RUSSIA, BRITAIN, AND THE PEACE
Follette, Sen. Robert M. La Jr.
Russia, Britain, And The Peace By SEN. ROBERT M. LA FOLLETTE, Jr. EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the second of 3 articles charting a foreign policy for America, based on Bob La FoUette's historic speech...
...I yield to no man in my admiration for the magnificent courage and resolution of the Russian people in standing up against the invader, driving the Nazi hordes from their homeland, and pressing on to final victory...
...This hope has dwindled as the Soviet Union has failed again and again to live up to the terms of the agreement as it was made public...
...It seems to me all the more important, in view of Russia's great sacrifices toward winning the war, that we stand firmly against any steps which may wreck the peace...
...But the fundamental fact is always the same—Russia ignores her solemn commitments to a program of joint responsibility and cooperation in establishing temporary regimes for the liberated lands of Europe...
...Exposure of these sordid bargains brought desertions among soldiers in the European armies, protests from trade unionists in England and from Labor Members in the House of Commons...
...We shall be false to everything we think we have been fighting for if we do not speak up to our allies now and make it clear that although we are,firmly resolved to participate actively in world affairs, we are equally determined that the power and influence of the United States shall never be lent to policing unjust peace terms and perpetuating an unjust status quo...
...I have already discussed some phases of our own government's conduct...
...Translations (Continued on Page 2) were published in the Manchester Guardian on Dec...
...The provisional Russian Revolutionary Government publicly repudiated those treaties and issued a proclamation for a peace without annexations and indemnities, based upon the foundation of the self-determination of nations...
...Recently I have watched Soviet Russia's activities in the field of world politics with grave apprehension...
...The result is that many Americans who have sound, constructive criticism to offer are being intimidated into remaining silent...
...They* went even further than the Russian Provisional Government had gone...
...Russia Showed The Way A little later, on the same day that the British Cabinet had discussed among other things the question of Rumania and Russia, Col...
...Russia is at present as suspicious of the capitalistic countries as we are of her intention to try to force communism upon other countries...
...It must be obvious to every American who has watched the developments from Casablanca, Quebec, Teheran, Dumbarton Oaks, and Yalta that virtually every compromise has been at the expense of the very principles to which we have committed ourselves before the world...
...No one who studies the causes of war can evade the basic fact that imperialism creates breeding grounds for conflict...
...5, 1918, professing adherence to general principles previously announced by President Wilson...
...I refuse to go along with this Hitler-like doctrine of total approval and unquestioning obedience...
...The present program of the Russian Government is a sharp deviation from the peace program she was proposing in the early days of her revolution...
...This doctrine violates the spirit of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution...
...Britain's curious operations in Italy and Greece—• together with Mr...
...Second, the way in which the Communists twist the meaning of words from their common usage in the truly democratic countries makes it very difficult to reach an understanding with them on the one hand, and gives their propaganda a tremendous advantage on the other...
...During the first World War, soon after the overthrow of the Czar, the Russian Revolutionary Government proposed to the Allies terms for peace, which, had they been agreed upon and incorporated into the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, could have made a much better treaty and a more effective League of Nations to prevent war...
...25, 26, and 28, 1918, and also appeared here in pamphlet form...
...the 3 governments will jointly assist the people...
...In these countries American and British officials have h.een denied an opportunity to freely examine conditions at first-hand...
...When the Inter-Allied Conference met in Paris, war aims and the Russian question were skilfully ignored...
...The 2, it seems to me, must go together...
...29, 1917...
...It is because I feel so deeply that thus far the first arrangements of the peace settlement itself are fraught with the gravest danger that I" want to discuss briefly next week the nature of the organization to preserve those arrangements...
...It is un-American...
...8, 1918, President Wilson appeared before Congress and delivered his 14 Points speech, which renewed the hopes of many people in different countries who longed for the kind of a peace that might endure...
...ITHINK it must be perfectly clear that in this World War, as in the last, the United States has, thus far, failed to use its bargaining power with its Allies to win commitments...
...House arrived in London...
...Her present demands and her methods seem more in accord with the old imperialistic purposes and methods of the Czarist regime than with those of the early days ef her revolution...
...The Kremlin has taken over these territories in much the same way that it would the states within the actual pre-war boundaries of Soviet Russia...
...An enduring peace can be built only by eliminating the deep underlying causes of these ever-recurring European conflicts...
...The treaties were.published in this country in the New York Evening Post on Jan...
...My concern includes the conduct of our own government in past years and certain activities of our British ally as well...
...2, 1917, and they appeared in pamphlet form in England a little later...
...It has become virtually impossible to criticize the activities of at least one of our Allies—Soviet Russia—however constructively, without bringing down about one's head a storm of smearing vilification and misrepresentation by a tightly organized minority...
...Those were terms to which the democratic-minded peoples of the world could and did subscribe...
...After those talks he recorded in his diary that he thought it would be useless to try to get either the British or the French to designate terms and noted that neither Great Britain nor France could meet the new Russian terms of "no indemnities and no aggression...
...Churchill's affirmations of friendship for the Fascist government of Spain—are deeply disturbing to countless Americans who have accepted the doctrine that this is a war of liberation and freedom...
