REALISM WITH RUSSIA

...Realism With Russia THE formulation of a sound and sensible working relationship with the Soviet Union has been made needlessly complicated and chaotic by the shrill intervention of two groups in the United States: 1. The dues-paying Communists and their dues-saving fellow travelers who scream "fascism" at every criticism of the U.S.S.R., no matter how sincere or constructive...

...This same character now screams "Red-baiter" and "appeaser" at anyone who dares to ch* llenge openly and earnestly certain Soviet war aims...

...Ickes' Itchy Fingers' SECRETARY OF INTERIOR Harold Ickes, whose record in most domestic affairs [except petroleum] has been one with which progressive-minded people will not quarrel, seems to have developed a weakness which cannot help but lose him some of the enthusiastic support he has hitherto held...

...The story of what "grass roots" administration has meant to the success of TVA needs no recounting...

...In a front-page editorial recently the editors wrote: "Against Germany we are using every weapon except political warfare...

...Apparently the choleric Secretary will stop at nothing to defend a position that is opposed to the almost unanimous progressive opinion that MVA, like TVA, should be set up as a regional authority, freed to as a great a degree as possible from political control in Washington...

...TVA chairman Lilienthal put it this way in his series of articles concluded recently in The Progressive: "TVA was not intended to be merely an aid to the development of one river valley...

...Certainly, the tremendous success of the TVA should establish the precedent here...

...2. Non-Communist Americans, once intolerant Red-baiters themselves, who have swung all the way around and now, just as intolerantly, dismiss every honest questioning of Soviet policy as "obstructionism" and "a threat to Allied unity...

...The second was the attitude of the London Daily Worker "which scents an anti-Soviet intrigue in every word of criticism of the Soviet Union...

...Not so long ago there were reports, that he was maneuvering to bring the Tennessee Valley Authority under the domination of the Department of Interior...

...This, it seems to us, is an eminently sound position—not only for Americans groping to find their way in the labyrinth of world politics, but for Mr...

...It was clearly designed to throw the light of actual experience— riot just talk or theories or promises, but actual experience—on the development of resources by a new method and a new principle...

...Hauling out his talented hatchet against all who disagree with him he took a most vicious cut at David Lilienthal recently, charging that the TVA chairman is "one of the busiest propagandists the U. S. A. has produced...

...Only on this basis of candor is there a probability of genuine agreement with Stalin...

...The right and only way is to state frankly the [democratic] principles and interests which seem to us important, even when they are in conflict with those of the Soviet Union...

...President Roosevelt himself has spoken up for an independent, decentralized MVA...

...Here in our own community, for instance, a local character who was a violent critic of the Soviet Union a few years ago cried "Communist" at union spokesmen when they asked for a three-dollar a week raise for underpaid workers...

...In discussing the bitterly controversial Polish question, the New Statesman noted that "there are two attitudes to this problem that seem to us harmful...

...Then came stories that he was casting covetous glances at the Rural Electrification Administration—although it should be said for him in this instance that it would be hard to think of any way he could do a worse job with REA than the Department of Agriculture is now doing...

...Psychiatrists call this "over-compensation"—indulging in one violent extreme in an effort to compensate for a previous violent extreme...

...Ickes obviously does not understand that the point in question is not what TVA has done, so much as how it has done it...

...They fight because they have no alternative...

...The Progressive, whose owners and editors were advocates of recognition of and a working relationship with Russia long before such a course became "respectable," finds in the New Statesman's position much sound counsel for all Americans who are not professional apologists for the Soviet Union...

...A Mindless War' The New Statesman and Nation of London, bitterly disappointed by the failure of Allied leadership to give great moral and political meaning to the war, has dubbed this "a mindless war...

...We have offered them nothing but unconditional surrender, and they believe, just as we believed when we were prepared to fight to the death in 1940, that the alternative is national and personal destruction...

...To steer a straight course in this sea of emotion is not easy...

...Hence the perplexity of Allied generals, who find themselves in a position of great military superiority, and who are surprised by the high morale and tough fighting qualities of the new, almost untrained German recruits...

...The first harmful attitude, it pointed out, was irresponsible criticism of everything the U.S.S.R, does...

...A thoughtful analysis of the problem of, dealing with Soviet Russia appeared recently in the New Statesman and Nation, a London liberal weekly considerably to the left of center which views most Russian moves with favor...

...He has seriously contributed to disunity when the united strength of all progressives is urgently needed to get the necessary legislation through Congress...

...There is evidence aplenty that he has developed a "itchy fingers...

...he respects realism and candor, and suspects both sycophancy and old-world diplomacy...

...Secretary Ickes has not helped to advance the fight for development of the Missouri watershed by precipitating a brawl over who will administer it...

...It is noteworthy that its biggest problems today come, not from the people in the vast area of its operation, but from the politicians in the national capital who want another political football to kick around...

...This latter group is capable of making as much noise as the Communists themselves...

...Now, the blunt and plain-spoken Cabinet officer has come out for Department of Interior domination over the proposed Missouri Valley Authority...

...Roosevelt, too, as he prepares for his historic conference with the others of the Big Three...

...Goebbels has told them so, and Goebbels has our own propaganda to support him...

...Whether the Department of Interior can or cannot build the dams and dig the navigation channels just as efficiently as a regional authority is not the main issue...