Massive Denunciation

Judged by old-fashioned standards of diplomacy, the world seemed to be blowing up a major war last week. But with ears dulled by the cold war's screeching decibels of massive denunciation, the U.S. took with relative composure a week in which:

1) Russia's Nikita Khrushchev, in a letter to President Eisenhower, issued a virtual ultimatum that the U.S. must withdraw its forces from Formosa Strait, abandon not only Quemoy and Matsu but Formosa as well--or be faced by the combined might of Russia and Red China.

2) The President found the tirade so abusive that the U.S. flatly rejected it, sent it back technically unopened.

3) The Chinese Communists used their advanced MIG-17 jets to strafe Nationalist Chinese craft trying to reinforce Quemoy. Said Nationalist Chief of General Staff "Tiger'' Wang Shu-ming, "I don't know how much longer we can practice restraint."

4) The U.S. reinforced the Seventh Fleet, already the greatest concentration of fire power ever in the Western Pacific, stripped down the Formosa defense command for action, added supersonic Lockheed F-1048 and the Army's Nike Hercules antiaircraft missiles to Formosa's arsenal, then sent Pacific Commander in Chief Admiral Harry Felt to Formosa for conferences and inspection.

Only in the diplomatic silences of Warsaw was there a muffling of the decibels of denunciation. There the U.S. and Red China bargained at the ambassadorial level (see below), with the peace of Asia and, quite possibly, the world at stake.

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