The Captive Nations
DOUGLAS, PAUL H.
'We are involved in mankind . . . and with what happens to the 100 million people east of the Iron Curtain' The Captive Nations By Paul H. Douglas The Russian drive westward against Hitler in...
...As the years passed, the talk of liberation faded more and more into the background...
...1960-ifs...
...Accept it...
...The most influential American commentator, Walter Lipp-mann, has urged such a recognition of the status quo for several years...
...The Russian Communists will not be deterred from attacking the free world by moralistic preaching, professions of friendship or even by concessions, but rather by a fear of reprisals on the part of the democracies which would make such a venture too costly...
...Similar voices are being raised in this country...
...East of the Iron Curtain, it is said, Russia should be recognized by the West as dominant in fact and in law, both now and for the predictable future...
...that we should assert this right by public statements...
...Forget the pledges which Stalin gave at Yalta and forget the claims of the people of Eastern and Central Europe...
...I am not ashamed to say that I am concerned about the freedom of men and women everywhere...
...What then would be the effect of our abandoning the cause of liberation and either explicitly recognizing the permanence of Russian control over the subject peoples or failing to mention our support for their legitimate purposes...
...They pride themselves on being realists...
...A cruel hoax had been practiced upon the heroic men who, trusting in these campaign speeches, lost their lives or their freedom in a vain effort to be free...
...The answer to this attack is very simple...
...and that we should carry this message by radio to the people concerned...
...We of the human race are brothers, one of another, and in the long run this world cannot exist half-slave and half-free...
...The psychological deterrent to war would, thereby, be greatly reduced...
...The subject was muted at the Geneva summit conference of 1955 and the revolutions of the following year found us as unready to help the rebels as we had been in 1953...
...It is better, therefore, say our critics, to yield an untenable position than to run such a risk...
...We are involved in mankind . . . and with what happens to the 100 million people east of the Iron Curtain' The Captive Nations By Paul H. Douglas The Russian drive westward against Hitler in 1944 and 1945 placed the Russian armies in military possession of East Europe...
...It is even less possible in dealing with Communism...
...To encourage them would merely kill off tens of thousands of patriots and weaken still further the cause of national independence...
...here looks at the background of Captive Nations Week, July 17-23...
...To refuse to recognize Russia's claim for dominance might trigger a nuclear attack by Russia and result in the destruction of this country and the Western world as well...
...For if we urge that the people east of the Iron Curtain should be free and independent, or at least have the chance for fair elections under genuinely neutral auspices, we may—it is alleged—provoke a nuclear attack by Russia...
...Perhaps if we throw them overboard Khrushchev will leave us alone...
...Would it not plunge these people into deep discouragement and make most of them indifferent to what happened...
...Would it not lead others to go along with the tide...
...If the Communists know that in the event of war they would face the open or sullen opposition of the 100 million people behind the Iron Curtain, they will be far less likely to start trouble...
...But I do most emphatically deny that they are the only consideration...
...The methods for achieving liberation, however, were not started and, when revolts broke out in Central and Eastern Europe in 1953, the new Administration found that it did not have the plans, the means or the will to make good the pledges of the year before...
...This desire is just as keen among people east of the Iron Curtain as it is elsewhere...
...They say: "Russian armies, tanks, guns, planes and missiles control Poland and the other subject nations...
...Its advocates are not necessarily either evil or duplicitous...
...We are involved in mankind, and I would like to say to the self-styled realists that if they are not really concerned with what happens to the 100 million east of the Iron Curtain, they should be ashamed...
...Today, powerful voices are suggesting that we drop the whole subject of liberation and accept the status quo as final...
...Minister Harold Macmillan, and, while it is opposed by Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and General Charles de Gaulle, their opposition is not as strong on this point as it is on East Germany and on Berlin...
...It is said that we are tools of the organizations in this country which are concerned with their homelands and that we are standing in the way of peace and increasing the danger of a nuclear war...
...Let me make it clear, however, that I am not proposing a war of liberation...
...And if this feeling can he kept vibrant and alive, we will have a powerful defense against Communist aggression...
...I do not deny the importance of these factors...
...There was too much loose thinking about this subject eight years ago...
...Fifteen years later we are still concerned with the question of what shall be the fate of these captive people...
...One of the most powerful deterrents to a Communist attack would also be the active opposition of the subject peoples...
...Precisely here, in the psychological aspects of the world struggle, the so-called "realists" make their great mistake...
...Most men have the desire for freedom and for control over their own affairs...
...I was grieved by the fate of the Jews under Hitler...
...Those of us who disagree with the policy of accommodation and of abandoning the 100 million people in the captive countries are often accused of being swayed by political motives...
...There are moral forces in man...
...What I am saying is that we should keep alive the moral, and I believe the inalienable, right of these people to decide for themselves if they want to be free...
...We are charged with being concerned only with the fate of Poles, Czechs and Lithuanians, rather than with that of our fellow Americans...
...They tend to think of power in purely material terms—in the relative number of divisions and in the strength of the artillery, tanks, planes and missiles...
...Successful revolutions from within are impossible...
...Therefore, it is reasoned, don't argue with reality...
...In the election campaign of 1952, John Foster Dulles attacked the doctrine of mere "containment" as cowardly and demanded that we pursue a policy of liberation...
...I am grieved at the lot of those under Communism...
...This position is strongly supported by Prime Senator Paul H. Douglas (D.-lll...
...The Russians would very quickly sense this, exult in our abandonment of the cause of freedom and of self-determination, and propagandize for new adherents...
...Before we condemn this policy, let us seek to understand it...
...How similar is this reasoning to that of the appeasers who from 1935 to 1939 urged the world not to oppose the aggressions of Hitler and Mussolini but to accept them as means of satisfying the Nazi and Fascist desire for conquest and domination...
...Appeasement certainly proved impossible in dealing with the Fascist dictatorships...
Vol. 43 • August 1960 • No. 31
