Macmillan Still Has Hopes For Progress

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28921, 15 June 1959, Page 11

Macmillan Still Has Hopes For Progress

(Rec. 10.30 p.m.) LONDON, June 13. The British Prime Minister (Mr Macmillan) said today that he did not altogether despair of progress at the Geneva Foreign Ministers’ conference.

The Western spokesmen were still trying to find some measure of agreement with the Soviet Government on Berlin. “We have to be firm. We cannot abandon the people of West Berlin or weaken in any way our right to protect them,” Mr Macmillan told a Conservative Party rally in North London. “On the other hand we have to be reasonable and try to work out new arrangements which will be an improvement on the present situation,” Mr Macmillan said. “The Foreign Secretary and his Western colleagues are still trying to find some measure of agreement with the Soviet Government on this question and I do not altogether despair of progress. “At the same time we to remember that unless the present Soviet attitude is considerably modified the Berlin situation may still become dangerous.

“West Berlin has of course been threatened before,” he added. “We all remember the attempt which the Soviet Government made in 1948-49 to cut off West Berlin and the massive airlift which was organised at that time to succour the city. “However, since then the situation of Berlin has been quiet and the 2,500,000 inhabitants of West Berlin have developed their way of life in freedom.

“The revival of their prosperity has been one of the remarkable miracles in post-war Europe.” The Prime Minister said that Mr Khrushchev's note, in which he declared, in effect, that Soviet Russia considered the occupation of West Berlin should be brought to an end was not in itself a very terrible threat, but it could have had far-reaching implications. “It is easy to see that a dangerous situation might arise if there were in this way to be interference with the rights of the Western Powers in Berlin,” Mr Macmillan said.

“We have to consider not merely our rights, but our obligations.

“These include the future of the people of West Berlin, who have trusted in the West to defend their right to live in democratic freedom.” Mr Macmillan said. “In these circumstances, it was clear to me that some measures must be taken, if possible, to prevent such a dangerous situation arising. I believed that we should seek a solution by negotiation, if necessary, between Heads of Governments.

“The present talks in Geneva, therefore, are the first stage in this process. I still hope for some

progress there,” Mr Macmillan said.

Before dealing with the Geneva talks and the Berlin situation, Mr Macmillan said: “We cannot hide from ourselves the existence of a deep, long drawn-out struggle between two ways of life, two totally different conceptions—communism and that of the free world.

“If we reject Marxism as we do, we should equally reject the Marxist doctrine of the inevitability of final physical conflict between them.

“On the contrary, I believe that with patience and imagination, combined with firmness and devotion to our own idea, we may see in due course something like real co-existence develop.

“And as generations pass without war, these rigid distinctions will become blurred and I think the natural instincts of our common humanity will bring us together.” he said.