Yangtze Showdown Read online

  At the end of the interview at the police station Colonel Ch’eng said he was not satisfied with some of Howard-Williams’s answers. The exit visa was delayed. Commander Slayton found himself the target of anti-American feeling. Some 150 former employees of the US Navy in Shanghai, most of them Chinese, besieged the American consulate for several days. Slayton and other members of staff were not allowed to leave the building. The protesters, who demanded severance pay, were encouraged by Communist propaganda denouncing ‘foreign imperialists’ and ‘bureaucratic capitalists’. Other pay disputes broke out in the city, with some demands going back years. The US State Department accused the authorities of permitting ‘if not fostering, a pattern of extortion’ against foreigners.7

  Weston had no wish or reason to remain in Shanghai, but he could not, of course, obtain permission to leave. The British consul, Robert Urquhart, told him to continue to lie low until his escape could be arranged. The first opportunity was the British cargo ship ss Edith Moller, which had beaten the Nationalist blockade. ‘However, the master was not keen to take me,’ Weston reported. ‘He had his own difficulties and was not even allowed to take passengers with permits and did not want to take me as a stowaway as his ship was to be searched before leaving.’

  The lieutenant then asked a chief petty officer called Cunningham, who worked for Commander Pringle, and the interpreter Khoong to arrange with their Chinese friends for a junk to take him to the frigate HMS Hart, which was patrolling at the mouth of the Yangtze. On 10 August, in a room at the back of the consul’s house on the Bund, he negotiated a deal with a fish merchant and a junk owner. The cost of hiring the junk was a large quantity of rice. It was arranged that the junk would rendezvous with Hart near Gutzlaff Island, and ‘my junk would be distinguished by my white shirt at the masthead’.

  The trip was planned for the next day but postponed after a tip-off that the Communists were searching all junks at Woosung. There were several arrests after arms were discovered. Soldiers were also checking vehicles travelling from Shanghai to Woosung. The fish merchant gave Weston daily reports on the patrols. On 15 August the lieutenant was given the all clear, and he met his helpers along with Khoong’s ‘numerous relations as cover’ in a Shanghai street that afternoon. They left in a lorry, arriving in Woosung half an hour later without being searched.8

  Weston, who had been given a special passport by the consul, noted: ‘My only disguise consisted of being dressed in a dirty shirt and pair of shorts, being generally shabby and unshaven and wearing sunglasses and a Panama hat to simulate a Shanghai coolie. This would not have stood up to close scrutiny but my entourage of Chinese prevented my being closely observed. I believe there was only one other foreign resident at Woosung and Shanghai foreigners were not permitted there.’ After waiting for the right moment in a ‘native’ restaurant Weston was taken to a sampan which went to a junk already under way. He was ‘battened down in the hold’ as the junk left the harbour. Later he emerged to find a ‘happy’ crew who shared their supper with him. The weather was squally but by dawn, with the tide in their favour, they were making good progress towards Gutzlaff Island.

  The destroyer Comus had replaced Hart on patrol, and Weston spotted a warship. In the growing light he realised it was not Comus but a Nationalist ship enforcing the blockade. It was not a friendly sight. ‘I made signs to the junk skipper to keep away and he put the junk about on a course clear of the warship, but the tide was setting more strongly and we continued to close. There were many other fishing junks near us but we were further to seaward than the others in order to make Gutzlaff. When about a mile away from her, the destroyer fired several bursts towards us with Oerlikon and machine guns and addressed us in Chinese over their loud hailer. This was evidently an order to close and about half an hour later we anchored astern, having failed to get alongside because of the tide.’9

  A boarding party searched the junk and suspicions were aroused over the passenger with ‘soft hands’. Weston was suspected of being a Russian but he was able to prove otherwise. A request to allow the junk to continue was met with a refusal, and he was put on board the Tai Kong, an ex-American destroyer. Weston was told he would be taken to Ting Hai Island and he tried to argue with the captain but finally accepted that ‘reason and argument seldom influence Chinese’. No doubt his experience at Chingkiang railway station was fresh in his mind. He learned that the Nationalist navy suspected its own army of trading with the mainland and there was also concern that Communist fifth columnists were being landed by junk on the Chu San islands. Weston pointed out that any junk involved in these operations would surely hug the coast but again his argument was ignored. The captain also refused to transfer him to Comus or to put him on Gutzlaff Island, or to even inform the Royal Navy of his whereabouts. Weston did not want Comus searching for him in vain.

