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FORMOSA. Joseph W. Ballentine. Washington, D. C.: The Brookings Institution,
1952. 218 pages. $2.75.
Reviewed by Admiral Charles M.
Cooke, U. S. Navy (Retired)
(Admiral Cooke was Chief Strategical Advisor and Chief of Staff to Admiral E. J. King during World War II and commanded the Seventh Fleet in the China area during 1946, 1947, and part of 1948, until he was retired for age. During 1950 and 1951 he served as Advisor to Generalissimo Cliiang Kai-shek in Formosa.)
On the last pages of his book, Mr. Ballentine states:
“The main purpose of this study has been to assemble and arrange the facts that are relevant to an answer to the questions here raised, if and when it becomes necessary for the people and the government of the United States to give an answer and to stand upon that answer.”
In his presentation, Mr. Ballentine shows himself well informed as to the facts up to the end of World War II. These facts are well presented in Part I of his book. In Part II: Developments Since World War II, and Part III: The Present and The Future, the merits and shortcomings of the Nationalist government are objectively and fairly comprehensively presented. But in fulfilling the indicated purpose of his study on Formosa, namely to give the people and the government of the United States an authoritative presentation of the truth relating to the Formosa problem, Formosa falls short.
An objective presentation of truth cannot be regarded as satisfactory when salient facts are omitted, either from lack of knowledge or from a reluctance to make forthright statements. While it is true that an informed reader can discern serious shortcomings on the part of the United States Government in handling the Formosa problem, the average reader will not receive adequate guidance.
If the government of the Republic of China, the Nationalist Government, is to be effectively used in behalf of the United States, of the free world, and of Free China, it is essential that a true picture be presented as to its failures, as to what caused them, and as to the bearing of these failures on a true evaluation of present and future strength. Mr. Ballen- tine’s presentation omits completely many determining and vital facts. He omits to state that the best Chinese divisions were equipped with American arms to fight the Japanese, that in the summer of 1946 a complete embargo on military supplies, including ammunition for Chinese Nationalist guns of American manufacture, was imposed by the United States and continued in effect for over a year—imposed to force the Chinese Nationalist government to bring into the government the Communists who were not only in rebellion against it but who were dedicated to the overthrow of the Nationalist government. Mr. Ballentine does give some watered-down recognition of the fact that at the same time that the Nationalists were being hamstrung by U. S. government action the Communist armies were being armed and supplied and trained by the Russians in Manchuria.
Mr. Ballentine follows the State Department line in his assumption that the protection of the Seventh Fleet was necessary to prevent the fall of Formosa to Communism in 1950. Presumably he was not aware that the State Department allowed no official intelligence agencies or personnel to visit Formosa during the period between the fall of mainland China and the beginning of the Korean war, except those under the control of the State Department. MacArthur was not allowed to have any intelligence agents in Formosa, nor the Navy, nor CIA—just State Department representatives, including military attaches. The military attache who reported facts that did not follow the State Department line was summarily detached. Thus it was that during the fall of 1949 the U. S. Consul General could report without challenge that Nationalist control of Formosa was on the point of collapse and could be expected to continue not more than a few weeks. These discrediting predictions which continued off and on for a period of nine months never materialized, but they seriously hampered the recovery of Formosa under the Nationalist regime and the reestablishment of the strength and integrity of the Nationalist government in the public opinion of the United States and the world.
In the omissions listed above, and others, Formosa fails to show, in so many words, how the United States built up the position and prestige of China in 1943 at the Cairo Conference in order better to serve the American objective of defeating Japan, of how in 1945 China was treated as a secondary and subservient power in order to serve the interests of Russia, and perhaps also expedite the defeat of Japan, of how after the war U. S. Government treatment of a friendly power became increasingly and manifestly hostile and antagonistic. The study does indicate how American public opinion has restrained further extension of U. S. Governmental hostility to Free China in favor of Communism.
There still seems to be little public information available as to just how far the
American government advanced toward the recognition of Communist China during the period August, 1949, to June, 1950, in conjunction with the British government. Some of the pertinent facts are related in Formosa. In August, 1949, the State Department condemned the Nationalist government in its so-called White paper, United Stales Relations with China, frequently referred to in Formosa. On the 1st of October the Communist government in China was established, to be recognized by Russia a few days later. About two weeks later a secret conference was held in Washington, as reported by Mr. Stassen, a member of the conference, in which recognition of Communist China was considered. In December, 1949, U. S. diplomatic representatives all over the world were warned to prepare for the fall of Formosa. On January 5, 1950, England recognized Communist China, and the United States declared that the U. S. government was no longer concerned with the strategic importance of Formosa and would give no further military assistance or advice. These and other facts properly juxtaposed do not of themselves establish coordination of action between England and the United States, but they do give food for thought. A discussion by one with Mr. Bal- lentine’s diplomatic background of this pertinent sequence of events would have been welcome. Also omitted in his book is any account of State Department officials, concerned with the direction and handling of our Far Eastern Affairs, who have since been found to be security risks, and some of whom have acknowledged serious errors in the conduct of our relationships with the Chinese government and the Communist regime m the Far East.
