International Socialism
The two conferences of European Socialists Which have taken place in this country in the past week have neither expressed nor inspired strong feelings of brotherhood. The committee of Inter- national Socialist Conferences which met at Transport House last Friday and Saturday formally excluded the Rumanian, Bulgarian and Hungarian Social Democrats, and the motion whereby it did so no doubt had precisely the same effect as its appeals to the Polish and Italian Socialists to evade the Communist embrace before it was too late—that is to say, it marked beyond all possibility of doubt the split between those parties which accept the whip of the Cominform and those which do not. Mr. Cyrankiewicz, the Polish Socialist Prime Minister, had rejected all advances in advance by simul- taneously condemning the non-Cominform Socialists of Western Europe and announcing a new turn of the screw of co-operation between Polish Socialists and Communists. The Italians of Signor Nenni's faction walked out of the .meeting. The Czech Social Demo- crats would no doubt have done the same had not the British Foreign Office saved them the trouble by failing to issue their visas in time. So the scene moved to the Surrey hotel where on Sunday and Monday representatives of the Socialist Parties of 14 out of the 17 countries due to receive Marshall aid met to concert measures. They rejected an ambitious French proposal for a large-scale meeting of European Socialist parties, trade unions, and progressives to give a Socialist direction to Western Union. That was perhaps just as well, since that might turn out to be the wrong direction. But they managed to contribute to progress by arranging for a smaller conference to be held in Paris in April, at which the socialisation of the Ruhr will be discussed ; agreeing to take no part in Mr. Churchill's Hague conference ; and discussing what conditions would make the Marshall Plan unacceptable. No doubt it was all well intended.
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