The Speech

Said the Prime Minister:

"It has fallen to the hard lot of Britain to play a leading part in the Mediterranean. We have great responsibilities and we have made great exertions there. . . .

"We have one principle about liberated countries, or repentant satellite countries, which we strive for according to the best of our ability and resources. Here is the principle.

"I will state it in the broadest and most familiar terms: government of the people, by the people and for the people, set up on the basis of free universal suffrage, elections with secrecy of ballot, and no intimidation.

"That is, and that always has been, the policy of this Government in all countries. It is not only our aim and in our interest; it is our only care. It is to that goal that we try to make our way across all difficulties, obstacles and perils of the long road. Trust the people. Make sure they have a fair chance to decide their destiny without being terrorized from either quarter or regimented.

"There is our policy for Italy, for Yugoslavia and for Greece. No other interest have we than that. For that we shall strive, and for that alone. . . .

"There is no case in my experience, certainly not in my wartime experience, where a British Government has been so maligned and its motives so traduced in our own country by important organs of the press or among our own people. That this should be done, among the perils of this war, now at its climax, has filled me with surprise and sorrow. It bodes ill for a future in which the life and strength of Britain, compared to the other Powers, will be tested to the full, not only in war but in its aftermath. . . ."

For Greece, No Apologies. "I have never been connected with any large enterprise of policy about which I was more sure in mind and conscience of the rectitude of our motives, of the clarity of our principles, and of the vigor, precision and success of our action, than what we have done in Greece.

"We went to Greece for the second time in this war. We went with the full approval of both our great Allies. We went on invitation of the Greek Government, in which all parties, even Communists, were represented. . . . We came with good gifts in our hands : civility and assistance to all parties of the Greek Government, which was formed and had to face the confusion left by the flight of the Germans.

"We brought food, clothing and supplies. We came with a small force of troops. We took up our positions from no military point of view. . . .

"We were received with flowers and cheers and every expression of rapture, and we British -- wicked British, so denounced by American correspondents . . .and so hounded by some of our own --busied ourselves in distribution of supplies throughout the country to which we had access. . . ."

EAM's Game. "While the British were busy distributing food and endeavoring to keep things steady, the EAM and Communist ministers, who were eventually increased to seven in the Papandreou Government, were playing a different game. Throughout this has been a struggle for power. They were playing a game of ELAS bands and their Communist directors. While sitting in Mr. Papandreou's Cabinet, they were working in closest combination with the forces gathering to destroy it and him, him and his colleagues representative of everyday life in Greece . . . and when the fierce mountaineers had got well into the city, all those seven Communists resigned like clockwork, except one who was a little late but by running very hard under threat of death managed to keep his appointment."

ELAS Advances. "On the night of Dec. 4-5 a series of telegrams arrived showing that advancing ELAS forces were about a thousand yards from the center of the Greek Government and the Hotel Grande Bretagne and also the same distance from the British Embassy . . . and seemed to be overrunning this place, or at any rate the seat of Government by this well-armed and well-directed mob --[after an interruption] -- brigands, if the Honorable Member wishes ; this was about to take place.

"Almost all police stations in Athens and the Piraeus had been occupied or stormed by ELAS forces, some with the slaughter of every single inmate. Firing was widespread throughout the city. It was growing; it was approaching. . . .

"The hour was early, 2 o'clock in the morning, when orders were given to General Scobie to take over command of Athens and restore and maintain order by whatever measures were necessary. If that were wrong, I take full responsibility with my colleagues who are most desirous of sharing it with me.

"For three or four days or more it was a struggle to prevent a hideous massacre in the center of Athens in which all forms of Government would have been swept away and naked, triumphant Trotskyism installed. I think Trotskyism is a better definition of Greek Communist and certain other sects than the normal word. It has the advantage of being equally hated in Russia."

Factional Feuds. Churchill described the difficulty of getting the Greek factions to work together:

"Imagine what difficulties there are in countries wrecked by civil war, past or pending, and where clusters of petty parties have each their own set of appetites, misdeeds and revenges.

