WAR SITUATION AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Hansard, 15 December 1943)

§ Mr. Eden

To resume, about our Far Eastern approaches, the hon. Member for West Bromwich went on to speak about the delivery of supplies to China, and he laid emphasis, I think rightly, on the importance of that and of our taking some share therein. He was answered to a considerable extent by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Chester-le-Street (Mr. Lawson) who spoke with personal knowledge of the difficulties. It is true that these supplies are being conveyed entirely by United States aircraft. The reason is that China is in the United States sphere and our American friends are continuing a very remarkable performance, unique in history, in the supplies they are delivering over this hump of stupendous mountains. The figures rise month by month. Though I well understand my hon. Friend's point of view when he said that if only we could come into the picture it would be good for our relations with China, I think he and the House will understand that it would be wrong to do that at the expense of some part of our military effort. There must be confidence between Allies and military necessities must override temporary political advantages. That is the attitude we have observed and, in full agreement with us, this delivery is being done entirely by the United States.

1649 My right hon. Friend the Member for Luton (Mr. Burgin) asked whether we were convinced that we are making the fullest possible use of all our military resources. I would reply to him, Yes, the plans—and I am coming to them a little later on—which we laid down at Teheran will, as I hope I made plain yesterday, call for all the efforts of our Allies in every respect. There will be no margin, and it is going to take all our energy to fulfil all the demands made on us in the very near future. As I did refer to Teheran, I would like to say a word on a subject which I omitted to mention yesterday, and that is on behalf of His Majesty's Government to express our thanks to our hosts in Persia and to the Persian Government, our friends and Allies, and also to tell the House that the Persian Foreign Minister expressed to me his gratification that his country's capital had been chosen for this meeting. We were therefore all the more glad to find that there was full agreement between ourselves, the United States and the Soviet Union about our policy towards Persia both now and after the war. That was set out in a document which was extremely well received in Persia and, I think, in many other lands in the Middle East as well.

Now I come a little nearer home again, to my hon. Friend the Member for West Leicester (Mr. H. Nicolson). He has a deep knowledge of the French people and of the French character, and he has also had many years' experience of diplomacy. Naturally, I always listen and pay great attention to what he says. He chided us quite a bit for our handling of the Lebanese situation. Well, it is a little difficult to handle these matters through the diplomatic channel always with the gentleness that you might wish, in the urgent conditions of war. I do not think he was quite fair in some of the things he said. He implied, for instance, if I understood him aright, that the French declaration of Lebanese independence in 1941 was made under pressure from us. That is not so; we welcomed it, but it was not our pressure that caused the French to make it. We have not asked the French Committee to abandon the Mandate, except, of course, as part of a general settlement between themselves and the Levant States, a settlement which, I think, everybody in all parts of the House would 1650 greatly like to see. I must also say—although I do not want to re-open old wounds—that M. Helleu's action was not one which could be readily defended. The French National Committee expressly repudiated it. We had to act with some promptitude, because the situation—and my hon. Friend himself and others will have seen the statements made by our friends, such as the Prime Minister of Egypt, Nahas Pasha and others—was very inflammable. If there was any roughness in our methods, I beg my hon. Friend to believe that it was not intended, though it might have been indispensable. Let me say a few further words about France. I share entirely my hon. Friend's sentiments that the reconstruction of France is not only entirely desirable but necessary for us here in these Islands. But I must say that that can only be done from within. It cannot be done even by her best friends from without.

Let me now turn to another subject, which was raised by the hon. Member for North Lambeth (Mr. G. Strauss), namely, Portugal. The hon. Member asked me about the wolfram position, and I think he said that if Portugal wanted consideration she should show good will. I think that was a little harsh on Portugal, who has shown a considerable measure of good will in granting to the Allies the quite invaluable bases in the Azores. As regards the wolfram position, it is, broadly, this: Naturally, we want to reduce the export of Portuguese wolfram to the enemy as far as we can. We have had many and protracted negotiations about it, and we have succeeded in bringing about a very substantial reduction. Portuguese exports of wolfram to the United Nations—that is, mainly to us—and to the enemy are based on certain precise agreements under which we, in fact, secure considerably the greater part of these Portuguese wolfram supplies. These agreements were made a little time ago, when, perhaps, things were not quite so good as they are now and they are due for renewal in the first half of next year. We shall resume negotiations with the Portuguese Government with a view to securing a further modification of the present arrangements in our favour. I should add that the Portuguese Government have never been left in any doubt about our strong views on this subject and we shall continue our efforts to secure 1651 a further reduction in wolfram exports to the Axis and to reach agreement with the Portuguese Government to this end.

