HL Deb 19 July 1961 vol 233 cc688-721

4.22 p.m.

Debate resumed.

EARL ATTLEE

My Lords, I think the House is indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Henderson, for his lucid and careful survey. It is not my intention to cover the same ground, which has already been covered quite adequately. We have heard from the Foreign Secretary a survey of the world, which I think he summed up very adequately when he said we lived in a world of international anarchy—. rather lamentable if you consider what we tried to do at San Francisco years ago —and I am not going to refer to the many difficulties in different parts of the world with which he has to deal. I only recall that I am perfectly clear about what was agreed at Potsdam with the Soviet in regard to the status of Berlin, and I would also recall how we had to stand against an attempt to win back West Berlin from Communism by blockade, which was defeated by our air forces, British, French and American.

I am very conscious of the tension which must face the Foreign Secretary in that regard. But when I look at the question of international anarchy I ask myself: what is the opposite of anarchy? And the opposite of anarchy is government. Not merely of ideas about law and order, but positive ideas of government. I should like to see the British Government, and indeed the Governments of the Commonwealth, following up that admirable statement which was issued after the last Commonwealth Conference.

It is anybody's guess what are the effective influences working behind the Iron Curtain. The Foreign Secretary indicated, as it seems to me, that there appears to be a double influence. There is the interest of Russia and the interest of international Communism. Always one of the difficulties, I think, in estimating Russia is that they are heirs not only to Marx and Lenin but to Peter the Great, Catherine the Great and the rest, and we are facing something which is specfically Russian as well as being international Communism.

The question we have to ask ourselves is: how far at the present time are the rulers of Russia still bent on trying to overturn Western civilisation by force, and how far are they influenced by fear? I think that one of the most potent influences in the world to-day is fear; not only ambition of conquest or the desire to spread Communist doctrines, but fear. One must remember that Russia has twice been overrun by Germany, and that fear remains. And we may think it ridiculous that they should suspect the West of having desires to overthrow the Communist régime by force, but that is at the back of the Russian mind. Equally, you have fear in the West, particularly in the United States. The question is: how we are to banish fear?

I think that when we look at all these various problems in the world to-day we must recognise that they are not always a direct result of Russian instigation. But there is no doubt that where there is a sore place it is exacerbated by Russia. It seems to me that until one looks at the overall picture of the world to-day one does not do much good in trying to get a settlement of particular questions because, every attempt is vitiated by this underlying suspicion and fear. Berlin is related to the strategic position of Russia. You cannot separate disarmament from the question of contest in the world. You cannot even deal with, what seemed at one time the most hopeful of problems, missile warfare—282 times, I think, that Committee have met; but they cannot get forward; everything fails.

I remember Sidney Webb saying years ago that when you had problems you did not always cure them by hammering on the bulge because you hammered on the bulge in one place and it came up in another. We have to deal with every question to-day which faces us. We are living in a world of anarchy, and I am afraid that in all our attempts to deal with these different questions we are still aiming at living in a world of anarchy. The Foreign Secretary remarked on the infringing of sovereignty. The question which faces the world to-day is just how far we can allow sovereignty. It is as if we were trying to deal with the problem in this country, as we have had to do in the past, of how far it is possible to have a rule of law enforced by the police without infringing the sovereignty of the individual citizen. In a community like ours, in a dangerous community, you have every day to infringe the sovereignty of the driver of a motor car in order to prevent still more massacre on the roads. It seems to me that there is need in the world to-day for a much broader approach on the whole problem of our international relations.

The United Nations has not been successful in ridding the world of the fear of war, just because it was formed at that time on the basis of absolute individual sovereignty. It is my contention that until we depart from that conception of individual absolute sovereignty and sovereign States we shall not cure this international anarchy, and until we aim at something wider than the mere holding off for the time being of some particular crisis, like Berlin, we shall be faced, year after year, with a situation of tension. It may be that that is the special desire of the Russian Government; maybe they want to keep the world in a state of tension in order that they may operate in these disturbed waters. But it is also possible, and worth exploring, whether they may not have come to the conclusion—after all they have their internal development; they have their internal problems—that it might be worth while to sit down seriously and consider whether we cannot take adequate measures to prevent this continued tension, which everyone knows could at any time bring down the fabric not only of Western civilisation but of the Communist world as well.

I have been engaged in talking on this subject with a great many leading people in many countries, and there is a great body of opinion in the world today that realises that we must get away from anarchy, and that means a degree of world government. When I talk with people they are always waiting for somebody else to take the first step. I have approached all the smaller countries and talked with their Prime Ministers, but it is not quite a job they can do. I have talked with the President of the United States, I have talked with people of a great many countries of the world, but no one is quite willing to take the lead. There are many suggestions that perhaps after all the people best calculated to take the lead in this would be the British Commonwealth of Nations. After all, we in this country have set the world an example of relinquishing sovereignty, as we have done over Asians and Africans. We represent not just one continent or one people of one colour; we represent all the continents and all the colours. We are therefore in a position to make an approach, and I would like that lead to be given by us in the United Nations. You cannot get disarmament without security; you cannot get the rule of law without international courts of law. You cannot get international justice without some sanction behind that justice in the form of an international force. That has been illustrated over and over again of recent years where there has been trouble—the absence of power, the absence of an international force, the absence of a tribunal.

I know something of the difficulty, the suspicion in the Russian mentality, but I am convinced that when you take all these problems separately every time you approach them you will be met by suspicion, because this is regarded as just one move in a game of higher politics. It is possible, I think, that one might get to grips with the broader sub- ject, if we could try to make the rule of law a reality in the world. I am not suggesting that we can do it ourselves; I do not believe in a unilateral approach. I do not suggest you can do it with the Russians on the basis of any ethical ideas; I do not think they have them. They have no objective idea of justice or anything else. But it may be that there is enough self-interest there, enough desire, such as we have, for survival, to make that approach.

I should like to see that approach made. I believe that, if it is properly done, you will get a response from Governments and a great response from peoples. I think you could make people realise that the kind of world that we are living in must have government; that it is as out-of-date for a closely linked world like our own to be without government as it would be for a great city like London or a country like Britain to be without government. The same reasons that have compelled us to have government in this country are applicable to the world to-day. The example of what to do is here. There was anarchy in the streets of London 150 years ago; we cured it by a police force. There was, in the Middle Ages, a state very often of private war between private armies. We cured it by suppression of private armies and the substitution of courts of law. The analogy of what we have done in this little Island of ours is what the world needs to-day. I should like to see our British Commonwealth take the lead.

