Spectator's Notebook
NOT being acquainted with the inside story of Mr. Geoffrey McDermott's retirement from his position of British Minister in Berlin, I cannot offer any judgment on the rights and wrongs of the matter. He claims to have been stellenbosched following political differences with the Foreign Office; the Foreign Office denies this and goes as far as to say that Mr. McDermott's iews on Berlin as expressed in his Observer article had never been conveyed to it. As between :'sese contrasting versions of the same incident ;Oe third (or historian's) account will not be 1,.aown for some time. For the moment I should simply like to observe, first, that, whatever the merits of Mr. McDermott's political thinking, he tone of his article and some of its contents had the effect of making me think that he did not like Germans very much. And, secondly, that
do not think it a particularly good thing that he should have burst into print in this fashion. the net result of the whole incident will be to increase West German suspicions of this country's loyalty to its ally just at the moment when we can do with the confidence of Dr. Schroeder and Dr. Erhard—if not of Dr.
Adenauer. People who have been in official posi- tions do have a certain responsibility for what they say upon vacating them—even if they are burning with a sense of injustice. It would be as well if Foreign Office Winslow boys could keep out of the press in future.
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