Mr. Ballentine’s book does contain many valuable facts which can be useful to a careful reader. At times he almost approaches a position of being critical of U. S. action in the direct manner of his criticisms of Chinese shortcomings, but each time as he sticks a hesitating foot into the water he seems 1° find it too cold to plunge in. _
With regard to the status of Chiang Kal' shek, as to his not being popular with overseas Chinese, Mr. Ballentine might wed have added that, whether that was still true or not, no substitute for Chiang Kai-shek had been found or proposed by the Chinese or Americans or anyone else, except the Communists—who of course favor Mao Tse-tung.
THE WAR AGAINST JAPAN. A Pictorial Record, prepared in the Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army. Washington, D. C.: Government Printing Office, 1952. 480 pages. $3.50.
Reviewed by Lieutenant General Robert L. Eichelberger, U. S.
Army (Retired)
(General Eichelberger, Superintendent of the U. S. Military Academy, West Point, at the beginning of American participation in World Ward II, held major command positions in the Pacific throughout the war. He is best known for his leadership in the New Guinea, New Britain, and Philippine liberation campaigns and as commander of the 8tli A rmy, 1944-48.)
This volume has much of merit. The photographs are an indelible record of many phases of our war in the Pacific. One sees details of landings, construction of airfields, and something of the naval war, as well as of the great air fight. The military student will find these photographs of interest and value.
The discussion is perhaps over-simplified, but gives enough for the casual student to follow the progress towards victory. Although I have said that the volume has much merit, it is doubtful whether it will satisfy the serious student, if taken by itself. Additional maps and sketches are needed. Being familiar through years of actual contact with the ground fighting, I should like to see more information about the Navy and its part in the victory. Then too, I question the value of some of the photographs, as compared with those which might have been included.
When I have studied the Brady photographs of the War of the Confederacy, among the most prized ones are those that show the leaders, such as Sherman and Grant, as they actually appeared at the time and while in the field. In this book I have not noticed the presence of any officers, and I believe that from a historical standpoint, this is an error. Surrender Day on the Missouri in Tokyo Bay was a real high-point of history. The picture, page 456, doesn’t identify the occasion in any way. The Allied leaders could have been shown, or perhaps Admiral Nimitz signing the surrender document with Admiral Halsey in the background. A photograph of the Japanese surrender delegation coming aboard would have been of historical interest. To me, also the sight of the great air armada over the Missouri after the conclusion of the ceremony was a memorable one. The view of four B-29’s on page 457 does not do justice to the occasion.
There are no photographs of the historic landing at Atsugi Airfield on August 20, 1945. The picture on page 458 of a few troops at Tateyama covers one of the least important phases which involved the Eighth Army in Japan.
In the Southwest Pacific fighting, along the axis from Australia to the Philippines, the publicity customarily made all opposition seem easy and the casualties light. Photographs of many operations were few, and individual armies did not have the right to issue communiques as was done in Europe. On the other hand, Navy vessels were floating photographic laboratories, and often coverage of landings on certain small islands was out of proportion to the importance of the operation.
The casualties as covered in the book I believe to be in error. In preparing figures on casualties for the Pacific for the Saturday Evening Post, I found them to be approximately 300,000. My figure was disputed at first because General Marshall’s final report has given the casualties at approximately 170,000. This figure was found to be that for the Army alone, of which the Southwest Pacific area took approximately 112,000 in a theater that was supposed to have had very few losses.
This book is unique in failing to present any photographs of the high command in the Pacific, to say nothing of failure to mention their names in the discussion.
Although I have pointed out that there are better photographs which could have been selected covering certain specific events, nevertheless, the Volume has some value for the student of the future.
EL CAMPESINO. By Valentin Gonzalez and Julian Gorkin. New York: Van Rees Press, 1952. 218 pages, $3.50.
MY RINGSIDE SEAT IN MOSCOW. By Nicholas Nyaradi. New York: Thomas T. Crowell Company, 1952. 297 pages, $3.75.
Reviewed by Captain William R.
Smedberg III, U. S. Navy
(Captain Smedberg was aide to Secretary James For- restal, 1946-47, recommissioned and commanded the battleship Iowa, and is now Chief of Staff to the Commander Destroyers, Atlantic Fleet.)
In these two books we are afforded a realistic look at Russia and her brand of Communism, through the eyes of two men whose backgrounds, upbringing, and education bear not the slightest similarity. The story of one man starts in Spain; the other, in Hungary. Each had achieved a measure of fame or success in his own country; each had an unusual opportunity to learn much about Russia and the ways of the Kremlin. What these two foreigners, privileged for a time as few others have been in Moscow, saw and learned of the phony Soviet Communism makes engrossing reading—valuable textbooks for all who prize their freedom.