4.37 p.m.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

My Lords, the story is told of the late Lord Balfour, who spent many years in the House of Commons and was for some time Leader of that House, that he once remarked that he never heard a speech in the House that had not one good point; but he added, after a pause, that he had seldom heard a speech that had more than one good point. At a time like this, with steadily darkening skies, one is sorely tempted to range very wide, from Berlin to Kuwait, to Laos, to Indonesia, to all parts of this very troubled globe. I think we all owe a deep debt of gratitude to the noble Earl, Lord Home, for taking that particular course as Foreign Secretary, in the fine speech which he delivered this afternoon. But to-day, at any rate, I personally intend to bear Lord Balfour's dictum very much in mind and concentrate on one main point, which has indeed already been mentioned by more than one speaker. Whether it is a good point or not will be for your Lordships to judge, but it is at any rate, I think, very relevant to the whole foreign position which we have been discussing this afternoon.

It is this: if our foreign policy is to be wisely directed in the present crucial time, it is, I submit, absolutely essential that we first assess correctly the nature of the conflict in which the world is at present engaged, or we may well come to the wrong conclusions as to who are our enemies and who are our friends. It is not uncommon, in the Press and elsewhere, to see this struggle, this cold war, described as a struggle between dictatorship and democracy. Starting from that conclusion those who hold this view are apt to move on to the further conclusion that any nation that does not enjoy the system of Parliamentary democracy must be regarded as not on our side but, on the contrary, on the other. That, I know, is a popular view which is fairly widely held. But, if I may say so with great deference, I believe that the premises on which that view is based are ill-founded; and so, in consequence, are the conclusions. If we base our policy on them they are, I am afraid, likely in due course to lead us into very great dangers.

The struggle in which we are to-day engaged is, I suggest, not one between dictatorship and democracy, but something quite different. Its real nature, I thought, was admirably defined by the Foreign Secretary in his speech this afternoon: it is a struggle between two great power blocs, one dominated by the Communist Powers, Russia and China, and the other representing, broadly, Western civilisation. Whether the Communist Powers are dominated by force or, as the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, said just now, by fear, I do not know; but I am driven to the conclusion that they are more imperialistic than defensive.

If that be the right assessment of the present position, and I believe it is; and if we are fighting for our lives, as I believe we are, for the preservation of Western civilisation against a growing threat from the East, surely the right course for us in determining our attitude towards this or that country is to concern ourselves not so much with the exact political system under which that country is at present governed but with the more immediate consideration: is that country broadly on our side in resistance to the immediate peril facing the non-Communist world?

I remember one historic occasion in recent years when just such a decision had to be made, and when it was made rightly. It was during the last war. I happened to be staying at Chequers when the news came in of the German invasion of Russia, and the Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill, had to make up his mind at once what attitude this country should take to this new and immensely important event. The Soviet system was something entirely contrary to all those things for which he and this country had always stood. It was a rigid and monolithic dictatorship; it was kept in power by force and allowed, at that time at any rate, no liberty of thought or speech at all. But the Prime Minister had no hesitation: he decided that Hitlerite Germany was the greatest immediate peril, and that any country, whatever its domestic form of Government, which was opposed to Hitlerite Germany was on our side; and immediately, that very evening, as your Lordships will remember, he made a broadcast to the nation saying that he regarded Russia as our ally in the great conflict in which we were engaged, and that we must be ready to give her every help in our power. Unless he had taken that decision we should very likely—I was almost going to say "very probably"—have lost the Second World War.

My Lords, I believe that that story has a lesson for us all at the present time. There are two countries which are to-day under a constant fire of abuse by the British Press and by certain sections of British opinion. They are Portugal and Spain. We have had examples of that criticism this afternoon. It is said, quite truly, that they are dictatorships; that they have no free Parliamentary institutions, and that therefore they are to be regarded as the evil thing and we must have nothing whatever to do with them—or, at any rate, as little as possible. My reply to that would be: which side are they on in the great struggle which is raging to-day?

The most immediate peril, I believe—I have already said it—to the Western World, and to us in particular, is the Communist Imperialism represented by Russia, China and their satellite countries. Where do Spain and Portugal stand on that? Indubitably, on our side. In these circumstances, at a time which is, I believe, in its way, just as dark and dangerous as the dark days of the war, are we going to take the same decision as Sir Winston Churchill and the Government of his day took with regard to Russia—

VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH

My Lords, may I put a point to the noble Marquess? I am most interested in this argument. I think he must remember that while we all favoured joining up with Russia directly she was invaded by Germany, some of us went to Lord Halifax in 1938 and suggested that instead of pursuing the course pursued at Munich, if we wanted a balance of power for the freedom we sought to maintain why not go to Moscow, and not Berchtesgaden or Munich. Therefore, this is no new point. But when it comes to talking about Spain—

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

Perhaps the noble Viscount will allow me to finish my speech; then he can say what he likes. But perhaps I may return to my remarks. Are we to continue to cold-shoulder two nations which may be essential for our own survival? For, make no mistake, my Lords, Spain and Portugal may well occupy key positions in the struggle between Communism and non-Communism which is now raging. I made bold not so long ago—two or three years ago—to warn your Lordships that the main object of Communist strategy was to drive Western influence entirely out of Africa. It seemed to some of your Lordships at that time a most far-fetched suggestion. But does it seem so farfetched now? I do not believe it does.

There are many students of world politics to-day who would go further and suggest that it would be by no means impossible for Communist long-term strategy to have yet more extensive aims —namely, that when they have virtually eliminated Western influence from Central Africa, they will swing north through West Africa with the object of outflanking Western Europe from the south and then deploying all the resources of the cold-war in a full-dress assault on the two nations of the Peninsula which, not being democracies—and they are not democracies—are the weakest link in the Western defences. Were that to succeed, and were Spain and Portugal won over to Communism, what then would be the position of Western Europe, confined in a narrow salient, with Communist-controlled Governments right behind our main line of defence and with bases both on the west end of the Mediterranean and on the Atlantic? That possibility may seem fantastic to many of your Lordships to-day. But it is no more fantastic than recent events in the Congo and Angola would have seemed to many people only a few years ago.

If that be the position, while Spain and Portugal may not have the same forms of Government that we have, they may well, I believe, be as important to the Free World as Russia was during the war. After all, to Portugal in particular, who is under a heavy burden at the present time, we owe an enduring debt of gratitude. As has been said, I think, already this afternoon, she has been our faithful Ally for upwards of 600 years. She has stood by us in fair weather and foul. In the last war when we, in our own dire need, appealed to her for some help, she gave us facilities in the Azores which were of the utmost value to us and our Allies, though at that time she had herself no effective means of defence against our enemies. Nor did she allow the fact that we had different methods of government from her to stand in her way. She came to our assistance, to the best of her ability, with what aid she could.

Is it then for us, my Lords, in her hour of need, to turn our back on her in the United Nations or elsewhere and to assume, as I am afraid I thought even so fair and moderate a speaker as Lord Henderson did to-day, that she, and she alone, is wrong? Is this not just the moment when we ought to show sympathy and a desire to help? And is that not likely to be the better way of bringing her round perhaps more closely to our views?

