IMPERIAL BRITAIN AND THE RED 'COLOSSUS'
Morley, Felix
Imperial Britain And The Red 'Colossus' By FELIX MORLEY NEARLY 60 years ago, in a course of lectures given at the Ecole des Sciences Politiques in Paris, a great French historian indulged in a...
...We have the obvious swing towards more active support for the Communist wing of the under-' ground movement in both Greece and Bulgaria...
...Sorel foresaw that such development would destroy the stability of that European Balance of Power on which the security of the British Empire is thought to depend...
...Her only foe is that Power, or that coalition of Powers, which may endeavor to dominate Europe...
...It is in southeastern Europe, in the Danubian Basin to which M. Sorel referred in his lectures of 60 years ago, that there has been more uncertainty as to Russian ambitions...
...The evidence as to this tremendous change of emphasis is still largely circumstantial...
...The prosperous solidarity of Au-stro-Hungary in 1886, let alone that of Victoria's far-flung realm on the eve of her 50th anniversary as Empress, must have made the observation of the French professor fantastic for most of his listeners...
...The New Colossus' Accumulating evidence indicates that at the Teheran Conference the Russian claim to special interest in southeastern Europe was voiced even more assertively, by Stalin himself...
...Nothing more, for instance, is now heard of the projected invasion of the Balkans, for which the British long argued as the preferable alternative to the costly cross-Channel attack...
...The future of Danubia was apparently earmarked for Russia, whose opinion on the subject in 1938 was neither invited nor desired...
...Albert Sorel did not foresee Munich...
...Here it has been both the British and the American hope that an economically well-integrated and politically stable federation might be established, simultaneously blocking both Germany and Russia from access to the Mediterranean, thereby restoring that balance which the Austro-Hungarian Empire once afforded and for which British diplomacy will surely continue to make valiant effort...
...According to that diagnosis Russian ambitions, as evidenced by the intention to displace German influence throughout the Danube Basin, are fast becoming a headache for Great Britain...
...19 to 30, the Soviet delegation came out flatly against "theoretically planned groupings" of small countries and made plain Russia's absolute rejection of "all attempts to revive a policy of cordon sanitaire, under any guise whatsoever, against the U.S.S.R...
...The President returned to Washington in time to share his information on Teheran discreetly with the Congress...
...Actually a more complicated and pressing problem than the future of Germany is the political adjustment of that huge belt of territory to its east and south which Germany at present dominates...
...Yet it appears that Winston Churchill, who was 69 at Teheran, has released for anxious domestic consideration problems strangely similar to those brought home from Munich by Neville Chamberlain, who was also 69 at that conference...
...As an offset to this development, in behalf of the traditional Balance of Power system, General Smuts suggests political union of Great Britain and the small democracies in western Europe, whereby the Dutch and Belgian colonies would presumably become parts of an even greater empire...
...Puppet governments for these future Soviet Republics already exist in skeletonized form, and will undoubtedly be ready to take over as soon as the Russian armies can achieve the necessary advances...
...The elimination of differences among the "Big Three" allies is an essential prerequisite to the establishment of a postwar order having any of the characteristics of stability...
...The treatment to be accorded a defeated Germany was clearly not the outstanding issue at Teheran...
...As her foe varies, so her allies vary...
...In his Christmas Eve broadcast, however, the President promised a report to the Congress "in about two weeks time," or around Jan...
...From the viewpoint of that disintegrating system there will be a distinction without a difference if the fat Danubian Basin has merely been shifted from the fire of German, to the frying pan of Russian, hegemony...
...The hope of stemming the westward advance of Russian influence is, however, becoming progressively more faint...
...Lacking the same reason, Franklin Roosevelt has been equally uncommunicative...
...The latter is now seeking to obtain authentic information from Washington as to where, after Teheran, Poland stands...
...If the Balkans are to be in the Russian sphere of influence, we need not anticipate that an Anglo-American army of occupation will eventually be stationed there...
...And it was Neville Chamberlain who, on Sept...
...But Congress was allowed to adjourn for the holidays without the representatives of the public receiving any authoritative word on the political implications of the discussions...
...7. And he simultaneously made it clear that the Teheran Conference was by no means entirely devoted to military considerations...
...He illustrated his point by asking the British to visualize more clearly the dominating position of Russia, "the new colossus that bestrides this continent" and is already beginning to assume "a position which no country has ever occupied in the history of Europe...
