bound to suffer at this stage, but the knowledge that we are being led by weaklings… . .
It is as though your life depended on a game of chess, and you had to sit watching it, seeing the most idiotic moves being made and being powerless to prevent them.
23 April
The Greeks appear to be packing up. Evidently there is going to be hell to pay in Australia. So long as it merely leads to an inquest on the Greek campaign, and a general row in which the position of Australia in the Empire will be defined and perhaps the conduct of the war democratized somewhat, this is all to the good.
24 April
No definite news from Greece. All one knows is that a Greek army, or part of a Greek army, or possibly the whole Greek army, has capitulated. No indication as to how many men we have there, what sort of position they are left in, whether it will be possible to hang on, and if so, where, etc. etc. Hints thrown out in the Daily Express suggest that we have practically no aeroplanes there. Armistice terms drawn up by the Italians evidently aim at later using Greek prisoners as hostages, with a view to blackmailing the British into giving up Crete and other islands.
No indication of the Russian attitude. The Germans are now close to the Dardanelles and attack on Turkey evidently imminent. The Russians will then have to decide definitely whether to make a stand against Germany, put pressure on Turkey not to resist and perhaps get Iran as the price of this, or sit still and watch the whole southern shore of the Black Sea pass into German hands. In my opinion they will do the second, or less probably the third, in either case with public orgies of self-righteousness.
25 April
C., of my section of the Home Guard, a poulterer by trade but at present dealing in meat of all kinds, yesterday bought 20 zebras which are being sold off by the Zoo.
Only for dog meat, presumably, not human consumption. It seems rather a waste… . .
There are said to be still 2,000 race-horses in England, each of which will be eating 10-15
lb. of grain a day, i.e. these brutes are devouring every day the equivalent of the bread ration of a division of troops.
28 April
Churchill’s speech last night very good, as a speech. But impossible to dig any information out of it. The sole solid fact I could extract was that at the time of his offensive in Libya Wavell could never concentrate more than 2 divisions, say 30,000
men. Heard the speech at the Home Guard post. The men impressed by it, in fact moved.
But I think only two of the ones there were men below the £5 a week level. Churchill’s oratory is really good, in an old-fashioned way, though I don’t like his delivery. What a pity that he either can’t, or doesn’t want, or isn’t allowed, ever to say anything definite!
2 May
A man came from –—’s yesterday morning to cut out the cover for our armchair.
The usual draper type, smallish, neat, with something feminine about him and nests of pins all over his person. He informed me that this was the only domestic job he was doing today. Nearly all the time he is cutting out covers for guns, which it seems have to be made in the same way as chair covers. –—’s are keeping going largely on this, he said.
3 May
The number evacuated from Greece is now estimated at 41-43,000, but it is stated that we had less men there than had been supposed, probably about 55,000. Casualties supposed to be 3,000, and prisoners presumably 7 or 8 thousand, which would tally with the German figures. 8,000 vehicles said to have been lost, I suppose vehicles of all kinds.
No mention of ships lost, though they must have lost some. Spender, one of the Australian ministers, states publicly that “rifles are as useless against tanks as bows and arrows”. That at any rate is a step forward. Apparently there is what amounts to war in Iraq. At the very best this is a disaster… . . In all probability we shan’t even deal properly with the so-called army of Iraq, which could no doubt be bombed to pieces in a few hours. Either some sort of agreement will be signed in which we shall give away everything and leave the stage set for the same thing to happen again; or you will hear that the Iraq Government is in control of the oil wells, but this doesn’t matter, as they have agreed to give us all necessary facilities, etc. etc., and then presently you will hear that German experts are arriving by plane or via Turkey; or we shall stand on the defensive and do nothing until the Germans have managed to transport an army by air, when we shall fight at a disadvantage. Whenever you contemplate the British Government’s policy, and this has been true without a single break since 1931, you have the same feeling as when pressing on the accelerator of a car that is only firing on one cylinder, a feeling of deadly weakness. One doesn’t know in advance exactly what they will do, but one does know that in no case can they possibly succeed, or possibly act before it is too late… . . It is curious how comparatively confident one feels when it is a question of mere fighting, and how helpless when it is a question of strategy or diplomacy. One knows in advance that the strategy of a British Conservative Government must fail, because the will to make it succeed is not there. Their scruples about attacking neutrals — and that is the chief strategic difference between us and Germany in the present war — are merely the sign of a subconscious desire to fail. People don’t have scruples when they are fighting for a cause they believe in.
6 May
The Turks have offered to mediate in Iraq, probably a bad sign. Mobilization in Iran. The American Government stops shipments of war materials to the U.S.S.R., a good thing in itself but probably another bad sign.
Astonishing sights in the Tube stations when one goes through late at night. What is most striking is the cleanly, normal, domesticated air that everything now has.
Especially the young married couples, the sort of homely cautious types that would probably be buying their houses from a building society, tucked up together under pink conterpanes. And the large families one sees here and there, father, mother and several children all laid out in a row like rabbits on the slab. They all seem so peacefully asleep in the bright lamplight. The children lying on their backs, with their little pink cheeks like wax dolls, and all fast asleep.
11 May
The most important news of the last few days, which was tucked away on a back page of the newspapers, was the Russian announcement that they could not any longer recognize the governments of Norway and Belgium. Ditto with Jugoslavia, according to yesterday’s papers. This is the first diplomatic move since Stalin made himself premier, and amounts to an announcement that Russia will now acquiesce in any act of aggression whatever. It must have been done under German pressure, and coming together with Molotov’s removal must indicate a definite orientation of Russian policy on the German side, which needs Stalin’s personal authority to enforce it. Before long they must make some hostile move against Turkey or Iran, or both,
Heavy air raid last night. A bomb slightly damaged this building, the first time this has happened to any house I have been in. About 2 a.m. in the middle of the usual gunfire and distant bombs, a devastating crash, which woke us up but did not break the windows or noticeably shake the room. E. got up and went to the window, where she heard someone shouting that it was this house that had been hit. A little later we went out into the passage and found much smoke and a smell of burning rubber. Going up on the roof, saw enormous fires at most points of the compass, one over to the west, several miles away, with huge leaping flames, which must have been a warehouse full of some inflammable material. Smoke was drifting over the roof, but we finally decided that it was not this block of flats that had been hit. Going downstairs again we were told that it was this block, but that everyone was to stay in his flat. By this time the smoke was thick enough to make it difficult to see down the passage. Presently we heard shouts of “Yes!
Yes! There’s still someone in Number 111!” and the wardens shouting to us to get out.
We slipped on some clothes, grabbed up a few things and went out, at this time imagining that the house might be seriously on fire and it might be impossible to get back. At such times one takes what one feels to be important, and I noticed afterwards that what I had taken was not my typewriter or any documents but my firearms and a haversack containing food etc., which was always kept ready. Actually all that had happened was that the bomb had set fire to the garage and burned out the cars that were in it. We went in to the D.s, who gave us tea, and ate a slab of chocolate we had been saving for months.
