Word: suddenness
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...Marxist theoretician. Nor does he possess the studied mandarin sophistication of the late Premier Chou En-lai, another longtime comrade-in-arms. Not that Deng lacks for a keen intelligence or a world view. But what he has consistently sought to impose is a preference for gradual rather than sudden change and for pragmatism over doctrine. In discussing China's second revolution recently, Deng said, "If it could enable people to improve their lives gradually, then I think the policy itself is a sure guarantee of its continuity...
...aged and often invisible predecessors, he traveled widely, exchanging his fedora for a hard hat to inspect factories and showing off his stylish First Lady Raisa abroad. Gorbachev also moved quickly to consolidate his personal power. His principal rival for the top job, Grigori Romanov, suffered the indignity of sudden retirement. After 28 years as Foreign Minister, Gromyko was kicked upstairs, to the largely ceremonial position of President. And last week Viktor Grishin, a longtime associate of Leonid Brezhnev, was eased out as Moscow party boss...
...thousands of unsuspecting Finnish radio listeners, the bitter cold, snowy Sunday afternoon all of a sudden turned hot. Expecting light entertainment, they instead heard "newscasters" announce that World War III had begun. The West German city of Hamburg had been pulverized by a Soviet nuclear missile, the broadcast said, while radioactive fallout was threatening Finland. Already 500 million people had perished in the first exchanges of a great nuclear conflagration...
...virtues of this singular insulation are acknowledged by even the government's critics: while superpower tensions have torn Indochina asunder, civil and incivil wars have haunted even such tiny neighbors as Sri Lanka, and booming Asian powers like Singapore and Japan have had to bear the costs of sudden prosperity, Burma has remained serenely on the geopolitical sidelines, at peace. Only once in recent years has it hit the head-lines: in October 1983, when North Korean terrorists planted a bomb in Rangoon that left four members of the visiting South Korean Cabinet dead. Of late, Burma has stepped...
...same. Moreover, adds a foreign diplomat, "Nobody has made a decision in this country for so long except Ne Win that nobody has any experience in doing so." Nor is it likely that those in power will dismantle the foundations on which they sit. "If they try a sudden leap forward," says a Western diplomat, "a lot of people are going to fall between the cracks...