Welcome for Jawaharlal

"I thought Nehru was an old man, but he is young," glowed the 19-year-old Dalai Lama in Peking last week. The truth was, however, that Nehru looked bad. For several weeks he had suffered acute insomnia; he had flown to Red China, against doctor's orders, with laryngitis and a fever. Along the way, Nehru had acted in high-strung fashion: at Calcutta he kicked aside a jobless young refugee who prostrated himself before Nehru ("He is holding my foot"); at Rangoon he wielded his wooden cane at a welcoming crowd which he thought was drawing too near. When the Nehru party finally got to Peking, it was learned that Nehru had ordered his secretary off the plane at the last minute, to make room for his personal physician. Last week, moving into one of the crises of his career, 64-year-old Nehru was sick.

He was also beset with a deep psychological unease: his right to speak for Asia was in question. "Meetings between the Prime Ministers of India and China are world events," he had proclaimed grandly in Calcutta. He cherished the belief that he could negotiate an Asian "area of peace," guaranteed by Red China, in counterblast to the "trivial" Manila Defense Pact. But Nehru's area of peace, it seemed, was already coming unstuck: neighboring Nepal complained about Red China's infiltration of its northern Himalayas; Burma, worried by Communist guerrillas in its own country, wanted tangible reassurance of Chinese good intentions; even Indonesia, staunchest of Nehru's supporters, was put out by Red China's claim of jurisdiction over Indonesia's 3,000,000 Chinese. As Nehru proceeded on his way, paying a friendly call at Hanoi, he was surprised when Ho Chi Minh, president of the Red Viet Minh, did not bother to meet him at the airfield.

"Mutual Understanding." Shortly after noon on a cold and cloudy day, Nehru's DC-3 touched down at Peking. The Red capital's factories and offices were closed in his honor, and 1,000,000 Chinese lined his route. "Since the dawn of history," croaked Nehru throatily to Red China's Premier Chou Enlai, "India and China have coexisted as good friends . . . We should try to deepen our mutual understanding." But what happened during the next few days showed that the Communists wanted all the understanding to come from Jawaharlal Nehru.

The Communists started off by goose-stepping Red infantrymen before India's man of peace; then they made sure that Nehru met the Dalai Lama of Tibet, whose barren land Red China conquered in 1950 over Nehru's public protest. They took Nehru round to a National Minority Institute where the Communists produced students from "40 border regions." The Communists explained that the students underwent training in "political ideology," then returned to South Asia's neutral frontiers as "teachers and leaders." Commented Jawaharlal Nehru, who had come hoping for a pledge of non-interference in other nations: "Very interesting."

In long hours of private talk with Nehru, Mao Tse-tung and Chou showed no interest in granting Nehru his area of peace. Instead, Chou wanted to enlist him in a "joint declaration" that would pledge "protection" to Asia against Western interference.

Nehru dutifully paid the traveler's routine tributes to Red China (no beggars, and "the Chinese have abolished prostitutes also"), but it was obvious that Red China's belligerency offended him. "Any attempt to impose the will of one nation upon another must endanger peace," Nehru pointedly remarked one evening at dinner. "I earnestly hope the people of China will cooperate." And when Chou suggested that Red China should attend Nehru's projected conference of Asian and African neutrals, Nehru silkily referred Chou to the sponsoring "Colombo Powers," for "it is not I who will be sending out invitations."

Cocky Misunderstanding. To the little group of Indian newsmen accompanying him, Nehru said: "The purpose of these talks is to remove dislike, suspicion and fear of each other . . . The Chinese response is good." One newsman asked: "Is the purpose to make China acceptable to the rest of the world?" Nehru replied: "To make the rest of the world acceptable to China." Whatever platitudinous pledges of esteem might be agreed to at the end of the visit, the fact was (according to word sifting back to New Delhi) that Nehru was shocked by Red China's cocky misunderstanding of the outside world, and afraid that Red China's distorted picture might lead Asia to disaster. And as for Red China's proposed Asian bloc, Nehru was "not very enthusiastic."

By week's end some of India's usually neutralist newspapers were drawing an editorial conclusion they would have damned as U.S. propaganda not seven days before. "There is no prospect," said the Hindustan Times, "of India, Burma and Indonesia wanting to swing over to China." And the influential Times of India seemed to be writing an epitaph over Nehru's dream of a protected Area of Peace when it acknowledged that "it would be something unusual for Communist China to reject the traditional Communist pattern of expansion."

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