Later I remarked on E.’s blackened face, and she said “What do you think your own is
like?” I looked in the glass and saw that my face was quite black. It had not occurred to me till then that this would be so.
13 May
I have absolutely no theory about the reason for Hess’s65 arrival. It is completely mysterious. The one thing I know is that if a possibility exists of missing this propaganda opportunity, the British government will find it.
65. Rudolf Hess (1894- ), German Nazi, second to Goering as Hitler’s successor, flew to Scotland on 10
May 1941, allegedly bearing peace proposals to be delivered to the Duke of Hamilton. He was interned in Britain and sentenced to life imprisonment by the international war crimes tribunal at Nuremberg in 1946.
18 May
Iraq, Syria, Morocco, Spain, Darlan, Stalin, Raschid Ali, Franco — sensation of utter helplessness. If there is a wrong thing to do, it will be done, infallibly. One has come to believe in that as if it were a law of nature.
Yesterday or the day before on the newspaper placards, “Nazis using Syrian air bases”, and reports in the paper that when this fact was announced in Parliament there were cries of “Shame!” Apparently there are people capable of being surprised when the armistice terms are broken and the French empire made use of by the Nazis. And yet any mere outsider like myself could see on the day France went out of the war that this would happen.
Evidently all chance of winning the war in any decent way is lost. The plan of Churchill and Co. is apparently to give everything away and then win it all back with American aeroplanes and rivers of blood. Of course they can’t succeed. The whole world would swing against them, America probably included. Within two years we shall either be conquered or we shall be a Socialist republic fighting for its life, with a secret police force and half the population starving. The British ruling class condemned themselves to death when they failed to walk into Dakar, the Canaries, Tangier and Syria while the opportunity existed.
21 May
All eyes on Crete. Everyone saying the same thing — that this will demonstrate one way or the other the possibility of invading England. This might be so if we were told the one relevant fact, i.e. how many men we have there, and how equipped. If we have only 10-20,000 men, and those infantry, the Germans may overwhelm them with mere numbers, even if unable to land tanks etc. On balance, the circumstances in Crete are much more favourable to the Germans than they could be in England. In so far as the attack on Crete is a try-out, it is much more likely to be a try-out for the attack on Gibraltar.
24 May
News from Crete ostensibly fairly good, but a note of pessimism visible everywhere under the surface. No news at all from Syria or Iraq, and that is the worst indication. Darlan announces that he is not going to hand over the French fleet. More punches will be pulled, no doubt, on the strength of this palpable lie.
25 May
I hear privately that we have lost three cruisers in the operations off Crete. Much excuse-making in the papers about our having no fighter planes there. No explanation of why such landing grounds as exist in Crete had not previously been made impossible for the German troop-carriers, nor of why we failed to arm the Cretan population until it was too late.
31 May
Still not quite happy about Abyssinia. Saw today the news reel of the South African troops marching into Addis Ababa. At the Emperor’s palace (or whatever the building was) the Union Jack was hauled up first and only afterwards the Abyssinian flag.
1 June
We are clearing out of Crete. Mention of 13,000 men being evacuated. No mention yet of the total number involved. The most frightful impression will be created if we remove the British troops and leave the Greeks behind, though from a cold-blooded military point of view it might be the right thing to do.
The British are in Bagdad. It would be even better to hear they were in Damascus.
One knows in advance that we shall not make sufficiently harsh terms with the Iraquis, i.e. shall not make possession of the oil wells a condition of granting them an armistice.
Hess has simply dropped out of the news for some days past. The evasive answers to questions about him in Parliament, denial that the Duke of Hamilton had ever received a letter from him, statement that the M.O.I. had been “misinformed” when it issued this piece of news, failure apparently by the whole House to ask who had misinformed the M.O.I., and why, were so disgraceful that I am tempted to look the debate up in Hansard and find out whether it was not censored in the newspaper reports.
The sirens have just sounded, after a period of 3 weeks in which there has not been a single air raid.
3 June
Now that the evacuation of Crete is completed, there is talk of 20,000 men having been removed. Obviously, therefore, they must have begun clearing out long before this was admitted in the press, and the ships sunk were probably lost in that operation. Total losses will presumably be about 10,000 men, 7 warships (3 cruisers, 4 destroyers), probably some merchant ships as well, a good many A.A. guns, and a few tanks and aeroplanes. And all this for absolutely nothing… . . The newspapers criticize more boldly than they have ever done hitherto. One of the Australian papers says openly that it is no use trying to defend Cyprus unless we are taking action against Syria. No sign of this, apparently. Reports this morning that the Germans have already landed armoured units at Latakia. Together with this, vague hints that the British “may” invade Syria.
Within a few days it may be too late, if it is not sixmonths too late already.
8 June
The British entered Syria this morning.
14 June
Complete mystery, about which no one has any real news, surrounds the state of affairs between Russia and Germany. Cannot yet make contact with anyone who has seen Cripps since his return. One can only judge by general probabilities, and it seems to me that the two governing facts are (i) Stalin will not go to war with Germany if there is any way short of suicide of avoiding it, and (ii) it is not to Hitler’s advantage to make Stalin lose face at this stage, as he is all the while using him against the working class of the world. Much likelier than any direct attack on Russia, therefore, or any agreement that is manifestly to Russia’s disadvantage, is a concession masked as an alliance, perhaps covered up by an attack on Iran or Turkey. Then you will hear that there has been an “exchange of technicians” etc. etc., and that there seem to be rather a lot of German engineers at Baku. But the possibility that the whole seeming manoeuvre is simply a bluff to cover some approaching move elsewhere, possibly the invasion of England, has to be kept sight of.
19 June
Non-aggression pact between Germany and Turkey. This is our reward for not mopping up Syria quickly. From now on the Turkish press will be turned against us, and this will have its effect on the Arab peoples.
The Derby was run yesterday, at Newmarket, and apparently attended by enormous crowds. Even the Daily Express was derisive about this. The Evening Standard has been declaring that Hitler must invade Britain within 80 days and suggesting that the manoeuvres in Eastern Europe are probably a mask for this — but this, I think, with the idea of frightening people into working harder.
The British Government has ceased issuing navicerts to Petsamo and stopped three Finnish ships, on the ground that Finland is now for all purposes enemy-occupied territory. This is the most definite indication yet that something is really happening between Russia and Germany.
20 June
We have all been in a semi-melting condition for some days past. It struck me that one minor benefit of this war is that it has broken the newspapers of their idiotic habit of making headline news out of yesterday’s weather.
