![handle is hein.cow/anamacp0277 and id is 1 raw text is: FOREWORD
THIS volume of THE ANNALS will appear just as the Chinese Communists prepare
to celebrate their second National Day on October 1, marking the second anni-
versary of the proclamation of the Chinese People's Republic in 1949. Whatever
the situation in Korea may be by then, the Chinese Communists will still have much
to celebrate. The two years of shock treatment they have administered to the tra-
ditional institutions of Chinese society have rendered virtually impossible a recon-
stitution of the pre-1949 forms of Chinese life. An ambitious foreign military ad-
venture-described as a mass movement to Resist America, Aid Korea, Defend-
Our-Homes and Protect-Our-Country-has been grasped as an opportunity to
accelerate the liquidation of unfriendly and unco-operative elements and to impose
upon the Chinese people a disciplined, totalitarian regime.
For the record of a comparable despotism, China must turn back the pages of
her history for more than two thousand years-to the heyday of the First Em-
peror of the Ch'in dynasty (221-209 B.C.). A noted English Sinologist, comment-
ing on the collapse of the Ch'in despotism, passed judgment in these words: A sys-
tem so opposed to the moderation and love of compromise that are inherent in the
Chinese character could not last (L. A. Lyall, China [New York, 1934], p. 132).
But the Chinese Communists, who know their history well-if usually to distort it to
their ends-know that Ch'in despotism was accompanied by an unmatched spasm
of constructive achievement, and that they, too, intend to remake the face of China.
They have given evidence of this determination by employing every device of
modern technology, propaganda, coercion, and political discipline so to remake
the mind of China that they may escape the judgment passed upon the Ch'in.
But when Chinese Communist military forces intervened in great strength in
Korea in November 1950, the American public suddenly lost all interest in con-
templating the recent course of Chinese affairs against a background of two thou-
sand years of historical experience. Overnight, the United States and other mem-
bers of the United Nations found themselves in an effective state of war with
Communist China. They formally branded Communist China as an aggressor
in February 1951; and, while reluctant to engage in hostile action against the Chi-
nese Communists on the latter's own territory, they agreed in May 1951 to em-
bargo the shipment of arms and other strategic materials to China. It was no
longer feasible to debate the possible diplomatic recognition of Communist China
or the restoration of normal commercial and political relations with that country.
Almost deliberately, it seemed, the Chinese Communists had elected to follow the
course of action that would most rapidly disabuse their potential friends of illusions
about their liberal or progressive character.
Against this background of imperfect hostile relations, the people of the United
States have been obliged to search out the most reliable information about Com-
munist China. What kind of people are the Chinese Communists? Wh'at kind of
ideas do they hold about themselves and others? What is their program and
policy? How are they organized to maintain their rule over China's multitudes?
How do they go about getting their work done? What are their relations to the
Soviet Union? to the Western world? to the world-wide program of revolutionary
international Communism? The purpose of the present Report on China is to
supply the answers to such urgent questions as these on the basis of the most ac-
curate information now available.
Does Communist China represent such a direct threat to the security of the
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