EVEN as skirmishes sputtered on in Viet Nam last week, other Asian nations were already beginning to contemplate the uncertain political future of the postwar Far East. Having dealt in the harsh, simplistic vocabulary of hot and cold war for the better part of a generation, Asian leaders initially had nothing better to offer than uncomfortable clichés.
Japan's Premier Kakuei Tanaka, for instance, opened a new session of the Diet just before the cease-fire with enthusiastic incantations of a "new age," a "turning point" and a "new chapter." Singapore's Prime Minister Lee...