McNEIL ON SAFEGUARDS OF SECURITY AND PEACE

Press, Volume LXXXIIi, Issue 25302, 30 September 1947, Page 6

McNEIL ON SAFEGUARDS OF SECURITY AND PEACE

’GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Mr Hector McNeil’s speech before the United Nations General Assembly, in great part a reply to Mr Vyshinsky, was remarkable for the force with -which the main points of his argument emerged from the cool, clear level of his frankness and good-humour. The brief cabled summary is supplemented below in extracts which deal, inter alia with Russia’s attitude to the Marshall Plan discussions, charges of “war-mongering,” and iron curtain policy.

Several speakers, including our Polish colleague, have referred to the unity of the nations which fougnt against Fascism and have sighed for a retention of that unity. That, of course, and I do not mince my words, is either nostalgic nonsense or dangerous dishonesty. We are no longer the same company of nations who iougnt. Even 'if we were the same company, the nature of our task is different. Our job in war was to visit disaster and disorder upon our enemies; our job now is to bring order to the world as a whole. We have, therefore, when we parted with overt war, parted also WIJI that identity of purpose. Further, in war the choice of methods is limited, whereas in peace, even when we secure identity of objective, the choice of method is complex and diverse.

World Opinion Not to Be Flouted Each Power must be willing to'Permit reasonable access within its borders to the nationals of friendly Powers, including accredited newspaper men and the bona fide servants of international organisations. Each Power must display a consistency of attitude and a sober regard for fact in its pleas, its complaints, its judgments, ana its contacts. Further, in the international disposal of the problems which lie*between us, the nations must not wantonly flout any really world-wide expressions of opinion on matters which are of concern to the whole world. Mr Vyshinsky, for example, complained that the United States, by bringing the subject of Korea to the Assembly, violates an agreement made at Moscow in December, 1945, relating to the procedure to be adopted to prepare the people of Korea for independence. 1 may say in passing that, of course, my Government has been consistently interested in this subject; and we expect that the United States will be able to make a fair case t® show that they have exhausted the use of all the procedure laid down at Moscow. But that is not the point. The point is that Mr Vyshinsky says that it is bad international practice to bring that subject to the United Nations because ox an agreement made between his Government and the Government of the United States at that date. But in the same speech it is apparently good practice for Egypt to bring a complaint to the Security Council, although it js not disputed that Egypt made an agreement —which still has nine years to run —with my Government in 1936, covering the subjects which are disputed at the Security Council. The Marshall Plan and Paris He made a further attack, and I am sure it is not the last, on the Marshall proposals and the Paris Conference. I nope I make it plain that I naturally do not object to his attacking; but Mr Vyshinsky, reared on Marxism and now blossoming forth as an exponent of laissez-faire economics, made great play with the “sovereign rights” of these European countries. Now, as has been repeatedly made plain, there are many misconceptions about sovereignty, and I propose later to deal with some of them; but no one dragooned, bludgeoned, importuned, or politically discriminated against these 16 nations who assembled at Paris to make them do so. The business of attending or not attending was exclusively the business of these States. Mr Vyshinsky bases his indignation on the fact that they—and I quote him—-

“have an inalienable right to of their economic resources and t plan their own national economy s they see fit.” I think that is exceiw That seems to me most reasoniSp That is the understanding upon which they attended Paris. That is the hT, which my Government retains to II sell, making only such co-operathj planning as it sees fit to make. Bw Mr Vyshinsky proceeds to say that the United States are villainous are disturbers of the peace, they *4 breakers-up of this international strut, ture. Why? Because, apparenth they choose to exercise this same in alienable right to their own property which Mr Vyshinsky approves in ever European Power but disapproves q[ without reserve, in the case of tk United States.

In a fashion it can be argued ati can be shown that every treaty h B diminution of national sovereignty, h a fashion it is true that membershtt of every international organisation takes away from national sovereignty That may have disadvantages; I don’t think so. But it certainly is plain that the disadvantages of non-co-operation, as Mr Vyshinsky pointed out to us, ai? much more hazardous now. Mr Vyshinsky quoted the Charter in support of his theory. I think he quoted it wrongly. The Charter does not insist upon absolute sovereignty. What the Charter does insist upon is the severeign “equality”—and that is the operative word—of the member States That is to say, what one gives up the other equally must give up. Unless therefore, nations are prepared to come to the table willing to discuss the delimitation, of sovereignty in equity and by consent, this United Nations organisation is robbed of its meaning and our presence here is a farce. Wax-Mongering

The charges hurled against us here and elsewhere that we are war-mong-ers are nonsense. We have disarmed and demobilised and are engaged in carrying our demobilisation still fur- • ther. We are co-operating in disarmament, as I have shown, and wUi continue in that co-operation; but I repeat on behalf of my Government, with all the solemnity I can command, that there can be no systematic disarmament without a real basis in collective security. My Government is pledged, and again pledges itself, that if the nations will get down to creating such collective security, in which everyone will co-operate, they will find Great Britain in the forefront playing her part, in this most esse., tial task. Armaments are the resuit of insecurity; therefore security must take precedence over armament. When Mr Vyshinsky argued on Thursday, I have no doubt in perfect sincerity, that his Government was distressed and angered by the statement of individual Americans that Russia was preparing for war and was a warmonger, I wanted to say this. The reply is not to imprison any individual or to suppress American or British newspapers. The reply is to open the doors of Russia so that the nations —the ppople of those nations who have great underlying sympathy with this now emerging Power—can see what is going on. The reply is not to criticise others because they allow their citizens to speak freely, but to urge that all countries should tolerate views freely expressed by citizens of free States. The truth needs no stratagems nor defence.