A SPECTATOR 'S NOTEBOOK
IN stating in the House of' Lords on Tuesday that the Foreign Secretary had decided to create an Economic Intelligence Depart- ment of the Foreign Office, and implying that it would largely be staffed by members of the present Department of Economic War- fare (which, its conflict ended and its raison d'être achieved, would sink gracefully into nothingness), Lord Selborne threw new and welcome light on Mr. Eden's plans for reconstructing the Foreign Office. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the economic element in foreign relations in the future, and it is important on every ground that a strong economic section should be built up in the Foreign Office and able economists form part of the staffs of all the principal embassies and legations. Over and above that, the ordinary members of the service, who are the potential Amb4ssa- dors and Ministers of tomorrow, must themselves have at least a comfortable working acquaintance with economics ; Mr. Eden has .already given assurances on that point. So long, it may be added, as Mr. Richard Law remains at the Foreign Office there is sufficient guarantee that the economic side of international relations will receive due attention. It was significant that in the House of Lords d:scussion the two speakers most comprehensively familiar with the conduct of international affairs, Lord Cecil (who was Minister of B:ockade in the last war) and Lord Perth, pressed strongly for the absorption by the Foreign Office, after the war, of the more important sections of the Ministry of Economic Warfare.
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A mischievous article, or an article containing some mischievous passages, in the well-known Saturday Evening Post, of Philadelphia, has been quoted in various papers here. In an article entitled " What Really Happened at Teheran" (that suspicious " what really happened ") the writer avers That "Stalin's edged wit, aimed at Churchill," was replied to in kind, so that President Roosevelt had thrust on him the duty of moderating the asperities " before they drew blood." Stalin's jibes, it is added, were barbed with memories growing out of the Prime Minister's anti-Bolshevik days five-and- twenty years ago. Nonsense though this appears on the face of it— for it is matter of common knowledge that the atmosphere at Teheran was conspicuously cordial—it seemed to me worth while to make inquiries in quarters where authoritative information was obtainable. The facts actually are that Marshal Stalin and the Prime Minister got on so well together that they were soon on terms of highly good-humoured chaff, in which it was part of the fun for the Russian leader to rally the P.M. on the completeness of his conversion from the views he held immediately after the last war. There could be no better evidence of the friendliness of the personal relations established. Through taking the jokes with portentous seriousness the American writer has acquired—and disseminated—an impression precisely opposite to the facts.
* * * * Exhilarating as the report on U-boat warfare in April sounds— more U-boats sunk by the Allies than Allied ships sunk by U-boats —optimism should, I think, be a little restrained. The recent German claims in regard to U-boat warfare have been significantly modest ; all, indeed, that the Allied announcement necessarily means is that the number of U-boats sunk in April was something over ten. In other words, the U-boats were almost inactive last month —though, of course, far more were operating than were destroyed. Where were the rest—several hundred of them? There can be
little doubt that they were massing for counter-invasion operations. That was only to be expected ; with the Luftwaffe completely out- classed, the U-boat may be the German's chief weapon against sea- borne troops. What is more important if it is true is a report to which the Daily Mail gave considerable prominence on Wednesday that the U-boat crews are being transferred from their large, long- range vessels to a new type of small submarine, with -acrew of seven or eight and a high surface-speed, designed expressly to operate, not far from base, in waters like those of the English Channel. If these boats exist the Admiralty no doubt know all about them; but it may not be an altogether simple matter to counter them.
Most people are awaiting the opening of the Second Front cam- paign with impatience, and its development with confidence. But there is such a thing 'hs a foolish excess of optimism, and in such views as the Daily Express voiced in its leading article on Tuesday it is difficult to see any sense at all. The subject was a possible attack on this country by paratroops, and the bombing of invasion ports by the Luftwaffe, as a blow in anticipation of the Allied invasion of the Continent. The Daily Express thinks this might rather be welcomed. " It would be easier to round up German paratroops in our own fields than blast them out of concrete across the Channel. And, of course, such an attack would give our magnificent Home Guards the opportunity for which they first enlisted." Or, again, the Luftwaffe bombing of ports and communications. "That will certainly be attempted, and it will save the R.A.F. much petrol if the enemy comes here instead of lying low across the Channel." Now this is all very well on the easy assumption that the paratroops, the hardest- trained and hardest-bitten men in the German army, will be wiped out on sight by the Home Guard before they have done a scrap of damage, and that the Luftwaffe will be disposed of as summarily by the petrol-saving R.A.F., without dropping a bomb where it will hurt a baby or a bridge. On every possible ground it is obviously better that the Luftwaffe should be engaged over France than over Britain. and that paratroops should be opposed by the toughest units in the Allied armies, not by the Home Guard, which, for all its public spirit and gallantry, no one could equate with a first-line force. Why should the Express or anyone else desire that costly combat?
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I am not, I am sorry to say, an authority on music (or on many other pursuits and arts), and for this appreciation indebtedness lies elsewhere: "Dame Ethel Smyth was often a hilarious sight— whether on a railway station or a concert platform. Her sense of fun, gaiety and high spirits were irrepressible and irresistible, and though she possessed more prowess than genius as a composer it was an invigorating, stimulating prowess. Of her operas, The Wreckers is the most likely to survive, but her musical output was great, and it may be found that there are more lasting and valuable things among her songs and smaller compositions than in the larger- scale works, such as her Mass, and the very ambitious choral and orchestral work, The Prison. Like many musicians she wrote extremely well, and her Impressions that Remained (1919) had a great and deserved success. She was an unforgettable and attractive personality and inspired affection and respect among men and women alike, in spite of being from childhood up always in the front
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