"If I had driven the wife of the Deputy Prime Minister [Mrs. Clement Attlee] out to die in the snow, or the Minister of Labor [Ernest Beyin] had kept the Foreign Secretary [Anthony Eden] in exile for a great many years, or the Chancellor of the Exchequer [Sir John Anderson] had shot at and wounded the Secretary of State for War [Sir James Grigg] or the head of one or the other of the spending departments -- if we who sit here together had all backbitten and double-crossed each other while pretending to work together, if we had all put our own group and party first and our country nowhere, if we had all set ideologies, slogans or labels in front of comprehension, comradeship and duty, we should certainly have come to a general election much earlier than it is now to be.. . .

"We must recognize the difference between our affairs and conditions and those which prevail in Athens, especially while firing is continuous all around and cannot possibly be overlooked."

Unconditional Surrender. After the luncheon recess, Churchill turned to the war:

"We have reached the 65th month of the war and its weight hangs heavy upon us. No one knows what stresses are wrought on his friends and himself these days by this long persistence of strain quite above the ordinary, normal life of human society. . . .

"There is, therefore, demanded from us all the moral and intellectual impulse of unity and a clear conception and definition of a joint purpose sufficient to overbear the fleeting reinforcement which our enemies will derive from the realization of their forlorn condition.

"Can we produce that complete unity and impulse in time to achieve a decisive military victory with the least possible prolongation of the world's misery, or must we fall into the jabber and babel of discord while victory is still unattained?

"This seems to me the supreme question both of the hour and of the age, for often have great combinations almost attained success and then at the last moment cast it away. Very often by the trials and sacrifices of armies they have reached the conference table only to cast away what had been gained. Very often eagles have been squalled down by parrots. Very often, in particular, have the people of this island, indomitable in adversity, tasted the hard-won cup of success only to cast it away. . . .

"This, when restated in detail, might well become a greater obstacle to the end of the struggle than the broad generalization which the term unconditional surrender implies. . . .

"This, at least, I can say on behalf of the United Nations, to Germany: 'If you surrender now, nothing you will have to endure after the war will be comparable to what you are otherwise going to suffer during 1945.

"Peace, though based on unconditional surrender, will bring to Germany and Japan immense and immediate alleviation of suffering and agony which now lies before them.

"We Allies are no monsters, but faithful men, trying to carry forward the light of the world, trying to raise from bloody welter and confusion, in which mankind is now plunged, the structure of peace, of freedom, of justice and of law--which system shall be an abiding and lasting shelter at last for all. . . ."

Power Politics. "The expression 'power politics' has lately been used in criticism against us in some quarters. I would anxiously have asked the question 'What are power politics?'* I know some of our friends across the water so well that I am sure I can always speak frankly without causing offense.

"Is having a navy twice as big as anybody else's in the world power politics? Is having the largest air force in the world with bases in every part of the world power politics? Is having all the gold in the world power politics? If so we are certainly not guilty of this offense. I am very sorry to say that they are luxuries far away from us.

"I am, therefore, greatly indebted to my friend, the illustrious President of the United States, four times summoned by popular vote to the headship of the most powerful community in the world, for his definition of power politics. With that marvelous gift which he has of bringing troublesome issues down to earth and reducing them to the calm level of ordinary life, the President declared in his recent message to Congress that power politics was misuse of power. I am sure I can say . . . we are absolutely in agreement. . . ."

Everything We Have. "We have sacrificed everything in this war. We shall emerge from it for the time being more stricken and impoverished than any other victorious country. . . .

"After the defeat of France in June 1940, for more than a year we stood alone. We kept nothing back in blood or effort or treasure from what has now become the common cause of more than 30 nations. We seek no territory; we covet no oilfields; we demand no bases for forces of air or of sea. We are an ancient Commonwealth dwelling and wishing to dwell at peace within our own habitations. . . . We have given and shall continue to give everything we have.

"We ask nothing in return except that consideration and respect which are our due, and if that is denied us, we would still have good conscience. Let none, therefore, in our country and Commonwealth or in the outside world misname or traduce our motives."

* To the editor of the London Times H. de Vere Stacpoole wrote: "Sir: What are powerless politics, and how do they function and what do they led to?"

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