Now I must make a reply to a question by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrew (Mr. Wedderburn). He asked what was our policy about the long-distance bombardment of Germany. Was there to be any change of priority? Was there to be a setback in the picture at all? I should like to assure him that no postponement and no lessening of the significance of that part of our offensive action is contemplated. On the contrary, this long-range offensive bombing of Germany has a very high place indeed in our plans for the coming year. I think there was an impression in his mind that perhaps some of our Allies were not so keen about this as we are, but I can assure him quite definitely that that is not so. Certainly our Russian Allies attach the greatest importance to this long-range bombing of Germany. If I remember aright, Marshal Stalin himself said so publicly a very short time ago. Anyhow, that process will continue, and it will have the effect of shortening the war.

I now want to make a remark or two about the speech of the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Bevan). I might have said a great deal more on the political side—perhaps I can before I sit down—but the main results, particularly of the Teheran Conference, were military. It is the co-ordination and the final determination of our plans in the coming months which were reached there. I can also tell the House, lest there is any uneasiness about it, that we have not entered into any kind of secret engagement or treaty or anything which could cause anyone a sleepless night or a sleepless hour, and the hon. Member need not have any fear that the movement of power has been from him to the Treasury Bench. I can give this undertaking, that as long as I have anything to do with the conduct of the Foreign Office, if I make an engagement I shall come and tell the House at once, which is the constitutional practice, and, if they do not like it, they can turn me out. If they do like it, I may perhaps make another. That is the constitutional practice, which we do not propose to vary, so the hon. Member need not go back to the county council just yet. He complained a good deal about our strategy in the Mediterranean. There he 1652 is at an advantage in relation to me, because, if I am going to start to defend our present strategy, it is impossible to do so without giving some indication of our future strategy. There were quite a lot of things that I was longing to say even as he was speaking, but I restrained myself then and I shall now on that head, except perhaps to quote a little poem of which I am rather fond: My soul, be thou a patient looker-on. Judge not the play until the play is done. Her plot has many changes. Everyday Speaks a new scene. The last act crowns the play. I advise him not to pronounce a final critical judgment until the last act. By all means let everyone express his criticism, but the last act may prove us not to be so far wrong. The hon. Member was also critical of our policy towards General Tito. We sent supplies by air some time back, but, of course, traffic by air over that distance is an extremely difficult matter. I admit that supplies were small. Weather conditions often stopped flight, but supplies brought regularly by air have been going on since May. Before that they went in smaller quantities. Since we have had the heel of Italy we have had sea communications and we are opening up supplies that way, but that is competing with the needs of our own armies in Italy. The same bases have to be used both for the supplies up the Adriatic and for the supplies up Italy. When the hon. Gentleman suggested that we would not have begun to do anything about this if we had not been prodded by the Americans he was entirely wrong.

§ Mr. Eden

That is implying that it had something to do with the American liaison officers. They had nothing whatever to do with it. It has been done on our part and it has been our responsibility. It is not true that we needed to be prodded into this policy. It was approved by the United States and the Russian Governments, but the decision to send supplies was that of His Majesty's Government. We must be allowed to say something for ourselves sometimes.

I come to say a word about the Greek position. As far as I understood my hon. 1653 Friend's criticism I can relieve his mind, although I do not think that he wants to have his mind relieved. As far as I can understand it, he seems to think there was some understanding or agreement between ourselves and the King of Greece which concerned the King's future, possibly that he should return to his country and possibly that we should use force and authority to put him back into his country. There is no such understanding of any sort between us and the King of Greece. He has never asked for anything of the kind and he has made it plain, more than once in a broadcast in July and in a statement to his Ministers, which has more lately been published, that he places his fate in the hands of his people. I do not think a monarch can do more than that. My hon. Friend says that the publication of the letter of the King of Greece was the result of something I had said to the King in Cairo. That would be quite a logical deduction, but logic is often wrong. As a matter of fact, I was as surprised as my hon. Friend when I saw that letter published when I got back here. I have talked to the King of Greece about his future and the future of his country. What else is a Foreign Secretary for? As a matter of fact, I never urged him to publish that document, but I think he was very wise to do so because I think it will dissipate some of the doubts.

