The Foreign Service
Both Sides of the Curtain. By Sir Maurice Peterson. (Constable. 2 is.) THE first two hundred and ninety-nine pages of this book run :along more or less normal lines. The diplomat's lot is usually pleasant. Wherever he goes, he is a privileged person with duck- shooting, trout-fishing, motoring and bridge to relieve the monotony of chancery and the tedium of official ceremonies. All this is narrated agreeably enough with touches of caustic humour, some good anecdotes, and a vivid sense of personal satisfaction. Of the political side of his activities the author does not tell us much, even allowing for the restrictions under which he necessarily laboured, His account of his ;experiences in Spain and Russia further illustrates the difficulties of doing business in a totalitarian country, where the dictator is inaccessible and the Press under rigid control. There are some interesting sidelights, but no startling revelations.
On page 300, however, Sir Maurice breaks loose and in the following four pages sketches a radical proposal for the reform of the foreign service. He briefly summarises the failure of our foreign. policy between the wars, though the argument is confused by the antedating of Hitler's reoccupation of the Rhineland by three years. He condemns collective security as furnished by the Covenant and the treaty of Locarno, and appeasement as attempted by the acceptance of the Japanese seizure of Manchuria and of Mussolini's rape of Abyssinia, by the naval treaty, with Germany and the agreement with Italy of 1936. The precise nature of his alternative policy is not disclosed, but Sir Maurice has no doubt where the cause of our failure lies. It is due to ignorant parlia- mentary interference with the conduct of foreign. affairs. The House of Commons is ill-informed, because only the Foreign Secre. tary has access to the real facts, and of Foreign Secretaries, with the exception of Balfour and Curzon, he has a low opinion. From Curzon to Eden they were just " a succession of uninspired personalities," of whom Ramsay MacDonald was the " most naive." Lord Halifax, who recalled the author from Spain to make way for Sir Samuel Hoare, understood nothing about the Spanish situa. tion. What then is the answer ? Sir Maurice suggests that it lies in associating the pernianent heads of the Foreign Office with the Foreign Secretary in the responsibility for foreign policy and its exposition in Parliament. If they do not agree with him, they should have the right to proclaim their dissent in public. The Cabinet, Parliament, Press and public would then judge between them en toute connaissance de cause. If the Foreign Secretary was beaten, he would be sacked. If, as seems more likely in the ordinary run of party politics, which Sir Maurice appears to dis- count, the permanent heads were beaten, they could not be sacked of course, but they could always be ostracised in some Embassy abroad, where apparently they would no longer enjoy freedom of speech. - One may somehow doubt whether this revolutionary notion is likely to be adopted; It ignores the elementary facts of political life. A contradictory debate between the Foreign Secretary and his Permanent Under-Secretary in the Albert Hall or in the Third Programme would certainly be diverting as well as instructive. but I do not expect to witness it in my time. Nevertheless, without endorsing his particular prescription one cats very well agree with Sir Maurice that the present state of affairs is unsatisfactory. Neither Parliament 'nor public has sufficient information on which to form an adequate judgement on foreign affairs. With the present restrictions on newsprint we are not even told of many things with which the readers of Le Monde or the New York Times are conversant. In the United States Congress and in most foreign Parliaments there are standing committees on foreign affairs, which frequently hear and interrogate the responsible officials, whether political or permanent. In this way an educated nucleus of members of all parties is formed. Much good might come from closer contact betwee.n the foreign Office and Parliament on similar lines. As one reads meagre cabled versions of the utterances of Sir Alexander Cadogan pr Sir Gladwyn lebb at Lake Success, one cannot help regretting that we. cannot occasionally have similar statements here—in full. At present we-are starved, and, however impracticable his remedy, Sir Maurice Peterson has rendered a service by drawing attention to the dangers of our present ignorance. For regrettable though it may seem to the expert, foreign policy must in the end be reconciled to public opinion.
HAROLD !BUTLER.
Previous page
