" PROPOSALS TO RESTORE SANITY " SIR, —In a world intellectually
bewildered and morally adrift, with crooked diplomacy for the time being triumphant, any constructive proposals to restore sanity in the international situation may at least be given a fair hearing. (The Spectator is perhaps the only forum likely to concede it.) Here is the proposition for what it is worth : (i) A military alliance between the democracies and the German people, on condition that Hitler and his associates be forthwith deposed from office, and the German people set up some other form of government of their own choosing with whom the Allies may negotiate for a just settlement of the matters at present in dispute between the countries concerned. (ii) Such a settlement to include as a sine qua non, the restoration of the status quo, or some equivalent just demarcation of the boundaries of a resurrected Poland. (iii) The new Alliance then to undertake a new crusade with the avowed intention of ridding the world of Stalinism and all its sinister implications. Having delivered mankind from the menace of Hitlerism, the task still left, before a settled world becomes possible, is the overthrow not of a genuine Communism, but of that form of dictatorship which has been ruthlessly imposed upon the Russian people and has spelt for them as real a denial of liberty and the rights of man as is manifest in Germany since Hitler came into power. Hitlerism and Stalinism are the joint enemies of all the human race holds dearer than life itself. To rid the world of this dual menace, the peoples of the world might well now be summoned to unite. Were the " German Freedom Radio " to press this home in its propaganda campaign, it might rapidly be transferred from the Utopian plane to the sphere of practical politics. If a Russo-German pact till quite recently was regarded as inconceivable, we need not now hesitate to envisage an alliance with the best elements in Germany and Russia co-operating with us and all men of good will for a just and abiding peace. Allied diplomacy of a bold and constructive character is our imperative need now in the changed situation confronting us, and it might well save millions of lives and further bloodshed if we were by these suggestions to undermine the present unholy alliance of our enemies by setting before their peoples and ourselves a possible way towards peace.—I am, Sir, &c., H. MAURICE RELTON.
The Athenaeum, Pall Mall, S.W.I.
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