25 days inside red China

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Part of Panorama

Title: 25 days inside red China
Creator: Jesus Marcos Roces
Language: English
Source: Panorama X (10) October 1958
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Fulltext: An eye-opener for Free Asia 25 Days Inside Red China By JESUS MARCOS ROCES Vice-Mayor of Manila Fou might be surprised to know that the trip I made to Red China was the cul mination of a plan that was initiated over two years ago. It was during a series of in formal discussions with friends on our national future that we came to the conclusion that we in the Philippines knew very October 1958 1J little about what was going on behind the bamboo curtain. We decided that because of our geographic proximity with the mainland of China, it was vital for us to know first what was happening there. The late Ramon Magsaysay, with whom the matter was brought up in 1956, thought the project a meritorious one and asked me to find out if a trip to the Chinese mainland would be feasible. Later, I in formed him that I had been able to obtain an invitation from the Red Chinese Govern ment. Although the President was personally in favor of the idea, he was somewhat hesitant to give me the green light be cause of other angles that might embarrass the government if such a trip was made. It therefore waited for the President’s authorization. I fin ally received it after his death, although a month before his death, he personally reiterated to me that such a trip was im portant. Last July 16, I crossed the Lo Wu River that separates Kowloon from Red China and there I found myself in a strange world. Twenty-five days later, I recrossed the river. Some of us perhaps may well survive the first year of Com munism but even if you sur vive you will be totally changed. I will not, therefore, speak on the factories that we visited, on the lavish and fancy dinners prepared for us, on the amaz ing industrial development of Red China nor go into great detail on the fantastic powers being built by total regimen tation of one-fourth of the world’s population. These are all incidentals, symptoms of a much bigger event which is the emergence of China as a new world power. I would ra ther give you an intimate pic ture of what the communists intend for us. I want to share with you the conclusions I have arrived at on the basis of this impres sive and yet you most unset tling experience. I shall there fore talk about China, its gov ernment, its people, its indus trial development, chiefly as it affects us. J^et me tell you of a business man I knew in Shanghai. Before the war he had a fac tory. In 1949, the communists came and like all capitalists he hid in his house in fear. Two weeks later he was called to the military garrison office and ordered to operate his factory. At first, business was as usual except for government dicta tion of what he must produce, what he must pay for raw ma terials, what he must pay his employes and the price for which he must sell his products. In 1953, however, all private capitalists were compelled to 12 Panorama "voluntarily” join the so-called “joint state private enterprise.” This was the closing step to wards communism and under this system his property was assessed. Of the assessed value he was promised 5% yearly for a period of seven years. In short the expropriation of his pro perty entitled him only to 359k of his properties’ assessed va lue which was payable to him in seven yearly installments. After payment is complete, he would be given a chance to become an employe of his own enterprise. This is the history of a cap italist who from the very be ginning was sympathetic to the communist’s .cause. This is the history of one of the few cap italists that survived. Those who fled to Formosa and Hong kong had their properties con fiscated. Those who remained and hid were denounced by re latives, employes, and friends, or neighbors. At first they were systemati cally plucked by the new re gime. Victory bonds were of fered for sale with each busi nessman receiving his respec tive quota. These quotas were set by the businessmen’s own workers, who were asked be forehand how much their bosses could afford. The work ers were encouraged to report venalities of the capitalists and to divulge back taxes evaded during the past year. Accusa tions of concubinage or mal treatment of laborers or dis honesty, dating ten or twenty years back, were presented. Real estate taxes were made higher so that idle lands and buildings 'could be confiscated for non-paymepJk.of taxes. Then came Korean War and naturally more quotas for the businessmen. A rich man might wake up in the morning and read in the newspaper that he had volunteered to buy a fjghter plane for action in Ko rea. Someone else might dis cover tha.t he was sending a complete hospital to the front.There was no choice. But the worst was yet to come. In February, 1951, a mass campaign for the liquidation of the "counter-Revolutionary ele ments” was announced by Mao Tse Tung. The workers were organized to hold rallies where their bosses were placed on the stage and were accused. Judging was passed and made right there and then. The par ticipants of the rallies them selves shared in the enforce ment of the charges such as beating a man who was con demned to be beaten to death. Mao Tse Tung, chairman of the Red Chinese Government in Peking, has publicly an nounced that more than 800,000 people were liquidated. Other estimates are much higher. October 1958 13 JPhis was followed by the “three anti” and by the “five anti” campaigns wherein all businessmen were put through wringers, a sort of human washing machine. Inves tigations on their methods of dealing with others including their workers, competitors, families, and the quality of their goods were made. Again it was a class struggle tech nique. Emphasis was also made on a businessman’s perfor mance in terms of “new think ing” demanded by the new com munist authorities. Again, the workers brought up charges and were the accusers. Com petitors who had grievances freely aired charges and the state imposed fines which gen erally stripped capitalists of all liquid cash and stocks of goods. New standards for do ing business were also enforced which, according to the Red authorities,, were necessary in order to live up to the new objectives of the communist rulers. Many were sent off to ex perience—“reform through la bor”—a nice word for the la bor gangs included in the two million coolies who first built dams on the Huei River and some of whom are working on the Yellow River. Brain washing of some form was a common experience and there is hardly a Chinese today who dares to think freely out loud. A man’s children were indoc trinated to make sure that no one had rest even in his own home. This is the brief history of the capitalist class in Red China. The businessmen, however, were not the only ones who experienced a change in their status. The women of China experienced it too. Whereas be fore they were tied to their household chores, now they have been “liberated” and are factory workers like their male counterparts. 