POWER POLITICS WRITTEN IN INVISIBLE INK

Morley, Felix

Power Politics Written In Invisible Ink By FELIX MORLEY REPORTING on the Moscow Conference to a joint meeting of both Houses of Congress, Cordell Hull, the Secretary of State, on Nov. 18,...

...If permanent peace is the objective, and Secretary Hull assures us that is the case, then the Cairo Declaration had better be rounded out to make it applicable to all, not merely Japanese, imperialism in Asia...
...No-Yong Park, as far back as 1937: "It is safe to assume that the Retreat of the West will continue, even if Japan is crushed...
...But the more important, and more secret, meeting of the chiefs of state has done little that is discernible to bring the earlier promise towards fruition...
...And there is small reason for optimism if the unrevealed decisions at Cairo and Teheran merely develop, in the traditions of secret diplomacy, the political philosophy which dominates in the published announcements...
...In both cases the substance of the news reached the American people from Allied, •from neutral, and even from enemy sources before it was made available by our own misnamed Office of War Information...
...The opinion of Gandhi and Nehru on the subject would prove the point, should Mr...
...Of supreme importance," said Secretary Hull, "is the fact that at the (Moscow) Conference the whole spirit of international cooperation, now and after the war, was revitalized and given practical expression...
...In current propaganda "isolationist" is an even more overworked noun than is "enslavement...
...Small Reason For Optimism But the bungling of press arrangements, though indicative of a general public-be-damned attitude, could have been forgiven if the Cairo and Teheran statements, separately or together, had carried the hopeful preliminaries at Moscow along that "forward movement" promised to Congress by Secretary Hull...
...The only basis for reasonable criticism is found in the inclusion of the adjective "peace-loving," which seems to seek to divide the world into an unreasonable classification of nations preferring war to peace and vice versa...
...It is therefore the more unfortunate that the next steps, as revealed at Cairo and Teheran, have been predominantly in the direction of disillusionment...
...The common people of every nation consider themselves, and undoubtedly are, peace-loving...
...Both statements, certainly, promised that the war will be won in a big way, which was assumed in advance...
...Argentina, for instance, is today unquestionably demonstrating peace-loving characteristics...
...It records, as the agreed purpose of President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, that "Japan shall be stripped of" her territorial acquisitions during the past fifty years...
...The analogy is unfortunate...
...The Moscow Conference seemed a promising first step towards such a system...
...would certainly be more rational to work for revolution in Germany, rather than to encourage the unity of desperation there also...
...it could readily be incorporated in the platforms of the two major parties for the coming political campaign...
...1, is wholly concerned with the dismemberment of the Japanese Empire...
...it was in accord with both the Fulbright and the Connally resolutions...
...So it comes ill from a high official of a belligerent power to base a program of world order on arbitrary differentiations...
...The Moscow Agreements, though obviously only a prelude, were promising...
...Instead there was little or nothing to justify all the preliminary build-up...
...The Conference thus launched a forward movement which, I am firmly convinced, will steadily extend in scope and effectiveness...
...One may hope that this is a legitimate interpretation...
...With a single unfortunate exception, perhaps pardonable in the heat of a desperate war, this clear-cut statement by Mr...
...That the territories which Japan has seized from China should be restored to the latter is an admirable ambition—one for which American soldiers can die content—provided that the rectification of past injustice is not at the expense of Japan alone...
...And it is the more logical to read an appeal to the German masses between the lines of the statement from Teheran, made public on Dec...
...Hull might have been well-advised not to raise the unprofitable issue of which states, on the record, have over the generations shown the most consistent leanings towards pacifism or belligerency...
...Furthermore, "mindful of the enslavement of the people of Korea," the Anglo-American leadership, supported by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, is "determined that in due course Korea shall become free and independent...
...But more than an avuncular attitude towards- western fellow-travelers on the part of "Uncle Joe" will be needed to establish that partnership "in a future system of general security" which, according to Secretary Hull, is now being designed...
...Hull provided a preliminary definition of foreign policy on which all Americans can agree...
...But one looks in vain through the Cairo Declaration to find any mention even of Hong Kong, to cite one minor instance of the many Asiatic conquests "by violence and greed" which were not sponsored from Tokyo...
...Hull presides...
...England Heads War List The only objective test of whether a nation is "peace-loving" is afforded by analysis of the number of wars in which, over a period of time, its government has become engaged...
...In a very ingenious article Dorothy Thompson argues that the Churchill-Roosevelt-Stalin statement, when carefully studied, can be regarded as a plea to the German people to overthrow the Nazi tyranny, and as a veiled assurance of fair treatment if they do so...
