Churchill urged nuclear war on Russia

Press, 5 January 1979, Page 5

Churchill urged nuclear war on Russia

NZPA London Sir Winston Churchill urged Britain and the United States to launch a nuclear war against the Soviet Union in 1948, according to official papers published for the first time tnis week. He made the suggestion, a report in the “Guardian” has said, as leader of the Opposition to the Labour Prime Minister, Clement Attlee. It was rejected and the American ambassador in London, Lewis Douglas, said the idea was full of “practical infirmities.” Churchill’s suggestion — at a time when the Soviet Union did not have an atom bomb — was made during the period of increasing tension which led two months later to the Russian blockade of West Berlin. The “Guardian” said

a that the British Cabinet and Foreign Office records — just released under the 30-year secrecy rule — reveal the extent of British and American anxiety at a time when a third world war came close to reality. About this time Lord Russell, who later became an ardent peace campaigner, also suggested a preemptive strike against Russia while the West alone had nuclear weapons. Churchill had already alluded to the West’s temporary nuclear advantage in a foreign-affairs debate in the House of Commons early in 1948. He said he could not dismiss from his mind the limited time during which the atomic bomb “would be in safe hands.” His proposal in April, 1948, was that Britain and the United States should require the Soviet Union to retreat from Berlin and

East Germany on pain of having their cities “razed."

An armoured breakthrough to Berlin was also suggested, the “Guardian” said, by General Lucius Clay, the American military governor ot Berlin. It was dismissed as impractical, and the United States Army’s chief of operations, General Albert Wedemayer, and Sir Charles Portal, later Lord Portal, of the Royal Air Force, suggested the ultimately successful Berlin airlift.

“The airlift succeeded beyond the dreams of everyone ...” the “Guardian” said. “By the time the show was over, the Russians were looking extremely silly. The danger of war ha.’, been averted and Berlin had become linked to the West with bonds tempered by a mutual adversity.”