...Only by frankly facing and openly discussing all difficulties and major differences of policies as they arise can a true meeting of minds be reached...
...That "Declaration on Liberated Europe" specifically committed the United States, Great Britain and the Soviet Union to the following: "They jointly declare their mutual agreement to concert, during the temporary period of instability) in liberated Europe, the policies of their 3 governments in assisting the peoples liberated...
...It is my earnest conviction that Russia is today making the same mistakes which France made after World War I. For all their lip-service to the principles of genuine international cooperation, the French governments of the 1920s placed their faith in a network of military alliances, a ring of satellite states, and the Maginot line...
...I am no more prepared to commit the United States to enforcing British rule over India, Burma, or Malta than I am to commit my country to enforcing Russian dominion over Poland, Rumania, or Austria...
...Balfour started in on his ideas of territorial division...
...When understandings have been openly arrived at they should be formulated in open covenants so that the peoples of the countries involved may know what commitments have been made...
...I hoped, however, that the Yalta Agreement might serve to lessen the tensions and afford ah opportunity for joint consultations on some of the more perplexing problems of Europe...
...EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the second of 3 articles charting a foreign policy for America, based on Bob La FoUette's historic speech in the Senate May 31...
...Certainly Russia's international policy has changed radically...
...The whole artificial structure crashed like a house of cards before the first breath of reality...
...Russia will never find peace and security through dominating the Balkans, Central Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean...
...I have been shocked at the failure of most of our American newspapers to challenge these undemocratic and war-provoking demands of our Russian ally...
...Balfour, and the Prime Minister, Lloyd George, conferred for an hour and a half, again going into the question of war aims...
...Nor can I have the slightest faith in a system of international cooperation which rests on the threats of any one nation to withdraw unless she has her way in all matters where she feels she has a direct, selfish interest...
...Such unquestioning acceptance of every tentative proposal made by a foreign power will ultimately wreck our cooperation with any country...
...to form interim govern-(Continued on Page 16) mental authorities, broadly representative of all democratic elements in the population and pledged to the earliest possible establishment through free elections of governments responsive to the will of the people...
...The Bolsheviki had come into power under Lenin the day before Col...
...This is totalitarian doctrine...
...Repeating France's Mistake I am deeply concerned about these developments, and many others like them, because I believe their continuance will undermine, impair, and may destroy a program of genuine international cooperation...
...The latest example is Austria, where the Kremlin created a provisional government, placed it in power, and announced it to the World without in anyway consulting Great Britain and the United States...
...Edward M. House, who had been appointed by the President as the leading American representative, arrived in London 3 weeks before the Paris conference...
...It violates the basic concept of democracy...
...I am well aware of the stupendous contribution our Russian ally has made to victory in Europe...
...Violating The Charter It was true that the voice of the Russian people had been more compelling and moving than any other at the time when it repudiated and exposed the sordid secret treaties and called for a declaration of terms upon which there was a possibility of building an enduring peace...
...In order to allay suspicion as to Britain's imperialistic aims and to win the support of Labor, Prime Minister Lloyd George made a war aims speech before the Trade Union Congress in London Jan...
...The Russians sought to have the question of a public declaration of war aims and potential peace terms brought up before the Inter-Allied Conference which was to meet in Paris on Nov...
...The feeble response of what was once our liberal press has been especially alarming...
...A Dwindling Hope I was not one of those who gave way to unbounded enthusiasm when the results of the Yalta Conference of the Big 3 were announced with the publication of the Crimea Declaration...
...In those Archives they discovered the sordid, war-breeding treaties that had been secretly made among the European Allied Governments...
...The disaffection was so great among the democratic-minded people in Europe that the Allied Governments became alarmed...
...In the end she found herself weakened, betrayed, and impotent...
...The details are different in each instance...
...I shall never forget the thrill of that Russian voice repudiating sordid secret international bargains and calling for a new kind of open diplomacy and open international agreements...
...Churchill's dogmatic, and at times arrogant, refusal to discuss any definite plans for freedom for the subject peoples of the British Empire deserves the greatest censure...
...Her arbitrary policies toward Poland constitute clear-cut violations of the United Nations' pledges against territorial changes which do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the people concerned...
...basic causes of unrest, insecurity, and war...
...I yield to no man in my admiration for the magnificent courage and heroic sacrifices of the Russian people in Europe...
...I advocated recognition of the Russian Soviets and urged economic cooperation with that Government...
...There he, Mr...
...17, 1917, they actually published in Russia the texts of these secret Allied treaties which proved that the Allied Governments had been sending soldiers to the front to die, not for democracy, but for territorial aggrandizement...
...On this occasion I do not criticize her internal economy nor her conduct of domestic affairs, although I disagree completely with her totalitarian form of government...
...Roosevelt placed extraordinary emphasis on that phase of the Crimea Agreement because he felt so strongly and hoped so much that it would permit of a just and democratic settlement of some of the more compelling issues of Europe...
...I do not propose on this occasion to take up in any detail the record of compromise and surrender which has marked our relations with our principal Allies...
