WAR IN CHINA: Eagles in Shansi

One of the most important and least noticed dispatches of the whole war in China last week hit the back pages of U. S. newspapers. It was merely a pair of sentences to the effect that Chinese troops had lured a Japanese army into perilous passes of the Chungtiao Mountains, at the foot of Shansi Province, rolled down on them from advantageous positions, and in four days slaughtered 2,000 men. Even allowing for exaggeration, this was a major Chinese victory.

Similar dispatches had previously trickled into similar oblivion: month ago, for instance, one described a guerrilla action near Great Wutai Shan, the sacred Buddhist mountain in Shansi—when Chinese caught an unsuspecting Japanese brigade and killed a full third of the force.

Rugged Shansi Province has for over two years been the key to the entire war in North China. Against it the Japanese have successively hurled three major campaigns and many little ones—all of which have blown up like light bulbs thrown against a wall. Because the province is as remote and vague to most U. S. readers as darkest Uganda, its news has either been undiscovered or shoved out of sight. But last week there reached the U. S. the report of a young visitor to this major theatre of China's struggle—first white man to visit parts of the province in 15 years. What he wrote was enough to make any parlor warrior drop his teacup.

Theodore H. White is a 24-year-old Harvard graduate with short legs, freckled face, cocky eyes, indomitable spirit, a compassion for suffering people, and a curiosity which would cost a cat all nine of its lives in no time. At Harvard he sold newspapers to keep himself in shirts, tooted a trumpet to keep himself in spirits, and did just enough studying to keep himself in the top 20 of his class of 1,000.

When he graduated he was awarded the Sheldon Prize Fellowship—$1,500 for a year's travel outside the U. S. He had looked forward to China: he had studied Chinese at Harvard, and he wanted to see what war is like. What he saw made him chuck traveling and go straight to work for the Chinese Government as a translator and writer in the Ministry of Information. Recently he realized the importance of Shansi Province in North China warfare, became impatient with meagre reports which were drifting out, and so decided to go and see for himself.