Hope

No one beat a victory gong, no firecrackers sputtered. But for the first time in almost two years of political haggling, China could look with cautious hope to a truce in her civil war.

Three generals were charged with the trucemaking: the Central Government's forceful, realistic Chang Chun, Governor of Szechwan Province and a leader of the progressive Political Science Group; the Communists' able, amiable Chou Enlai, veteran revolutionist and leader of Yenan's unity delegation in Chungking; and, sitting as consultant between the two Chinese, the U.S.'s Special Envoy George Cattlett Marshall.

Proposal. Before these three were named came a week of rapid-fire action. The Communists, whose military position in northern China was rapidly worsening, had urged an "unconditional, immediate and nationwide" truce. On New Year's Eve, the Government countered with a three-point plan: 1) "all hostilities within the country shall cease and railway communications shall be restored"; 2)-General Marshall should be consulted by a representative of the Government and a representative of the Communists; 3) an impartial commission should investigate conditions in the civil-war zone.

Then Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek made a speech to the nation. Once again he demanded the nationalization of China's Communist armies, the ending of a state-within-a-state. "The people's most persistent aspirations," he said, "are stability and reconstruction. ... If there is more than one supreme authority who can issue military and administrative orders, if the means of communication and transportation are destroyed here and there . . . the people can never have their aspirations realized."

At the same time the Generalissimo proposed a political broadening of the National Assembly (constitutional convention), which will begin the transformation of China into a constitutional democracy. The Assembly will meet on May 5.

Acceptance. The Communists asked Yenan for instructions, conferred with General Marshall. After two days they accepted in general the Government plan as a basis for truce negotiation. This week Generals Chang, Chou and Marshall got down to cases.

In other moves last week the Central Government stabilized and strengthened its authority:

P: Into Changchun, Manchuria's capital, flew the first detachment of Government troops. There ancl in Mukden, Manchuria's industrial metropolis, they took over from the Russians.

P: Some 26,000 men of the Government's U.S.-trained New Sixth Army prepared to sail aboard U.S. naval transports for Manchurian ports.

P: In remote Soviet-bordered Sinkiang, the Central Government made peace with rebellious Kazak tribesmen, granting them a wide measure of autonomy and thereby ending more than a decade of intermittent dispute.

P: To Ulan Bator Khoto, capital of Soviet-dominated Outer Mongolia, went Chungking's formal recognition of Outer Mongolia's "independence." By giving up all claim to what had once been her frontier province, China paid the price asked last August in the negotiation of the Sino-Russian Treaty.

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