BACKGROUND FOR WAR: After Korea?

Even after victory is won in Korea, a disturbing question will remain: Will there be other Koreas in Asia?

Of the Asian mainland’s 16.3 million square miles, Communism controls about two-thirds, including Asia’s heartland. Much of Asia’s rimland is, however, nonCommunist, although under heavy pressure (see insert opposite).

Most immediately threatened rimland country is Indo-China, where a French army (150,000 men) has been unable to put down Communist Ho Chi Minh’s rebels (see below). The Indo-Chinese Reds probably cannot win without direct intervention by Red China.

Should Indo-China fall, the neighboring countries would be untenable against the Reds. Siam, a happy, well-fed land whose ill-equipped army (30,000 men) and relaxed government could not withstand aggression. Malaya, where Malayan and crack British forces (85,000 men) have been trying for more than two years to finish off an estimated 3,000 Red guerrillas, is a baffling headache to the British. Burma has managed (more or less) to subdue its gun-toting Communists and the tough Karen rebels, but the country is still highly unstable. Fall of these countries in turn would directly menace the vast subcontinent of India.

In the long run, probably nothing of the Asian mainland could be held against Communism were it not for the wide arc of island groups swinging from Japan down to Australia, which offers more or less solid bases for U.S. power. The arc’s northern anchor and firmest U.S. base is Japan; to it some famous real estate (Okinawa, Guam, etc.), provides secure stepping stones across the Pacific. Far more precarious are the chain’s three other links:

Formosa, where the Chinese Nationalists maintain the strongest Asian anti-Communist army (500,000 men) and which a vacillating U.S. policy may or may not decide to hold against Communist attack; the Philippines, whose government and army are dangerously inefficient and plagued with corruption; and Indonesia, whose government has fought Communism at home, but is inexperienced and saddled with staggering administrative problems.

U.S. air and naval power based on the island chain could hold Communism in check almost everywhere along Asia’s rimland. Needed: U.S. pressure and guidance for firmer governments, U.S. training and equipment for better Asian armies.