14 Panorama The landlord class was li quidated and the peasants were made to organize themselves into cogs of a food producing machine. Freedom of religious belief is a thing of the past. For although the churches are officially opened, every Chin ese knows that if he wants to get on with the new regime, religious beliefs and practices will be held against him. All these changes, these bru tal trials and total disregard for human dignity ironically are efforts dedicated towards making Red China a power. But his power will be used to enhance Chinese hegemony throughout our area in Asia. Do not doubt even for a sin gle moment the effectivity of their efforts. It is a fact and I saw it. The harnessing of Chinese man-power of 670 mil lion people towards this pre cise objective has made Red China today industrially power ful, a far cry from the poor agricultural China of years ago. N ever before in the modern history of the Philippines have we known far-reaching consequences of having China organized under a single and powerful government. Chiang Kai-shek’s government at best was a shaky coalition whose authority depended mostly upon getting along with the warlords who held actual con trol of most of the country. To understand the conse quences for us of this new re gime, let us examine the for gotten facts of our own his tory. The Chinese really began to take interest in our country in the 12th century with the establishment of the Southern Sun Dynasty. Driven out of North China by the Mongols, the Sung emperors looked to overseas trade for income. Be fore that, trade between the Philippines and China were handled chiefly by Arab ships. Now the Chinese began to build huge junks that visited our shores every year coming’ down on the Northeast mon soons and returning on the Southwest monsoons. During this period, the Chi nese were particularly anxious to buy cotton which was grown on the Ilocos coast and in Bor neo; also narra wood, pearls, bird’s nests, etc. This was how all Chinese pottery and porce lain found in our graves got here. With the creation of the Ming Dynasty in 1368, China had a vigorous new highly na tionalistic and imperialistic re gime somewhat like, but weak er than, the one that the com munists are building now. The Mings were expansion-minded and hence sent their fleets of trading ships throughout Southeast Asia even as far as the east coast of Africa. In October 1958 15 1405 the Ming Emperors appointeckA,<S§birhese governor for ISUZlTfi. His name was Ko Ch’a Lao. When the Spawft'rds arrived here, they talked of going on !5 China but soon became fear ful of the Chinese as they learn ed more about them. This was one of the reasons for the re peated bad blood between Spa nish and Chinese in the Philip pine that led to the infamous Chinese massacres. But with the beginning of the. nineteenth century the Chinese state de cayed internally and all that we had to worry about were those Chinese who migrated overseas seeking jobs and op portunities. Today we face a double threat: the direct military and economic power of the Chinese communists and their cham pionship of revolution. Our on ly real defense against both is a democracy that works. To the Chinese residents of the Philippines I must sound p * . warning. A new power in their ancestral land may bring to them temporary benefits, as the communists try to use them to control business in South east Asia. But as sure as night follows day, the communists will in time destroy them. No Chinese in the Philippines are members of the proletariat or the peasant class and in the inexorable process of commu nist way, their business class has to be destroyed. Their sal vation lies not only in their staying in the Philippines and facing the requirements of na turalization, but in embracing, like real Filipinos, our ideals, our histories, our culture and our language. course, when we thinly of the threat of communism it is only natural that we look towards America. This is lo gical. At this very moment the Seventh Fleet of the United States is not only protecting the island of Formosa but also the island of the Philippines,. While the Seventh Fleet re mains here our danger of in vasion is not imminent. But Red China's accumulation of power is inexorable. Already the Red Chinese jet bombers based around Canton and on Hainan island can reach every island in the Philippines. In a single airport in Nanking I saw perhaps 200 twin engine jet bombers of Russian design and construction. But what is more insiduous than communism from within? Here we cannot look towards America because America can save us from the enemy from without but can never save us from ourselves. Through the ICA the Americans are attempt ing to put our economic house in order, but this help has been ineffectual in solving our basic problems. It will continue so 16 Panorama while the direction of the ef forts remain so shortsighted and confused. By contrast, from what I have seen in Red China, Russian as sistance has been directed to wards the basic essentials of building a modern economy. The Russians have rebuilt the steel mills in Anshan, which admittedly they had wrecked in 1945, and are now building the gigantic new steel work at Wuhan. The Russians have also built the dam and hydro electric power stations on the Yellow River, China’s sorrow. Nearly all heavy machine tool industries