The Portuguese Government claim that the terrorist attacks in Angola have been fomented, and indeed organised, outside that territory. I am not clear whether Her Majesty's Government accept that view; but certainly they do not reject it, judging by the Answer which was given to me by the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, a few days ago. And I think it is rather borne out by statements made by those on the spot, such as a Methodist missionary, Derrick Nearn, whose words were reported in the London Press. It is only fair to say about Mr. Nearn that he was extremely critical about the Portuguese counter-measures—I do not want at all to overstate the case. But he added these words: The whole thing"— this is the uprising of the terrorists— seemed to have been planned and organised well in advance. Overnight, vital roads and bridges were cut off. It appeared to have all happened simultaneously. My Lords, that does not sound very like the unaided work of the untutored African. And if it was fomented from outside I think that has an important implication which we ought all to bear in mind. For it is stated quite clearly, I understand, in the Anglo-Portuguese Treaty of 1663 that Britain will defend the interests of Portugal and her overseas territories "as if they were her own", and come to their defence "with all land and sea forces" in time of trouble. I would remind your Lordship that that is not merely a provision which might have been appropriate to the seventeenth century but not to the times in which we live. It was, in fact, ratified again in 1942 by a National Government of all Parties, of which Sir Winston Churchill was the Leader, and the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, and myself were all members.

Although in this particular case Portugal has not asked us to come to her aid—and she will not, I imagine, do so—she might, I think, in these circumstances naturally expect us not to hamper in any way her efforts to restore law and order in her overseas territories which are now so gravely threatened. And, my Lords, if in fact these terrorist attacks are being fomented from outside there can be little doubt from whence the impulsion comes. It is all part of that broad strategy to which I have already referred, and is directed ultimately against us as much as against Portugal—against the Western World as a whole.

Moreover, my Lords, it has been conducted—and I think this is generally agreed—with the maximum of ferocity on the part of the aggressor. The noble Lord, Lord Henderson, in his speech did not say much about these atrocities on the part of the terrorists. But there were, in fact, very many horrible cruelties before the Portuguese moved at all. I have not seen the photographs which were produced to the United Nations, some of which, as your Lordships know, were considered too horrible to be shown even to them. But I have taken two extracts from the British Press within recent weeks. They were not given great prominence; they were just items of news which appeared near the bottom of the columns, but they give us some idea of what the Portuguese have been up against. The first stated quite simply and baldly that: Near Carmona, terrorists killed a Cape Verdian and his wife after setting fire to all the native huts. The couple's infant son was torn into half by the legs. The second stated, equally baldly, that: At Camabalata, 160 miles from Luanda, a coffee plantation belonging to Mr. Karl Henner Huckling, who is German-born, was ransacked in his absence. His wife and the staff of 25 Africans were murdered and his three children, the youngest a baby, burned alive. And, my Lords, many hundreds of Portuguese men, women and children, died in these ways within the last few months. And the shocking thing, I feel, about these appalling cruelties, which seem to have been directed especially against women and children, is that they appear not to have been merely exhibitions of the bestiality of savages but acts of deliberate policy designed to terrorise the Portuguese into abandoning their country. And the same, I think, is true of the "scorched earth" policy on which I see from the Press the terrorists have now embarked.

That, my Lords, is the situation with which the Portuguese Government and people are at present faced. It is for them a supreme crisis. They have either to abandon Angola, which is essential, I believe, to Portugal's existence as a viable nation, or to establish law and order with whatever severity appears to be necessary. No doubt great severity has been used. It is not for me to say whether it has been to severe. If so, that is something which I am sure we must all deeply deplore. But it is hardly, I submit, for us to point the finger of scorn and execration. When we ourselves in the last war were faced with a similar threat to our very existence we had no hesitation in bombing the great German cities, knowing, as we must have known, what it must mean for the women and children who lived in those cities. We did not like it; we hated it. But we did it because we believed profoundly that it was the only way to save our country, and all those things for which our country stood, from utter destruction. That being the case, do not let us too readily execrate Portugal, who, faced with a similar crisis, has adopted a rather similar policy.

There is another thing, my Lords. It may well be—I expect it is so—that Portuguese methods of colonial administration are not the same as ours; and it may well equally be that we like ours better, even very much better, than theirs. But would the situation be improved if the whole of Angola were handed over to anarchy and to those who have themselves been guilty of these appalling atrocities? I beg you, my Lords, do not let us make our ethics too selective.

Now a word about Spain. Spain under the present regime does not enjoy a form of Government that we could possibly welcome in this country. But certainly it is not more alien to our ideas of free institutions than Russia was at the time when we welcomed her as an Ally in the days of the war. We have a long history of friendship with Spain, and if we wish her to modify her present system —and 1 think we all do—I should have thought that the last way to achieve our result was to drive her into resentful isolation. It may indeed be a hard fact that we have to face that Spain and Portugal are not temperamentally suited to the particular form of Government which suits us, and that their national temperaments require something more authoritarian.

Indeed, my impression—and I was at the Foreign Office at the time of the Spanish Civil War—is that, whichever side had won that conflict, the result was likely to have been a dictatorship either of the Right or of the Left; and that may still be true. In any case, my Lords, is it the counsel of wisdom and states- manship to treat them as if they were a bad smell and do our utmost to alienate two nations whose co-operation may in no long time be vital to our own security? After all, as has been pointed out this afternoon by the noble Earl the Foreign Secretary, the general outlook of the world is grim enough in all conscience.

We are threatened in Berlin; we are threatened in South East Asia; we are threatened in Kuwait—and we shall all wish, I am sure, to congratulate the Government, and the Foreign Secretary in particular, upon the firm stand which has been made there against Iraqi pretensions. By the swift and effective action which they took, one may be certain that they averted what might have been a very serious crisis indeed. But I am sure the Foreign Secretary would be the first to say—in fact, he practically said so in so many words this afternoon—that the danger in that part of the world is not yet over; and in other parts it seems to be growing. The West is under a pressure which, as I think the noble Earl, Lord Home, said, is on an unparalleled scale. In wide areas of the world the structure of Western security, and even of Western civilisation, is shuddering and quaking. There never was a time when there was more need for the Western World to stand together, even if the ultimate goal is for us to get that World Government for which the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, pleaded so eloquently this afternoon.

My Lords, we talk a great deal nowadays about peaceful co-existence, which means, as I understand it, living together in peace and friendship with nations—even those with different political systems from ours; and we talk a great deal, too, of the urgent necessity for the West to close its ranks. Surely, I submit, this is a good time and a good place to begin to practise what we preach.

5.2 p.m.

