STRENGTH OF RUSSIA

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26606, 17 December 1951, Page 7

STRENGTH OF RUSSIA

Eisenhower’s Views

(Rec. 7 p.m,) LONDON, Dec. 15, General Eisenhower to-day denied that the Russian Army was invincible, says the “Sunday Dispatch.” General Eisenhower told the North Atlantic Treaty Organisations temporary council committee in Paris that the Russian Army should not be thought of as a rolling tide, He added: “There are people who imagined the Russians had tanks with armour four feet thick, planes which flew twice as fast as any of the Western Powers’, and soldiers who were eight feet tall and four feet wide. “On the contrary, they have the same problems as we have.” Asked if the forces N.A.T.O. planned to give him in 1952 would be able to deter aggression, General Eisenhower said that if they came along to schedule it would be perfectly feasible to establish au equilibrium. A point would soon be reached when it would be foolish for anyone to attack the West.

BRITISH LABOUR PARTY

FUTURE POLICY TO BE EXAMINED (Special Correspondent N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, December 14. Several sub-committees will be appointed by the National Executive Committee ol the Labour Party to examine and report on future party policy. The executive’s policy committee. which includes Messrs Aneurin Bevan and lan Mikardo, will be responsible for the appointment of the sub-committees. “Their task will be the drafting of a fresh party policy. They will consider, among other matters, Labours future attitude to the problems of transport, housing, and the coalmines. They will also reconsider, with particular care and attention, the party’s traditional policies about the management and control of nationalised industries.” says the political correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian.’ “The need for some revision of the party’s policies has been widely recognised through the Labour movement. Since the general election, influential members of all sections of the movement have been aware that this is the party’s first chance in six years to reflect in peace upon the best methods of applying Socialist principles to the current political problems. ‘‘The decision by the executive means that the party’s leaders have acknowledged the need for a period of organised and official rumination. It also means that the varied and sometimes contradictory contentions of the different sections of the party leadership can be advanced in private and at leisure. Those who sometimes disagree with the majority ol the executive should, therefore, find it less tempting in future than it has been in the past to advertise the violence of their rebellious feelings. “The debate within the party is likely in any case to be less acrimonious than many of the party s critics are inclined to suppose. The strength of the Labour poll at the general election proved that the movement had not been divided even if the national executive was showing signs of fission.”