Succes de Scandale
Scandal '63. By Clive Irving, Ron Hall, Jeremy Wallington. (Heinemann, 7s. 6d.) 'A GIGANTIC national irrelevance,' the Spectator last week called the Profumo affair; and, on the evidence, the electorate seems inclined to agree. Yet connected with the affair—sometimes by chance, as in Rachman's case—there has been a succession of exposures; not the Emperor (the Prime Minister comes reasonably well out of Scandal '63) but his court have been revealed without their clothes. The Cabinet, Parliament, security, the courts and the police have been brought under suspicion, sometimes into con- tempt; and institutions which used to be singled out for display as characteristically British have acquired a raffish appearance, like Underground posters after a Saturday night. How far some of the charges made are justified, the Denning Re- port will presumably help to decide; but even if they all can be dismissed, the existence of that poisonous exhalation of rumour earlier this year was surely an indication of something constitu- tionally amiss. To treat the affair as irrelevant would be unwise.
As an aid to understanding not just what hap- pened, but why, Scandal '63 is surprisingly useful, considering the speed with which it has been rushed out. This has meant missing Denning: and the authors have been unable to secure, or at least to print, some other relevant informa- tion. The few characters who emerge in the round are those who talked freely, like Ward and Colonel Wigg: others remain as if observed from the crowd around the Old Bailey, or from the reporters' seats: Keeler, for example, and Mandy, both of whom were presumably contracted else- where. It is not easy to assess how far the threat of libel has prevented other disclosures. One of Ward's better-known mistresses is referred to but not named—which seems a little unfair on those who are named, but are not in a position to make the threat of a writ effective. And another character who, I suspect, played a slimy part, will appear to the casual reader as a public- spirited citizen—possibly because he, too, would have reached' for his solicitor if any hint to the contrary had appeared. Nothing could have been feared more than an injunction for a book of this nature.
Only on one point would I like to see the record altered—as distinct from amplified. The writers have been unfair to Ward, when they say he was prepared to 'rat' on Profumo when cornered. Anthony West said much the same thing in the Spectator recently; and West was reflecting what, in my experience, remains quite a widely-held view when he remarked that, in his eyes, Ward's only sin lay 'in his effort, when he first saw trouble closing in on him, to turn in a friend in an attempt to save his own skin.' But Profumo was not a friend of Ward's, except in the sense that Ward claimed friendship with all influential acquaintances. Ward did not even much like Profumo; but he went to considerable lengths to shield him. It was Ward who went round to the Mirror, when Keeler gave them Profumo's letter, and with a mixture of cajole- ments and bluff persuaded them not to use it. Later the Mirror was to explain that they thought
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it was 'effusive but not conclusive'; and if they had no other confirmatory evider.x.e, this would have been understandable, in view of-the way the newspapers had had their fingers burned over Galbraith's' letter to Vassall. But the Mirror did have confirmatory evidence; what deterred them was the fact that it came from Ward; and Ward, though willing to disclose what had happened in confidence, refused to be party to an exposure of Profumo. Later, too, as the authors admit, he went on television and lied on Profumo's behalf.
At this point, however, Ward began to hear from friends that he was being cast for the part of fall guy (I know of no equivalent expression here) by Profumo's friends in the Conservative Party, who were giving it out, as they genuinely believed, that an innocent Profumo had been nearly, but not quite, trapped in the Welbeck web. Ward also found that his activities as Procurer-General to the Establishment, a post to which rumour had rapidly promoted him, were being investigated by the police with a view to prosecution. Ward had prided himself on being 'in' with the authorities; he had co- operated with MI5 over Ivanov, and with Scot- land Yard over the drug ring in which Keeler had got mixed up. Not unnaturally he leapt to the conclusion that the prosecution was politi- cally inspired, with the design of distracting attention from Profumo. It was stupid of him to imagine that by giving away Profumo he would be able to distract attention from himself; but that he should have done so, in the circum- stances, hardly deserves to be called 'ratting.' And perhaps it is not unjust that the central figure who comes least well out of Scandal '63 is Profumo himself, a promising young man ruined not, it seems, by Keeler, but by in-
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