LORD STRANG

My Lords, the governing factor in the present state of the German question is, of course, the Notes which have just been sent to Moscow by the three Western Powers in reply to Mr. Khrushchev's latest memorandum. Her Majesty's Government's reply will, I hope, receive the general support of your Lordships' House. It is firm on the crucial point, where firmness is required; it does not say a word more than is necessary; and it advocates a settlement by negotiation on an interim or permanent basis. But the delivery of the Note is not the end of the matter; it is perhaps rather a new beginning, a first step in a new operation. What is important is what will happen next, and then later on, in the further development of the controversy.

On the question of Berlin, Russian tactics have followed a common pattern, both in 1958 and again now. They present an ultimatum, together with what may ostensibly appear to be concessions. What Mr. Khrushchev has recently said is very much like what he said in 1958. There is the six-month ultimatum: unless we make a treaty with the two parts of Germany, he will make a separate treaty with East Germany himself; if we will make a treaty, he offers some alleviations in our position—and he seems, my Lords, to be willing to negotiate. Now it is necessary, I think, to note that since Khrushchev's ultimatum of 1958 his international position has been much strengthened. His conduct of his foreign relations has become more confident and more menacing. He has pressed his wrecking Troika proposal; he has brought the nuclear test conference to a standstill; he has made a spectacular new announcement about stepping up his armaments; it is his declared policy to support violent revolution and civil wars; and he believes that, with the balance of power now tending in his favour, he can practise brinkmanship in comparative security since the Western Powers, he thinks, will not dare to use force to repel these indirect revolutionary attacks upon their position. He hopes, in fact, to force major retreats upon the West without war.

Of course, he has his own difficulties, but in the coming Berlin crisis the test of our nerve is likely to be more severe than ever before. However, it may not be quite as grim as that. We have a bit of time, and both sides have left the way open for negotiation. There should be an opportunity for diplomacy, as the Foreign Secretary has rightly said. Now it is the dual purpose of diplomacy, as properly understood, first, to finds ways to avoid, if possible, the final clash between opposing forces; and secondly, to search for areas of common interest, however small they may be, between the contestants—and this, again, is a point which the Foreign Secretary has made. The difficulty in these days of public and polemical diplomacy is to find a way for the traditional, confidential procedures to operate. But there is everything to be said—and this has been said by several noble Lords in this debate—for being ready to negotiate, or at least to discuss.

Where it is a matter of negotiation, my Lords, we are all under a very strong temptation. We are all tempted to tell Her Majesty's Government and other Western Governments what we think they ought to do; where to stand fast, where and in what measure to make concessions, and what preparations to make for a variety of circumstances that may arise in the future. My Lords, I shall resist this temptation and say no more about Germany. I would add only that in all these matters in regard to Germany, and in regard to everything else, we can, I know, with confidence, leave our affairs safely in the hands of the Foreign Secretary.

I now turn to another topic. This is not a debate in which one ought to speak at length about the Common Market, but I would ask your Lordships' indulgence if I raise, once again, one matter to which I alluded in your Lordships' House a little more than a year ago. It is a broad political point affecting international relations, and it is one which arises directly out of the debate in your Lordships' House on June 21. Again, I will try to be brief. The Treaty of Rome, as we all know, is an instrument of the highest complexity, but in the simplest terms one may say that its more immediate objectives are economic—the Common Market, the Economic Community, the creation of an economic entity which shall act as a unit. Its ultimate objective is political.

That this is so is made quite clear in the preamble to the Treaty, which says that the signatories are determined to establish the foundation of an ever-closer union among European peoples. It has also been authoritatively stated by, !I think, one of the authors of the Treaty of Rome that the Economic Community is something which involves, as he said, the entire economic, social and political life of each member country". That, my Lords, is the underlying purpose of the Treaty, and without this the whole conception would lack its real meaning. This is the driving force behind the aspirations which have brought the Treaty into being. Without this objective, the Treaty would have been hardly worth concluding. Unless the Six go on to work towards a closer political association, the enterprise will fall short of its real purpose. It is true, of course, that General de Gaulle has hitherto been rather cool about this; but, as the General himself once said, the future lasts a long time, and the future may well bring France back to her original course, the course marked out by M. Jean Monnet.

If this view of the Treaty is true, and I believe it is, there are forces in Europe behind the Treaty of Rome which are quite foreign to ourselves. The wartime and early post-war tribulations drove the Western European peoples together, and they came to see their future as a continuing, close association for common support and reassurance. Happily, we escaped the worst of these experiences. We were not subject to these compulsions. We have not evoked these aspirations. Nevertheless, what the Six may be expected to require of us if we apply for membership of the Community is, as an article in The Times recently put it, that we should accept without reservation the unwritten political content of the Treaty of Rome". Now, my Lords, as if to drive this point home, the heads of Government of the Six have just put into writing in a separate document this unwritten political content of the Treaty of Rome. Their aim is "a united Europe". They are determined to develop their political cooperation with the aim of European unification", and to give form and substance to the will toward political unity already enshrined in treaties like the Treaty of Rome. They aim also at creating common institutions. Those words may be vague but the 'tendency is plain.

Can we truly say that this is the sentiment of our own people? Is this really what our people want to do? What is now proposed is not yet a federation. But was not the noble Earl, Lord Avon (as he now is), right when he said, as early as 1952, That the United Kingdom should join a federation on the Continent of Europe…is something which we know, in our bones, we cannot do"? And if there is any serious doubt on the question whether our people are, in a positive sense, prepared to contemplate the longer-term political implications of the Treaty, and not only its letter but its spirit, then it would be less than honest to make application for membership.

My noble friend Lord Gladwyn has been quite frank—and I am sorry he is not in his place; I did give him warning, but it does not matter because I am going to praise him—about the implications of the Treaty. He has not tried, as other people have done, to minimise the political content of the Treaty, present or prospective. Unlike him, I am not a "hot gospeller" for our joining the Common Market; but on this particular issue I do agree with him. I should like to quote one sentence from his speech in your Lordships' House on June 21. He said [OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 232 (No. 96), col. 646]: But the fact remains that we should have accepted a binding and, so to speak, an organic commitment wider than, and different in kind from,"— and I repeat those words "an organic commitment wider than, and different in kind from,"— our commitments under our existing Treaties, far-reaching as some of those undoubtedly are. I think that is true, but Government speakers do not seem to see the position in the same light. For example, the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, speaking in the same debate, said [col. 699]: I am inclined to suggest to your Lordships that to take part in negotiations for joining the Common Market does not involve us in any more prospective sacrifice of sovereignty than taking part in, let us say, a disarmament conference. The Foreign Secretary, on the same occasion, unless I have misunderstood him, seemed to see our prospective commitments under the Treaty of Rome as analogous to those already accepted under other instruments. But I think, with Lord Gladwyn, that there is a fundamental difference. It is one thing to enter into precise commitments as to what one undertakes to do or what not to do, and even to submit to inspection; it is quite another to hand over the power of continuing decision, now and hereafter, intimately affecting our internal life, permanently to a body that is over and above ourselves.

