ONE POINT MADE by Macmillan in his letter to Bulganin
was that the Russians might cease to jam the Russian programme of the BBC. So they might. But I should not expect any great results if they did. For this service which was vigorous and effective up till a few years ago has lately become a notorious waste of time. Unlike the Soviet propaganda services to which the Prime Minister compared it, it very rarely utters a word which would irritate even the touchiest of its listeners. What are we to say about a service which contrived to avoid broadcasting Khrush- chev's Secret Speech but managed to give a long series of talks on a Rembrandt exhibition in Amsterdam? So little did it either represent Britain or offend totalitarian susceptibilities that, alone among the BBC programmes for Eastern Europe and among Western programmes for Russia, it was for six months last year excepted from the jamming and given the freedom of the Soviet air. It might just as well not have been.
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