...In our press and radio comment, certainly, there was general disposition to overlook all their deficiencies, the more so because of the Great Expectations aroused by Mr...
...Great Britain, Russia, and the Netherlands, at whose far-flung, jack-booted feet Japan first learned the technique of imperial conquest, have also certain responsibilities when it comes to territorial restitution in Asia...
...Hull's appeal to Congress...
...For if one consequence of the present war is certain it is that the White Man can now lay down his "burden" in the Far East and retire without fearing that his unselfishness will be misconstrued...
...18, asserted: "The principle of sovereign equality of all peace-loving states, irrespective of size and strength, as partners in a future system of general security, will be the foundation stone upon which the future international organization will be constructed...
...The law of diminishing returns will prevent the epithet from stifling the healthy instinct against premature endorsement of a contract in which everything except the dashing signature of Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill is as yet written in invisible ink...
...That phrase, incidentally, was used in the Cairo Declaration, directed at Japan, but not in the manifesto leveled at Germany from Teheran...
...And diminishing returns in propaganda reach the point of absolute zero when Winston Churchill or any other British official declaims on the non-British "enslavement" of Asiatic peoples...
...It reaffirmed the aspirations of the Atlantic Charter...
...Unfortunately the most authoritative Study of War, made by Prof...
...Like all self-righteous assertions, the classification is likely to have a boomerang effect...
...And the sequel is a sad commentary on Secretary Hull's fine statement that America in the future will be judged "by the manner in which we meet the unprecedented responsibilities that rest upon us—not alone in winning the war but also in making certain that the opportunities for future peace and security shall not be lost...
...Quincy Wright and his associates at the University of Chicago, shows (Vol...
...But on the more delicate problems of post-war collaboration the reasonable public anticipation was severely disappointed...
...Churchill let them out of prison long enough to speak...
...It also indicated the pleasure of the entire electorate in a prospect of postwar settlements based on justice and the concept of human brotherhood, thereby possessing promise of both permanence and stability...
...With this exception, however, the Secretary of State a month ago laid before Congress a concise and admirable initial statement on long-range foreign policy...
...There is no doubt of Stalin's increasing influence throughout all Europe...
...7, because Stalin himself has never favored the "unconditional surrender" policy...
...So Mr...
...For while an iceberg conceals its bulk beneath the surface its structural character is indicated in the portion visible...
...Having taken steps to fortify Japanese resistance by the decision to destroy that empire it...
...Western Imperialism Not Mentioned That philosophy is one of power politics, pure and simple...
...Teheran Declaration Needs Clarifying In the prophetic words used by a well-known Chinese scholar, Dr...
...The statement issued after the Chiang-Churchill-Roosevelt conference at Cairo, like that authorized after the Churchill-Roosevelt-Stalin meeting in Iran, suffered from an almost incredible ineptitude in the field of public relations...
...And it is because of this failure that the Republican reluctance to underwrite President Roosevelt's foreign policy, in advance of clarification, is daily becoming more pronounced...
...If the Cairo Declaration needs supplementation, as a basis for an enduring peace, the need of the Teheran Declaration is for clarification...
...In consequence, there was good reason for the wave of enthusiasm which swept the country after Mr...
...1, p. 650) that in the wars of modern civilization England has been the most frequent and Japan the least frequent participant...
...The response was not merely a tribute to the personal integrity and unswerving idealism of the venerable Secretary of State...
...Law Of Diminishing Returns The Teheran Declaration, however, would have been much more encouraging if it had done more than merely refer to "the world family of democratic nations" in terms which beg the question of whether this "family" is as yet anything more than hopeful aspiration...
...Harry Hopkins, or somebody around the White House with or without a passion for anonymity, should , suggest in high quarters that there is a law of diminishing returns in propaganda as well as in economics...
...Apologists for the official statements from Cairo and Teheran, hard pressed to build "constructive comment" from such flimsy material, have fallen back on the old comparison with the iceberg, which shows only one-eighth of its mass above the water...
...What should have been spectacular and electrifying announcements were merely warmed up hash by the time our Administration was graciously pleased to take the American people into its confidence...
...Bungling Of Press Arrangements Precisely because of the good start made at Moscow it was expected that this "forward movement" would gather momentum as soon as the "Big Three" —-Churchili, Roosevelt, and Stalin—could meet to advance the preliminary work accomplished by their Foreign Secretaries...
...Yet its fidelity to the policy of strict neutrality seems to irritate rather than delight the department of our government over which Mr...
...The official statement on the Cairo Conference, as released in Washington on Dec...

Vol. 7 • December 1943 • No. 51


 
Developed by
Kanda Sofware
  Kanda Software, Inc.