May I quote an authority on this point? Mr. Uwe Kitzinger, in the course of an exhaustive study of the present state of the debate in the June number of the World Today, remarks: …even where the Council of Ministers is concerned, the ultimate absence of a veto on most questions of substance, and the direct impact of international decisions on internal British affairs, make the Rome Treaty different in kind from anything that has been accepted by Britain so far"— and I repeat those words "make the Rome Treaty different in kind from anything that has been accepted by Britain so far"— and it is no wonder if supranationality even in this attenuated form is looked upon with distrust". The distinction between this new kind of treaty obligation and the general run of treaty obligations into which we have entered in the past is clearly, I think, if rather abstrusely, brought out by Professor Manning in a letter to The Times on July 18. His point is the same —to draw a sharp distinction between those kinds of obligation. I trust, my Lords, that the Foreign Secretary will look at this point again.

Along this same line of reassuring argument is the point, made by some advocates of our entry, that, after all, we should have a veto on the most important matters and should be able to block any undesirable advance towards integration or supranationality. I am not saying that the Government have said this. I think that the truth is that the scope of the veto under the Treaty will be progressively reduced, as the years go on, in the later stages of the transition period. But whether this is so or not, I would say again that it would be less than honest to apply for membership if our objective, once inside, would be to try to water down or dilute the political content of the Treaty, present or prospective. If the Treaty of Rome has any outstanding value—and I think it has—it is because it offers to Western Europe the possibility of closer union, which will meet a need felt by the peoples of the six countries. If we do not want to go along this road we had better not set foot on it. To go in with the object of using the veto in order to frustrate the underlying purposes of the Treaty would indeed be to play the part of "perfidious Albion".

6.20 p.m.

VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Morrison of Lambeth will not be speaking. He has withdrawn from the debate to-night, and I therefore wish to have the consent of the House to take his place, which consent I have. First of all, I should like to pay a very great tribute to my noble friend Lord Henderson for once again presenting a résumé of the Foreign Affairs position, as he has to-day. I am very grateful to him, and I am quite sure that he has placed the review of the position in relation to the dangers which seem to be arising in future relationships with Russia in exactly the right perspective. It is no use for us to deny the fact that, if we are once going to start negotiating about things which would very sadly water down the terms of the contracts under which we are working under the International Treaties of 1945, we shall not know where we shall land. I support entirely the interpretation of that position which has been given both by my noble friend and by the Foreign Secretary.

I should like to say a word about Kuwait. At the time the noble Earl the Foreign Secretary made his announcement of the policy that was being pursued, I could not possibly see how this country could have acted in any other way under the terms of our agreement with the Ruler of Kuwait. We supported the announcement then and we support the position now. Whatever may have to be done in future about negotiations over the use of the oil resources of the Middle East as a whole, so long as we have actual commitments, such as our agreement with the Ruler of Kuwait, I feel that those commitments have to be met, until there is a change.

I also support very strongly, as I have all the way through, the line which the Foreign Secretary has taken with regard to the troubles in Laos. We have been very anxious to see a better feeling there and a better settlement and we will do all we possibly can to support the Foreign Secretary in his efforts there.

I should like to say a few words in reply to the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, whose speech brought back memories to me of how foreign affairs have gone during my lifetime. He referred to the step that was taken by Sir Winston Churchill as Prime Minister in 1941 when Germany invaded Russia. The noble Marquess drew certain lessons from his point of view. I think it was absolutely necessary to support Russia at that time against the invader, irrespective of her political philosophy or of anything else. It was a question for us of survival. The United States had not yet come into the war, at any rate actively, and it was necessary far our survival. It was a setting up during war time of a balance of power, which no student of the strategy of defence could possibly have missed. And the principle which operated then should not operate merely from the point of view of saving a defeat in war, but should operate in the same way with regard to the preparation of a balance of power which might prevent warfare breaking out at all. I was moved this afternoon when the noble Marquess, looking at these events from his point of view, strove to bring these matters into relation with Portugal and Spain, because of that experience of ours. We had even to go to a Communist dictatorship to get where we wanted to get in the course of the war.

Probably no other Member of your Lordships' House has a greater experience than the noble Marquess himself of the political controversies and events of the 'thirties. Then our policy on Spain was one of non-intervention. We often complained about this from the Labour Benches and many people wanted us to intervene on behalf of the Liberal and Socialist Government of Spain elected by the people, but that was not done. And when the world war broke out, what happened in Spain? The dictatorship joined with the Nazis. I have records in my files at home of the greetings from Franco to Hitler. And, finally, the Spanish Blue Division was on the side of Hitler at the time of the invasion of Russia by Germany. Therefore, I cannot place much reliance on that argument.

It is true that Portugal was not in that position. Portugal is a very old Ally of ours, and is still our Ally, and I hope that she will continue to be our Ally; but that will not prevent us from making strong representations—which 1 believe the Foreign Secretary has already done —with regard to the unnecessary severities they may be carrying out in Angola. Even in the course of the war, it was not easy to obtain the free use of the Azores for our Navy. We were not getting the facilities that were vital to us. I was First Lord of the Admiralty at that time and I know what I am talking about. I had enough difficulty, because the southern ports in Eire were not available to us, to be able to carry out a proper defence of this country. The facilities that the use of the Azores afforded to us was an important factor in the situation.

The fact is that unless we get, what my noble friend Lord Attlee asked for this afternoon, a change of thought and of action, which will certainly take a very long time, and unless we get a recognition of the need for lesser sovereignty among all the countries in the world and some move towards world government, then we shall have to rely upon supporting whatever collective efforts may be authorised by a body like the United Nations. We have to make sure that the countries which are free shall remain free. And we have to make alliances and agreements, especially of the expansive nature of N.A.T.O. I do not see where we should be to-day if we had not taken that action ourselves. Therefore, I beg the noble Marquess to think again about Angola.

The noble Marquess was restrained in his language about our missions there and I am not complaining about that. I think that more reliance should be placed upon those who have been in the country for such a long time engaged in their work. I am a Baptist and very proud of the Baptist Missionary Society. I cannot think of anything sad or which would reflect any lack of faithfulness in the history of the Baptist Missionary Society. It is a great institution.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

My Lords, I never criticised the Baptist missionaries.

VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLS-BOROUGH

My Lords, I speak of missionaries in general and I said that I was not complaining about the noble Marquess's language. But I want their evidence to be regarded as worthy of acceptance. From the day that William Carey worked in India, the Baptist Missionary Society has been a great witness, not only in preaching the Gospel but in establishing freedom of mind and freedom of life. In the case of Angola, I would say that if you study carefully the whole of the Baptist missionary reports that have been received, one thing is outstanding—that many of them feel that perhaps they delayed too long in complaining about the measures carried out. The Baptists have been working there for 85 or 86 years and have always had reasonably good relations with the Portuguese Government; and for this reason they were hesitant about making complaints about that Government's action in Angola. When you come to read the actual testimonies of those who have sent in reports direct, I cannot think there can be any doubt whatsoever that the number of killed and wounded, and the severe restrictions upon men, women and children in the course of the actions of the Portuguese Government, are something that we ought to try to prevent in future. The great provocation in the northern part of the territory of Angola is, I think, undoubted; but I do not think that excuses a Christian nation from taking any but the proper measures. It does not excuse the use of exaggerated, unfair and cruel methods.

I was interested in the example which the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, gave as to the lines upon which he was thinking. He seemed to compare this operation of a very backward race in Northern Angola as something akin to our reply to Hitler's attack upon us and our attack upon German open cities. If I remember rightly, we were then struggling for the final defence after the open attack upon out cities here. We were then replying to, and not initiating, attack.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

But were not the Portuguese doing the same?

VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH

I should say in very different circumstances indeed. However misguided and cruel they have been on one side in some of those things, which were engineered perhaps more from the Congo than from Angola—and that must be recognised—nevertheless it was a very different standard from the attacks being made upon us by Germany, a civilised and highly educated race, with all the philosophies of Goethe and Nietzsche behind them. The attacks were upon us, and we had finally to defend ourselves from being completely wiped out and having our freedom entirely destroyed. I think that was a very different set of Circumstances.

So when we approach the thought about the proposals upon foreign affairs, I think we have to be careful how far we go and what we say. I keep on coming back, when I am thinking on these matters, to some words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: What is the hardest task in the world? It is to think. I will put myself in a position to look an abstract truth in the eye, and I dare not; I blench and I withdraw, first upon this side. and upon that. That is how many of us, if we are sincere and anxious, must often feel upon these great questions about which the noble Marquess has been speaking. I do not want to be sitting in judgment upon the noble Marquess. I get too many anxieties when I think about these different factors and truths that any man with a soul is called upon to face in trying to decide upon what is best for humanity.

I should now like to say a word upon what the noble Lord, Lord Strang, has said in regard to the Common Market. It is obvious that as a Party we on these Benches are most interested in what the noble Lord has been saying. But he will not expect either me or my noble friend who will wind up the debate for the Opposition to give a firm expression of opinion about the Common Market. The noble Lord, Lord Strang, has spoken with great energy and a great deal of courage this afternoon, and I should like to thank him for it. I think he has put a case before us which needs to be considered carefully. I do not want to go further than that.

I would say, however, from my own personal observation, that the political aims in Europe come differently from different heads of Government and different speakers. I have not yet forgotten the speech made by General de Gaulle on May 31, 1960, which is worth looking up, when he said that what he wanted was a European Confederation from the Atlantic to the Urals. At what point in the Urals he hoped that it might end, I do not know; I have not looked at the map to see what he meant. But that was certainly something extremely broad and ambitious. Looking at the political side of the matter, I feel that it still requires a good deal of further consideration. I hope that before we make a decision, one way or the other, about the Common Market, before we become committed, there will be a great deal more thought and education of the people.

In regard to the general position in the world, I may say that we in this House are grateful for the obvious care, attention and detail of which the Foreign Secretary has been shown to be capable in the time since he went to the Foreign Office. He may have been in this Chamber when I said I hoped he had already made his representations to the Portuguese Government with regard to the situation in Angola. I rather have a recollection that there was a report, when he made his visit to Portugal, which said that he had not been silent upon these matters. I thank him very much for that.

In the meantime, with the case that has been put by my noble friend Lord Henderson, and with which I thoroughly agree—as I do with most of the points the Foreign Secretary has made this afternoon—I would say to him that we wish him well in a most difficult time. I do not think my noble friend Lord Attlee was offering anything in the way of criticism when he put his great and idealistic conception before your Lordships this afternoon. The Foreign Secretary, of course (and nobody knows this better than my noble friend), has to deal with foreign affairs as they are from day to day, and our general work, collective thinking and united action in the direction of idealism is not always capable of being effective in settling something which arises overnight. In all these matters I want to say to the Foreign Secretary that of course we shall criticise whenever necessary, but we do wish him well; and we hope that what he does will lead not only to the maintenance of peace but to greater happiness in the world.

5.38 p.m.

LORD BIRDWOOD

My Lords, I propose to follow the precept put before your Lordships by the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, and make only one point. It will be for your Lordships to judge, when I have finished, whether the point I make is a good one or not. I have always felt that for speakers on the Floor of the House it is perhaps more useful to focus attention on only one or two of the corners of the international situation, and therefore I make no apology for concentrating my remarks on Berlin and the situation in Germany which surrounds it.

It is here, it seems to me, there is going to be the great test of wills and energies. And while I am quite convinced that Her Majesty's Government are as determined as the Americans or anyone else not to yield on matters of principle, some of us are not so happy about what I would suggest is quite a lot of loose, defeatist and irresponsible talk—sometimes from people whom one expects to be responsible—in sections of the Press; in programmes over the air and in the day-to-day comments which we collect as we do the daily lot and which might be summed up as the view of the man in the street. For myself, I want to make it quite clear, for what it is worth, that as a Back Bencher, I shall support the Government in the present policy—a policy which, when one has finished being clever in the matter, in the last analysis adds up, as I see it, to being just to fight for the truth.

It is not for me to deliver a lecture on history, but may I remind the House of one or two facts which are sometimes overlooked? Mr. Khrushchev, it seems to me, has now abandoned his legal arguments which have been put up from time to time to support the view that Berlin is part of the territory of the Soviet Zone; and, of course, they do not bear examination. But to put the record right with ourselves, I would remind the House of the Official Gazette of the Control Council of June 5, 1945, which referred to Berlin as "occupied" by each of the four Powers, and the setting up the Kommandatura; and in regard to Berlin said of the four Commandants that their task was to "direct jointly the administration" of the city. Previously there was the London Protocol of September 12, 1944 (which I think was drawn attention to in the Note in reply to Mr. Khrushchev and was referred to in this morning's Press), signed by the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Government defining the three Zones of occupation, and which, having noted the Soviet-occupied Eastern Zone, added with the exception of the Berlin area for which a special system of occupation is provided. I am raising a point of history because the whole pattern of the post-war settlement is sometimes rather ridiculed to-day. There have been articles in the Press ridiculing it. The noble Lord, Lord Boothby, poured scorn on it in the Sunday Times last Sunday. The fact is, as it seems to me, that the price of anything very different would have been to risk splitting the Allies during the war. I would ask those who are to-day wise after the event, had they been in authority at the time, whether they would themselves have taken that risk.

