CHINA: A Matter of Despair

Nationalist China, now formally abandoned by the U.S., crumbled faster & faster. On the day the State Department issued its White Paper, Red columns led by Manchurian General Lin Piao marched unopposed into Hunan's capital of Changsha, last major city between the Communist armies and Canton, seat of the Nationalist government.

The world's headlines called it a story of treason; it was perhaps just as much a matter of despair. Nationalist Generals Cheng Chien and Chen Ming-jen had been close all their lives. Together they had risen to positions of leadership and...

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