THE PEACE IN PREPARATION
. . . THE PEACE IN PREPARATION . . . Molotov THE distorted emphasis placed by the American press and the State Department on developments in Japan has effectively screened from the public the...
...He pointed out that big industrialists get off with a 20 per cent tax in supporting a war which cost individuals as much as 80 per cent of their income...
...They might stop long enough to remember that we have America's future position in the Far East to think about...
...How will they regard democracy if their food is one-third less than what they got during the worst period of the war...
...An Epic Tragedy' Some of the comments by trained correspondents, most of which were buried in inside pages, are especially revealing...
...If the conference leaders have their way, people everywhere are not even to be told what part of the world is, at any given moment, paying the price of rivalries and national egotisms, delaying indefinitely a return to peace and sanity...
...Foreign Minister Bidault's Republican Populaire Party, pledged to support Gen...
...We aren't going to feed them, but it's up to us to see that they get the most out of their own food factories...
...Kuh made it clear, as have other correspondents, that "the conference has, unquestionably, brought into sharp relief the deterioration of Anglo-Soviet relations, regardless of the advent of the British Labor Government to power...
...The Sun's correspondent took occasion to point out on his own that "comments in some sections of the American press, as reported in dispatches received here, are diametrically opposed to the Chinese attitude to- ward the Japanese, which is uniformly conciliatory.'' Pointing Toward Democracy Meanwhile, even before the Truman Administration's announcement of its "policy" in Japan, Mac-Arthur's command took action which the Associated Press correspondent in Tokyo described as designed to "see that the fallen nation feeds itself and develops an appetite for democracy...
...Frederick Kuh, covering the conference for the Marshall Field papers, New York's PM and the Chicago Sun, referred to the deliberations as an "epic tragedy," and denounced the "barren and fatuous communiques" issued by "these five men with a mania for secrecy...
...Douglas MacArthur's policy of firmness and fairness in dealing with the conquered Japanese drew repeated fire from jingoists in the United States...
...After three weeks of secret meetings in a guarded London palace, the Foreign Ministers prepared to adjourn this week without reaching agreement on a single major issue...
...Some face-saving formula was being prepared for a final announcement, the New York Times reporting from London that the Foreign Ministers may "pull something out of their hats at the last minute so as not to have to register virtually complete failure...
...See editorial on Page 12...
...Confirmation of Dean Acheson as Undersecretary of State became a part of the controversy after Acheson had issued a statement rebuking MacArthur for fixing policy in occupied Japan...
...We are charged with teaching the Japanese people to be democratic...
...The American policy, the Truman Administration has decided, calls for encouraging sweeping changes in Japan's economic, political, and social systems which, again, is not in opposition to the program being pursued by MacArthur...
...Such people back there, who have never seen any fighting, are getting tough now that the fighting is over...
...We want a peaceful population...
...Jingoists On Fire Meanwhile, the commotion over the preliminary settlement in Japan continued to claim most of the headlines w.hile the tragedy of London went largely unnoticed...
...A Tokyo dispatch to the Chicago Sun this week quoted "highly placed officials of the supreme command of the Allied Powers" as saying that Gen...
...Molotov, Byrnes,|and Bev-in are brooking no interference from others—are being governed by any basic principles or a long-time program, other than the power policy formula of stab-and-grab...
...The conference, he said, "is deadlocked, frustrated, and steeped in conflicts in almost every phase of its drooping efforts...
...Raymond C. Kramer of MacArthur's economic and scientific section-announced that U. S. policy will be to seek "to give the man in the street a break which will make him like democracy...
...From none of the reports has there been the slightest indication that the Big Five or more properly the Big Three since the Messrs...
...THE PEACE IN PREPARATION . . . Molotov THE distorted emphasis placed by the American press and the State Department on developments in Japan has effectively screened from the public the vastly important story of the tragic fiasco in London where the Big Five's Council of Foreign Ministers has failed utterly to bring any order out of the chaos of Europe...
...No Guiding Principles Symptomatic of the strained situation was the protest by Soviet Foreign Commissar Molotov that the Council's announcements had made too much information available to the people of the world...
...Commenting on criticisms that MacArthur was pursuing a "sissy" policy toward the Japanese, one official asked: "Can't we enforce the peace and surrender terms without being thugs...
...de Gaulle, won 106 seats, while the Communists picked up 75...
...Molotov, according to all reports, including those filed by correspondents most friendly to the Soviet Union, has been adamant in refusing to budge from Russia's demands for control of Central Europe, for heavy reparations from Italy, for African colonies, and for the extension of her influence in the Darda- nelles, the Mediterranean, Turkey, and Iran...
...Faced with the assignment of preparing what was to be, in actuality, a peace settlement for Europe, the Council has roamed over the subjects of reparations, trusteeships, boundaries, waterways, disposition of territories and colonies, and economic needs without approaching anything resembling definitive agreement...
...There is not one of the latter who is not deeply worried, disappointed, or pessimistic...
...Belatedly, the Truman Administration, which has vacillated one day in favor of MacArthur policy and the next day against, made public the instructions sent to MacArthur which call for stripping Japan of its war production industries and limiting the rest of its heavy manufactures to strictly peaceful requirements—a course which is no way in conflict with the policies being pursued by MacArthur...
...We must snap them out of their daze and let them do a normal day's work...
...Leon Blum's Socialist Party achieved the greatest advance when it gained 195 seats, on the basis of nearly complete returns...
...There is no use dodging what is now plain: A serious cleavage has developed between Russia and the Western democracies...
...All this must be done with a minimum of restrictions on the daily life of the Japanese to ward off black prospects three or four-months hence...
...A lot of people would like to see us pour thousands of troops into the streets armed with billies to knock the Japs about...
...The Radical-Socialists, a center group, lost 197 seats while parties of the Right were routed with the loss of 324...
...Mac-Arthur "will continue to enforce the surrender terms and carry out the occupation policy he established without change, criticisms notwithstanding...
...Despite this protest, however, Molotov convened a press conference and for 45 minutes presented the Soviet viewpoint for publication...
...Across the Channel in France, that nation's Leftist parties scored a sweeping victory in local elections last week...
...Said Herbert L. Matthews of the New York Times: "The New York Times has four or five correspondents covering this conference daily and they come in contact with many persons connected with the Council...
...Col...
...MacArthur believes we can punish the Japanese in such a way as to make them respect us, not hate us...
...At the outset," he said, "we must strive to prevent inflation, level off prices, and supervise rationing...
Vol. 9 • October 1945 • No. 39
