Foreign News: Fire v. Interests

The Standard Oil Company of New York has the largest interests in China of any petroleum firm whatsoever. President Calvin Coolidge has despatched U. S. Marines "to protect U. S. interests in China" (TIME, March 7, 1927). The commander-in-chief of these Marines is Brigadier General Smedley Darlington Butler, famed "fighting hell-devil Marine." Last week General Butler personally directed U. S. Marines who fought for more than 24 hours and finally extinguished a fire which threatened the $25,000,000 petroleum stores of the Standard Oil Company of New York, at Tientsin (near Peking).