THE NATION: Giant Strides

A month after the Korean war began, General Eisenhower said: “You can’t win anywhere if you don’t win this one.”

It is now apparent (see WAR IN ASIA) that the U.S. is not going to win the Korean war. Washington has not the will to win it. During eight months of truce negotiations, U.S. forces have grown weaker, the enemy stronger. There is no will to achieve anything more than a stalemate. All Asia will note as a great new fact that the U.S. was unable to cope with the Chinese Reds.

Europe, despite years of effort and the expenditure of billions of U.S. dollars, is still not defensible. France, drained by Indo-China, is in grave economic crisis. West Germany is still unarmed, still unable to defend itself against a Russian advance that might make a Communist military spearhead out of German men and industry.

This is the background against which Secretary Acheson last week reported “giant strides” of progress at the Lisbon NATO conference. Such progress reports are familiar milestones of the last five years. They are true, in a way. The free world does move, but the question is whether that movement amounts to anything when measured by 1) the cost of the U.S. effort and 2) the progress of the enemy. Thus measured, the U.S. is taking “giant strides” north on a train that is moving south.