FOREIGN RELATIONS: War Is War

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For those who had any notions that the U.S., as a result of President Eisenhower's talks with Nikita Khrushchev, might be backing away from any of the basic principles that have guided its foreign policy, Under Secretary of State C. Douglas Dillon last week had a stern message to deliver about at least one troublous area: Red China and Formosa. His speech, delivered in Manhattan at the twelfth annual conference of the Far East-America Council of Commerce and Industry, came against the background of Red China's saber-rattling tenth anniversary fete fortnight ago, when Communist Defense Minister Lin Piao, with Khrushchev on hand, condemned the U.S., proclaimed that nobody would be permitted to interfere in Peking's "liberation" of Formosa.

"The time has come for all of us, on both sides of the Iron and Bamboo curtains, to face squarely the issue of whether we can afford to permit any dispute anywhere to be settled by recourse to arms," said Dillon. "We firmly reject attempts by Communist leaders to justify what they call 'just, revolutionary wars' or 'wars of liberation.' War is war, no matter where or why it may be fought. Peace also is indivisible. Peace is not the prerogative of the Communists alone, nor can it be applied only to areas outside the immediate concern of the Sino-Soviet bloc."

Of immediate concern to Communist China is Formosa, but, Dillon said, "There can be no glossing over the danger that an attempt to seize Taiwan and the offshore islands is just as likely to embroil the world community in total war as is the launching of any other type of war. There can be no exceptions in the matter of peaceful settlement of disputes . . . We earnestly hope Peking will see the light."