  A minesweeper replaced Tai Kong on patrol on 17 August. The junk was turned over to the minesweeper for ‘further examination’, and the destroyer sailed to Ting Hai harbour, arriving that afternoon. Weston said he was well treated on board, with the first lieutenant insisting on giving up his cabin. At Ting Hai he was seen by the captain of a destroyer flotilla and told he would be sent to Formosa on the next available ship, and the Royal Navy would be informed. He was accommodated in a Yangtze pilot vessel, which had been seized by the Nationalists shortly after the fall of Shanghai, and politely discouraged from going ashore during the day. Two ships sailed to Formosa without him, and on 19 August the captain of the destroyer flotilla said he would, in fact, be allowed to go to Comus. That evening he sailed in a destroyer for a midnight rendezvous with the British ship.10

  ‘I was very glad to be back and to taste English food again and to be able to borrow some clean clothes,’ he reported. Comus signalled that he had been picked up. It was made clear that Weston’s escape should not be publicised. He was disappointed to learn that he would not be rejoining Amethyst in Hong Kong but would fly back to Britain in secret.

  Comus had been searching for him for three days.

  I believe that the refusal of the Nationalist navy to transfer me before, or to inform the Royal Navy or British consul at Canton that they had picked me up was due to their resentment at the presence of our guardship at the entrance of the Yangtze. They contended that the British guardship was inside the three-mile limit, which they measured not from the low water mark but from the Yangtze light vessel. Their officers continually tried to draw me on the question of their right to close the port of Shanghai, to which I replied non-commitally. Meanwhile I recorded on board HMS Comus or forwarded by signal all the intelligence I was able.

  After a few days on board Comus he was landed near Kure, Japan, and a Sunderland flew him to Hong Kong. Kerans met him at Kai Tak with ‘some gear salvaged from the wreckage of my cabin’, and promising to settle his affairs in Hong Kong because Weston was not allowed to leave the RAF mess. The lieutenant even had to use another name. Early the next day a Dakota flew him to Singapore, where he met Admiral Brind and the chief of his intelligence staff. Later he travelled to Britain in a civilian plane.

  A naval security officer was waiting for him at Heathrow but all the secrecy was in vain. Reporters and cameramen were also there. The security officer told Weston he could tell them anything up to the time of his escape, which he was not to mention.

  ‘I felt I knew better and should not see any reporters at all,’ Weston recalled.

  But the security officer was quite right in that they were impossible to avoid. They were even waiting at my home and had been told I could answer limited questions. Apparently the News Chronicle had been told of my impending arrival by their Far East office. The BBC were told by the naval information department that my escape was secret and announced this on the news. This as I expected drew forth a protest from the assistant naval attaché Shanghai and I can only hope there will be no repercussions there. This escape would not have been successful without the constant support of Commander Pringle and Chief Pe
tty Officer Cunningham and Mr Khoong, who each gave me great assistance at no little risk to themselves. 11

  During a spell of leave he was invited to the offices of the Admiralty’s Naval Intelligence Division, which was ‘anxious to hear at first hand of your experiences’.12

  23

  The Nervous Colony

  AMETHYST’S ESCAPE AND THE ANGER of the Communists focused British minds once again on the vulnerability of Hong Kong. Reinforcements were being sent to improve the colony’s defences, but it was thought advisable to keep publicity to a minimum. Britain wanted to deter aggression. It did not want to antagonise Peking. On 25 August Ambassador Stevenson in Nanking told the Foreign Office of the importance of restricting statements on ‘warlike preparations’. The message had been taken on board by the Ministry of Defence and service chiefs, and the Foreign Office ‘are doing what they can to influence the press, the news agencies and the BBC’. The Colonial Office asked the Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Alexander Grantham, to make sure that the colony’s civil authorities showed the same ‘reticence’.1