22 June
The Germans invaded the U.S.S.R. this morning. Everyone greatly excited. It is universally assumed that this development is to our advantage. It is only so, however, if the Russians actually intend to fight back and can put up a serious resistance, if not enough to halt the Germans, at any rate enough to wear down their air force and navy.
Evidently the immediate German objective is not either territory or oil, but simply to wipe out the Russian air force and thus remove a danger from their rear while they deal finally with England. Impossible to guess what kind of show the Russians can put up.
The worst omen is that the Germans would probably not have attempted this unless certain that they can bring it off, and quite rapidly at that.
23 June
Churchill’s speech in my opinion very good. It will not please the Left, but they forget that he has to speak to the whole world e.g. to Middle-Western Americans, airmen and naval officers, disgruntled shopkeepers and farmers, and also the Russians themselves, as well as to the leftwing political parties. His hostile references to Communism were entirely right, and simply emphasized the fact that this offer of help was sincere. One can imagine the squeal that will be raised over these by correspondents in the New Statesman etc. What sort of impression do they think it would make if Stalin stood up and announced “I have always been a convinced supporter of capitalism”?
Impossible to guess what impression this move of Hitler’s will make in the U.S.A.
The idea that it will promptly bring into being a strong pro-Nazi party in England is a complete error. There are no doubt wealthy people who would like to see Hitler destroy the Soviet régime, but they will be a small minority. The Catholics will certainly be among them, but will probably be too acute to show their hands until Russian resistance begins to break down. Talking to people in the Home Guard, including Blimps and quite wealthy business men, I find everyone completely pro-Russian, though much divided in opinion about the Russian capacity to resist. Typical conversation, recorded as well as I can remember it:
Wholesale poulterer: “Well, I hope the Russians give them a bloody good
hiding.”
Clothing manufacturer (Jewish): “They won’t. They’ll go to pieces, just like last time. You’ll see.”
Doctor (some kind of foreigner, perhaps refugee): “You’re absolutely wrong.
Everyone’s underrated the strength of Russia. They’ll wipe the floor with the Nazis.”
Wholesale grocer: “Damn it, there’s two hundred bloody millions of them.”
Clothing manufacturer: “Yes, but they’re not organized” etc. etc. etc.
All spoken in ignorance, but showing what people’s sentiments are. Three years ago the great majority of people with above £1,000 a year, or even about £6 a week, would have sided with the Germans as against the Russians. By this time, however, hatred of Germany has made them forget everything else.
All really depends on whether Russia and Britain are ready really to co-operate, with no arrière-pensée and no attempt to shove the brunt of the fighting on to one another. No doubt a strong pro-Nazi party exists in Russia, and I dare say Stalin is at the head of it. If Russia changes sides again and Stalin plays the part of Pétain, no doubt the Communists here will follow him and go pro-Nazi again. If the Soviet régime is simply wiped out and Stalin killed or taken prisoner, many Communists would in my opinion transfer their loyalty to Hitler. At present the British Communists have issued some kind of manifesto calling for a “People’s Government” etc. etc. They will change their tune as soon as the hand-out from Moscow comes. If the Russians are really resisting, it is not in their interest to have a weak government in Britain, or subversive influences at work here. The Communists will no doubt be super-patriotic within ten days — the slogan will probably be “All power to Churchill” — and completely disregarded. But if the alliance between the two countries is genuine, with a certain amount of give-and-take, the internal political effects on both sides must be all for the best. The special circumstances which made the Russian military assistance, a bad influence in Spain, don’t exist here.
Everyone is remarking in anticipation what a bore the Free Russians will be. It is forecast that they will be just like the White Russians. People have visions of Stalin in a little shop in Putney, selling samovars and doing Caucasian dances etc. etc.
30 June
No real news of the Russo-German campaign. Extravagant claims by both sides, all through the week, about the number of enemy tanks etc. destroyed. All one can really believe in is captures of towns etc. and the German claims so far are not large. They have taken Lemberg and appear to have occupied Lithuania, and claim also to have by-passed Minsk, though the Russians claim that their advance has been stopped. At any rate there has been no break-through. Everyone already over-optimistic. The Germans have bitten off more than they can chew. “If Hitler doesn’t break through in the next week he is finished” etc. etc. Few people reflect that the Germans are good soldiers and would not have undertaken this campaign without weighing the chances beforehand. More sober estimates put it thus: “If by October there is still a Russian army in being and fighting against Hitler, he is done for, probably this winter.” Uncertain what to make of the Russian government’s action in confiscating all private wirelesses. It is capable of several explanations.
Nothing definite about the nature of our alliance with the U.S.S.R. Last night everyone waited with much amusement to hear whether the Internationale was played after the national anthems of the other allies. No such thing, of course. However, it was a long time before the Abyssinian national anthem was added to the others. They will ultimately have to play some tune to represent the U.S.S.R., but to choose it will be a delicate business.
3 July
Stalin’s broadcast speech is a direct return to the Popular Front, defence of democracy line, and in effect a complete contradiction of all that he and his followers have been saying for the past two years. It was nevertheless a magnificent fighting speech, just the right counterpart to Churchill’s, and made it clear that no compromise is intended, at any rate at this moment. Passages in it seemed to imply that a big retreat is contemplated, however. Britain and the U.S.A. referred to in friendly terms and more or less as allies, though apparently no formal alliance exists as yet. Ribbentrop and Co.
spoken of as “cannibals” which Pravda has also been calling them. Apparently one reason for the queer phraseology that translated Russian speeches often have is that Russian contains so large a vocabulary of abusive words that English equivalents do not exist.
One could not have a better example of the moral and emotional shallowness of our time, than the fact that we are now all more or less pro-Stalin. This disgusting murderer is temporarily on our side, and so the purges etc. are suddenly forgotten. So also with Franco, Mussolini etc., should they ultimately come over to us. The most one can truly say for Stalin is that probably he is individually sincere, as his followers cannot be, for his endless changes of front are at any rate his own decision. It is a case of “when Father turns we all turn”, and Father presumably turns because the spirit moves him.
6 July
Several of the papers are growing very restive because we are not doing more to help the U.S.S.R. I do not know whether any action, other than air raids, is really intended, but if nothing is attempted, quite apart from the military and political consequences this may have, it is a disquieting symptom. For if we can’t make a land offensive now, when the Germans have 150 divisions busy in Russia, when the devil shall we be able to? I hear no rumours whatever about movements of troops, so apparently no expedition is being prepared at any rate from England. The only new development is the beginning of Beaverbrook’s big drive for tanks, similar to his drive for planes last year. But this can’t bear fruit for some months, and where these tanks are to be used there is no hint. I can’t believe they want them for use against a German invasion. If the Germans were in a position to bring large numbers of armoured units here, i.e. if they had complete command of the sea and air, we should have lost the war already.
