29 DECEMBER 1961, Page 10

SIR,—May I refer your correspondent Elaine Windrich to Lord Keynes's

famous letter to the New Statesman of October 14, 1939, in which he said :

The intelligentsia of the Left were the loudest in demanding that Nazi aggression should be resisted at all costs. When it comes to a show- down scarce four weeks have passed before they remember they are pacifists and write defeatist letters to your columns, leaving the defence of freedom and of civilisation to Colonel Blimp and the Old School Tie, for whom Three Cheers.

Similarly before the last World War the Labour Party screamed for 'collective security' and yet made security of any kind impossible by bitter opposition to all defence measures.