BATTLE OF KOREA: Very Grave

Winston Churchill, a prophet who has often been right in the past, told the House of Commons last week that the Korean situation is "very grave." He doubted that the Communists had ever had any "will to peace"; they had plainly used the truce talks to accumulate a formidable striking force. He gave figures on the enemy buildup (some of which were also given by General Mark Clark's headquarters in Tokyo); the enemy now has a million-man army ready to fight, 500 tanks and self-propelled guns, an 1,800-plane air force of which about 1,000 are jets. Churchill announced that he was sending his Defense Minister, Field Marshal Earl Alexander, to Tokyo for consultations with Clark* and to Korea for a firsthand look at the struggle.

At Panmunjom, North Korea's dapper, tireless Lieut. General Nam II returned to the truce table with a "grave warning." The Communist armies, he cried, "decidedly cannot sit by while seeing their capTured fellow combatants being slaughtered by your side at will" (see below). This sounded uncomfortably like the warnings that emanated from Red China on the eve of her massive intervention in the autumn of 1950.

Was Nam voicing another such threat —or was it just a bluff? General Van Fleet in Seoul saw no signs—yet—that a Communist offensive is imminent.