Staff meeting. Agreed that Korea was about to shift from military stalemate to truce and political stalemate. Gen. Ho 【何世禮] called attention to the fact that the latest communist offensive was on large scale, using for the first time the Stalin tank, which had been guarded as a secret even more assiduously than the MIG-16. These facts point to, not the end, but the beginning of offensive action. Such an offensive requires long time in preparation, given the poor transportation in North Korea. Duplicity is still possible. The communists may use the truce negotiations to weaken the morale of U.N. troops and to gain time for stockpiling supplies in the front.
Invited Bertram Wolfe to meet C. M. Chang 【張純明] at lunch in Old China. He is also an ex-communist. He thinks Great Britain has no really sound scholars on Russia, Leo Deutscher and Carr being both biased. Carr is an apologist for totalitarianism of any variety. He began to be critical of the alliance with Soviet Russia soon after Pearl Harbor, thinking that with Russia as an ally, no peace was possible.
Went to a hardware store to buy screens, so as to improve ventilation in the house.