Hail, Formosa!

To see once is better than to hear a hundred times.

--Chinese proverb

Globetrotter Adlai Stevenson, journeying last week from Japan to Formosa, was broadening his view of Far Eastern affairs.

In Tokyo, he urged a union of all free Asians against the Communist threat. "Asia," he said, "is what might be called the area of decision in the modern world. [Japan] is one in whose hands the destiny of Asia, and thus of the world, must rest. Whether it is to be a free or a slave world is a decision we all face."

Deplaning at Taipeh, Stevenson was pleasantly startled by the crowd of dignitaries and cheering onlookers come to welcome him. He quipped: "I am greatly impressed. But I am not running for any office on this island."

By the end of his two-day visit with the Chinese Nationalists, the U.S. Democratic leader was even more impressed. He had dined and talked with President Chiang Kai-shek ("Very interesting, very interesting," said Stevenson), watched Nationalist troops in maneuvers, listened to U.S. Ambassador Karl Rankin and other U.S. and Chinese officials. Stevenson summed up his impressions for newsmen:

"Everything I have seen or heard indicates conspicuous improvement. It is always a mistake to confuse bigness with greatness. This is a laboratory demonstration of better government and a healthy economic setup. The fact that it is small does not mean it is worthless. It can be the most important historical accomplishment of many years if not many centuries in the Far East . . . [Formosa is] an essential part of the Pacific defense of the free world."

One important effect of President Eisenhower's order deneutralizing Formosa was brought out last week by Nationalist China's permanent representative to the U.N., Dr. Tingfu F. Tsiang. Said he: "President Eisenhower's message was the first time since the end of the war that China has received from the United States moral aid . . . Economic and military aid without the accompaniment of moral aid does not go far ... If the United States, in these days of its world responsibility, were to make more use of its moral prestige in aid to peoples struggling for freedom, the people of this country would discover that the amount of economic and military aid, which you are actually giving, would be thereby made much more effective."

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