No talk of any formal alliance with Russia, nor indeed anything clarifying our relationship, in spite of more or less friendly utterances on either side. We can’t, of
course, take any risk until it is certain that they are in firm alliance with us, i.e. will go on fighting even if they have succeeded in beating back the invasion.
No reliable news from the fronts. The Germans are across the Pruth, but it seems to be disputed whether they are across the Beresina. The destruction claimed by both sides is obviously untruthful. The Russians claim that German casualties are already 700,000, i.e. about 10 per cent of Hitler’s whole army.
Examined a number of Catholic papers, also several copies of Truth,66 to see what their attitude is to our quasi-alliance with the U.S.S.R. The Catholic papers have not gone pro-Nazi, and perhaps will not do so. The “line” apparently is that Russia is objectively on our side and must be supported, but that there must be no definite alliance. Truth, which hates Churchill, takes much the same line but is a shade more anti-Russian, perhaps. Some of the Irish Catholic papers have now gone frankly pro-Nazi, it appears. If that is so, there will have been similar repercussions in the U.S.A. It will be interesting to see whether the “neutrality” that has been imposed on the Irish press, forbidding it to make any comment on any belligerent, will be enforced in the case of Russia, now that Russia is in the war.
66. A journal of the extreme Right.
The People’s Convention have voted full support for the government and demand “vigorous prosecution of the war” — this only a fortnight after they were demanding a “people’s peace”. The story is going round that, when the news of Hitler’s invasion of Russia reached a New York café where some Communists were talking, one of them who had gone out to the lavatory returned to find that the “party line” had changed in his absence.
28 August
I am now definitely an employee of the B.B.C.
The line on the Eastern front, in so far as there is a line, now runs roughly: Tallinn, Gomel, Smolensk, Kiev, Dnepropetrovsk, Kherson. The Germans have occupied an area which must be larger than Germany, but have not destroyed the Russian armies.
The British and Russians invaded Iran 3 days ago and the Iranians have already packed up. No rumours that one can take hold of about movements of troops in this country.
They have only about a month now in which to start something on the continent, and I don’t believe they intend anything of the kind. Beneath the terms of the Churchill-Roosevelt declaration one can read that American anti-Hitler feeling has cooled off as a result of the invasion of the U.S.S.R. On the other hand, there is no sign that willingness to endure sacrifices, etc. in this country has increased because of it. There are still popular complaints because we are not doing enough to help the U.S.S.R., but their whole volume is tiny. I think the Russian campaign can be taken as settled in the sense that Hitler cannot break through to the Caucasus and the Middle East this winter, but that he is not going to collapse and that he has inflicted more damage than he has received. There is no victory in sight at present. We are in for a long, dreary, exhausting war, with everyone growing poorer all the time. The new phase which I foresaw earlier has now started, and the quasi-revolutionary period which began with Dunkirk is finished. I therefore bring this diary to
an end, as I intended to do when the new phase started.
58. Wartime Diary:
14 March 1942 - 15 November 1942
14 March 1942
I reopen this diary after an interval of about 6 months, the war being once again in a new phase.
The actual date of Cripps’s departure for India was not given out, but presumably he has gone by this time.67 Ordinary public opinion here seems gloomy about his departure. A frequent comment — “They’ve done it to get him out of the way” (which is also one of the reasons alleged by the German wireless). This is very silly and reflects the provincialism of English people who can’t grasp that India is of any importance. Better-informed people are pessimistic because the non-publication of the Government’s terms to India indicates almost certainly that they are not good terms. Impossible to discover what powers Cripps has got. Those who may know something will disclose nothing and one can draw hints out of them only by indirect means. E.g. I propose in my newsletters,68 having been instructed to give Cripps a build-up, to build him up as a political extremist. This draws the warning, “don’t go too far in that direction”, which raises the presumption that the higher-ups haven’t much hope of full independence being offered to India.
67. Sir Stafford Cripps flew to India on 22 March in an attempt to arrange a compromise settlement with the Indian Congress Party, the party of Indian independence, to ensure Indian cooperation during the war and allow for a very gradual transition to independence when it was over. Nehru and the Congress Party would accept nothing less than complete independence and, as Cripps was not authorized to offer this, the talks broke down on 10 April and he returned to England.
68. For broadcasting to India on the B.B.C. Eastern Service.
Rumours of all descriptions flying round. Many people appear to suspect that Russia and Germany will conclude a separate peace this year. From studying the German and Russian wireless I have long come to the conclusion that the reports of Russian victories are largely phony, though, of course, the campaign has not gone according to the German plan. I think the Russians have merely won the kind of victory that we did in the Battle of Britain — i.e. staving off defeat for the time being but deciding nothing. I don’t believe in a separate peace unless Russia is definitely knocked out, because I don’t see how either Russia or Germany can agree to relinquish the Ukraine. On the other hand some people think (I had this, e.g. from Abrams, a Baltic Russian of strong Stalinist sympathies though probably not a C.P. member) that if the Russians could get the Germans off their soil they would make a sort of undeclared peace and thereafter only keep up a sham fight. Rumours about Beaverbrook’s departure:69
69. On the pretext of physical illness Lord Beaverbrook: had resigned from his post as Minister for War Production and left the Government. The real political reasons behind this move are still matters of speculation.
a. Cripps insisted on this as a condition of entering the government.
b. Beaverbrook was got rid of because he is known to be in contact with Goering with a view to a compromise peace.
c. The army insisted on Beaverbrook’s removal because he was sending all the aeroplanes etc. to Russia instead of to Libya and the Far East.
I have now been in the B.B.C. about 6 months. Shall remain in it if the political changes I foresee come off, otherwise probably not. Its atmosphere is something halfway between a girls’ school and a lunatic asylum, and all we are doing at present is useless, or slightly worse than useless. Our radio strategy is even more hopeless than our military strategy. Nevertheless one rapidly becomes propaganda-minded and develops a cunning one did not previously have. E.g. I am regularly alleging in all my newsletters that the Japanese are plotting to attack Russia. I don’t believe this to be so, but the calculation is: If the Japanese do attack Russia, we can say “I told you so”.
If the Russians attack first, we can, having built up the picture of a Japanese plot beforehand, pretend that it was the Japanese who started it.
If no war breaks out after all, we can claim that it is because the Japanese are too frightened of Russia.
All propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth. I don’t think this matters so long as one knows what one is doing, and why…
On 11 March 1942 I started the rumour that beer is to be rationed, and told it to 3
different people. I shall be interested to see at what date this rumour comes back to me.
(30 May 1942. Never came back. So this casts no light on the way in which rumours come into being.)
Talked for a little while the other day to “William Hickey”,70 just back from the U.S.A. He says morale there is appalling. Production is not getting under way and anti-British feeling of all kinds is rampant, also anti-Russian feeling stimulated by the Catholics.
