation of their new treaty with
China.
Next, certain Chinese generals
who have been denying American
press correspondents permission to
enter Manchuria and report on the
important developments there,
threw the blame for. this policy
squarely on the Russians, one even
claiming the Russians regarded
U. S. correspondents as enemies. j."
This the Russians did deny, and
the promptness and emphasis with
which they denied it indicated
clearly how much they didn't like
it.
In regard to the Chinese attitude
these days, one notices very I'M
derstandable determination on the
part of the Chinese to assert them
selves now that they are legally
free of most of the outside influ-
ences which have made their past
hundred years a nightmare strug-
gle to survive.
| An example is the resolution OF
the Shanghai Chamber of Com
merce to bar all foreign shipping
from Chinese waters. But such
an attitude has little connection
with the reality. which is that
China has little or no shipping
and little or no prospect of get
ting any except through her allies.
It is possible that Russia may
be up against a similar Chinese
attitude in Manchuria, and that
Ambassador Hartman has brought
the latest Moscow reaction to it.
For the time being at least the
Russians appear to have demon
strated broadly that they want no
part of the internal Chinese civil
dispute between the Communists
and the Kuomintang government.
It's equally possible that they
have no desire to permit Chinese
balancing tactics to bring them
into any more conflict with Ameri-
can policy in East Asia than al
ready exists in the nature of the
lease iI1s+ now