On the Spree
Featured on the back page of The Times, in the next picture to five, strapping, brown Egyptian channel swimmers, Mr. Attlee, Mr. Bevan and Dr. Summerskill looked sadly under- nourished and over-worked. But it looks as though Moscow and Peking, cities of the fat and the free, will put that right in a jiffy. Already Mr. Malenkov has picked a posy for Dr. Edith who received 'it ' with a ready response.' And Mr. Bevan, in anticipation of his welcome from Mr. Chou en-Lai, has already out-Bevaned himself with the statement at London Airport that the danger of isolating China from the West, like the-fact of Russian isolation from the West since the Revolu-, tion, ' comes from certain elements in the United States.4 Naturally there is a lot to be gained from seeing the inside of modern China; it is not necessary to be a Bevanite or even a Socialist to believe that. And nobody would he tempted to agree with Mr. Hector McNeil that this delegation is ' irresponsible,' if the delegation itself had not set out with the determined perversity of a Searle schoolgirl on a gratuitous half holiday. By all means look at China--but look straight. To leave for Peking in the hilarious conviction that the cold war is all America's fault, and that Mr. Malcnkov is really rather a dear if you handle him right, is not a particularly reassuring sign of clear-sightedness.
Previous page