Valentin Gonzalez, known as El Campe- sino (The Peasant) grew up in a hard school. Born in a humble family, in the wild, mountainous, backward province of Estramadura in Spain, constantly fighting to wrest a living from the harsh soil, he spent his boyhood in an atmosphere of ceaseless struggle against the oppression of the monarchy. First arrested by police at fifteen, he progressed through his murder of four civil guards with a home made bomb when he was sixteen, in and out of jails and military prisons, until he joined the Spanish Communist party in 1929. Then came the Civil War when he twice saved Madrid, became the hero of the peoples armies of the Republic, was used by the Russian Communists, and finally “honored” by being enrolled in the Frunze Academy, the highest staff college in the Soviet Union. He was called “one of the leaders of the Red Army in the service of World Revolution.” In spite of every initial advantage, including his marriage to one of the Soviet elite—a friend of Stalin’s daughter —his fierce belief in human dignity, impatience with restraint, and hostility to the type of authority wielded over all Russians, caused him to be finally expelled from the Academy. His attempts to leave the country, arrests, escapes, recaptures, imprisonments, and accounts of tortures make almost unbelievable reading. Few humans could have survived and made a final escape, still sane, from what El Campesino describes as the “most perfect machine ever devised to disintegrate and dehumanize human beings.’ Few foreign diplomats have been given the same privileges, seen so much of official life in Moscow, and become personally acquainted with such high-ranking members of the Russian Government as Dr. Nicholas Nyaradi. His family was as distinguished in Hungary, for many generations, as that of Gonzalez was lowly and unknown in Spain- A banker and lawyer before he became Hungary’s last non-Communist Minister of Finance, he was sent to Moscow to conduct negotiations over a fraudulent Soviet reparations claim of 200 million dollars which his impoverished country couldn’t even begin to pay. During the seven months of heartbreaking conferences with the powerful Mikoyan, or Merkulov, he was allowed to watch the Red Army, visit farms and factories, talk to people in the streets, attend official parties, and listen to some of Russia s top policy makers and their plans for the future. It became apparent to the man from freedom-loving Hungary that the Soviet development of so-called Communism had lost any resemblance to the basic principles of communal benefit to the people. He determined to help the rest of the world to discover the true conditions inside Russia. ln this book of his, My Ringside Seal in Moscow, he does just that, in an admirable and impressive manner.
Both men, the peasant and the aristocrat, have looked closely at the Soviets and their system. Both men were considered impof' tant to the Reds who took particular pains to win them over, but both arrived at the identical conclusion: Soviet Communism is not for the people; it is as false and hyp®' critical as its small group of rulers; and it lS definitely not for either of them.
BRASSEY’S ANNUAL: THE ARMED FORCES YEAR-BOOK, 1952. Edited by Rear-Admiral H. G. Thursfield. New York: The Macmillan Company, 430 pp. + 22 photographs. $9.50.
Reviewed by Commander Ellery H.
Clark, Jr., U. S. Naval Reserve
(iCommander Clark is an associate professor, Department of English, History, and Government, U. S. Naval Academy, and a member of the naval history staff.)
This edition, third in treatment of Britain’s three fighting services and sixty- third in its naval history, comprises over thirty essays appropriately placed either in the section of general reading interest or one relating to a particular defense department.
Major General Wade briefly reviews the evolution of British naval strategy from a past desire to defeat an enemy surface fleet to the present “combat the mine, the submarine and air-borne weapons.” The current fleet strength and building program of the Royal Navy reflect this emphasis upon anti-submarine warfare. The active force includes 5 carriers, 12 cruisers, 67 destroyers and frigates, 39 submarines, 46 minesweepers, and no battleships.
In naval technology the British continue to make good progress in gas turbines, steam catapults, and underwater television, the latter successfully used in 1951 to identify the sunken British submarine Affray, lying at a depth of 258 feet.
Several articles historically interesting are on such varied subjects as the development of the British destroyer since 1894, the problems and progress of the British Reserve Fleet, and the work of the Royal Navy in the recent Suez Canal crisis.
Russia’s Navy probably has from 350 to 400 submarines in commission and another 120 under construction. Estimated new additions during the year include three of the Sverdlof class cruisers, each mounting nine 8" guns, and four 40-knot destroyers. Editor Thursfield considers the 1952 completion of any new Soviet battleships very unlikely.
Many contributors discuss important facets of the current struggle between contrasting civilizations. Jules Menken’s “War by Proxy” depicts the Communists’ seven support measures in insurrectionary wars, fought in areas marked by agrarian and middle-class discontent, rising nationalism, and political weakness. Sir Robert Lockhart’s “Political Warfare” presents interesting statistics on the number of radio broadcast hours spent in psychological warfare, about 762 hours weekly by the Soviets and 667 by the United States. Colonel Wyndham’s “The Near and Middle East in Relation to Western Defence” describes Yugoslavia as the key to the Balkans and geographically a “possible thorn in the side of either West or East.”
Land and sea air power articles provide a basis for discussion. Lieutenant Commander Nicholl believes that the World War II success of the aircraft carrier may not be duplicated in another war and that its future duties will be for escort, anti-submarine patrol, fleet defense, amphibious operations, or action against surface forces. J. M. Spaight, reflecting upon the land operations of aircraft in this same war, criticizes certain Allied bombing objectives and priorities and recommends for the future more attention to enemy fuel and transportation areas and less to city-wrecking.
The photographs are valuable and show good topical balance. British naval and military forces in action supplement the views of ships and aircraft.
This volume of Brassey is well worth careful perusal by all naval personnel.