70. ‘William Hickey”, a social diary which has appeared in the Daily Express for the last thirty-five years, edited by various people. At this time it was edited by its originator, Tom Driberg, a leftwing politician who later became a Labour M.P.
15 March
Short air-raid alert about 11.30 this morning. No bombs or guns. The first time in 10 months that I had heard this sound. Inwardly rather frightened, and everyone else evidently the same, though studiously taking no notice and indeed not referring to the fact of there being a raid on until the All Clear had sounded.
22 March
Empson71 tells me that there is a strict ban by the Foreign Office on any suggestion that Japan is going to attack the U.S.S.R. So this subject is being studiously avoided in the Far East broadcasts while being pushed all the time in the India broadcasts.
They haven’t yet got onto the fact that we are saying this, we haven’t been warned and don’t officially know about the ban, and are making the best of our opportunity while it lasts. The same chaos everywhere on the propaganda front. E.g. Horizon was nearly stopped from getting its extra paper to print copies for export on the strength of my article on Kipling (all well at the last moment because Harold Nicolson and Duff Cooper intervened), at the same time as the B.B.C. asked me to write a “Feature” based on the article.
71. William Empson (1906- ), the poet and critic. At this time working in the Eastern Service of the B.B.C.
broadcasting to China.
German propaganda is inconsistent in quite a different way — i.e. deliberately so, with an utter unscrupulousness in offering everything to everybody, freedom for India and a colonial empire for Spain, emancipation to the Kaffirs and stricter race laws to the Boers, etc. etc. All quite sound from a propaganda point of view in my opinion, seeing how politically ignorant the majority of people are, how uninterested in anything outside their immediate affairs, and how little impressed by inconsistency. A few weeks back the N.B.B.S.72 was actually attacking the Workers’ Challenge Station,73 warning people not to listen to it as it was “financed from Moscow”.
72. New British Broadcasting Station, broadcasting propaganda in English from Germany.
73. Another station broadcasting propaganda in English from Germany.
The Communists in Mexico are again chasing Victor Serge74 and other Trotskyist refugees who got there from France, urging their expulsion etc. etc. Just the same tactics as in Spain. Horribly depressed to see these ancient intrigues coming up again, not so much because they are morally disgusting as from this reflection: for twenty years the Comintern had used these methods and the Comintern has always and everywhere been defeated by the Fascists; therefore, we, being tied to them by a species of alliance, shall be defeated with them.
74. Victor Serge (1890-1947), Russian by parentage, French by adoption, one of the most literary of the Russian revolutionaries, was deported to Siberia in 1933 as a Trotskyist. After his release he was Paris correspondent for P.O.U.M. during the Spanish War. In 1941 he settled in Mexico where he died impoverished.
Suspicion that Russia intends making a separate peace now seems widespread. Of the two, it would be easier for Russia to surrender the Ukraine, both on geographical and psychological grounds, but they obviously couldn’t give up the Caucasus oilfields without a fight. One possible development is a secret agreement between Hitler and Stalin, Hitler to keep what Russian territory he has overrun, or parts of it, but thereafter to make no further attacks but to direct his offensive southward towards the oilfields of Iraq and Iran, Russia and Germany keeping up a sham war meanwhile. It appears to me that a separate
peace is distinctly likelier if we do make a continental invasion this year, because if we succeed in embarrassing the Germans and drawing off a great part of their army, Russia is immediately in a much better position both to win back the occupied territories, and to bargain. I nevertheless think that we ought to invade Europe if the shipping will run to it.
The one thing that might prevent this kind of filthy doublecrossing is a firm alliance between ourselves and the U.S.S.R., with war aims declared in detail. Impossible while this government rules us, and probably also while Stalin remains in power: at least only possible if we could get a different kind of government and then find some way of speaking over Stalin’s head to the Russian people.
The same feeling as one had during the Battle of France — that there is no news.
This arises principally from endless newspaper reading. In connexion with my newsletters I now read four or five morning newspapers every day and several editions of the evening ones, besides the daily monitoring report. The amount of new matter in each piece of print one reads is so small that one gets a general impression that nothing is happening. Besides, when things are going badly one can foresee everything. The only event that has surprised me for weeks past was Cripps’s mission to India.
27 March
News of the terms Cripps took to India supposed to be bursting tomorrow.
Meanwhile only rumours, all plausible but completely incompatible with one another.
The best-supported — that India is to be offered a treaty similar to the Egyptian one. K. S.
Shelvankar,75 who is our fairly embittered enemy, considers this would be accepted if Indians were given the ministries of Defence, Finance and Internal Affairs. All the Indians here, after a week or two of gloom, much more optimistic, seeming to have smelt out somehow (perhaps by studying long faces in the India Office) that the terms are not so bad after all.
75. K. S. Shelvankar, Indian writer and journalist, in England during the war as a correspondent for Indian newspapers.
Terrific debate in the House over the “affaire” Daily Mirror.76 A. Bevan reading numerous extracts from Morrison’s own articles in the D.M., written since war started, to the amusement of Conservatives who are anti-D.M. but can never resist the spectacle of two Socialists slamming one another. Cassandra77 announces he is resigning to join the army. Prophesy he will be back in journalism within 3 months. But where shall we all be within 3 months anyway?
76. The Dally Mirror, a popular, leftist, daily newspaper had been called to order by Churchill for taking what he called a defeatist line i.e. critical of the Government’s handling of the war. After a famous debate in the House the affair fizzled out.
77. Pseudonym of William Connor (1909-67), Kt. 1966, well-known radical journalist who wrote a personal column in the Dally Mirror.
Government candidate defeated (very small majority) in the Grantham by-election. The first time since the war started that this has happened, I think.
Surprise call-out of our company of Home Guard a week or two back. It took 4½
hours to assemble the company and dish out ammunition, and would have taken another hour to get them into their battle positions. This mainly due to the bottleneck caused by refusing to distribute ammunition but making each man come to H.Q. and be issued with it there. Sent a memo on this to Dr Tom Jones, who has forwarded it direct to Sir Jas.
Grigg.78 In my own unit I could not get such a memo even as far as the Company Commander — or at least, could not get it attended to.
78. Sir James Grigg, K.C.B. (1890-1964), Permanent Under-Secretary of State for War 1939-42; Secretary of State for War 1942-5.
Crocuses now full out. One seems to catch glimpses of them dimly through a haze of war news.
Abusive letter from H. G. Wells, who addresses me as ‘you shit’, among other things.
The Vatican is exchanging diplomatic representatives with Tokyo. The Vatican now has diplomatic relations with all the Axis powers and — I think — with none of the Allies. A bad sign and yet in a sense a good one, in that this last step means that they have now definitely decided that the Axis and not we stands for the more reactionary policy.
