Ever since Chinese authorities seized the Soviet-operated Chinese Eastern Railway (TIME, July 22) and expelled Communist agents from Manchuria, Chinese and Russian soldiers have scowled at each other across Manchuria's barren border, fired occasional shots, made desultory raids. Last week tension snapped. Soviet strategists, choosing a moment when civil war wracked half of China, sent four modern divisions, complete with tanks. over the line. Two divisions moved west from Vladivostok, two east from Chita to clamp Manchuria in a Soviet vise.
In Hailar, first important town occupied by the Russians last...
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