"What Is There to Do?"

Officers and men of General Fu Tso-yi's northwest command wore the same unadorned uniforms, ate the same plain food and thought of themselves as simply the best troops in China. They called themselves "Ho Tao Wawa" (River Bend Babies) because they had trained in the bitter country above the great bend of the Yellow River. Under able, plain General Fu (TIME, Dec. 15) they were doing some of China's most effective fighting against the Chinese Communists last week.

Crumbling Front. But there were just not enough River Bend Babies, or any other Nationalist troops of similar training, morale and tenacity, to hold the crumbling North China front, from Inner Mongolia to the Yellow Sea. One evidence of that came during the week: the Chinese government evacuated Yenan, after occupying the former Red capital for 13 months. Yenan's value had been psychological rather than military, but still it was a hard loss to take. Yenan's fall meant that it was the Reds, now, who had strength to spare on psychological objectives.

What explained the troubles of the Nationalist armies? Miscalculations, for one thing. After V-J day, China relied generally on its few crack U.S.-trained divisions, and on full Allied cooperation, to regain its liberated areas and restore peace. At great cost, China now knew better.

Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek had recited the litany of military disasters to China's new National Assembly. Assemblymen were shrill in their discontent with the situation. They elected the Gimo president of the republic, but members screamed for the heads of discredited Nationalist commanders. It was clear to all that some long-range planning had to be done over again. But even long-range planning would mean some immediate military changes. A new 14-week conscript-training program was being tried out in the Nanking-Shanghai area with U.S. advisers. General Sun Li-jen had set up another training center in Formosa. But too many farm boys were still being dragged from the paddy fields, given rifles, and sent off to battle.

Crumbling Morale. Better incentives, too, were needed for the Nationalist rank & file. Not only did that mean better pay (now the equivalent of 25-c- U.S. a month), but it meant land bonuses to soldiers (which the government has now promised but has not yet begun to distribute). And it meant deeper concern for badly sagging morale.

A fortnight ago, at Kweisui in Inner Mongolia, a TIME correspondent talked with officers and men of a Nationalist armored unit that had fought the Japanese in Burma and the Reds in Manchuria. They had fought well, but were growing tired. Said one: "I've been in the army nine years." Said another: "Last year, I sent in my resignation. This year I was warned that I'd better not try to resign again . . . What is there to do but sit around and wait?"

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