THE TABLE'!’ March 8th, 1958. VOL. 211, No. 6146

t ■'abl :t A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Published as a Ncwsparet

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Regina et Patria

FOUNDED IN 1840

MARCH 8th, 1958

NINEPENCE

Leaving Bad Alone: The Status Quo in Europe Church and State in Italy: Wider Implications of the Case of the Bishop of Prato The Schools of Belgium: An Issue in this Y ear’s Election. By Mark Grammens Epsilon, in Bulgaria: The Door Ajar. By J. A. Cuddon Beati Mundo Corde: John Wesley’s Assize Sermon Two Hundred Years Ago. By T. S. Gregory

Lenten Meditations: Raphidim and the Rod of God. By Sebastian Bullough, O.P.

Critics’ Columns : Notebook : Book Reviews : Letters : Chess

RECEDING SUMMIT

| T rests principally with Mr. Dulles whether there is to be any summit meeting, and he is very far from keen on what could well be. in his own words, “ a fraud and a hoax.” The less preparation before such a meeting, the more likely it is to be no more than that exchange of speeches which Mr. Macmillan in his reply to Marshal Bulganin so much deprecated.

The Russians give the impression when they talk of the Foreign Ministers meeting in April in preparation for summit talks between Heads of Governments in June, that they are much more interested in a conference being held than in what is on the agenda. They have ruled a great many subjects off the agenda, including German reunification, so that it looks as though their idea of a conference is a platform from which Russia will win the plaudits of the uncommitted but alarmed countries who find themselves without nuclear weapons in the age of nuclear war. All these countries will say an emphatic “ Hear ! Hear ! ” when the Russians propose a total banning of all nuclear weapons, and the West can only reply that it has no strength apart from its possession of such weapons. No doubt the West has drifted into relying too much on weapons which lack one of the principal advantages of military resources, in that they cannot be used in mildly graduated strength and with the minimum employment of force in support of policy. For countries which have all formally and solemnly forsworn the use of force to achieve political ends or right legal injustices, and have instead committed themselves to the procedures of the United Nations, this should not be so important in small issues.

The present position has come about through the combination of two things in the first post-war period ; that while the Americans were being disillusioned about Russia and learning that Soviet imperialism was really very much worse than British imperialism, the Americans also had the monopoly of atomic weapons, and believed that they had a very comfortable lead. They had exploded atom bombs in the summer of 1945, when the Russians were only just beginning to collect German scientists and to start in earnest on this part of the arms race. The American forces drained out of Europe, but the research went ahead, so that when the Korean War broke out, five years after the surrender of Japan, the Americans were in a position to talk without bluffing about atomic warheads for the artillery, and that imminent development brought the uneasy armistice that has lasted until now. The Americans at first thought of these weapons as the ultimate sanction and security for peace, and it is only in the last year that this thinking has had to be revised. The Russians, having caught up and being at the moment ahead in some matters, judge the moment ripe for discussion ; and it would be a mistake to assume that they only want the discussion for propaganda.

It is true that the Russians have only themselves to thank for the suspicions they generate. From its beginning the Communist movement has always been singularly open in discussing its strategy for the destruction of the capitalist world, debating the best means for deceiving the enemy before delivering knock-out blows. Lenin made numerous statements to his followers on the role of deception in the Communist advance, and Manuilsky in 1931 made a notable prediction when he said,

“ Our time will come in twenty to thirty years. The West will have to be put to sleep and we will launch the most spectacular peace movement on record. There will be electrifying overtures and unheard-of concessions. The capitalist countries, stupid and decadent, will rejoice to co-operate in their own destruction. As soon as their guard is down, we shall smash them with our clenched fist.” That was before the great complication of hydrogen bombs, which may be thought to have a very much