Whose Man in Havana?

By CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS

MR. GRAHAM GREENE, in a letter to The Times on January 3, complained of the ignorance of the British Foreign Office about events in Cuba, which had caused Mr. Selwyn Lloyd to state in Parliament that, when the Britisli Government granted permits for the export of arms to President Batista, it had no evidence of a civil war in Cuba. Perhaps it arose like this.

PRIVATE SECRE'l ARY : 1-IU110.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: Hullo, Foreign Secretary speaking.

P. S. : There's a PQ, sir, about our exporting arms to Cuba. A Socialist Member, a Mr. Delargy, wang to know why we are send- ing arms to President Batista to use Against the revolutionaries.

F. S.: Is there a revolution in Cuba?

P. S.: Oh, yes, I fancy so, sir. I read about it in the Daily Mail.

F'. S.: How long has it been going on?

P. S.: Well, sir, more or less ever since I can remember.

F. S. : Are you quite sure that it really has been going on'?

P. S.: Well, of course, if you wish it, sir, I can ring up someone and make certain.

F. S.: Perhaps that would be just as well. Who did you hear about it from?

P. S. : Well, sir, you've seen the reports from 59200/5. Mr. Wormold, OBE, who was then our man in Havana, is going about the country now lecturing on Cuba under the auspices of the Foreign Office, and he says for a fact that there is a revolution in Cuba.

F. S. (laughing heartily): Mr. Wormold, did you say? Well, then, it1/2 all quite clear. Surely you know why Mr. Wormold is lecturing for the Foreign Office?

P. S.: I'm 'afraid I don't quite understand, sir.

F. S.: You know we had to keep Mr. Wormold lecturing. Otherwise he would Have sold the story of how he invented all his reports to the Sunday papers. But, if Mr. Wormold says that there is a revolution in Cuba, we can be quite sure that there isn't a revolu- tion in Cuba.

P. S.: As you say, sir, but the Daily Telegraph says that revolutionary forces have occu-

pied Havana, and that the revolutionaries are heavily armed.

F. S. (laughing heartily once more): Arc they armed with vacuum cleaners?

P. S.: I'm afraid that I don't understand, sir. Mr. Graham Greene in The Times says that he is quite sure that there is and always has been a revolution in Cuba.

F. S.: Mr. Graham Greene made Mr. Wormold say that there was a revolution in Cuba, but he explained that Mr. Wormold only said that because he wanted some more money as he could not sell his vacuum cleaners.

P. S.: But this time, sir, it's not only Mr. Graham Greene. The Daily Express and the BBC and all sorts of other people say that there is a revolution in Cuba.

F. S.: Oh, these journalists are all gullible. They would believe anything that Mr. Graham Greene told them. But, when you have had as much experience of public life as I have had, you will be a bit more careful in swallowing any old story that a novelist makes up just to sell his books.

P. S.: Very well, sir, what will you tell Mr. Delargy?

F. S.: I will tell him that I will make a further statement as soon as I have got some more information.

P. S.: But surely, sir, if I may say so, it's not any longer merely a matter of what Graham Greene says? Now that the papers have all said that there is a revolution in Cuba on the strength of the statements of our official lecturer, might it not be very damaging to our prestige if we said that there was not a revolution in Cuba after all? Supposing that Mr. Delargy were to ask a further question when Parliament meets again?

F. S.: Yes, there's something in that.

P. S.: SO there is a revolution in Cuba then, sir, after all?

F. S.: Yes, I suppose that there had better be. P. S.: Perhaps Mr. Wormold's suggestion put the idea into their heads, sir?

F. S. I dare say that's the explanation. Our pre§tige, I am happy to say, stands very high indeed in Cuba.