1 April
Greatly depressed by the apparent failure of the Cripps mission. Most of the Indians seem down in the mouth about it too. Even the ones who hate England want a solution, I think. I believe, however, that in spite of the “take it or leave it” with which our government started off, the terms will actually be modified, perhaps in response to pressure at this end. Some think that the Russians are behind the plan and that this accounts for Cripps’s confidence in putting forward something so apparently uninviting.
Since they are not in the war against Japan the Russians cannot have any official attitude about the Indian affair, but may serve out a directive to their followers, from whom it will get round to other pro-Russians. But then not many Indians are reliably pro-Russian. No sign yet from the English Communist Party, whose behaviour might give a clue to the Russian attitude. It is on this kind of guesswork that we have to frame our propaganda, no clear or useful directive ever being handed out from above.
Connolly yesterday wanted to quote a passage from Homage to Catalonia in his broadcast. I opened the book and came on these sentences:
One of the most horrible features of war is that all war propaganda, al the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting… . It is the same in all wars; the soldiers do the fighting, the journalists do the shouting, and no true patriot ever gets near a front-line trench, except on the briefest of propaganda tours. Sometimes it is a comfort to me to think that the aeroplane is altering the conditions of war. Perhaps when the next great war comes we may see that sight unprecedented in al history, a jingo with a bullet-hole in him.
Here I am in the B.B.C. less than 5 years after writing that. I suppose sooner or later we all write our own epitaphs.
3 April
Cripps’s decision to stay an extra week in India is taken as a good omen.
Otherwise not much to be hopeful about. Gandhi is deliberately making trouble, sending telegrams of condolence to Bose’s79 family on the report of his death, then telegrams of congratulation when it turned out that the report was untrue. Also urging Indians not to adopt the scorched earth policy if India is invaded. Impossible to be quite sure what his game is. Those who are anti-Gandhi allege that he has the worst kind of (Indian) capitalist interests behind him, and it is a fact that he usually seems to be staying at the mansion of some kind of millionaire or other. This is not necessarily incompatible with his alleged saintliness. His pacifism may be genuine, however. In the bad period of 1940
he also urged non-resistance in England, should England be invaded. I do not know whether Gandhi or Buchman is the nearest equivalent to Rasputin in our time.
79. Subhas Chandra Bose (1897-1945), Indian nationalist leader and leftwing member of Congress. He was so violently anti-British that when the Japanese attacked the Americans he offered his services to Japan, organized an Indian Revolutionary Army and led a military campaign against India. His death remains mysterious and unconfirmed.
Anand80 says the morale among the exiled Indians here is very low. They are still inclined to think that Japan has no evil designs on India and are all taking of a separate peace with Japan. So much for their declarations of loyalty towards Russia and China. I said to him that the basic fact about nearly all Indian intellectuals is that they don’t expect independence, can’t imagine it and at heart don’t want it. They want to be permanently in opposition, suffering a painless martyrdom, and are foolish enough to imagine that they could play the same schoolboy games with Japan or Germany as they can with Britain.
Somewhat to my surprise he agreed. He says that “opposition mentality” is general among them, especially among the Communists, and that Krishna Menon81 is “longing for the moment when negotiations will break down”. At the same moment as they are coolly talking of betraying China by making a separate peace, they are shouting that the Chinese troops in Burma are not getting proper air support. I remarked that this was childish. A.: “You cannot overestimate their childishness, George. It is fathomless.” The question is how far the Indians here reflect the viewpoint of intellectuals in India. They are further from the danger and have probably, like the rest of us, been infected by the peaceful atmosphere of the last 10 months, but on the other hand nearly all who remain here long become tinged with a western Socialist outlook, so that the Indian intellectuals proper are probably far worse. A. himself has not got these vices. He is genuinely anti-Fascist, and has done violence to his feelings, and probably to his reputation, by backing Britain up because he recognizes that Britain is objectively on the anti-Fascist side.
80. Mutk Raj Anand.
81. V. K. Krishna Menon (1879- ), Indian statesman, lawyer, author and journalist. At this time he was living in England and was active in leftwing English politics. He was also the spokesman of the Indian Congress Party in England during the period of the struggle to achieve independence. In 1947 when India had been granted independence he was appointed High Commissioner for India. Represented India at U.N.O. 1952-62.
6 April
Yesterday had a look at the bit of the by-pass road which is being built between Uxbridge & Denham. Amazed at the enormous scale of the undertaking. West of Uxbridge is the valley of the Colne, and over this the road runs on a viaduct of brick and concrete pillars, the viaduct being I suppose ¼ mile long. After that it runs on a raised embankment. Each of these pillars is 20 feet high or thereabouts, about 15 feet by 10 feet thick, and there are two of them every fifteen yards or so. I should say each pillar would use 40,000 bricks, exclusive of foundations, and exclusive of the concrete runway above, which must use up tons of steel and concrete for every yard of road. Stupendous quantities of steel (for reinforcing) lying about, also huge slabs of granite. Building this viaduct alone must be a job comparable, in the amount of labour it uses up, to building a good-sized warship. And the by-pass is very unlikely to be of any use till after the war, even if finished by that time. Meanwhile there is a labour shortage everywhere.
Apparently the people who sell bricks are all-powerful. (Cf. the useless surface shelters, which even when they were being put up were pronounced to be useless by everyone who knew anything about building, and the unnecessary repairs to uninhabited private houses which are going on all over London.) Evidently when a scandal passes a certain magnitude it becomes invisible.
Saw in Denham someone driving a dog-cart, in quite good trim.
10 April
British naval losses in the last 3 or 4 days, 2 cruisers and an aircraft carrier sunk, 1
destroyer wrecked. Axis losses, 1 cruiser sunk.
From Nehru’s speech today: “Who dies if India live?” How impressed the pinks will be — how they would snigger at “Who dies if England live?”
11 April
It82 has flopped after all. I don’t regard this as final, however. Listened-in to Cripps’s speech coming from Delhi, which we were rebroadcasting for England etc.
These transmissions which we occasionally listenin to from Delhi are our only clue as to how our own broadcasts sound in India. Always very bad quality and a great deal of background noise which it is impossible to take out in recordings. The speech good in the earlier part and plain-speaking enough to cause, I should think, a lot of offence. In the later part it rather moved off into the breezy uplands vein. It is a curious fact that in the more exalted passages in his speeches Cripps seems to have caught certain inflexions of voice from Churchill. This may point to the fact — which would explain his having undertaken this mission when only having such bad terms to offer — that he is at present much under Churchill’s personal influence.
82. Cripps’s mission to India. C.E. 11-22
18 April
No question that Cripps’s speeches etc. have caused a lot of offence, i.e. in India.
