T17F TA B r . f T , Aprì' 51« / . 1951

THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

PRO ECCLESIA DEI, PRO REGE ET PATRIA

VOL. 197, No. 5787

FOUNDED IN 1840

LONDON, APRIL 21st, 1951

SIXPENCE

PUBLISHED AS A NEWSPAPER

CATHOLIC TEACHING AND SOCIAL POLICY

Some Timely Clarifications by the Irish Hierarchy

MEDICINE AND THE STATE The Irish Bishops’ Condemnation of a Free Health Scheme ERNEST BEVIN ROME LETTER His Role as a Breakwater Princess Elizabeth’s Visit

BRITAIN’S FINANCIAL PREDICAMENT Reflections on Mr. GaitskelFs Budget : H . By Douglas Jerrold

SPRING BOOKS SUPPLEMENT Reviews by Vincent Turner, W. W. Robson, D . B. Wyndham Lewis, Yvonne ffrench, Adrian Morey, J . J . Dwyer, T . A. Birrell, F. C. Copleston, H . J . Massingham, J . M . C. Toynbee, Robert Speaight, John Rothenstein, Arnold Lunn, A. J . Brooker,

George Scott-Moncrieff, Christopher Hollis, and Elizabeth Sewell

NO APPEASEMENT IN ASIA P RESIDENT TRUM AN followed up his recall o f General M acA rthur by a s i n g u l a r l y emphatic radio and television speech, in which he told the American people th a t the Communists in the Kremlin are engaged in a “monstrous conspiracy” to stam p out freedom all over the world, that the United States would be among their principal victims, and th a t what is going on in Korea is p a r t o f the conspiracy. He quoted secret intelligence reports, one o f a Communist officer in the F a r East telling his men several months before the invasion o f Korea somewhere between the two extremes o f all-out a ttack and simply waiting to be hit, covering up and warding off the blow, and then waiting apprehensively to see where the Communists may choose to strike next. For there is a very real weakness in any policy o f passive defence ; and the best way to deter an aggressor is to make sure th a t he has his own anxieties, his own weak spots to watch and safeguard ; and this is particularly true o f the new insecure Communist Party regime which has installed itself in Pekin.

“ In order to undertake successfully the long-awaited world-revolution, we must first unify Asia . . . Java, Indochina, Malaya, India, Thailand, Tibet, Ceylon, Philippines and Japan are ou r ultim ate targets. The United States is the only obstacle on our road towards the liberation o f South East A sia.” President T rum an added that the resolute stand made in Korea has already slowed down the Communist tim e-table elsewhere. In short, he showed th a t the Korean issue is, like the blockade o f Berlin o r the a ttem p t on Greece, a tria l o f strength in which the free world must show itself strong and resolute.

And against this clear diagnosis, how lam entable look all the half-hints and tentative suggestions with which the British Government is credited in Washington—suggestions th a t the hostility o f the Chinese Communists might be bought off if they were given Form osa and a seat in the Security Council, suggestions th a t they have a moral o r legal claim to anything which was promised a t Potsdam six years ago to th a t N ationalist China o f Chiang Kai-shek which had been a staunch ally against Japan and was counted on to be one o f the main powers in th e United Nations. Any gratuitous presents to Pekin o f strategic o r diplom atic advantages would have exactly the result they had when made to Moscow. They merely make it possible for the Communists to advance the plan o f conquest rath e r more rapidly, to com fort our enemies and dishearten our friends ; and Mr. Herbert Morrison is starting off very badly a t the Foreign Office if this is his policy.

President T rum an ruled ou t any military diversions on the mainland o f China as calculated to lead to a perhaps uncontrollable extension o f hostilities. .But, with the return o f General M acA rthur, the American public will have to face the question what is the correct military policy. It plainly lies

Against Britain the overall Kremlin strategy is to break the Western world in Asia, to cut us off from our sources o f vital raw materials and dollar exports, and to overstrain and disrup t the British economy, compelling us to rearm and to maintain, perhaps indefinitely, a vast superstructure o f military costs. I t is the .first duty o f British statesm anship to see the outside world as it is ; and this is the great indictment to be made o f British Socialism, th a t it has wilfully averted its gaze, adopting a wholly wrong o rder o f priorities, and has now landed the country in a vastly more difficult position th an it would have been in if the open conspiracy o f the Kremlin, which has never been concealed, either in theory o r practice, had been more accurately assessed, its implications pondered, and the correct conclusions drawn about the only possible allocations to be made o f B rita in ’s national resources. The Perpetual Surprise

Mr. Harold Wilson, giving increasingly ominous warnings th a t even the Governm ent’s chief asset, full employment, is no longer safe, explained th a t certain essential supplies, notably sulphur, w ithout which many British industries would have to close, only come to us from the United States ; and, as American necessities increase, British supplies are reduced. There are alternative ways o f obtaining sulphur, inside this country and the Empire, but one method will take two and the o ther four years to function. This is surely exactly the kind of thing planners might be expected to foresee, if their offer to plan is to be taken seriously. Two and four years ago, it would not have surpassed human intelligence to foresee the contingency o f rearm ament, or to deduce th a t with rearm ament greater quantities o f various materials would be required. It might be thought th a t anything bought with dollars had always and inevitably about it a note o f precariousness, which made it p rudent to arrange for alternative supplies. We would have no desire to judge Mr. Wilson o r any o ther Minister