I have reminded your Lordships of past Agreements, if only to note that, when the legal arguments are exhausted, the Communist practice is to adopt a different technique, in the belief that the West will change a situation in order to avoid a crisis. A crisis is then manufactured in order to effect just that change. This, it seems to me, is the identical method which they have employed in attempting to introduce the Troika device into the United Nations Secretariat. We are told that as realists we must accept the fact of the division of the world into three camps, Communist, capitalist and neutral. It seems to me that it is just exactly that same technique which is introduced in the case of Berlin and Eastern Germany. A situation is manufactured; a change is demanded to meet it, and we are told, again as realists, that we have to accept the change. Alas! it seems to me that too many people in the country are falling for this kind of thing. The Sunday Times article to which I have referred closed with this passage: In the long run, realism is a better basis than illusion for the conduct of foreign policy and is less dangerous. I think your Lordships will take my point when I say that realism might have told us in 1940 to pack up and surrender.

I would submit a very simple proposition, and that is that to permit this mental and moral creeping paralysis, to accept change for the sake of change and for the relief of tension, is the betrayal of a very great principle. History surely tells us that we can take our short-term profit in such ways, but the long-term result will surely be anarchy and disaster. I should think that it is only wise for us now to assume that Mr. Khrushchev will find it very awkward to retreat from his declared intention to sign a separate Treaty with Eastern Germany. I feel, therefore, that we are justified to some extent in speculating as to what could happen if and when Eastern German officials took control. I think Her Majesty's Government are quite right when they say in the Note published this morning that this would lead to a serious situation. I think it is fair to assume that, if we do stand on our rights in Western Berlin, our convoys may well be interfered with; and it is fair to assume that we should have to deal with Eastern German officials, whether as the agents of the Soviet Government or as the servants of a Government which we do not recognise.

Every conceivable device is going to be brought to bear on us to afford that official recognition. Personally, I hate the idea. If we were going to take such a step, conscious as a people that we had, in fact, been led down the garden path, then perhaps the pill might conceivably be swallowed; because it would connote that we had learned the lesson and that the last word had not been said. But is this the mood of the people today? That is what worries me. I would repeat that, outside the Government today, there are far too many shepherds trying to lead the sheep in the wrong direction. I would only beg that whatever measures are taken, they are taken without any compromise whatsoever of the future.

There is one interesting feature of such a situation. What would be the status of the 20 Soviet divisions in Eastern Germany after the Soviet had signed their Treaty with Ulbricht? More than ever, surely, it would be crystal clear to a watching world that they remained for the sole purpose of holding up a tottering and hated régime. But if I may return to this speculation of possible action which would arise from action of the Eastern German officials, I would suggest that it would be rash misjudgment to panic in any way, and to assume that the very first incident on the autobahn from Helmstadt into Western Berlin is going to trigger off a nuclear war. May I put some of the embarrassments that must arise for the potential enemy?

An incident, of course, would first be the concern of the Eastern German forces —not the Soviet forces. I ask: How far can Herr Ulbricht trust his own troops? For the first minor incident he might be able to depend on a quick concentration of reliable men. But the moment what started as a small incident tended to spread into the countryside, I would suggest that he might have to face the possibility of his own men throwing away their arms. I think it is hardly wise, or possible, beyond that point to speculate, except to say this: that surely it must be an overriding interest of the Eastern German Administration to prevent a local situation from spreading. A scorched-earth development will be the very last kind of situation which will suit Communists, whether they be German or Russian.

I think we should remember, too, that an incident or a minor clash, or any of the hundreds of different permutations and combinations of such a situation would take place on soil with a potential fifth column of about 16 million people; and Herr Ulbricht is well aware of that situation. I would suggest that a justified conclusion is that, rather than indulge in tragic prejudgment and extreme assumptions, we must be ready to protect our rights in Berlin, meeting each situation as it arises with the minimum amount of force, in order to confirm our determination not to have an artificial situation imposed upon us.

My Lords, when truth is in danger of being abandoned it is not a bad thing to restate the truth and to go on restating it over and aver again until the balance is restored. The truth is, if I may use unparliamentary language, that Khrushchev and Ulbricht between them are in a hell of a mess. It does not matter which you regard as the dog, which you regard as the tail, and which is wagging which. The truth is that sixteen years after the war Communist domination has failed to turn 17 million Germans into Communists. As the Foreign Secretary once said, they vote the only way left to them and that is with their feet, and there are about 1,000 pairs of feet voting every day at this moment.

In this situation there is one obvious card that the Communists will play, and that is a belief in the dangers of German rearmament. Again, to come back to Lord Boothby's article—I warned him that I was going to say these things, but apparently he is unable to be present—there occurred this passage. the basic reality which hit us"— that is Lord Boothby and somebody with him— with unexpected force on the 'other side' of the Iron Curtain is that they fear German rearmament. My Lords, I find that naive in the extreme. Years ago I could have told any Western trader or journalist, any visitor travelling under patronage, before he started off, that the first priority job of those in control on the other side is to see that this fear is kept alive.

The first thing which the British Inter-Parliamentary Union delegation to Warsaw discovered on the tables in the hotel, when they turned up in Warsaw in September, 1959, was a collection of documents put out by the East German Embassy in Warsaw to impress us that Adenauer and his Nazi generals were at it again. Now this card is going to be played over and over again, and the sad and terrifying reflection for me is that those who on their lawful occasions visit Iron Curtain capitals and have access to the men in control seemingly are not so much concerned with the truth or otherwise of the allegations which are put to them as seeing, in their solicitude, that those views are projected and picked up by the British public at home.

Before I finish I shall indicate my own view as to the validity of this weapon in the Communist armoury. Meanwhile, may I return to this nightmare of Herr Ulbricht? Of course the real fear, with rising tension in Eastern Germany, is of his own failure, and that, surely, would represent a political and psychological defeat of significance for Communism far beyond the East German frontiers, with its repercussions most certainly, of course, throughout Eastern Europe.

Here, if I may, I will make just one diversion from Germany and come back to this article in the Sunday Times. The noble Lord wrote this: The Dulles policy of liberation is dead, if indeed it ever lived, and it would be better to face that fact. Here is the philosophy of the realist returning. Only two days previous to that, on the 14th July, President Kennedy had solemnly and publicly designated what is termed in America "Captive Nations Week" in accordance with a resolution that President Eisenhower formerly approved, naming the third week in July always for this purpose. until such a time as freedom and independence shall have been achieved for all in the captive nations of the world. My Lords, it seems to me that for the Americans the Dulles policy is not quite dead; nor, I insist, is the evidence, for those who care to look for it, to the effect that this policy should never be abandoned. If it were otherwise, what need would there be for that barbed wire that stretches from the Baltic down to the Black Sea?

