Resurrecting the Monster View of China

Resurrecting the Monster View of China NEW DELHI seems to be full of Indochina, First there was the inauguration of the Centre for the Studies on Indochina at the India International Centre. T N Kaul is to be its Chairman. What studies the Centre would do on Indochina no body can say. It is not known if there is anybody on its council with any expertise on Indochina. But the fact that T N Kaul will preside over the Centre makes one tithing certain. Its studies will be in impeccable English and whenever its research becomes audible it would be even more of a pleasure. There are not many in India now who can use the English language so well as T N Kaul, But then the difficulty is Kaul actually speaks two languages. One is his old-fashioned, suave and rather diplomatic English, the other is his political language. We cannot say we fully like or even understand the latter. Kaul in his remarkable speech during the inauguration went hammer and tongs at China and the US, one felt, in that order. The overriding problem in Indochina is China and unless those misbehaving urchins in Beijing are made to behave there shall be no peace in Indochina! Sceptics like us have the impression that it is quite customary with the section of an elite in India not to attack the United States either in isolation or as the principal enemy. If you combined your attack on the US with China or Pakistan or both, it is so much safer. More particularly, if you attack China as much or even more than you attack the United States, everybody is happy. Reagan