BRITISH AND ALLIED YOUTH
Stn,—I should like to thank Mr. Nicolson for his Marginal Comment of July 16th ; his marvellous analysis of that problem of "We" ; and his making a start with the cure (exposure to the light)—his telling me that I am not alone when writing in an occasional letter, or in my diary: lonely. But I am writing to tell you of my surprise to see that all this was referred to the British Forces ; to the British Youth that to some of us Allied at least seemed so much better off than we, just where spiritual loneliness was concerned. In fact it is the British Forces with ABCA and encouragement to study (we have " intellect " and " student " in the vocabulary of swear-words only) ; and with those of our generation with the same interests probably serving together—or at least able to find each other—it is to them our dreams and desires go to. The often uttered sigh: " If only we could get a transfer. . .." Mr. Nicolson's description—with a few additions—seemed to refer even more to us. To lack of faith and (in the long run, fortunately) no con- ventional habits to force us blindly into a trodden-out grave there has been added chaos in the mentality of our entire environment. Not chaos at the time of defeat and occupation ; at that time we knew our minds very well and were one with our environment ; but conditions as they developed hereafter " abroad "—in this country: We live in a small community, in an isolated community, in a so-called independent army- group. We are led and ruled independently by the sole will of our army commanders, with no public, no public opinion or public court of justice to control them ; with no one they need render account to. Of course, we are not under strict discipline, for discipline affords too much effort. They rather wangle through on the way of least resistance: let him who shouts most have his own way.
There also is a lot of shouting. This term "shouting" must also be understood in the sense of an opposite to thinking. Thinking, reflecting, arguing or planning have disappeared, discredited. A small example was the misplaced effort, not so long ago, of a subaltern to present a thought to the men of his platoon. A line of thought as ABCA might suggest it. He translated the following passage from an English publication: " We must be prepared that even after defeat the Second World War will appear to the German war party to have been on balance a favourable operation. What will be remembered will be not so much the actual defeat as the nearness to victory."
There was no grasp of the passage—no disagreement, also no agree- ment. But there ensued, not argument, but excitement, shouting and abuse at those that worry about far-off planning without adding a concrete number of something they did not know themselves what. Perhaps of dead Germans. The subaltern in any case has been mentioned afterwards as idiot, as conjurer, or as misleading gangster. This is the atmosphere around us. This the state of mind that when found in an individual seems reason for sympathy, but when seen from outside in the mass must be termed reaction. And reaction it is all over Europe: Yugoslavia as classical example, Poland, Belgium and others following suit over here.
Standing between those trends my attitude obviously turned fatalistic. So has that of some friends. Friends with whom we might enjoy the past wisdom of our (now discredited) first President, Masaryk, with whom we might even discuss trends of modern thought or our own present forlornness (rather than forsakenness). But we can do so only when no third person is in ear-distance and when we ourselves are not stopped by our own fatalistic smiles. What is the good of it? All that is gone; and what is left is over there—in the Royal Air Force. T. E. Lawrence was mentioned by Mr. Nicolson. He just seems that personification of today's airmen, of those that described their innermost life—not their deeds—in books like Fighter Pilot and The Last Enemy. And those make us feel that just because of their lack of hero-worship and their strong sensibility their task, though harder than that of former genera- tions, is far from hopeless in an environment more friendly and more sane than ours.
A newspaper as our own channel for the young, as Mr. Nicolson suggested, would be a tremendous advantage, though, for those of us Allied that would prefer serving in the bigger whole, but practically are condemned to remain isolated. I enclose my card, but if published can
Previous page