  The problem of Hong Kong had been a headache for Prime Minister Attlee and his Cabinet for months. There was even the argument that the colony should be abandoned if the threat became too great. Sir Stafford Cripps, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, believed that postwar Britain, in the grip of austerity, could not afford to pay for the extra defence, and that the colony would be impossible to hold in the face of an attack by a massive Communist army. Attlee and the majority of his Cabinet did not take that view. Failure to face up to the challenge would seriously damage Britain’s prestige throughout the region. Attlee thought ‘the whole common front in Siam, Burma and Malaya was likely to crumble unless the peoples of those countries were convinced of our determination and ability to resist this threat to Hong Kong’.2 Grantham was confident that the colony could be defended so long as the Soviet Union did not intervene.

  Attlee and his defence minister, Albert Alexander, were hoping that Australia and New Zealand would see that it was in their interests to help with the colony’s defence. New Zealand’s premier, Peter Fraser, offered three frigates. His Australian counterpart, Ben Chifley, backed by foreign minister Herbert Evatt, rejected the appeal, arguing that Britain could be heading for a ‘full-scale war’ with China.3 Chifley and Evatt had, of course, stopped the Australian frigate Shoalhaven from taking part in the Nanking mission in April, which led to Amethyst being chosen as the replacement.

  In July 1949 British intelligence experts still believed that the return of Hong Kong was an important part of Chinese Communist policy. However, evidence obtained from Communist documents seized in the colony appeared to suggest that it was not an immediate plan. Trade and finance remained key factors: ‘It is not impossible that the trading value of Hong Kong in British hands may in the immediate future be of such great importance to them that they may temporarily acquiesce in the status quo.’

  In the event of an attack, it was estimated that 150,000 troops might reach the border with Hong Kong, but numbers could vary because of the narrowness of the front. Guerrilla raids were a threat, and the infiltration of agents in considerable numbers was probable. In the unlikely event of the entire Nationalist air force defecting, air raids on the colony would not involve more than forty medium and heavy bombers, supported by seventy fighter-bombers. The threat from the Communist navy had been ‘dismissed rather too lightly’. It was thought the Communists had sixty-five ships, including six destroyers and seventeen gunboats. The Joint Intelligence Committee at the Cabinet Office in London reported: ‘Although the efficiency of this force is thought to be low at present, it might be welded into an effective fighting force in a comparatively short time and might be of considerable nuisance value if employed against trade.’

  The committee also noted that the Communists had not overplayed the propaganda card over the claim to Hong Kong: ‘This restraint on the part of the vociferous and competent Chinese broadcasting system can only have resulted from orders from above. Furthermore, although Chinese Communist propaganda is constantly denouncing the “unequal” treaties with foreign powers, that governing Hong Kong has never yet been mentioned. These omissions are perhaps further indirect evidence in support of the theory that the Communists do not propose to take any immediate action to eject British rule from Hong Kong.’4

  The intelligence experts made another assessment in August and concluded that if the Communists were going to attack the colony it would not be before mid-October. Communist forces were making steady progress southwards and westwards in China. The main threat to Hong Kong was the thrust on Canton by General Chen Keng’s troops, who were advancing up the Kan valley. A subsidiary advance was being made in Fukien province.

  Six armies of General Lin Piao had captured Chuchow and Changsha, and were advancing to Hengyang. A second group of five armies were fighting to the west of the Tungting lakes and along the Yangtze gorge towards Chungking. In addition, there were thirteen armies involved in operations in north-west China, driving towards Szechwan province.

  The Joint Intelligence Committee reported:

  It is probable these operations are designed to secure the important rice harvest in this province and ultimately to move on Chungking in conjunction with General Lin Piao’s advance up the Yangtze gorge. It is considered this force is unlikely to be used for possible operations against Hong Kong.

