Golf from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 noon, with Gen. Han 【韓朝宗] in Bethesda Country Club. 95.
How is the famine to affect the regime on the mainland? At the end of Wang Mang’s 【王莽] New dynasty, famine sufferers, led by a bandit chieftain, swept the Wang regime out, putting Wang Mang to death on the streets of Loyang. However, in that period, government troops did not have too much advantage over the mob so far as weapons were concerned.
The Hungarian uprising of 1956 is closer to present-day conditions on the mainland. However, no one city in China can determine the fate of a regime, as Budapest did in Hungary, although Soviet intervention would not be possible in Shanghai, Hankow, or Canton.
The suffering of the masses in the countryside will eventually mean suffering in the cities, for famished people will not long allow food to be taken to the cities. Food riots may be very general. Militia will not suffice. The regular army will have to be scattered all over the countryside and may be affected by the sight of suffering and refuse to shoot.