May I say a word about our policy towards the Greek bands? The hon. Gentleman showed a great deal of prejudice in what he said about that. I laid down my doctrine yesterday, and I stand by it. It is that we are going to help people who are fighting the enemy. The hon. Gentleman described Colonel Zervas as a very bad man who had something to do with the plebiscite held at the time of the King's return. He is one of the leaders of the guerillas. He is not a royalist but a republican, but even if he were a royalist he has been fighting the Germans. There is no dispute about that. All our liaison officers know that and I am going to send him supplies as far as I possibly can. I am afraid that we have not been doing very well because the weather there has been very bad. With regard to other bands, we are ending a certain amount of supplies also. I have on my table at the Foreign Office some new proposals to try and unite these bands and 1654 to pursue a policy which will bring them closer together. I do not think that it is impossible. The King's declaration may make it easier. I beg the hon. Gentleman to believe that I am anxious to win the war and that I am not in the least interested whether somebody who is fighting the Germans calls himself a Communist, a Zervasist, or some other -ist. In my experience they will turn out to be very much alike by the time they have finished.

Let me now say something in answer to the questions put to me by the right hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Greenwood) and give a picture of what we are trying to do for the future. I agree with everything that the right hon. Gentleman said in the concluding passages of his speech yesterday, which have just been referred to. What the House appeared to be in doubt about was our plans and intentions as regards future foreign policy, the structure of our foreign policy and the methods by which we are going to pursue it. Let me try to explain why it is that I do feel much more confidence about the situation now than I did six months ago. Perhaps the House has rather forgotten the results of the Moscow Conference, because the much more splendid edifice of Teheran has put Moscow "down there." I would ask hon. Members to re-read those documents, because there, I think, they will find the answers to many of the questions they have put to me to-day.

Let me give one example. At Moscow we had to deal with three sets of problems, and first with the immediate political problem. One example was the Mediterranean. It is no secret that there has been, I do not say a certain amount of friction, but a certain amount of questioning, over what was going on as between the Allies in the Mediterranean. To meet that situation we set up this Advisory Council for Italy and we are working together on the Italian situation. I can only say one thing. We have never said that the King and Badoglio have got to be there for ever, but that if a change comes it will be better to have the change when you are certain that the new elements are truly representative of the Italian people, and I doubt whether a change could be made most usefully at the present moment. This Advisory Council for Italy is handling these matters, and all the four Powers are represented on it.

1655 Then we thought we must also look to the future and face up now to some of the problems that will arise in the latter stages of the war and at the end of the war. It was for those that we set up here in London the European Advisory Commission, which had its first informal meeting to-day. In both those matters we are already planning. As I have said, we do not exclude association with other Powers in the work of the London Commission, but we do want first to clear our own minds and to have our own suggestions ready to put to the respective Governments before we get to the final stage. Beyond the London Commission and the Mediterranean we are also at work on some scheme for international order that shall endure. I should like to quote two sentences from what Mr. Hull said to both Houses and Congress, because I think it is of immense importance as coming from a statesman of his calibre and with his reputation in the United States. He said: Through this Declaration"— that is the Four Power Declaration signed in Moscow— the Soviet Union, Great Britain, the United States and China have laid the foundation for co-operative effort in the post-war world towards enabling all peace-loving nations large and small to live in peace and security, to preserve the liberties and rights of civilised existence and to enjoy expanding opportunities and facilities for economic, social and spiritual progress. In other words, we have together undertaken to do this work, and we have undertaken to set up the machinery. I know only too well that some of our problems are short-term problems to be dealt with by one method and others are long-term problems to be dealt with by other methods, but we have made a beginning with this work, and we shall go on with it step by step.

1656 I am not going to tell the House that because of the Moscow Conference and the Teheran Conference all our difficulties are at an end and we can now sit back. Of course it is not so; but what I feel, though perhaps I expressed myself badly yesterday, was that before Moscow and the other conferences I was not sure there was a common foundation on which we, the United States and Russia could work, and now I am sure that there is. That seems to be of immense importance, because if we can, work together, as I have reminded the House before, though there will be plenty of difficulties there is nothing ultimately that we cannot resolve, we three with China. If any one of the four Powers drops out there is nothing effective that we can achieve in the international field. And so I tell hon. Members just before the Christmas Recess that we can feel more hope about the international situation to-day than we could feel six months ago.

What is the duty of His Majesty's Government in all this? The duty of His Majesty's Government in this, as I can see it, is to lend all our strength and all our authority, not as a cement between the United States and Russia—it would be an impertinence so to regard it—but to assist in an understanding between them and to give our own special contribution—because it is a special contribution, both as a Western democracy with an immense tradition behind it and also as the centre of this great Commonwealth and Empire. In those two things we have a contribution. Well, we have done our best to give it, in these last months, and we shall go on doing our best to give it, and, encouraged and no doubt prompted by this House of Commons, we shall do it not unsuccessfully.