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Foreign Affairs

HOUSE OF COMMONS Foreign Affairs

[MR. MACLEAN.] that the present rulers of Russia, finding their way blocked in the West, should follow the example of their Imperial pre- decessors and turn eastwards.

Europe has never been the only or the most important field of Russian policy. Whether she be ruled by Czars or com- missars, Russia has been and remains an Asiatic no less than a European Power. Marshal Stalin himself is an Oriental, and, by all accounts, proud of it. The mantle of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane has fallen upon him and sits as easily as that of Kutusov and Suvarov. When- ever, in the past, insuperable obstacles have arisen in the West, she has always turned towards the East. And now once again the Russians and those who serve them are on the move in Asia.

no

The situation is most immediately alarming in China, where Chiang Kai- shek's Nationalist Government is longer able to hold its own against the Communists, who now control half the country. Indeed, unless something is done, and done soon, there is reason to fear that in a matter of months the whole of China will have gone Communist.

Mr. Gallacher: Hear, hear.

Mr. Maclean: I am glad to get con- firmation for some of my ideas from such an authoritative source.

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Mr. Gallacher: Is it not the case that what the hon. and gallant Member calls "Communists must have the mass of the people behind them in resisting the millions of dollars and all kinds of arma- ments which America has poured into China for Chiang Kai-shek for so many years?

Mr. Platts-Mills: And men, too. Mr. Maclean: I would not agree with

that.

Mr. Platts-Mills: If the hon. Gentle- man will not face up to that will he ex- plain what he thinks is the danger to the Chinese people in chucking out the bar- barians who have been ruling them for the last 20 years? What danger is there in the Chinese people getting rid of Fascism in their country?

Mr. Maclean: It does not always follow that because a set of people win military victories they necessarily have the mass

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of the people behind them. Hitler over- ran large areas of Europe, but I do not really think that the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) would suggest that he had the mass of the people of Europe behind him.

Now, there are some who regard these developments with equanimity. Some hon. Members opposite even seem to regard them with enthusiasm. We hear the old argument that Chinese Commu- nists are not really Communists, but simply agrarian reformers with rather advanced views. From the enthusiasm which the hon. Member for West Fife shows for them there can be little doubt that they are the real thing. We also hear that even if China were to fall under Soviet or Communist domination, the Chinese people will, in the long run, get may be so, but for practical purposes the best of any foreign conqueror. That

these are rash assumptions on which to work. The Communist Moscow-trained leaders are at present manifestly on the best terms with the Kremlin. But it is possible that they will turn out, as other apparently good Communists have turned out, to be diversionists. It is all very well for the hon. Member for West Fife to look so smug, but I have known Com- munists who appeared to be perfectly respectable, like himself, but who, never- theless, much to their surprise, turned out to be Left or Right wing diversionists, or both at the same time. My advice to the hon. Member would be to be very careful indeed. These things may happen to anyone, but, as I say, it is a risky assumption on which to work.

It would be no less risky to place too much reliance on the long-term powers of resistance of the Chinese people. To do that would be to underrate the tech- nical efficiency, in these matters, of the They have learned a lot since their earlier Soviet Government and their fifth column.

failures in China. What we must not forget is that their colonial policy is one of their strongest points. For instance, in the years before the war they succeeded, with little effort, and without attracting attention at all, in appropriating the whole of Outer Mongolia, Sinkiang, not to mention the people's republic of Tannu Tuva, all nominally parts of China and equivalent in area to the whole of the Japanese conquests in Manchuria.

No. We must face up to the fact that if China is allowed to go Communist

Foreign Affairs

9 DECEMBER 1948

661 she will become a Soviet dominion, just as Outer Mongolia, Poland and Roumania have become Soviet domi- nions. If that happens the result will be a very serious shifting in the balance of world power, for, in the first place, the immense human and material re- sources of China will be placed at Russia's disposal and, secondly, Russia will find herself geographically and strategically in an irresistibly strong posi- tion from which to continue her con- quest of Asia. Sprawling across the whole of North Asia, from Port Arthur to Mount Ararat, Russia is already ex-

tremely well placed to follow her policy of Asiatic expansion while, politically, the teeming masses of Asia, who have grown used to a standard of life so low that any change must seem desirable, offer, as I am sure the hon. Member for West Fife will agree, an ideal field for Communist penetration.

In the 80's and 90's of the last cen- tury the Russians were checked by the knowledge that in their victorious ad- vance in Asia they must reckon with the embattled might of the British Empire. Today, that Empire, in the phrase of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is being liquidated," leaving a power vacuum which invites aggression and expansion. It is too much to hope that Pakistan and India, weakened and divided, will succeed for long in holding their own, unaided, against the overwhelming politi- cal, military and economic pressure of the Soviet Union. The same applies to Burma and other countries of South-East Asia, which are already being subjected to an intensive softening up process; to Afghanistan, Palestine and Iraq, in all of which a powerful Soviet fifth column is already at work.

Mr. Fairburst (Oldham): The hon. Member said а vacuum was being created by the liquidation of the British Empire. Can he tell us what force we should develop to fill that vacuum?

Mr. Maclean: If the hon. Member will listen 1 will do my best to answer him, although it is not for back benchers on this side of the House to produce a policy for the Government.

What chance is there of retrieving the situation before it is too late? The view is widely held that it is worse than use- less to help the present Government of

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Foreign Affairs China, that money sent to them is squan- dered while arms find their way almost immediately into the hands of the Com- munists. That may be so, but I think that even so we should not be in too great a hurry to abandon, without further ado, Chiang Kai-shek who, for a quarter of a century, fought constantly and not unsuccessfully against a variety of enemies, some of them ours, and who, again and again, has extricated his country and himself from apparently hopeless predicaments.

But if in fact it is, as it may well be, impossible to instil new life into the Nationalist Government, then some alternative rallying point must be found. For, after all, if, as seems all too likely, further vast stretches of the country fall into the hands of the Communists, it will have this effect: that, as the areas under their control grow larger, they will find themselves forced ever more on to the defensive and thus forfeit the initia- tive and the mobility which are at present among their most important assets.

But if China, and with it the rest of Asia, are not to fall under Soviet domination, what is needed above all is a strong positive lead from the West. The hon. Member did me the honour to ask me what my solution of this problem was. I would say A strong positive lead from the West.

Mr. Gallacher: What does that mean?

Mr. Maclean; I will tell the hon. Mem- ber. It is no use our deluding ourselves, with Asia and half Europe under Com- munist

The control.

outlook for Democracy would be gloomy, Atlantic pact or no Atlantic pact.

Mr. Gallacher: For Tory Democracy.

Mr. Maclean: It is not enough for us to barricade our front doors while leav- ing wide open what Lenin called—I hope the hon. Member for West Fife will recognise the quotation-the back door of the Capitalist and Imperialist Powers, which means, in his language, the Demo- cratic Powers. To meet a two-fold menace, we need a dual system of de- fence, Eastern Union as well as Western Union, a Pacific pact as well as an Atlantic Pact.

Mr. Gallacher: Will the hon. Member allow me?