MARGINAL COMMENT
by CAROLE.) NICOLSON
IN The Times the other day there appdared a letter from a foreign visitor containing a pertinent criticism of British diplomacy. The letter intimated in effect that our statesmen were apt to assume too readily that Cabinet Ministers in continental countries were also imbued with the public school spirit. When one reads the references to British politicians which occur in the memoirs of European Ambassadors and Ministers one cannot deny that the impression which we seem to convey is one of lethargic innocence interspersed with bouts of . downright eccentricity. Metternich, when he first met Castlereagh, thought him an easy, honourable man, but one whose ignorance of continental affairs was almost unbelievable. In Canning, on the other hand, he observed a streak of meteoric eccentricity, presaging doom and disorder to all mankind. Billow, when he went to Windsor, was much impressed by what he took to be the amazing naïveté of the British Cabinet, and remarked that they seemed to know as little of the affairs of Germany or Austria as he himself knew about the internal politics of Peru. Bismarck, who was far more intelligent than either, and
• who did not permit personal vanity to obscure his powers of obser- vation, realised that when an English statesman ceased to be simple he probably became dishonest. " Always suspect an Englishman," he said, " who speaks French well." Bernstorff, on the other hand, advised his Government to enter into an arbitration treaty with Great Britain on the ground that such treaties could always be sub- sequently evaded, whereas their immediate effect upon the senti- mental British was so uplifting that Germany could build three more battleships without causing the slightest alarm. What truth is there in all this? Are we in fact so gullible; so innocent, as our con- tinental neighbours sometimes assume?
* * It can, I suggest, be taken as an axiom (an axiom which it would be invidious to illustrate by personal instances) that the most successsful of our Foreign Secretaries in recent years have been those who have approached the problems of European diplomacy with the utmost simp'icity and straightforwardness ; whereas the least successful have been those who have endeavoured, owing either to the subtlety of their own intellects or to a vain desire to seem cosmopolitan, to ape the continental style. Sir Edward Grey, for instance—who must always remain one of the most unassailable figures in the history of British foreign policy—was invariably, and I think deliberately, naive.. He always worked on the assumption that a foreign statesman must be as frank and honourable as he was himself. When during the Balkan crisis of 1913 he interviewed in London a Bulgarian politician, well known for the tortuous malig- nity of his ways, he startled the officials at the Foreign Office by concluding his record of the conversation with the words, "I did not derive the impression that Monsieur X was disclosing to me all that he had in mind," which was as far as Sir Edward could go towards accusing a man of lying damnably. It can at least be argued that in adopting this attitude Sir Edward Grey and those who followed his excellent example were expressing a deliberate form of belief. If you treat a crook with honesty there is at least a chance that he may respond with such dregs of honesty as he may himself possess ; whereas if you seek to compete with him in duplicity he is quite certain to outbid you every time. Moreover, it is a sound rule to worry little about what may, or may not be, at the back of the other person's mind provided there be no doubt at all as to what is at the back of your own mind. And if confidence be the foundation of all good foreign policy, then it is more important that continental statesmen should have confidence in us than we in them.
* * * * Sir Edward Grey was once asked to give advice to a young man who had just entered the diplomatic service. Unlike Talleyrand, Sir Edward was not a man to whom generalisations assumed the form of ready epigrams. He ruminated for some minutes before answering. " Well, on the whole," he said at last, I should advise_ him to remember that gullibility is in the long run better than suspiciousness." How often in the years that have inter- vened have I pondered upon the exactness of this remark! It bears in fact a double relevance to British foreign policy, a tem- peramental relevance and what might be called a constitutional relevance. Temperamentally we are very good at being simple and very bad at being intricate. The constitutional implications go even deeper. No British foreign policy can be either consistent or effective unless it respond to the majority opinion in Parlia- ment and in the country ; and since public opinion is generally ignorant it is bound to base conclusions, not upon obscure facts, but upon overt and avowable principles ; and if those principles are in their turn to be readily grasped by the public at large they must be essentially understandable and therefore simple. But since principles which make too many allowances for the intri- cacies, not to say deceptions, of the continental mind can never be simple principles, it is on the whole better to assume that our own principles are so universally valid as to be shared by all. Con- versely, any foreign policy which is based upon some intricate or unavowable object or reservation immediately rouses in the public mind the suspicion that " there must be something behind it." When, therefore, foreign critics tell us that we are too gullible in our relations with foreign Powers, I reply that, within obvious limits, this is a fault on the right side.
* * This conception of British foreign policy as being inspired by what might be called " one-sided simplicity " is of course based upon three assumptions which may no longer apply. In the first place, if you are to base your policy upon a few simple principles which, whatever the circumstances, are undeviatingly adhered to, then you must possess immense and unquestionable power. A State whose power is not ultimately determinant may be obliged to adapt policy to circumstances. If, in the second place, foreign policy ceases to be national and becomes the subject of party controversy then again all continuity is destroyed. And if, in the third place, foreign policy is to be influenced by momentary par- tiality, prejudice or passion, then it is certain to become hesitant and obscure. I have every confidence that .public opinion, in this country at least, will in the end judge correctly regarding the needs of foreign policy ; the difficulty is that in moments of perplexity or excitement the people as a whole do not judge correctly ; and during the tithe-lag between incorrect and correct judgement much damage can be done. This time-lag, in normal times, is bridged by confidence, or at least by a suspension of disbelief. But in times like the present (when opposition parties are concentrating upon the destruction of confidence) suspicion, and the false attri- bution of motive, are bound to intervene. And if the principles of policy (which should be simple, avowable and easily under- stood) become distorted by party controversy, then it is always easy to twist the facts of any situation (which are in themselves intricate, incomprehensible and obscure) to fit the most damaging contentions.
* * * *
The dire confusion created in the public mind by recent events in Greece is illustrative of the perplexity which must always be occasioned when facts are obscure and principles distorted by party controversy. How can the ordinary citizen be expected to know the shades of difference between E.A.M., E.L.A.S., E.D.E.S., S.K.E. and E.L.D.? How can he hope to preserve, or to suspend, his judgement when the facts of a most intricate situation are still further complicated by doubts of principle and motive? It may be a bad rule to be over-suspicious of foreign statesmen ; it is a habit fatal to ,all effective foreign policy to become over-suspicious of your own statesmen. It may be too much to expect confidence 'in these transitional times ; but it is not too much to expect a greater degree of responsibility in party agitators, and on the part of the public an abstinence from too hasty conclusions_ and a greater degree of ordinary patience.
Previous page