that we were permit ted to see were of Russian de sign and construction. The great opportunity open ed to us by the reparations are being squandered by of ficial mismanagement and cor ruption. We have nothing com parable to the Indian or Chinese five-year plans. Our approach toward demo cracy is negative. We are try ing to stop communism by the use of our army, by watching our shores and by making mass arrests. But these are inef fective measures in the total eradication of danger and es tablishes only temporary secu rity. Meanwhile, more Filipinos are unemployed every year and our natural wealth lies large ly idle. The people must be conscious of their vital role in this life or death struggle. This requires a deeper sense of patriotism which we ironically, as a race, are short of in expressing ex cept during times of war, when it may be too late. y he pattern of communist conquest in China suggests that there are at least six points in our society that make it vulnerable to communism. 1. Unemployment and the October 1958 17 discontent that this encourages. —A man desirous of gainful work in order to feed his chil dren by honest toil but unable to find employment anywhere must naturally reject a society that has no place for him. This is natural. And in his exaspera tion he becomes an easy prey for subversion. The more spe cific danger, from the point of view of communism is, how ever, the discontent of the in tellectual proletariat. Young people out of college who can not find a place in society and therefore turn either to hooli ganism or to revolution. 2. Insecurity, instability, and uncertainty and the fear that they engender.—Employes who have jobs but who are not sure that they will have the jobs tomorrow; peasants who have farms to till but are not sure that they will till them tomor row; fear about our currency where, men who have saved for years may lose their lives’ toil to the threatened process of de valuation; fear that yesterday’s savings of ten pesos may buy one peso worth of goods to morrow; businessmen’s fears that tomorrow tbeir licenses with the Central Bank will not be renewed. 3. Low productivity both in agriculture and industry. — Physical effort is not properly rewarded because of faulty tech niques, lack of scientific educa tion, and medieval minded man agement. 4. Lack of faith in and un derstanding of the democratic processes.—This situation will exist whenever there is graft and corruption in our society. This will endure as long as those we brought to power use their powers to oppress, for per sonal aggrandizement or, what is worse, for personal venge ance. This situation will exist as long as powers are vested nearly exclusively in the river banks of the Pasig, and not dis tributed and assigned closer to the governed. This situation will obtain as long as government officials have double standards of morality — one for them selves, their families, and their friends, and another for the general public. 5. Lack of knowledge of what communism really is.—Our ef forts to fight communism em phasized the importance of not knowing anything about it, as if ignorance of communism was the best defense against it. Ac tually, one has to know com munism both in theory and more specially in practice in or der to successfully defeat it. For it is not those who know the real truth about commun ism that are so dangerous when they embrace it, but rather the masses who blindly fall into the communist trap. 6. Moral and religious degra dation.—This situation is one 18 Panorama wherein people profess Christ ianity but do not practice it. Do you believe that these six social cancers afflict us today in the Philippines? Then I ask you to start thinking for to morrow might be too late. Let us learn from history, always remembering that only through complacency can the commun ists obtain victory in our so ciety. Written Language for Minorities A LL OF mainland China’s two-score minorities will have written languages in the nc xt five years, according to the Peiping radio. A decision to this effect has been reached at a conference on the problem of minority scripts in the Communist Chinese capital. The conference decided that a speed-up in creating written languages for the millions of people in minority groups would be pos sible because of tho adoption recently in Peping of an official alphabet for Chinese. Peiping radio reports here said linguists believ ed the alphabet for Chinese could be adapted for use by most of the minorities now without written language. In the last few years Chinese linguists have worked out scripts for eighteen minority groups, in cluding one for the 6,500,000 Chuangs, the largest minority in the country. Some minority groups, such as the Mongols, the Uighurs and thu Huis, have had written languages for many years. The Peiping conference decided that the minor ity groups that have long been using Chinese would not be given scripts for their dialects. They will be expected to learn how to write in the new Chinese alphabet. ¥ October 1958 19 Gu Ifou Wold Wife! Only one of the four meanings given after each word below is correct. Without guessing, choose the right answer and then turn to page 74. If you have gone through high school, you should score at least eight correct answers. 1. dazzle — A. to deceive; B. to overpower by intense light; C. to move about briskly; D. to repel. 2. debacle—A. sudden collapse; B. a brilliant spectacle; C. soil'd opposition; D. supernatural event. 3. rummage — A. an excursion; B. storage; C. to search thoroughly among contents; D. to forfeit or give up. 4. writhe — A. to slander; B. to distort in pain; C. to flex, as muscles; D. to disappoint. 5. engender — A. to produce; B. to expose to danger or risk; C. to deliver; D. to separate forcibly. 6. contingent — A. connected to; B. a result of; C. de pendent upon something uncertain; D. independ ent of. 7. indigent — A. angry; B. repulsive; C. poor; D. dan gerous. 8. occult — A. elevated or raised; B. beyond ordinary knowledge; C. impossible of attainment; D. theore tical. 9. surly — A. sour; B. thick; C. sloppy; D. ill-humored. 10. jibe — A. to agree; B. to support; C. to hit vyth the fist; D. to make certain. 20 Panorama
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