FOREIGN POLICY

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 285, 2 December 1941, Page 6

FOREIGN POLICY

BRITISH SUCCESSES PEOPLE'S MISCONCEPTIONS I have frequently been disheartened to observe that the British public do not apply to the great Issues of foreign policy or to the processes and results of diplomacy that good sense which they apply almost instinctively to domestic politics, writes the Hon. Harold Nicholson, M.P., in the Spectator. On the one hand they are affected by unreasoning diffidence and suspicion, and on the other haifti they become the victims of false ideas. In home politics the British public have an inherited aptitude for sifting the false from the true, the superficial from the essential, the momentary from the permanent. In foreign politics this aptitude would seem to be denied them. It is not merely a question of ignorance, it is not solely a matter of indifference, it is rather that our public have never acquired in this connection the correct habit of thought. It is not so much knowledge which they need as the right line of approach.

I recall that at the time of the Abyssinian crisis of 1935 I received from one of my constituents a postcard on which were written the words: "Surely the Government must realise that what the people of this country want is the Covenant of the League of Nations and collective security, and that they will never stand for any European entanglements." What distresses me about this amazing statement is not so much that one of my constituents (who are in other matters patient and wise) should have displayed tragic confusion of thought, as that when I have quoted this paradox to audiences throughout the country I have observed that many of them regard this nonsense as a quite logical observation. For in truth the phrase "collective security" acquired for us in those years the narcotic, the almost anaesthetic, properties of a hypnotic formula, and doped us into the belief that by some facile means we could cb'ain security in this wicked world without the expenditure of energy, the strain of sacrifice, or the accumulation of power.

Principles and Details

How are we to teach our public to acquire, in regard to, foreign policy, a reasonable habit of thought? To my mind the confusion into which we have fallen is largely due to the fact that the ordinary man and woman has not been trained to distinguish between the principles of foreign policy and the details of its execution. To some extent this blurring of differences can be ascribed to the careless use of that unfortunate word "diplomacy," which is employed indiscriminately to signify either "foreign policy" or "negotiation." Thus on the one hand a theory has arisen that foreign policy is in some manner different

from national policy, and that it can only be understood by those who possess* a life-long knowledge of foreign countries and languages. And on the other hand it is currently believed that these "diplomatists" are reactionary, secretive, unreliable and out of touch with the lives of ordinary men.

Our object should be to induce the public to regard the Foreign Office in the same manner as they regard the Colonial Office. Were a major issue of colonial policy to arise, the public would have sufficient selfconfidence to apply to that issue the same balance of judgment which they apply to domestic issues; and they would be perfectly ready to entrust to those trained in colonial administration the execution of the principles upon which the majority in Parliament had agreed. Yet in regard to foreign affairs the public mind is warped by diffidence, from which arises in the first place suspicion, and then a lamentable tendency towards mystic formulas such as "collective security" and "federal union." I have been trying lately to inculcate the following doctrine: "It does not matter what you know; what matters is how you think. The principles of sound foreign policy are identical with the principles of sound domestic policy, namely, honesty, liberalism, fairness, order and strength. The people are responsible for our foreign policy; it is for them to insist that these principles be always applied."

Nazi Diplomacy's Failures

Of the many topical fallacies which dim the public mind, there is one which leaves me aghast. There appears to be a legend, creeping as a wisp of fog throughout the country, that in some manner Nazi diplomacy in this war,has proved itself more successful than our own. I cannot trace the origins of this quaint belief. It is true, of course, that the Axis Powers, by the menace of bomb and tank, have frequently been able to force some rabbit country to surrender without fighting to their venomous embrace. Yet even then they failed in Yugoslavia, as they failed in Greece. The fact remains that there were three absolutely vital objectives which Nazi diplomacy ought to have attained. It was essential to maintain good relations with Russia and to avoid a war on two fronts. It was essential to prevent North and South America from becoming closely associated with Great Britain. It was essential to induce the population of the occupied countries to acquiesce in German rule. They have utterly failed even to approach these three major objectives. And what diplomatic achievements can they show comparable to the Atlantic Charter, the Russo-Polish agreement, or the Allied Resolution of September 24?

These solid and formative results of British diplomacy were not obtained either by menace or by guile. Their open covenants, these pledges of potoer, derive from the experience of centuries. Mr. Churchill and Mr. Eden have been loyal to the most ancient of all traditions of our foreign policy, namely, that compulsion is a less durable factor in human relationship than consent.