(Due to arrive Melbourne 4.4.25)
My dear P.M.,
This sets out to be rather a random letter and will probably
contain a good deal of gossip.
The only thing of any real importance that has been going on in my
field of view in the last month has been the C.I.D. and Cabinet
meetings to work out some alternative to the Protocol. [1] Almost
all the Cabinet Ministers have prepared and circulated at least
one document giving their views, and the Heads of the Fighting
Services and numerous 'elder statesmen' have done the same. There
has been a good deal of difference of opinion and it has been
interesting to see the discussions coming through the maze of
suggestions to something approaching a fine point. None of the
suggestions have been perfect and it has been quite easy to pick
all sorts of holes and political arguments against any one scheme.
I do not envy the Prime Minister, who is sitting with the Cabinet
as I write, and I take it will be endeavouring to make up the
Cabinet's mind for it on this very momentous question.
As I cabled you yesterday, the result of the March 2? [2] Cabinet
pointed to a four-power pact including Germany, which was a good
deal of a surprise to me. [3] I hope before I shall close this
letter to be able to put in a few words as to the result of
today's Cabinet.
A talking point against a four-power pact including Germany is
sure to be the obvious fact that it is conceivable that, under it,
we might possibly have to combine with Germany against France, in
the event of France becoming obstreperous and attempting a coup
against Germany with the help of (say) Poland and Czechoslovakia.
You can imagine an average man in this country, from the
sentimental point of view, drawing back from the suggestion that
his son might in the next 20 years have to fight France. But this
bogey is considerably more remote than similar rather obvious
bogeys that could be put up with regard to almost any security
proposal.
The press, of course, have been very active and have written
themselves black in the face. No very strong current of opinion
seems to have made itself felt, mainly from the fact that the
Government have been absolutely silent, and I expect no paper has
thought it worth while definitely committing themselves in the
dark. The French press has evidently been told to be quiet and
not, by injudicious comment, to prejudice France's chance of some
really useful suggestion coming from us.
A feature of the whole business has been the lack of really
decided opinion as to which way British policy ought to swing.
There have been quite decided expressions of opinion by individual
departments, such as the Foreign Office and the Fighting Services,
but these have been based quite frankly on rather narrow grounds
and do not pretend to take all the facts into consideration.
The almost complete lack of any decided policy in dealing with
this question of British-French security has meant that they have
not been able to set about warning and educating public opinion as
to what would emerge from the Protocol discussions. The press have
got hold of a good many rumours and there has even, I think, been
some leakage of information, but this has not really been
sufficient to give the public any real hints as to what was going
to emerge because, of course, the Cabinet themselves did not know
even within fairly wide limits the way the mind of H.M.G. would
crystallise.
It has all been rather illuminating.
I have met the Hon. Newton Wesley Rowell [4] several times lately;
(he was in Sir Robert Borden's [5] Government). He tells me that
there is quite a fair possibility of a Canadian election this
year, based to a great extent on tariff questions between the east
and the west. [6]
If this does happen, it seems to me that the elections in the
three major Dominions (Canada, Australia and New Zealand) all
happening within a few months of each other and just at the time
when whatever comes out of the Protocol will have to be accepted
or not, will provide a very interesting test to see what the real
attitude of the various Dominions is towards backing up whatever
arrangement this country considers is best for the security of
Great Britain.
I drove Hankey [7] up to Oxford last week-end. We were to have
stayed the week-end with Lionel Curtis [8] at All Souls, but All
Souls were found at the last moment to be having a 'gaudy' and, at
the same time, Lionel Curtis got 'flu. Hankey stayed at New
College and I stayed with Wrong [9], the Vice-President of
Magdalen, and Hankey addressed the Ralegh Club on 'The Work of the
Cabinet Secretariat'. It was quite interesting and one met quite a
lot of very interesting but quiet, secluded people that Oxford
breeds. We drove out to have tea with John Buchan [10] on Sunday
afternoon. I found that his wife's sister married a cousin of
mine. He sent a number of kind messages to you. I am lunching with
him tomorrow to meet his chief, the Chairman of Reuters, Sir
Roderick Jones. Buchan does not seem to write much now, his time
being absorbed to an increasing extent with Reuters and Nelson &
Sons. [11] He is a very remarkable and very interesting man to
talk to.
Wrong, the man I stayed with, is a Canadian and I got a good deal
of quite interesting stuff, from my point of view, about Canada
out of him.
