Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1959-11-01
THEY DON'T WANT TO GO HOME
Overseas Chinese 'Roce' Apart
BY DON FRIFIELD
contributlng Writer

Nationalism In the resurgent
countries Of nom Communist East
Asia takes as many forms as there
are countries, but 1t is q regional
headache for the United States
Government and a catastrophe
for millions of people who seem
unable to blend into the coun-
tries where they live.
The biggest sufferers are the
IS million overseas Chinese who
dwell in these countries. They
vary enormously in education and
economic attainment. but they
have two traits conspicuously
evident:
. They inherit the cultural and
mercantile tradition of China,
which means that many feel no
particular economic or social in
ducement to absorb themselves
into what they consider the COM
paratively weaker and less donii-
nant traditions Of countries like
Indonesia, the Philippines, Wet
Nam, and Malaga.
Q They are racially distinct in
appearance from the natives Of
the countries where they have
settled. This sets them apart to
the eye as well as to the mind,
and as a supreme irony they
suffer from discrimination that is
basically racial. this notwith-
standing the fact that the extreme
nationalist in these countries are
also anti-American.
Keep Chinese Culture
Unlike the European immi-
grants to the Americas, the Chi
nese immigrants in the lands of
Southeast Asia have found that
they could make living and also
carry on q complete social life
without blending into the "host"
country, sometimes without even
learning the language. In many
cases. they honestly believe the
Chinese culture is too precious to
surrender, even though economic
opportunities in the China they
had left are quite another con-
sideration.
Because the colonial admins
traitors of these lands before
World War II could not have
cared less, the Chinese remained
o coherent, recognizable group.
Now the self-governing nations of
the area, eager to express their
new-found nationalism at all
costs. consider the Chinese either
"unassimilable" or even hostile"
to these ambitions.
These generalized tendencies
are compounded with another
phenomenon. The Chinese loves
his China as the seat of nome
and native village and remaining
family and ancestral graveyard.
He may hate the Communists,
but his prime loyalty is to the
Chinese condition" not to the
rulers Of the country but to that
part of it which spells home to
him. His pride in China is nom
political: he has little tradition
of national politics, although in
general ne will disdain the pres
ent system in China, the farm
communes and the regimented
life that hits at his Chinese" de,
n-Communist) traditions.
Because both Peking and Taipei
are focuses of attention for these
newly independent nations, they
fear the possibility of potential
fifth columns, Communist or Ma
tionalist. in their midst.
What makes all this hardest to
bear for the overseas" Chinese is
the general fact of their having
lived in the various countries for
many years, often for generations,
and that they or their forbears
are largely responsible for devel-
oping the trade and commerce of
areas that were fallow colonies
before they came. Far more than
the erstwhile European colonial
lists" Of Indonesia and Malaga, for
example, the Chinese established
thousands Of local businesses that