On the west, Asia is protected by the vast expanses of the Pacific Ocean against the determined efforts of the Washington government to check the spread of Marxism.  Washington’s current effort to become The Pacific power and also The Asian power have been blocked and perhaps thwarted by the defeat of General MacArthur and his international forces in the Korean War of 1950-53, and by the unanticipated and unbelievable resistance mounted by the peoples of South East Asia against the repeated efforts made by Washington to replace the French imperial presence there after its overwhelming defeat in 1954.

The decisive political developments in South and East Asia following war’s end in 1945 were first, the expulsion of the British, French and Dutch from their military strongholds in the area; second, the spectacular unification of China and its rapid advance from inferiority and political inconsequence to a place among the three major world powers; third, the meteoric comeback of Japan after its unconditional surrender in 1945; and fourth, the failure of the costly effort mounted by Washington after 1954 to establish itself in a position from which it could dominate the Pacific Ocean and East Asia.

So much we may learn from history.  Turning from the past and looking at the trends of the immediate future, it seems likely that Marxism will continue for at least some years to be the dominant force in Asia.  Furthermore, the Marxian presence in Asia will include both the Soviet Union in Northern Asia and China in South Asia.  Both countries are unquestionably stabilized economically and viable politically.  Both are headed away from capitalist imperialism.  Both are moving toward Marxian forms of socialism-communism.

The wars in South East Asia after the expulsion of the French in 1954 were organized, financed and armed primarily by the Washington government.  They were avowedly aimed at the up-rooting of Marxism from the area.  They not only failed in their main objective but they gave the Soviet Union and the Chinese a chance to pit their advisers, technicians and military equipment against that of the United States as the major capitalist contender in the area.  This phase of the counter-revolutionary drive to reestablish monopoly capitalism and imperialism in the Far East thus far has met with decisive and humiliating defeat.

This defeat marks the end of the capitalist occupation of Far Asia.  It also opens the way for the Marxists to demonstrate the workability of socialism-communism as a lifestyle for Asians and, presumably, for other segments of the Third World.

Success of the Marxists in maintaining and extending their presence in Asia will make it politically and culturally possible for them to take five essential steps: 

First, to extend the developing pattern of collective responsibility and collective action around the earth as rapidly as possible.  If such an extension proves feasible, it should give Marxism a real priority in stabilizing the economy and building up the political vigor of the Far East.