SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
J. W. M. THOMPSON
The damage which the atrocity stories from Vietnam will do to the Americans' self- esteem may seem a relatively minor matter at the moment, but I have a feeling it may prove not the least of their consequences. Every nation cherishes its own favourite view of its peculiar merits, and so far as the Americans are concerned it would be hard to think of a self-portrait more utterly at odds with the gruesome activities now being reported. I had just been reading the latest horror stories when I came across an American air line advertisement in one of the colour supplements. It could have emanated from no other country in the world but the United States. 'Americans are quick to smile' (so the TWA prose pro- claimed). 'This is often misunderstood by Britons and taken for insincerity. But Britons who spend any length of time with Americans are often surprised by their ge- nuine warmth and generosity. And the point is, Americans are quick to smile but that is really the way they are . .. And if there are children . . . they will be friendly and easy with the children . . . A great American humorist once said, "There's no such thing as strangers, only friends we haven't met." ' I repeat, this could only be an American advertisement, and anyone who has spent 'any length of time with Americans' will know that it is not to be written off as mere ad-man's claptrap. It is a true account of a deeply-felt view of themselves held by Americans, and not without justification. Yet none but Americans would express their self- regard in quite such undiluted language; no other nation would be likely to advertise its virtues in such happily complacent words. The consequence, to such a people, of becoming the culprits in a monstrous crime, or series of crimes, against the helpless and the weak, and even against the children with whom they feel themselves so 'friendly and easy', is incalculable. 'There's no such thing as strangers, only friends we haven't met': and also, alas, 'oriental human beings' such as those who figure on the ghastly charge sheet of Pinkville.
Many nations have lost wars in the past and recovered from the shock; others have suffered mortifying blows to their pride and those wounds have healed. But no nation has marched so surely into horror while believ- ing and proclaiming itself to be benignly heading in precisely the opposite direction.
On the record
It is also true, of course, that when illusions preside over events the effects are to be seen at many points. President Johnson refused to become 'the first American Presi- dent to lose a war': President Nixon employed' almost exactly the same words earlier this year. Yet this notion that 'defeat' would be a unique and appalling precedent, even if literally based upon the truth, rests in reality upon a large falsification of history.
In fact America has suffered previous politico-military defeats, and even in Asia. American men, money and arms massively supported the Chinese Nationalists but in spite of that they were driven off the mainland; while in Korea Chinese 'volun- teers' forced huge American forces back from the Yalu River to the 38th" Parallel. Much nearer home, the troubled story of us- Mexican relations is one of American failure to impose its will upon a small neighbour; Wilson sent in the marines, Franklin Roosevelt demanded a blockade of Mexican oil. And Castro's Cuba is another example of a small country defying America and getting its own way. It is simply untrue that America's history is one of unbroken 'vic- tory'. As I. F. Stone has written. 'Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower and Kennedy (at the Bay of Pigs) had to swallow the bitter pill ... and did so rather than gam- ble on longer and wider war.'
Miss Xanadu
I suppose Peter Simple's Rentacrowd organisation is already producing female demonstrators programmed to protest against the degrading of women by the 'Miss World' contest and similar enterprises. A ludicrous prospect, possibly. And yet it is strange that this sort of commercial spectacle has flourished so lucratively without. until the small demonstration at the 'Miss World' event the other day, attracting many signs of female resentment. It shows, perhaps, the essential spuriousness of much 'eman- cipation'. It certainly says much about the present condition of the Bac that 'public service' television should display the spec, tacle with such relish. I'd like to have heard Lord-Reith's response to the sight of BBC an- nouncers informing the nation of the dimensions of breasts, buttocks and belly of the exhibits.
This reminded me of something, and at last I've remembered what it is. Marco Polo, in his Travels, has a detailed account of how Kublai Khan recruited young women for his personal use. He sent 'valuers' to survey all the maidens in a province : 'After inspecting and surveying every girl, feature by feature ... the valuers award to some a score of six- teen marks, to others seventeen, eighteen or twenty, or more or less according to the degree of their beauty. And, if the Great Khan has ordered them to bring him all who score twenty marks, or perhaps twenty-one, these are duly brought. When they have come to his presence, he has them assessed a second time by other valuers, and then the thirty or forty with the highest score are selected for his chamber ...'
The system, doesn't seem to have changed greatly after seven centuries of progress. The difference today is that instead of the satisfaction of the Great Khan, it is now that of Mammon which is paramount.
More shock disclosures Thank heavens for a fearless crusading newspaper like The Times to expose scandals which most of us would otherwise never suspect. I refer, of course, to this disturbing revelation by a London barber in the `men's fashion' pages last Friday : 'I think that the hairdressing industry is sick at the moment. There is an upsurge of young people waiting to spend money, time and care on their hair and the trade seems to be closing its eyes to the fact. Nothing worries me more than to feel that there are not enough good, talented young people entering the trade ...' I mean, what could be more worrying, once the dreadful facts are known7
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