...We have the steady advance towards formal Anglo-American recognition of the Communist leader, Tito, and his Partisans as the accredited government of Yugoslavia...
...Imperial Britain And The Red 'Colossus' By FELIX MORLEY NEARLY 60 years ago, in a course of lectures given at the Ecole des Sciences Politiques in Paris, a great French historian indulged in a daring flight of speculation...
...29 of that year, put his signature on the agreement at Munich which made a German satellite state of Czechoslovakia...
...At Munich, with Anglo-French acquiescence, the control of Bohemia and the territory southeast of it passed into German hands...
...Simultaneously there is increasing aloofness for the pathetic "governments-in-exile" of King Peter of Yugoslavia and King George of Greece, whose ratings in Moscow are scarcely higher than that of Prime Minister Mikolajczyk of Poland...
...Sorel foresaw, indeed, what the editor of The Nineteenth Century has in mind when, in the September, 1943, issue of that famous English review he states: "England has no one permanent foe in Europe...
...For more positive evidence we have, since Teheran, the visit of President Benes of Czechoslovakia to Moscow and the signing of that unpublished but obviously far-reaching Russian-Czech alliance which for some time the British were able to postpone...
...In this area the Russian frontier agreed to by Germany in 1939 is to be reconstituted, with such modifications as may seem appropriate to Stalin's military advisers...
...Illness has as yet prevented Winston Churchill from making any report to Parliament on the discussions with Stalin...
...Albert Sorel would probably suggest, were he alive today, Teheran may yet prove a weight as disturbing as was Munich to the Balance of Power system...
...Sir Austen Chamberlain was never happy about the disappearance of the Dual Monarchy and the consequent "Balkanization" of the rich Danubian Basin which followed the last war...
...But among them was one young Englishman who was afterwards to say that he never forgot Sorel's warning...
...But he did foresee that if either'Germany or Russia should assume control of Danubia it would be for England much more than a matter of diplomatic humiliation...
...Unquestionably a black cigar is a more virile symbol than a black umbrella...
...As far back as the Moscow Conference, Oct...
...On this point President Roosevelt could say, speaking for both Churchill and Stalin in his Christmas Eve broadcast, that: "The United Nations have no intention to enslave the German people...
...The triumvirate, said Mr...
...Curiously enough, Sir Austen's half-brother, Neville, was Prime Minister of Great Britain when Hitler moved into Vienna in March, 1938...
...Major Differences Exist "Whoever is master of Bohemia," said Bismarck— who did not want it—-"is master of Europe...
...His remedy for British weakness, vis-a-vis postwar Russia, is, however, at the moment less important than his diagnosis...
...The foe of yesterday may be the ally of tomorrow and the ally of yesterday the foe of tomorrow...
...It would, indeed, be tragic if this estimate proved incorrect...
...Indeed, as Prof...
...And he added that, on the basis of these discussions, "I do not think any insoluble differences will arise among Russia, Great Britain, and the United States...
...At Teheran it does not seem to have been Stalin who was conciliatory...
...But it would be folly to deny either that important differences exist in the outlook of Russia, Great Britain, and the United States, or that significant concessions will somewhere have to be made to reconcile them...
...The steady growth of Soviet authority and influence gives additional point to the very notable speech, made in London by General Smuts at the end of November, in which this great imperialist warned against "the danger of over-simplification" of war issues...
...Should the Austro-Hungarian Empire ever be dissolved, said M. Albert Sorel to his students, the consequences to be anticipated would destroy the stability of the British Empire...
...Roosevelt, discussed "international relationships from the point of view of big, broad objectives, rather than details...
...Against that foe she must always be ready, always be strong and always have allies...
...This youth was Austen Chamberlain, destined, ironically enough, to become a member of the British Government which, in 1919, presided over the enforced disruption of Austro-Hungarian political and economic unity...
...As to its plans for a large part of this territory— much of Finland, the Baltic States, eastern Poland, northern Bukovina, and Bessarabia—Moscow has for months now made no secret...
...and that Winston Churchill was compelled reluctantly to accept the Russian ruler's viewpoint...
...At Teheran, with Anglo-American approval, the pendulum was swung the other way...
...More Than Humiliation He would have experienced even more doubts on the subject had he lived a year longer and thus witnessed that Nazi annexation of Austria which opened the door for German expansion through all of what has been called Danubia...
Vol. 8 • January 1944 • No. 2
