On the Chinese Home Front

...The plot was nonpolitical and non-militant...

...In the midst of war, the government had to show all was "normal" to hide the real-it v of the killing and suffering its troops were inflicting on the uppity cousins who had dared to defy yet another Chinese tradition, much older than the one on stage—that of China's suzerainty south of the Vietnam border...

...After all, Kweilin's airport serves civilian and military planes alike, and one of the guides had somewhat surprised me by confessing he had seen "many" fighters and transports there earlier...

...Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping had met with President Carter, they noted, and U.S...

...We are not like that," he responded, conveniently forgetting the mass protests that the Chinese had once held against America's war in Vietnam...

...cargo, a pink-cheeked girl in a conductor's uniform escorted me to the VIP waiting room...

...troops into Cambodia in May of 1970) was not accidental...

...The air of peace in a region that would have been engulfed in a "wider war" (the kind that Richard M. Nixon claimed he was "not seeking" when he sent U.S...

...The waiting room was jammed before departures, and security was minimal...

...To the Kweilinese, however, the conflict—just then reaching a crescendo—might as well have been in Africa or Latin America...

...The Russians force Vietnam to fight," said the oldest one among them, amid nods, ironic laughter and grunts of approval...

...Despite the seeming apathy of the Cantonese, I was still anticipating a display of militancy in this scenic city set between rows of limestone Karsts towering like sentinels above the Li River, some 300 miles from the Vietnamese frontier...

...Another billboard depicted farmers and workers, men and women of all ages, happily engaged in the nation's second "long march"—this one toward economic and technological achievement...

...A huge poster opposite the railroad station was emblazoned with giant red characters calling on the people to "unite, unite, unite" and "study, study, study...

...If the people of Kweilin had any really firm feeling about the fighting, it was that China was serious about "withdrawing" its troops...

...Obviously, the word now was moderation, and the authorities were as anxious to inculcate a rational outlook as they had at one time been to spur revolutionary zeal...

...With equal naivete, they believed the United States and Japan would keep the Soviet Union from invading by issuing warnings...

...In a less structured exchange— with no guides or officials eavesdropping on us—eight or nine young Chinese truck drivers and factory workers exchanged opinions by lantern light in a crowded alley near my hotel...

...I cannot imagine the war will last long or will come here," said a middle-aged cadre from Peking, leaning over the rail of an old ferry boat as we cruised down the Li River on a tourist's excursion...

...The next day, as a crowd of curious Cantonese gathered round, one of them told me that no one worried about the fighting: "It is very far from here...

...Two or three doors away, in a ramshackle, drafty hall, an audience ranging from shrieking children to grinning old men gaped at a slapstick comedy featuring an old man with a beard, a pretty girl in a long, tight dress and a young rascal...

...The mood of Nanning, seat of the provincial capital and a major military headquarters approximately midway between here and the frontier, might well have reflected deeper concerns, but discussions in Kweilin tended to be abstract...

...It was traditional operetta, a genre revived last year after having been banned during the Cultural Revolution...

...We have very little news," one of the ever polite, almost omnipresent China Travel Service guides told me my first evening in Kwangchow (Canton), during a brief stopover on my way here from Hong Kong...

...One night, as I wandered about searching for signs of military Donaid Kirk, a longtime NL contributor, is a freelance journalist currently reporting from the Far East...

...Secretary of the Treasury W. Michael Blumenthal had been to Peking...

...I thought 1 was about to be questioned by the security police, but it turned out she merely thought I was lost and wanted to make sure 1 was well treated...

...In any case, he was sure the offensive had not disturbed the masses of Cantonese strolling by us on the esplanade overlooking the Pearl River...

...The USSR, they agreed, was the real villain...

...The spacious modern railroad station, on the main line along which the Chinese had once shipped arms to aid the Vietnamese against the French and the Americans, also was a picture of tranquillity...

...They did not know the White House had opposed China's entry into Vietnam, and simply assumed America would be on China's side...

...The implication was clear: If there was nasty "punishment" to mete out to Vietnam, as the Communist Party headquarters in Peking had stated at the outset, the troops were doing it as quietly as possible without compromising new priorities on the home front...

...A young official said he assumed arms were passing through here "secretly at night...

...They were exuberant in their new faith...

...Perhaps through such entertainment the authorities hoped to divert the masses from more serious matters...

...Nevertheless, he seemed puzzled when asked if outraged citizens were staging demonstrations or rallies...

...One sure sign of the authorities' zeal to discourage informed debate was that Nanning was closed to both foreign and Chinese visitors throughout the offensive...

...Nothing has changed...

...Soldiers mingled with civilians inside, to be sure, but none carried a weapon or a pack...

...Although the broad streets of the town were crowded at times with military vehicles, most of these were laden with gravel, cement and other construction material...

...People paid little attention to them as they bicycled along serenely, flocked to the markets and cafes, packed the theaters, and even smiled at the foreign visitors in their midst...

...Otherwise, Vietnam gets no food to eat...

...The last time I visited China, in March 1978, Chinese still did not dare invite foreigners to their homes, much less sing, dance and drink with them at private parties...

...One of the Chinese played an accordion, and some young Chinese women practiced dance steps on the brick pavement...

...Nobody would have thought of talking about the war if I had neglected to ask...

...The shortwave bands of my pocket-sized Sony, purchased in Hong Kong to keep me up on the war news while I tried to get as close to the conflict as the authorities would allow, blared out a cacophony of pleas, statements and speeches from a dozen nearby capitals...

...We were all participating in an impromptu party where a vice president of an American bank strummed a guitar and sang such ditties as "John Brown's Body" and "Waltzing Matilda...

...It's just a border conflict," echoed another cadre, repeating the view I had heard in Kwangchow that "everything is quite normal...

...Yet except for a few old mig- 17s under canvas on the end of the single strip, the military planes were all gone bythetimeour CAAC Trident touched down beside them and taxied to the terminal...

...If the Russians attacked, a couple of them maintained with a dash of bravado, the Chinese would surely win, because "the Chinese outnumber the Russians...

...At the same time, it was another device to keep people from getting excited, and possibly even destructively "revolutionary," all over again...

...With a perfectly straight face, he explained that he personally listened to the news on Voice of America and the BBC but was uncertain how much he could believe...

...You see, our life is normal," he said, glancing toward the freighters unloading onto lighters several hundred yards away...

...The setting of our conversation was as significant as the words...