Atlantic Schism

Sir:

Never have I read a more typical proCommunist, appeasing Laborite pronouncement on the misunderstandings between ourselves and England than TIME'S [Oct. 12] page-wasted article: "A British View of United States Policy." From actual contact, I know these obnoxiously expressed opinions of leftist Tom Driberg to be far from typically British and even farther from typically Christian.

GEORGE C. KENNEDY JR. Philadelphia

Sir:

You have done us all a great service by turning over a page of your magazine to Mr. Tom Driberg, Labor M.P., to pass along his reasons why England mistrusts U.S. foreign policy . . . That a man of Mr. Driberg's views should have been elected to hold office in Great Britain--that, what is more, his statement must be accepted as representative of the views of the large body of his countrymen, tells us more than that the once mighty British character is now effete, senile, and immoral; it tells us that at our peril we rely upon England as a partner in the fight to preserve civilization.

WM. F. BUCKLEY JR.

Stamford, Conn.

Sir:

Driberg's Gandhi-like approach, that love will conquer all, is both appalling and dangerous. Sweet, lovable Daddikins Malenkov must be laughing himself silly to read that "the Soviet Union is far more self-sufficient [than Germany] and therefore not intrinsically expansionist . . ." How does our M.P. reconcile this view with the Russian occupation and economic exploitation of the Communist satellite nations? . . .

PETER PELLEGRINO

Drexel Hill, Pa.

Sir:

... So "Communism is a Christian heresy," "Naziism ... is pagan." To all but partisan Socialists, the similarities must seem more than their differences . . . We are piously asked to remember Soviet sacrifices (for us?) in World War II, but presumably asked to forget that Communism was first the accomplice of Naziism and, indeed, that the collusion of these monstrous philosophies brought about that war. These systems were competitors--not opposites. Yet we are invited to extend Christian charity to the Communists and implacable hostility to Franco, Rhee or Chiang. A curiously selective charity !

Let Mr. Driberg ask himself why so many Fascist leaders could, without changing their essential moral philosophy, move straight from Marxism to Fascism. Mussolini? Doriot? Or make the easy return trip, as so many an ex-Gauleiter--now a people's commissar of East Germany--has done . . . Also, let Mr. Driberg point out just one difference between the program of his party and that outlined 105 years ago by Marx in the Communist Manifesto . . . We are assured British Socialism, when it gets really in the saddle, will be Christian and very, very British--the collective state without the Lubianka. Really? . . .

Mr. Driberg's own squeamishness about Rhee, Chiang, et al. and his robust digestion for Communist cruelty is an odd phenomenon of the times. We, in the U.S., have had many exponents of this political and moral double-vision and double-dealing, but thank God, few ever got elected to Congress . . . PETER S. WILKINSON Brooklyn, N.Y.

Sir:

We are grateful to TIME for the article so remarkably stated by Tom Driberg, M.P. He speaks for millions of really patriotic Americans truly concerned with the welfare of humanity. Alas, though, how few of them are in public office today !

NETTIE B. GROLL

Philadelphia

Sir:

Saint Tom Driberg's pious blather--which all but claims Jesus Christ as the founder of the British Labor Party--is, of course, so farfetched and improbable as to be beyond the reach of criticism . . . What strikes me is the omission, in his article, of the name of Tito, the avowed atheist and persecutor of the Christian Church, while it includes the name of Catholic Franco. When one recalls Britain's ardent wooing of Tito, the omission may seem to be less than accidental . . .

K. L. KRUSE Oslo, Norway

Sir:

So ... Driberg believes that Russia is not intrinsically expansionist ? If I were he, I'd compare the world map of 1939 with the one in 1953, and then shudder. For a not intrinsically expansionist country, Russia, who is doing very well for herself, might well have England on her future list.

PAULINE GRISE

Elko, Nev.

Sir:

All that's the matter with Tom Driberg and the rest of the British soreheads is that they are smarting sharply under the consequences of their own unrealistic policies . . . Of course, it is an immoral thing to urge the reception of disreputable Red China into the U.N., and the British are at war with their own conscience. Most of all, there is the recent German election. It shows that Communism in Germany is nil, in contrast with the heavy vote in France and Italy. It shows that our most understandable ally in the world is West Germany, and that Britain will not be able much longer to withstand a real coalition of the Western powers against Communism, which Britain loves too much.

(THE REV.) W. C. DAVIS Salem Lutheran Church Parrottsville, Tenn.

Sir:

. . . Driberg is entitled to his views, but I wonder if he really believes that death at the hands of the Nazis is different from death, or slow torture, in some Siberian labor camp. I wonder if (and when) Russia and Red China begin to give real competition to Britain in the tooling, steel and textile market, will Mr. Driberg all of a sudden discover that Communism is also "anti-Christian"? . . .