Outside India I doubt whether many people blame the British Government for the breakdown. One trouble at the moment is the tactless utterances of Americans who for years have been blahing about “Indian freedom” and British imperialism, and have suddenly had their eyes opened to the fact that the Indian intelligentsia don’t want independence, i.e. responsibility. Nehru is making provocative speeches to the effect that all the English are the same, of whatever party etc. etc., also trying to make trouble between Britain and the U.S.A. by alleging that the U.S.A. has done all the real fighting.
At the same time he reiterates at intervals that he is not pro-Japanese and Congress will defend India to the last. The B.B.C. thereupon picks out these passages from his speeches and broadcasts them without mentioning the anti-British passages, whereat Nehru complains (quite justly) that he has been misrepresented. A recent directive tells us that when one of his speeches contains both anti-British and anti-Japanese passages, we had better ignore it altogether. What a mess it all is. But I think on balance the Cripps mission has done good, because without discrediting Cripps in this country (as it so easily might have done) it has clarified the issue. Whatever is said officially, the inference the whole world will draw is that (a) the British ruling class doesn’t intend to abdicate and (b) India doesn’t want independence and therefore won’t get it, whatever the outcome of the war.
Talking to Wintringham83 about the possible Russian attitude towards the Cripps negotiations (of course, not being in the war against Japan, they can’t have an official attitude) I said it might make things easier if as many possible of the military instructors etc. who will later have to be sent to India were Russians. One possible outcome is that India will ultimately be taken over by the U.S.S.R. and though I have never believed that the Russians would behave better in India than ourselves, they might behave differently, owing to the different economic set-up. Wintringham said that even in Spain some of the Russian delegates tended to treat the Spaniards as “natives”, and would no doubt do likewise in India. It’s very hard not to, seeing that in practice the majority of Indians are inferior to Europeans and one can’t help feeling this and, after a little while, acting accordingly.
83. Thomas Henry (Tom) Wintringham (1898-1949), writer and soldier. Served in France 1916-18 with the Air Force. Went to Spain in 1936 as war correspondent; in 1937 became commander of the British Battalion of the International Brigade. Founded Osterley Park training centre for the Home Guard.
Publications include New Ways of War, Politics of Victory and People’s War.
American opinion will soon swing back and begin putting all the blame for the Indian situation on the British, as before.
It is clear from what American papers one can get hold of that anti-British feeling is in full cry and that all the Isolationists, after a momentary retirement, have re-emerged with the same programme and slogans as before. Father Coughlin’s84 paper, however, has just been excluded from the mails. What always horrifies me about American anti-British sentiment is its appalling ignorance. Ditto presumably with anti-American feeling in England.
84. Father Coughlin, American priest and demagogue of distinctly Fascist leanings, discredited by his ecclesiastical superiors in 1942.
19 April
Tokyo bombed, or supposed to have been bombed, yesterday. Hitherto this comes only from Japanese and German sources. Nowadays one takes it so much for granted that everyone is lying that a report of this kind is never believed until confirmed by both sides. Even an admission by the enemy that his capital has been bombed might for some reason or other be a lie.
E.85 says that Anand remarked to her yesterday, as though it were a matter of course, that Britain would make a separate peace this year, and seemed surprised when she demurred. Of course Indians have to say this, and have been saying it ever since 1940, because it furnishes them if necessary with an excuse for being antiwar, and also because if they could allow themselves to think any good of Britain whatever their mental framework would be destroyed. Fyvel told me how in 1940, at the time when Chamberlain was still in the Government, he was at a meeting at which Pritt and various Indians were present. The Indians were remarking in their pseudo-Marxist way “Of course the Churchill-Chamberlain Government is about to make a compromise peace,”
whereat Pritt told them that Churchill would never make peace and that the only difference (then) existing in Britain was the difference between Churchill and Chamberlain.
More and more talk about an invasion of Europe — so much so as to make one think something of the kind must be afoot, otherwise the newspapers would not risk causing disappointment by talking so much about it. Amazed by the unrealism of much of this talk. Nearly everyone appears still to think that gratitude is a factor in power politics. Two assumptions which are habitually made throughout the Left press are (a) that opening up a Second Front is the way to stop Russia making a separate peace, (b) that the more fighting we do the more say we shall have in the final peace settlement.
Few people seem to reflect that if an invasion of Europe succeeded to the point of drawing the German armies away from Russia, Stalin would have no strong motive for going on fighting, and that a sell-out of this kind would be quite in line with the Russo-German Pact and the agreement which the U.S.S.R. has evidently entered into with Japan. As to the other assumption, many people talk as though the power to decide policy when a war has been won were a sort of reward for having fought well in it. Of course the people actually able to dominate affairs are those who have the most military power, cf.
America at the end of the last war.
Meanwhile the two steps which could right the situation, (a) a clear agreement with the U.S.S.R., with a joint (and fairly detailed) declaration of war aims, and (b) an invasion of Spain, are politically quite impossible under the present Government.
85. Eileen, Orwell’s wife.
25 April
U.S. airmen making forced landing on Russian soil after bombing Tokyo have been interned. According to the Japanese wireless the Russians are expediting the movement of Japanese agents across Russia from Sweden (and hence from Germany) to Japan. If true, this is a new development, this traffic having been stopped at the time when Germany attacked the U.S.S.R. The mystery of Subhas Chandra Bose’s whereabouts remains impenetrable. The leading facts are:
1. At the time of his disappearance, the British Government declared that he had gone to Berlin.
2. A voice, identified as his, broadcasts on the Free India radio (Germany).
3. The Italian radio has claimed at least once that Bose is in Japanese territory.
4. Indians here seem on the whole to think that he is in Japanese territory.
5. Escape to Japanese territory would have been physically easier than escape in the other direction, though the latter would not be impossible.
6. The Vichy report of his death in a plane accident between Bangkok and Tokyo, though almost certainly mistaken, seemed to suggest that Vichy quarters took it for granted that he was in Japanese territory.
7. According to engineers it would not be impossible to broadcast his voice scrambled from Tokyo to Berlin and there unscramble and rebroadcast it.
There are innumerable other considerations and endless rumours. The two questions hardest to answer are: if Bose is in Japanese territory, why this elaborate effort to make it appear that he is in Berlin, where he is comparatively ineffectual? If Bose is in German territory, how did he get there? Of course it is quite reasonably likely that he got there with Russian connivance. Then the question arises, if the Russians had previously passed Bose through, did they afterwards tip us off when they came into the war on our side? To know the answer to that would give one a useful clue to their attitude towards ourselves. Of course one can get no information about questions of that type here. One has to do one’s propaganda in the dark, discreetly sabotaging the policy directives when they seem more than usually silly.
To judge from their wireless, the Germans believe in a forthcoming invasion, either of France or Norway. What a chance to have a go at Spain! As, however, they have fixed a date for it (May 1st) they may merely be discussing the possibility of invasion in order to jeer when it does not come off. No sign here of any invasion preparations — no rumours about assembly of troops or boats, re-arrangement of railway schedules etc. The most positive sign is Beaverbrook’s pro-invasion speech in the U.S.A.