I had lunch next to Haden Guest [12] recently and ragged him about
how little his party really knew about Dominion thought, whilst at
the same time priding themselves on their Imperialism. He
countered by saying that it was very difficult for any one in this
country to really gauge Dominion thought or to get at the real
feeling of a country such as Australia, even on the mainsprings of
their policy, such as White Australia and, in greater particular,
about Singapore. After a good deal of talk we discussed how the
position would be affected by the creation of a small committee of
prominent Australians in London, with a paid Secretary, to control
and direct Australian publicity in England, get articles written,
cut the Australian press for republication here, and get articles
into the daily and periodical press of all sections of the
community. Any one periodical published in England with the
express purpose of solely voicing Dominion ideas would, I think,
be suspect, as a propaganda medium. The conversation was of a good
deal of interest and more so from the fact that Haden Guest came
back the next day to McDougall [13] (who had given the lunch) and
said that he was willing and ready to associate himself with any
such scheme for voicing Australian sentiment in this country. I
told McDougall, however, that this was going very much too far and
too fast. It might be that some such scheme as this would be a
workable and useful one but it would have to be considered very
carefully, and it would not, I think, be a good thing to have a
British Labour member, however moderate, in a leading part of any
such scheme.
I don't think, from what little I have seen of it, that 'The
Times' has a good service of news from Australia. Their chief
representative in Australia is, as you know, Delamore McCay, of
the 'Sydney Sun'. I don't know, of course, but I should not think
that the Editor of the 'Sun' would be in your confidence or in the
confidence of such people as he must move about amongst in order
to get a true reflex of Australian opinion. The result is that I
think his articles are rather poverty-stricken.
There is, of course, the press meeting in Australia towards the
end of this year. Major Astor [14] and someone else from 'The
Times' will be out there, as well as representatives of, I think,
all the leading papers. This should be quite a good opportunity of
their all taking steps to improve their position with regard to
their Australian correspondents.
I have met Astor several times and went to a very interesting
dinner at his house the other night. His wife, Lady Violet Astor,
talks of going to Australia via Canada with him in July.
At Oxford last week-end, Murray Wrong, Vice-President of Magdalen,
had a number of Australians to a meal so that I could meet them.
Two of them, Hall [15] and Watt [16], have ideas of going into the
Australian Public Service on the Foreign Affairs side. They
crossquestioned me about the possibilities and I told them what
there is to be told and asked them to keep in touch with me. I am
getting together particulars of the various Scholarships and
Fellowships which include Travel and a Study of Foreign Countries,
which would fit Australian undergraduates at Oxford and Cambridge
for Foreign Affairs work, and will send you the final schedule of
what is offering. I find there are quite a number, so that any
Australian with any brains at Oxford or Cambridge should be able
to get one or other of them, if he is keen on this sort of
occupation. There is also a Chair of International Relations at
the London School of Economics which I am getting particulars of.
Your office will then have on file particulars of all the British
educational facilities to broadcast to people sending their sons
over here to be educated, so that they can at least take into
consideration Foreign Affairs in the interests of Australia as an
occupation.
I have been trying lately to get the G.P.O. to let me have a
cheaper rate for deferred Government cables in cypher or code, but
they won't do it. There are many messages which could without
detriment go deferred, to be delivered in (say) 48 hours. When the
new Pacific Cable is laid and in operation in about 18 months'
time, if you think it worth while making a concerted attack on
them with the aid of the Colonial Office, and with your help, I'll
try again. They should give us 8d. or 9d. a word deferred instead
of IS. 4d. full rate Government message. At the moment all they
have to offer is 9d. a word in clear deferred.
5th March
There is very little more to tell you after last night's Cabinet
meeting on Security and the Protocol. The Prime Minister was away,
as his mother is said to be dying, and the whole matter was rather
hurried. There was a certain amount of adverse comment from
certain Ministers on the proposed quadruple pact to include
Germany, but it all ended up by Chamberlain [17] being authorised
to talk to Herriot [18] on the general lines that the tendency of
H.M.G. was towards some sort of quadruple pact to include Germany.
At the same time they would suggest a pact to be as loose and
vague as possible, preferably on some such lines as the Washington
Quadruple Agreement or Clause 3 of the Franco-Polish Treaty.
I am cabling you this evening in the above regard.
I regret that it has not been possible to send you any more clear-
cut cables about this Security-Protocol position but I have found
it extremely difficult, even with Hankey's assistance, to frame
cables that would indicate to you how the opinion was
crystallising out of the very many divergent lines of thought. I
will not enlarge on this now as everything that I have said in
this letter in this regard is almost certain to be dead before it
reaches you.
I am, Yours very truly,
R. G. CASEY