POLITICS
Stockton, the Times and the Anglo-Soviet alliance
T.E.UTLEY
The row between the Tory Party and Mr Phibbs has, it seems to me, several very odd aspects. To begin with, I am surprised at the widespread view among the sophisti- cated that, by taking the young offender to the High Court, Mr Tebbit violently over- reacted and gave further evidence of the growing instability of his judgment. The truth surely is that this nut (Mr Phibbs) declined to be cracked by anything less formidable than a sledgehammer. As soon as his article appeared, the Central Office was bombarded with calls of protest from the faithful. Though there is nothing parti- cularly serious about this thoroughly absurd affair, Mr Tebbit would have made a serious tactical error if he had done nothing. Perhaps he could have thought of something better to do, but speed was the essence of the matter. The filial piety of Conservative Party supporters in the coun- try towards former Tory prime ministers is something scarcely to be credited. A mere telegram from one of them, let alone his corporeal presence, will reduce a Tory Party conference to paroxysms of enthu- siasm. In Mr Tebbit's shoes, or bathing trunks, I would not have risked a pro- longed parley with the rulers of the Federa- tion of Conservative Students.
It is, of course, equally strange that the Tory faithful should feel so much compas- sion for Lord Stockton. He is, it is true, an old and ailing man with failing eyesight; but at least until recently he has remained a vigorous and tough political campaigner, and we must all hope that he will shortly resume that role. What is more, his activi- ties continue to be engagingly rebellious and malicious. This is why even those of us who disagree with him feel so much affec- tion for him. He came into the world as a rebel and has always had a soft spot for youthful indiscretion. Before the war, did he not seriously contemplate joining the Labour Party? It is easy to imagine the patronising chuckle with which he must have greeted Mr Phibbs's suggestion that he was a war criminal, though, by the way, Mr Phibbs's article contained no such precise accusation. It is also easy to im- agine the pleasure he must take in the obvious joke about Mr Phibbs's name. No, I feel no sympathy for Lord Stockton in the matter of this cruel insult, and I imagine that he would greatly resent it if I did.
What is even odder, and much more instructive, is the manner in which the controversy over the substance of the matter (Count Tolstoy's charges) is being conducted. On both sides, it has become bogged down in detail. I am wholly incom- petent to pronounce on all these questions about formal directives, implied under- standings, normal chains of command and so on. The stark central fact, which no one seems to dispute, is that thousands of Cossacks who had surrendered to the British army were forcibly handed over to the Russians, to certain death or torture, and that their women and children were often handed over as well. This is a very horrible and staggering fact. It did not happen by accident but by deliberate de- sign. It is a crime which will for ever reek to heaven. If Harold Macmillan, (who, as Minister Resident at Allied Headquarters in North-West Africa, had a particular responsibility for the whole Mediterranean campaign) had nothing to do with the decision, this is a surprising and not very creditable fact. What is much more impor- tant, however, is that the entire British Government and, in a sense, the entire British people, had a great deal to do with it. The question of historical interest is how we, as a nation, allowed this to happen and I will give you the answer.
When Hitler attacked Russia and the British very naturally and properly formed an alliance with the Soviet Union, the country had some moral sense about that alliance. Churchill said that he had always hated the Soviet Union and did not go back on a word that he had said about it, but that here was a nation which was fighting for its very existence, as we were, that we had a common enemy and that therefore we were allies. This moral discrimination, however, did not last for long. Democracies at war seem to think them- selves to be under the necessity of develop- ing positive and highly moral war aims and, therefore, of promoting all their allies to the status of sanctity. It was not enough that the Russians should be necessary, they must also be good. It is the nemesis of the liberal conscience in such matters that you start by believing that everything which is done must be impeccably right and that you end by believing that everything which has to be done must be assumed to be impeccably right. This what happened to us about Russia.
I had a small peripheral part in this general operation myself. Being physically unfit for more useful activity, I became a leader-writer to the Times in 1944. The chief object of the Times in those days was to convert the British people to the Anglo- Soviet alliance as a permanent means of curbing Germany. The operation was master-minded by two people, Robin Barrington-Ward and E. H. Carr. Preserv- ing the Anglo-Soviet alliance necessarily involved consigning large parts of Central and Eastern Europe to the Russians' sphere of influence. The philosophical justification advanced for this cannot now be described in detail, but it envisaged a kind of modern version of the Holy Alliance which was established by Metter- nich and Alexander I after the Napoleonic Wars. In Carr's view, national sovereignty was no longer of any importance. The great Powers must constitute an aristocracy to look after the general interests of mankind, within the respective spheres of interest of these Powers. It was a horrible fraud and, as I had only to write leaders about Western Europe, I happily had little part in it.
The handing over of the Cossacks was the climax, or almost the climax, of this particularly discreditable phase in our his- tory. It was argued that the Anglo-Soviet alliance ought to be preserved (quite right at the time) but it was also widely assumed that any amount of dishonour and moral self-deception was justified in preserving it. It was not only our economic resources which were depleted in winning that large- ly, but not wholly, glorious war; it was also our moral resources, and we should have the grace to confess the fact.
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