THE PRESS Leave It to Smith?
CHRISTOPHER BOOKER writes : As expressions of Tuesday optimism rWe had a very constructive talk. . . . I think we have got further forward . . . we may even surprise you') gave way to expressions of non- committal caution Mould you say today, Mr. Smith, that you were more optimistic or less optimistic than yesterday?' I wouldn't like to say') followed by the ominous headlines of Fri- day (`LAST DITCH BID.' 'BREAKING POINT'), and finally by those of Saturday ('BREAKDOWN.' NOW SMITH RIDES ALONE'), the press was indeed faced by a difficult task. Attendant on an inevitable ritual with its inevitable end, newspapers still had to keep up their news temperature, although deprived of any real knowledge of what was going on, and still hail to churn out their reams of editorial advice.
There was some peripheral entertainment to be derived from, for instance, the priggish severity with which the Daily Telegraph on Mon' day slapped down those who had been rash enough to make comparisons between 'the Arnett' can Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the present crisis'—in view of the fact that one 01 the first papers to draw that analogy had been the Sunday Telegraph eight days before. Or, indeed, from the excitement with which the Soil of the World bannered its front page on Sun: r1, day: 'EXCLUSIVE. Ian Smith in a remarkabi; interview. . . . SHE WILL ALWAYS BE OUR QuEgf4' Said Noyes Smith, the paper's political corre: spondent, below: `Mr. Ian Smith . assured me yesterday: "Come what may, we shall always sing 'God Save The Queen' . . . we shall keep our blue flag flying, with the Union Jack in the top left-hand corner. We shall continue to drink the loyal toast. We shall always dream of the great reconciliation."' A scoop for the News of the World, particularly commendable in view of the fact that Mr. Smith had the day before given an hour and a half press conference, during which he had surely exhausted everything he might have had to say. But what is this in the Sunday Express? Another 'exclusive' interview with Mr. Smith? `Whatever happens, Rhodesia intends to remain loyal to the Queen,' writes Keith Renshaw. `Mr. Ian Smith stressed this to me behind the scenes yesterday. . . . "We would still sing God Save The Queen and drink the loyal toast,"' etc. etc. All there, even down to the heart-rending bit about dreaming `of the day when there was the great reconciliation.' But such antics apart, the press on the whole, from The Times to the Sunday Mirror, was driven mainly to composing its face into an expression of deepest gravity and intoning at regular intervals a litany of such forthright exhortation as the Daily Telegraph's `there can be no petty dealing on such a grave issue.'
Only in two camps did the situation look totally unambiguous, did the issues seem as clear-cut as black and white, did the British government's course appear quite simple and direct. On the one hand, of course, with lan- guage so predictable that it was almost endearing, were the Daily and Sunday Express. When, two Sundays ago, no less a figure than Sir Max Aitken himself laid down his position under the heading, 'HOW DARE THEY TALK OF THE QUEEN'S ENEMIES,' there was already a mood of autumn in the air. For, with the shadowy exception of Europe,' this might well be the,last great Beaver- brook battle fought with conventional weapons with talk of `betrayal of those who fought' and `common loyalty to the Crown.' And as the last two weeks have unrolled, so no Beaver- creek stop has remained unpulled—from threats that, unless Wilson gave way, the British people Would rise up and throw him over the White C. tiffs of Dover (The British people must. step into this crisis more positively . . . the Labour Party will get merciless treatment at the next General Election. . . . At the next Election they will toss him out of office') to a terrifying Picture of what would happen to Britain if she were to impose full economic sanctions against Rhodesia (`money would pour out of London in a torrent,' Britain would lose much of her cppper supplies,' we might even have to face `cigarette- rdticling'). It has been a virtuoso performance in Vintage tradition, with finally, on Tuesday this ,wweek, the crowning blockbuster of a front-page arning' by a new recruit to the Daily Express rlitical staff, the Marquess of Salisbury, KG. As the Express's eternal saving .grace, on the same morning, there also appeared an Osbert Lancaster cartoon showing Maudie Littlehampton's beatnik ,4ughter, armed to the teeth, with the caption, ther, dear, I cannot lie! I'm off to Rhodesia
a, the David Astor battalion of the Inter- national Brigade.'
ambiguities the other camp, in which all the tortuous c7iguities of the Rhodesian situation were bil„71low magically dissipated by a ringing bugle "", was that occupied by those three guardians `)Alarhe national conscience, Messrs. David Astor,
•
s
respeatiir Hetherington and Paul Johnson, editors
the velY of the Observer, the Guardian and New Statesman. Not for them any mealy-
mouthed talk about 'difficult decisions.' Their
call to action was clear. As the Guardian put it:
The talks with Rhodesia cannot succeed . . . instead of negotiating from this position of weakness the British Government should now act as it would in any other colony . . . which had threatened open rebellion. It should sus- pend the Constitution and assume the Govern- ment itself.
As the New Statesman put it, in a leader headed, `The Only Answer To Treason': Can any useful purpose be served by the present talks on Rhodesia? . . . Britain's most prudent response to the threat of a UDI is the one which, at first glance, seems the least desir- able; an immediate suspension of the .constitu- tion, accompanied by intervention in whatever force is necessary to secure compliance from the present Rhodesian authorities.
And as the Observer put it, in a leader headed, 'Rhodesian Realities': Britain may yet come to regret the fact that her leaders were yesterday too timid to order the detention of Rhodesia's Prime Minister and his senior Ministerial colleagues, and to send troops into Rhodesia to support the Governor in resisting the proclaimed intention . . . to commit a plain act of treason.
There are certain political situations in which there can be no objective truth or 'right solution.' It is hard not to see in the eager stretching of these three `progressive' journals for a violent panacea, the relish with which they talk about `gritty reality,' an echo of the same zeal with which two and three years ago they worshipped the 'tough-minded efficiency' of the Kennedy whizz-kids, with which they craved for 'dynamic government' and .for `blasting holes in com- placency' in Britain. In every pallid liberal pro- gressive working for the Observer, there is a certain love of violence bursting to get out.
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