APPROACH TO THE SOVIET MR MORRISON’S ARTICLE AND THE RUSSIAN

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26513, 30 August 1951, Page 6

APPROACH TO THE SOVIET MR MORRISON’S ARTICLE AND THE RUSSIAN

(By

W. N. EWER.]

"Pravda,” the official newspaper of the Soviet Communist party, has printed in full an article by the British Foreign Secretary. That is something of an international event; fnr normally utterances of Western statesmen and politicians no publicity in the Soviet Union evn though they may be of the first im portance. Recently, for example, the United States Congress sent a goodwill message to the Supreme Soviet. With it went a letter from President Truman to the President of the Soviet Not a word of this was allowed to be printed in the Soviet press. So, when Mr Morrison in a speech he made in June, offered to write an article for ■‘Pravda." and when "Pravda accepted the offer, many people saw in it a possible sign of a coming change of attitude in Moscow. But these hopes have scarcely been fulfilled. "Pravda” has indeed printed Mr Morrison’s article in full. It has, as it was entitled to do, printed its own reply on the same page. Nor perhaps, should one complain if the reply is just about twice as long as the article. The Russian tends to be lengthy both in print and in speech. What does matter is not length but tone of reply. It shows no trace of any desire for better relations. The concluding sentences of the British Minister and of the Russian editor are in the sharpest contrast. Let us quote them. “I send you the friendly greetings of my fellow countrymen and our sincere wish for the genuine co-operation of your country in advancing the peace and progress of the world." This is Mr Morrison’s. “That is why the Soviet people regard present-day Anglo-American politicians as instigators of a new world war.” That is the editor of "Pravda." The friendly approach—and Mr Morrison was throughout his article sometimes frank but always courteous—has been rejected insultingly. That is, lam afraid, the net result of the exchange.

Russian Attack The whole of the “Pravda” article bristles with attack. There is not a friendly word in it from beginning to end—and very few polite ones. ‘Tor over a year now the Anglo-American peoples nave been tormenting the free-dom-loving and peaceful people of Korea, destroying Korean villages and towns, murdering women, children and old folks ” There is even an attempt to suggest by innuendo that Mr Morrison may be in some way implicated in the murders of the late Persian Prime Minister and of King Abdullah of Jordan. That is presumably for Soviet readers, who have already been conditioned by years of propaganda to reading this sort of vicious nonsense. Also intended for Russian consumption presumably are such statements that in Russia, but not in Britain, "in spite of the fact that the Labour Party has now been in office for six years," there is no freedom from “economic crisis, from unemployment, from poverty.” For the facts about full employment in Britain have been carefully hidden from the Russian people. Here “Pravda” has surely been a little uncertain: for many of its readers will raise their eyebrows (they dare do no

more) when they read that u. propagandists often are. for instance, that engaging trying to get away with Lit blt « ticularly outrageous asserting' such phrase, a. “It is wdflK&S Mr Molotov does it, Mr it Mr Gromyko and Mr They have not realised thattt? I°* has come to be recognised m that a really "big one” i t comiL*’ o ® here is the editor of same trap of his ow "Actually, as is known, the Com ists came to power in the nZ*democratic countne. a. a rMiiu” I ' l general election.” "SpleniideV* dax,” seems the approved schoolboys have been knnw^* l favour the translation l "Wht, * whopper!” " Prisoners That some naiveness crops UD and again, “The prison sndLff camps” in the Soviet Union “iS only for criminals from landlord»i2 capitalists down to terroriatTeu ** assassins and subversive ' an™ What an admission! As the daw“landlords and capitalists” vankhS long Since, there are in Soviet under the benign rule of Stalin, millions of “terrorist. assassins and subversive agents*wC although citizens of the h'ami? country in the world, are latent m overthrowing the best regime in world even at the risk of bei M 2? tenced to forced labour in Siberian camp. But the details of this long ug rambling reply to the British ftrS Secretary do not perhaps greatly. They are for the most nn compounded of the mixture of bitte ness and childishness with are only too familiar. What does matter, and it to gw. foundly disappointing, to pwjZ that which is all so familun' £1 there is not the slightest sign M change or of any desire for » change. Mr Morrison in his articls a pressed the hope that it might to bring about a better between our peoples.” if cofidZ easily, had there been a reply jg £ same spirit, have opened th* wu E a frank but courteous, and retoouto* exchange of views and information which could hav* |m|3l to clear the heavy atmospher*. Ita B was Mr Morrison’s hope and btafcH tion. But it has beep quickly one must assume deliberately fqgto trated. He has been answered tefl flouts and jeers and insulting tec* j i tion*. The deduction is only toe okstaaß The Soviet leaders have still tol*® sire for friendship or for co-op*Ntta l| For their own purposes passionately anxious that nothing|tal disturb the belief they seek day sflc day to create in their own people to in ' those of their dependencies ft* the British Government is a nuiswlent enemy, busily plannin* stigate a new world war." The pew of the Soviet dictatorship, both toh own country and in th* "siitQik states” rests in no small meme upon the maintenance of th* b»Uet h that myth.