Correspondents' Correspondence

...I asked him if he was concerned that people might resent being forced to work too hard...

...This is strictly a nonnews event as far as I'm concerned," grumbled a representative of one of the nation's top papers...

...The Chancellor's personal stature was considerably enhanced by his performance...

...Yet the polls showed that Heath himself was scarcely more popular than during his long sojourn in the wilderness...

...It's like we were straight out of central casting...

...studying, for example, was very hard because the entire family lived in one room...

...Many who had doubts about Heath had been comforted by the thought that Iain Macleod would be at the Treasury...

...The student, whose parents migrated to Singapore from India and who still considers himself an Indian although he has never visited his homeland, feels that only Communism could save India from poverty and humiliation...

...wherever the new developments in Sino-American relations may lead, their role will not soon be forgotten.—ARNOLD ABRAMS...

...Americans might make such an off-the-cuff gesture, like Lyndon Johnson bringing a camel driver back to the States," remarked one Western diplomat...

...Actually, he had opened the page...

...Furthermore, the attitudes of this student call into question the relationship in the Third World between the support of intellectuals for Communism and its appeal to the poor, who are of course attracted almost exclusively by the idea of expropriating and dividing up the possessions of the rich...

...The following day the new rates for National Insurance contributions were announced, and it did not take financial journalists, or even ordinary citizens, long to figure out that—for all but the very rich and the very poor?these practically wiped out the concessions of the previous day...

...Purity there was...

...First off the ramp was 18-year-old John Tannehill, decked out in bib overalls and granny glasses...

...This was not a spontaneous 'happening.'" A smiling Chou En-lai told his American guests, "you have opened a. new page in the relations of the Chinese and American people...

...In addition, it contained bold fiscal reforms aimed at bringing Britain closer to the Common Market system of VAT (Value Added Tax...

...This student is from a poor family and speaks poignantly of the difficulties he had to overcome to get an education...

...By all accounts, the instant ambassadors were virtually flawless in fielding the displays of friendship with which they were showered by the Chinese...

...they merely happened to be on it...

...But such sentiments evaporated as soon as we saw the composition of the zany group bound for China...

...The tvpical worker in Britain earns from $2,400-$4,800 a year: Under the new economic measures his net gain, or "incentive" (to use Tory jargon), averages out to only $24 a year, and in some cases he may even lose...

...A group of American innocents abroad had traveled where two generations of diplomats had feared to tread...

...Then came Glenn Cowan, 19, with floppy hat, shoulder-length hair and tie-dyed bell-bottom trousers...

...Barber's hour of glory was to be brief indeed, however...

...Its nationalism may be closer to the Third Reich's than to Gandhi's...

...He does not think Singapore needs Communism, because people here work hard without it...

...His remarks, to whatever degree they are representative, pose a problem for those in the West who see Asian Communism as merely a "nationalist" movement...

...Think of almost any type and we've got one: an amazing group...

...He said he was not, because it was for the good of "the nation...

...If he does nothing else even vaguely noteworthy in his life, Cowan should go down in the history books as the first person wearing purple bell-bottoms ever to be received by a Chinese premier...

...few believed the invitation to the American team had been extended as casually as had first appeared...

...A man tested in high office and of proven political courage, he had promised to become one of the most original and powerful Chancellors since the War...

...Then Macleod's successor as Chancellor of the Exchequer, Anthony Barber, unveiled the Heath government's first annual budget before the House of Commons...

...A democracy cannot make the people work hard," he said...

...After all, the very poor and the very rich—comprising only about 5 per cent of Britain's population—do not provide a very promising electoral base.—JOHN MANDER Chinese Diplomacy HONG KONG—One measure of how flat-footed the Great Ping-Pong Ploy caught everyone was the initial reaction of newsmen here...

...As far as could be determined, however, the American delegation included no political activists and nobody with special knowledge about—or interest in—China...

...The "new Toryism" seemed more inclined to knock down than to build...

...Although unprepared for such a mission, they handled it with aplomb...

...That hardly seems to be the role Communist intellectuals have in mind for the peasants, and it does not take too much imagination to figure out whose vision of a Communist future would win out in the end...

...STEVEN KALMAN Barber's Budget LONDON—It is generally agreed that Edward Heath's government was dealt a severe blow by the sudden death of Iain Macleod last July, a few weeks after his installation as Chancellor of the Exchequer...

...To him, Communism seems to be a mixture of the puritan ethic and nationalism —and above all a means of imposing on the masses the visions of greatness conjured up by Third World intellectuals who are infected with a certain jealousy of the advanced West...

...Barber and Heath, who had made so much of the "incentive" as a means of stimulating Britain's economy, suddenly seemed a good deal less clever than they had appeared on budget day...

...Still, our unlikely ambassadors performed their task admirably...

...Quite spontaneously, he mentioned that the man he admired most in history was Adolf Hitler, because he made Germany into a great nation...

...The government, despite its strongly pro-European orientation, otherwise took on a distinctly negative look...

...With Macleod's passing, some observers forecast that the Heath government would lose its political way —and subsequent developments seemed to bear out their predictions...

...The rest —including a strait-laced Chrysler executive from Detroit, a bearded college professor from Long Island, a Negro UN employe from Brooklyn, and an ibm programmer from Seattle—added to the mixture...

...While favorable to the wealthy, the new budget promised benefits for middle-and lower-class Britons...

...But not the Chinese...

...By the time the team returned from its unforgettable week of feasting, sightseeing and Ping-Pong playing, the significance of its adventure was clear...

...Most knowledgeable observers credited the sophisticated and smooth Chinese premier for the initiative...

...Many correspondents were annoyed at having to spend the better part of a Friday evening at Hong Kong's airport awaiting the group's arrival from Tokyo...

...When I pressed further, he explained that "the nation" was a sort of spiritual entity apart from the people who happened to live inside its borders...

...This too, he replied, was for the good of the nation, and the fact that they "have different opinions" was sufficient reason for killing them...

...It is not likely that Iain Macleod would have allowed his party to take such a course...

...It was especially hostile, of course, to the demands of successive waves of striking British workers—though here it gained some public support...

...They think such things out before they act...

...Even though China is a Communist nation, he thinks India should try to conquer it...

...And that, of course, led to his remarkable exchange with Chou En-lai about the hippie movement among American youth and the principle of judging people by what they are, not what they wear...

...Only a Communist government can force the people to work...

...What about people being murdered by a Communist regime...

...When they come out—that may be a story...

...Barber's budget speech was clear and to the point, presenting an apparently well-thought-out and well-balanced case, which Labor found difficult to fault...

...It was surprisingly vindictive toward institutions and individuals installed by its opponents over the past six years...

...We are an incredible bunch," remarked J. R. "Tim" Boggan, 40-year-old faculty member at Long Island University...

...Conning the Masses SINGAPORE—A chance encounter with an 18-year-old high school graduate here afforded unusual insight into the sources of Communism's appeal to the educated and semieducated of the developing world...

...He did not indulge in jargon about Western democracy being a mask for bourgeois rule: He favored dictatorship because he realized that the people would resist any regimentation imposed on them...

...Amid the general acclaim, there was even talk of a "new Barber," big enough to fill the shoes of Iain Macleod...

...It adds a certain purity to the situation...

...That's just fine," Bo2?ran observed...

...The masses in India are lazy, as were the masses in China before 1949...

...But now they must work, and that means national greatness...

...My Indo-Singaporean acquaintance went on to say that India should get nuclear weapons so it could fight Pakistan and China...

...My dream is that one day the whole world will bow before India...

...The timing and grace of the Chinese move suggested that Washington could learn a great deal about diplomacy from Peking...