  We estimate that no substantial Communist forces are likely to arrive in the Canton area before the beginning of September, or before the end of September at the borders of the leased territories. From the military point of view it is unlikely that any possible threat to the colony would arise until the greater part of Kwantung province has been brought under control. This is unlikely to be effective before the latter half of October.

  On morale in Hong Kong, there was this comment: ‘The Amethyst incident has stimulated local Chinese morale and caused loss of face to the Communists.’ The committee also looked at the situation in Shanghai, where many British nationals remained. The Nationalist blockade continued to be effective, with trade at a standstill. Six Liberator bombers had carried out ‘an unusually accurate’ attack on the dockyard.5

  A bleaker picture had been provided by the British consul, Robert Urquhart, who reported that ‘the opportunistic exploitation of capitalists in general and of the foreigner in particular is largely unchecked’. Urquhart was highly critical of the Communist officers in control of the city: ‘They neither have administrative machinery nor the knowledge to cope with problems of Shanghai and have to refer constantly to Peking. Pending decisions from Peking the only people who know their minds are Moscow-type politicians and Shanghai racketeers. They have united effectively to exploit many ancient grudges against foreigners and the natural greed of the Chinese for loot …’ He predicted that Peking would crack down on ‘frothing extremists’ who were trying to impress the new rulers. Shortages of food, fuel and raw materials were exacerbating the problem. ‘American aircraft’ of the Nationalist air force were dropping ‘American bombs’ on Shanghai and ‘it could be fairly easy for agitators to direct popular wrath against imperialists’. Urquhart’s comments were passed to admirals Brind and Madden.6

  The threat to Hong Kong produced parallels with the Berlin blockade and the Cold War. In a telegram to Commonwealth prime ministers in September, Attlee noted: ‘In some respects situation is similar to that which faced us – and to some extent still faces us – in Berlin. Just as we cannot foresee with certainty how future of Berlin will develop but are convinced of necessity of remaining there, so we are impelled to remain in Hong Kong without any clear indication of extent or duration of military commitments involved. In both cases the threat of Russian and Communist expansion necessitates holding what we have and not withdrawing.’

  Lieutenant General Francis Festing, the newly appointed commander of British forces in Hong Kong, revealed that ‘the building up of this place has gone exactly according to plan’. When
completed, the gun density would be equal to that in London at the height of the wartime Blitz. There were so many soldiers that a commando brigade had to be accommodated at the Jockey Club.7 One of the arrivals was Royal Marine commando Leslie Andrew Frank, the teenage son of Amethyst’s coxswain Leslie Frank. Father and son, who had not seen each other for more than two years, had an emotional reunion after the troopship Georgic docked. Marine Frank dashed down the gangway and grasped his father’s hand. He had learned of the frigate’s escape when his ship was in the Arabian Sea.8

  The British intelligence warning that mid-October would be a critical time was remarkably accurate. On 15 October Chinese Communist troops fanned out along the border with the colony. They chased retreating Nationalist soldiers, some of whom surrendered their arms to Hong Kong police and crossed the frontier. Customs officers also fled, but businessmen at the key village of Shumchun quickly ran up the red flag. British forces put into operation phase one of their defence plan, a state of readiness with increased border patrols. There were 40,000 British troops in the colony. On alert in the harbour were the aircraft carrier HMS Triumph, the cruiser Belfast and six destroyers.9

  The News of the World painted this picture:

  An unending stream of army lorries rolls towards the border hills. Dispatch riders, darting at speed through the streets and hill country, are all armed with Sten guns. In the centre of the city gunners are training with mobile field guns. Far off an RAF reconnaissance plane is faintly visible in the half-haze. Now and again comes the deep-throated roar of a Spitfire. Wherever one turns there are signs of defence preparations. Steel booms up and down the river close all but a tightly guarded shipping channel against any possible incursion of unauthorised craft. And out in the countryside thousands of men – Commando troops in the green berets, kilted Highlanders, stocky Gurkhas, gunners, tankmen – are set out on the hillsides or snuggling down in the valleys behind.10