LORD BOOTHBY

My Lords, will the noble Lord allow me to interrupt for one moment, simply to say that Mr. Dulles did encourage the Hungarian rebellion even to the point of sparking it off, and then he did nothing about it. That has not been forgotten in Hungary or in any other part on the other side of the Iron Curtain.

LORD BIRDWOOD

I entirely agree with the noble Lord that they have not forgotten the ineptitude and the failure of the West to do anything about their rebellion in Hungary. That I would accept completely. But I would insist that, if the circumstances were otherwise, there would be no need for this barbed wire fence that, in effect, turns Eastern Europe into a human cage.

But now, if I may return to Germany, I do not wish to speak entirely in terms of negative propositions. In any attempt to be constructive we face the embarrassment that the Germans have their elections on September 17 and, Party politics being what they are the whole world over, one does not wish to say anything that might be picked up as a Party Political point by one side or another. Therefore I will refrain from controversial matters such as the possibility of a restoration of flexibility to the whole situation through consideration of the future of the Oder-Neisse line, except to say just this: that I believe the key to all our problems, in Europe at least, is to find a conciliation between Germany and Poland. I believe that this is possible through courageous diplomacy and I will say no more.

I feel I am on safer ground when, on looking back, I take note of some of the proposals of the past. We have again reaffirmed our readiness always to negotiate, and I do not feel that just because reasonable and sane proposals have been refused by the Soviet this should prevent previous ideas from being taken out of the files and our having second thoughts on them, perhaps with a view to modifying and amending them.

The Eden Plan of 1954 has to-day been referred to, with its proposals for free elections in Germany, the setting up of a national assembly, the drafting of a constitution, and an all-German Government to be formed to negotiate a peace treaty. But there was one very important stipulation which I think we might still bear in mind, and that was that an all-German Government would have the authority to assume or reject the full rights and obligations of either the Federal Republic and/or the Soviet zone of the German administration. In other words, a reunified Germany, just as any other sovereign independent State, would be free to choose its own foreign policy, to join either N.A.T.O. or the Warsaw Pact, or—and this is important—to be neutral. I hope and believe that my interpretation of the Eden Plan is correct, and that the Eden Plan did not, in fact, exclude all-German neutrality. This is important, because over and over main it is said that the concept of all-German neutrality does not make sense.

My Lords, the Eden Plan has been rejected, but in Geneva the following year, 1955, the Soviet actually agreed to the principle of German reunification by free German elections. The directive to the Foreign Ministers signed on July 25, made that quite clear and it was signed by Bulganin, I think, with Mr. Khrushchev present. What happened? Four days later, on July 27, Khrushchev switched. Molotov, at the Foreign Ministers' Conference, said: The so-called free elections might result in the violation of the vital interests … of the D.D.R. Reunification could only come about by mutual agreement of the two Germanys. For four days, my Lords, we were on the brink of agreement.

Once we could persuade the Russians to sit down at a table, many avenues could be explored. One should not exclude disengagement. The Rapacki plan should not be excluded. Even (this has been referred to to-day) perhaps the rather vague thing called a U.N. "presence", not in West Berlin, of course, but covering the whole city, could be included. Above all, I think that the Western guarantees which have been offered against the revival of German militarism, and in which the Germans themselves are the first to wish to participate to-day, could be brought out of cold storage. The one condition on which we could not negotiate, of course, would be the basis of accepting Soviet conditions before we sat down.

I said, my Lords, that I would say a word about my own ideas on the validity of the belief in the danger of German rearmament. I presume that those who believe this would accept also, in varying measure, the danger of German reunification. I, in contrast, believe that there is a danger to Europe in failure to effect that reunification, because such failure would represent a psychological and political victory for the Communists. It is with that thought in mind that, in conclusion, I wish to say a word in general about Anglo-German relations.

It has been my privilege recently to follow the noble Earl, Lord Longford, in the chairmanship of the Anglo-German Association, a task which he fulfilled faithfully and with success over a period of eight years. Anglo-German relations, therefore, are for me a matter of rather more than mere academic interest. Indeed, I think that my views are based just as much on experience and thought as an individual as on anything else. I suggest that it is always very easy to win a round of applause by playing the obvious card of fear and hate of the Germans. When I note it happening in this country, I find myself contemplating the paradox that, to-day, the French, of all people, are much nearer in sentiment and friendship to the Germans than we are.

I will tell the House of a situation in my own experience which is not uncommon to-day. German students come to this country, and they come fully conscious of a past which they were too young to have lived with but believing that they can make a new start in the name of a new Germany and looking just for recognition of that hope. They then encounter coldness. They might have expected that, and they do. Beyond that, however, they come up against unintelligent and relentless attacks, not in very good taste, in the Beaverbrook Press and elsewhere, and they sometimes note the similarity of those attacks, sometimes the identity of those attacks, with the attacks made in the Daily Worker. Quite a number of students return to Germany beginning to wonder whether, after all, Hitler and the Nazis had offered something to their mothers and fathers.

In contrast, my Lords, I shall tell a rather different sort of story. Twenty-five thousand German officers and men passed through a prisoner-of-war camp, the Featherstone Park Camp in Northumberland, during the war. They received better and more imaginative treatment than is usually given to prisoners in such circumstances. They were allowed to print their own newspaper, Die Zeit am Tyne. They were treated well in the countryside where they worked. When the tide of Anglo-German relations started to flow the wrong way in a year or two ago, they formed in Germany their own association, the Featherstone Park Group, with membership stretching to places as far apart as Hamburg and Munich. They are now dedicated to doing just this, to combating this evil thing—for that is what it is—the encouragement and the perpetuation of hate between peoples who should be thinking, surely, in relation to the international situation which we have had laid before us to-day, of imperative unity in Europe.

I could elaborate this theme, my Lords. I could tell of the effect on me personally of watching the Swedish film Mein Kampf, not in a London cinema but in a cinema before a packed audience in Munich, an audience dominated largely by youth. I recall the sighs of horror and bewilderment, and the murmured voices which echoed the closing comment, "This must never happen again." I put the thought before your Lordships that the future belongs not so much to us as to a new and eager generation. Who are we to hand on a message of hate or fear of their children to our children? If, in contrast, we can sow the seeds of a new friendship and understanding among the generation which is to come, we shall—this is my conviction—as certain as night following day, have laid the foundations of a European renaissance which no insidious political cancer will undermine or shake for very many years to come.

LORD NEWTON

My Lords, as it is very nearly time for the Royal Commission, perhaps it would meet your Lordships' approval if the House adjourned during pleasure until 6.15.

House adjourned during pleasure.

House resumed.