...First, I do not believe in the United Front tactic* In my judgment it is bound to result in the ultimate triumph of the Soviet Russian form of totalitarianism wherever it is tried...
...But I am deeply concerned about her policies in world affairs, for here her conduct has a direct and perhaps decisive impact on all our hopes for a just and enduring peace...
...10 Downing Street...
...My deep concern as to forces which are at present actually undermining our hope of international cooperation and the formation of an effective world organization for enduring peace are not confined to our Russian ally...
...In some of these areas there is double talk about elections in the future...
...Russia's insistence on establishing the Made-in-Moscow Lublin regime as the government of Poland not only violates the Atlantic Charter, but is clearly a violation of the terms of the Yalta Agreement to which Marshal Stalin subscribed when he met with the late President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill...
...One of the first acts of the Russian Revolutionary Government of 1917 was to open the Archives of the Czarist Regime...
...The agreement to which Marshal Stalin, Prime Minister Churchill, and the late President Roosevelt subscribed at Yalta contained "a Declaration on Liberated Europe...
...I publicly stated that the proof of the pudding would be in the eating...
...Maps were brought out and Mr...
...The very tactics which Adolf Hitler embraced as his own in Meiri Kampf—the big lie, the big smear, and the wholesale impugning of motives and characters— have been taken over by this Russia-Can-Do-No-Wrong chorus...
...At 2 intimate dinners he had confidential talks about war aims and peace terms with Lord Chief Justice Reading and the Prime Minister, Lloyd George...
...My reservations on the agreement were based on 3 main propositions...
...I did this at a time when many present fanatical Rus-sophiles in this and other countries were advocating policies that sought to destroy that Government...
...We have come to the place in history when there must be plain thinking and decisive action to get at the...
...It is the voice of the Russian people...
...But plebiscites held after purges, liquidations, and deportations of liberal and democratic forces are a hollow mockery of the very tenets of democracy as practiced in the world prior to the advent of totalitarianism...
...Our hope for enduring peace rests, of course, on the nature of the peace settlement itself and on the nature of the organization created to preserve that settlement...
...There was nothing in the oath of office I took under the Constitution of the United States which obligates me to say "Ja' to everything and anything my own Government does, and there is certainly no obligation to say "Ja" to everything and anything a foreign power may do...
...This was only a dreary repetition of developments in Bulgaria, Rumania, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Poland...
...News of the publication of these treaties spread rapidly to other countries although many conservative newspapers tried to ignore them...
...House decided it was worse than useless to discuss territorial aims then, and that what was needed was an announcement of general war aims and the formation of an international association to prevent future wars...
...However, I do want to touch on a few of the developments with the utmost brevity...
...Unless these mutual suspicions between these 2 great countries can be eradicated by frank and honest discussion, it will be impossible to create and maintain an effective and genuinely cooperative world organization...
...IFEEL deeply that great and irreparable injury is being done to the cause of world peace, and to American-Russian relations by this minority group which demands cringing acquiescence to everything the Kremlin does...
...House dropped in at No...
...I am convinced that Mr...
...In the course of that speech President Wilson said: "There is...
...Third, I do not believe that the end ever justifies the means...
...The history of France and of all these unhappy European countries proves that no lasting peace can be secured by imposing domination from the top...
...The past should teach us that secret treaties breed evil and bring war among nations...
...On Nov...
...I remember the time when Russia was reminding the world of this fact and was demanding the repudiation of secret treaties and secret diplomacy...
...In addressing the Congress of the United States shortly after his return, Mr...
...I cannot underwrite gross violations of the democratic principles which can alone provide a political climate for enduring peace...
...Russia has also violated the Atlantic Charter and Yalta Agreements in other areas liberated from the Nazi yoke: in Rumania, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Austria...
...Russia's policies in Europe have constituted a direct violation of the pledges of the Atlantic Charter, to which she subscribed...
...The failure of the capitalistic governments to respond to her earlier call has perhaps made Russia suspicious...
...These areas have been blacked out so far as the press of this country and Great Britain are concerned...
...To allay unrest among the French people, Premier Clemenceau promptly endorsed Lloyd George's statement...
...I should like to note at the outset that I have no doubt some of my words will be misinterpreted and distorted by the smear bund...
...IHAVE briefly reviewed this record of the recent past because I think an awareness of what has been going on is vital to any honest consideration of the Dumbarton Oaks Plan, as amended at Yalta, which is now before the United Nations at San Francisco...
...This agreement has been consistently flouted by the Soviet Union which has proceeded unilaterally, and without in any way consulting her 2 partners, to set up in country after country, governments which are made in Moscow, and do not fulfill any of the basic requirements agreed to at Yalta...
...They were in accord with the principles that President Wilson had proclaimed as the United States' war aims...
...On Jan...
...Secret Treaties Breed War I believe that any enduring cooperation with Soviet Russia, as with every other country, must be based upon genuine understanding and accord...
...to solve by democratic means their pressing political and economic problems...
...a voice calling for these definitions of principle and of purpose which is, it seems to me, more thrilling and more compelling than any of the many moving voices with which the troubled air of the world is filled...
Vol. 9 • June 1945 • No. 25