ROBERT L. WENDT Raleigh, N.C.

Sir:

. . . Mr. Driberg's pettifogging lacks even a professional air. Because many people can find many diverse factors to blame in our present global mess, he assumes that none of these has any significance. And his refusal to compare Russian cruelty with the Nazis' "calculated" horror is a kind of ghastly hairsplitting.

Was there no calculation in the Communists' obliteration of the aristocratic and intellectual elites of their own and other countries? And what about the stepped-up collectivization program of the 1928 Five-Year Plan, which led to civil war and famine ?

MORRIS WATTENBERG The Bronx, N.Y.

Sir:

. . . Shame, Mr. Driberg, to mention Christianity and protect Communism. As a victim of both regimes, Nazi and Communist, I would like to wish for Mr. Driberg, the Red Dean of Canterbury and others like them, a stay in a Russian concentration camp, and then let them talk. God protect us from such politicians as Mr. Driberg . . .

ALFREDS GULBIS Caracas, Venezuela

Sir:

... As an American in Britain, I am even more convinced than before that Great Britain closely resembles the ostrich. She hopes that if she can sneer at America in a genteel fashion and . . . patronizingly reprove those naughty Russians, the whole problem will disappear . . .

DAVID H. WALLACE Edinburgh, Scotland

Sir:

. . . The Communists are not clumsy expansionists as the Nazis or the British Imperialists were. The Communists are much more subtle and refined; they expand their ideology not by war, rather by undercover mental poisoning of the free mind ... In 1939 Russia started its expansionist program by taking over the Baltic states and parts of Finland by political coups d'etat. Not by war . . .

The undersigned are two Estonians whose country has been occupied, terrorized and mutilated by Communists; whose immediate families were carted off like animals to Siberia in cattle cars . . . who as 14-year-olds fled their home, leaving everything behind, have wandered in war-torn Europe as dirty, hungry outcasts, begging for ersatz bread, hoping that somewhere there is a home for them . . . You want to know why our families were carted off to Siberia to die? . . .

Because all their lives they had been working hard to build a democratic country where their children might grow up as free men and women . . .

JAAN UPSI IVAR KESSE Minneapolis

Sir:

... A great many, like myself . . . have left the United Kingdom in sheer disgust. The "explanation" by Mr. Driberg is evil, mendacious and hypocritical . . . Since the conclusion of World War II, I have listened with increasing distaste and uneasiness to slander of every kind against Americans. As a result, I am that most unfortunate of all human beings--an Englishman who is ashamed of his own country. It ought not to be forgotten in the U.S. that the great majority of British people support the theories of Driberg. Neither should it be forgotten that the great majority of the people of Britain are ignorant to a degree unknown in most countries. Also they are undernourished and unhealthy, due to almost 15 years of continuous austerity and self-denial . . .

PETER E. TRENT

Montreal, Canada

Sir:

... As an Englishman, I felt ashamed and disgusted to read Driberg's article. Your American readers who must have been likewise disgusted, if not appalled, can be assured that they were the views of Driberg and not of the British.

GEOFFREY DEMPSEY

Bombay, India

Sir:

As a confused observer of American-British relations, I wish to thank TIME for instilling some clarity into the picture by publishing [the article]. Having lived through a period of ''peace in our time'' and other evidences of the results of British and European shortsightedness, it seemed hardly consistent to accept the views of some "enlightened Americans" that, in our present difficulties, the more experienced British public opinion should prevail over our own. The opinions expressed by Mr. Driberg go far to convince me that the British mind has not materially improved its clarity since the days of Munich . . .

HENRY B. BLUMBERG

Fairmont, Minn.

Sir:

. . . That "Communism is a Christian heresy, but Naziism was anti-Christian paganism" is "oversimplification" of itself. Communism, ideologically, is not simply an attempt to weaken Christianity, but to destroy all religions and Communism is even more pagan than Naziism ... If such muddleheaded thinking as Mr. Driberg's is typical of the British Labor Party, then thank the Lord for Sir Winston.

HOWARD E. BANTA, Mt. Vernon, Ill.

Sir:

. . . Having read the article, I believe more firmly than ever that present U.S. policy and the Catholic Church (I am a Protestant) are the only real barriers against Communism.

ANTS HANSSON

Great Falls, Mont.

Sir:

After reading Driberg's article, one should feel a very strong desire to exclaim at the top of his voice "God save the Queen . . . and Britain too" . . .

W. STEPP

Springfield, Pa.

P:For an answer to Driberg by another Briton, see NATIONAL AFFAIRS.--ED.

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