CHINA: Parody in Peking

In a beautiful setting provided by history, the rulers of Red China last week played a parody of democracy. The occasion: the First National People’s Congress, convened to “ratify” a 106-article constitution for Red China and then “elect” a chairman and vice chairman. From all over vast Communist China’s 25 provinces, from far-off Tibet and Inner Mongolia, came 1,141 delegates, striding up steps of gleaming marble, past newly painted red pillars and into Peking’s ancient Cherish Benevolence Hall.

“A great achievement in the further democratization of China’s political life,” the Peking People’s Daily proclaimed as the farce began. Delegates were carefully schooled on who was to get the most respect: after party chairman Mao Tse-tung, “his close comrades in arms. Liu Shao-chi and Chou En-lai.” Delegates listened dutifully to onrushes of grey gobbledygook, in which the only interesting point was the renewed slavish dedication to Moscow. From Mao: “The people of our country should learn from Soviet Russia and be prepared [through] several five-year plans to build our country.” From Moscow-trained theoretician Liu (who rivals Chou for the No. 2 spot): “We are still facing a real danger of a reactionary comeback . . . The Soviet road is the road all humanity will take.”

The only enlivenment was the appearance of the 19-year-old Dalai Lama, escorted out of Tibet by a Red general three weeks ago as thousands of his subjects wept and prostrated themselves. His presence was quite a coup: the Dalai Lama is a living God to his own people. Several years ago. uncertain of the Dalai Lama’s loyalty, the Communists began to groom the exiled Panchen Lama as a rival. He is the spiritual leader of Lamaism, as the Dalai is the temporal head. Last week both the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama (who is a 16-year-old Chinese ) were delegates in Peking. Dutifully, the Dalai Lama proclaimed that “the Tibetan people enjoy full freedom of religion,” and acknowledged Mao as “our great and beloved leader.”

More important than what was said at Peking, however, was what was not said. Formosa, target of Red verbal fury for weeks, vanished suddenly from official tongues. Neither Mao nor Liu mentioned “liberating” Formosa, and in the first two days of the Congress scarcely anyone else did either. Subsequently, according to Peking radio, one speaker fierily demanded the “ultimate” liberation of Formosa; a few days before, however, the word had been “immediate.” For whatever dark reasons, China’s Red rulers were for the moment not promising quick victory. Perhaps at Quemoy they had found out what they wanted to know about the U.S. intention to protect Formosa.