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Show ourselves trusting the Soviets all over again and risking appeasement. ap-peasement. Sometimes it appears that our American policy is too wavering, waver-ing, too trusting and overly gullible. gul-lible. There is every indication that the Communists know just when, where and to what extent we can always be taken in by their periodic peace campaigns and alternating aggression. Following the first Berlin blockade, the West swore that it would never again trust the Soviet So-viet Union. Immediately afterward, after-ward, the West fell over backwards back-wards to seek "better relations" only to have the Korean War This columnist would like to voice what appears unfortunately unfortunate-ly to be a minority opinion about the Cold War and to ask a question. ques-tion. That simply is, why can't we adopt a policy of firmness toward to-ward the Communists and stick to is? Virtually every observer of the Cold War has once again N been freely voicing the opinion in recent weeks that the new wave of Communist toughness over the Congo, Laos, etc., has ended Soviet Chairman Khrushchev's Khrush-chev's honeymoon with President Presi-dent Kennedy that began with the release of two imprisoned U. S. B-47 pilots shortly after inauguration day. occur. This time, we swore, Communism Com-munism has shown its true colors. When the Korean war ended and Stalin died, a widespread hope that we could do business with Communism swamped our American policy. Freer East-West East-West trade was encouraged and the Spirit of Geneva summitry ensued. The West was basking in this hope that "peace had finally arrived," when Moscow stepped up arms shipments to the Mideast, Mid-east, creating the 1955 Israeli-Arab Israeli-Arab crises and Moscow brutally crushed the Hungarian revolt. We were assured that "the world would never forget Hungary" Hun-gary" and a bloody Communism had shown "once and for all" it could never again be trusted. Nevertheless, a new wave of "kindness toward Khrushchev',' followed, when the Chinest Communists Com-munists created their series of Formosan crises. When these I ended, a weary world swore it would never forget the valiant French defense of Dienbienphu during the war in Indo-China or permit Formosa, whether we liked it or not, to fall to the Red Chinese. Within weeks, however, U. S. policy makers were debating whether the U. S. should really commit itself to Formosan defense. de-fense. A belief grew that Communism Com-munism had decided to abandon aggression as policy and decided de-cided instead to seek its gains through subtler economic competition. com-petition. We were told that Pei-ping Pei-ping was so busy developing its economy that it could threaten no more aggression. This happy delusion was shattered by the Indian border crisis, the cloodier than Hungary Communist crushing crush-ing of the revolt in Tibet, which Moscow supported and the world was "appalled." But the U. S. overcame its shock and fears of Red aggression aggres-sion against West Berlin quick enough to invite Khrushchev to the U. S. He was lionized by Americans, who began seeing in him the "best hope for peace" and was widely urged to recipient recipi-ent of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1959. His boorish reaction to the U-2 spy plane incident shattered the hopes. Americans declared that Khrushchev would never again win world confidence after he stepped up arms aid to the anti-U.S. anti-U.S. Castro Cuban regime and, in a return visit to the U. S., waged cold war in the UN in 1960. Nevertheless, we were on the verge of trusting Khrushchev again when the aggression in Laos, the Congo, etc., developed. Does the record suggest that this time we have learned that Moscow cannot be trusted? Or will we soon be seeing Khrushchev Khrush-chev as "peace maker" again? Communist policy is unwavering and relentless. Is ours? I We are once again being reminded re-minded that Soviet attacks on U N Secretary Hammerskjold and Soviet efforts to wreck the UN prove that there is little likelihood that East and West can reach early agreement on fundamental differences. We are again being warned by the FBI and others that he Communist sponsored worldwide wave of "spontaneous" demonstrations demon-strations against the West, following fol-lowing the murder of deposed Congo Premier Lumumba proves the menace of subversion is more than an imaginary threat. Everywhere, uneasiness is felt over the ease with which Communism Com-munism mobilized its dupes and puppets to stage protests in support sup-port of its Congo-UN policies on the streets of New York and in the UN itself. We are told that Khrushchev has finally shown that he is an evil man, the leader of a vicious system that can never again be trusted, and that hopes for East-West East-West accord may have to be postponed, We are told that the new dangers dan-gers from growing, menacing Communist China make an easing eas-ing of Red Chinese-American differences less likely now than ever before. The Kennedy administration has indicated that it now has some "second thoughts" about the instructions passed down in no uncertain terms to members of the executive branch of government, gov-ernment, notably the Pentagon, to refrain from criticism of the Soviet Union. The President himself, who only two weeks ago, rebuked the Chief of Naval Operations for criticism of Moscow, now appears ap-pears to have ended his own "be kind to Khrushchev" period with a sharp rebuke to Khrushchev, although not by name, for fishing fish-ing in troubled waters in the Congo. Many Washington observers and those of the Cold War now are saying that the President intends in-tends to take a much firmer stand toward Moscow than originally origi-nally intended. We hear that Moscow's blatant attacks on Hammerskjold and efforts to wreck the UN will convince con-vince the uncommitted Afro-Asian Afro-Asian nations "once and for all" that their future rests with the west. Ask anyone and you hear it said that now Khrushchev has gone too far in his Congo-UN policies, etc., and that he has finally lost world wide public opinion for his anti-Colonialist tack. This columnist wishes even prays that all of this were true, but doubts it and questions our steadfastness. The fear is that despite the revulsion re-vulsion over Communism's bold aggressiveness and UN wrecking wreck-ing policies, we shall soon find |