There seems to be no news whatever. It must be months since the papers were so empty.
Struck by the mediocre physique and poor general appearance of the American soldiers one sees from time to time in the street. The officers usually are better than the men, however.
27 April
Much speculation about the meaning of Hitler’s speech yesterday. In general it gives an impression of pessimism. Beaverbrook’s invasion speech is variously interpreted, at its face value, as a pep talk for the Americans, as something to persuade
the Russians that we are not leaving them in the lurch, and as the beginning of an attack on Churchill (who may be forced into opposing offensive action). Nowadays, whatever is said or done, one looks instantly for hidden motives and assumes that words mean anything except what they appear to mean…
We are all drowning in filth. When I talk to anyone or read the writings of anyone who has any axe to grind, I feel that intellectual honesty and balanced judgement have simply disappeared from the face of the earth. Everyone’s thought is forensic, everyone is simply putting a “case” with deliberate suppression of his opponent’s point of view, and, what is more, with complete insensitiveness to any sufferings except those of himself and his friends. The Indian nationalist is sunken in self pity and hatred of Britain and utterly indifferent to the miseries of China, the English pacifist works himself up into frenzies about concentration camps in the Isle of Man and forgets about those in Germany, etc.
etc. One notices this in the case of people one disagrees with, such as Fascists or pacifists, but in fact everyone is the same, at least everyone who has definite opinions.
Everyone is dishonest, and everyone is utterly heartless towards people who are outside the immediate range of his own interests and sympathies. What is most striking of all is the way sympathy can be turned on or off like a tap according to political expediency. All the pinks, or most of them, who flung themselves to and fro in their rage against Nazi atrocities before the war, forgot all about these atrocities and obviously lost their sympathy with the Jews etc. as soon as the war began to bore them. Ditto with people who hated Russia like poison up to 22 June 1941 and then suddenly forgot about the purges, the G.P.U. etc. the moment Russia came into the war. I am not thinking of lying for political ends, but of actual changes in subjective feeling. But is there no one who has both firm opinions and a balanced outlook? Actually there are plenty, but they are powerless. All power is in the hands of paranoiacs.
29 April
Yesterday to the House to hear the India debate. A poor show, except for Cripps’s speech. They are now sitting in the House of Lords. During C.’s speech one had the impression that the house was full, but on counting I found only about 200-250 members, which is enough to fill most of the seats. Everything had a somewhat mangy look. Red rexine cushions on the benches — I could swear they used to be red plush at one time. The ushers’ shirt-fronts were very dingy. When I see this dreary rubbish going on, or when I read about the later days of the League of Nations or the antics of Indian politicians with their endless changes of front, line-ups, démarches, denunciations, protests and gestures generally, I always remember that the Roman senate still existed under the later Empire.
This is the twilight of Parliamentary democracy and these creatures are simply ghosts gibbering in some corner while the real events happen elsewhere.
6 May
People do not seem pleased about Madagascar86 as they did about Syria,87 perhaps not grasping equally well its strategical significance, but more, I think, for want of a
suitable propaganda build-up beforehand. In the case of Syria the obviousness of the danger, the continual stories about German infiltration, and the long uncertainty as to whether the Goverment would act, gave people the impression that it was public opinion which had forced the decision. For all I know it may even have done so, to some extent.
No similar preparation in this case. As soon as it became clear that Singapore was in danger I pointed out that we might have to seize Madagascar and had better begin the build-up in our Indian newsletters. I was somewhat choked off even then, and some weeks back a directive came, I suppose from the Foreign Office, that Madagascar was not to be mentioned. Reason given (after the British troops had landed), “so as not to give the show away”. Result, the seizure of Madagascar can be represented all over Asia as a piece of imperialist grabbing.
86. The Allies had invaded and taken over the island of Madagascar, a French colony of strategic importance which supported Pétain.
87. In 1941 the Germans seemed on the point of taking over Syria as an air force base. Allied forces recaptured it from the Vichy French and successfully held it for the rest of the war.
Saw two women driving in an old-fashioned governess-cart today. A week or two back saw two men in a carriage-and-pair, and one of the men actually wearing a grey bowler hat…
8 May
According to Warburg88 a real Anglo-Russian alliance is to be signed up and the Russian delegates are already in London.
88. F. J. Warburg, managing director of Seeker & Warburg.
I don’t believe this.
The Turkish radio (for some time past I think this has been one of the most reliable sources of information) alleges that both Germans and Russians are preparing to use poison gas in the forthcoming battle.
Great naval battle in progress in the Coral Sea. Sinkings claimed by both sides so vast that one does not know what to believe. But from the willingness of the Japanese radio to talk about the battle (they have already named it the Battle of the Coral Sea) the presumption is that they count on making their objective…
11 May
Another gas warning (in Churchill’s speech) last night. I suppose we shall be using it before many weeks are over.
From a Japanese broadcast: “In order to do justice to the patriotic spirit of the Koreans, the Japanese Government have decided to introduce compulsory military service in Korea.”
Rumoured date for the German invasion of Britain: May 25th.
I saw Cripps on Wednesday, the first time I had actually spoken to him. Rather
well impressed. He was more approachable and easy-going than I had expected, and quite ready to answer questions. Though aged 53 some of his movements are almost boyish.
On the other hand he has decidedly a red nose. I saw him in one of the reception rooms, or whatever they are called, off the House of Lords. Some interesting old prints on the walls, coronets on the chairs and on the ashtrays, but everything with the vaguely decayed look that all Parliamentary institutions now have. A string of nondescript people waiting to see Cripps. As I waited trying to talk to his secretary, a phrase I always remember on these occasions came into my mind — “shivering in ante-rooms”. In eighteenth-century biographies you always read about people waiting on their patrons and “shivering in ante-rooms”. It is one of those ready-made phrases like “leave no stone unturned”, and yet how true it is as soon as you get anywhere near politics, or even the more expensive kinds of journalism.
Cripps considers that Bose is in German territory. He says it is known that he got out through Afghanistan. I asked him what he thought of Bose (whom he used to know well), and he described him as “a thoroughly bad egg”. I said there seemed little doubt that he is subjectively proFascist. Cripps: “He’s pro-Subhas. That is all he really cares about. He will do anything he thinks will help his own career along.”
I am not certain, on the evidence of B[ose]’s broadcasts, that this is so. I said I thought very few Indians were reliably anti-Fascist. Cripps disagreed so far as the younger generation go. He said the young Communists and leftwing Socialists are wholeheartedly anti-Fascist and have a western conception of Socialism and internationalism. Let’s hope it’s so.
19 May
Attlee reminds me of nothing so much as a recently dead fish, before it has had time to stiffen.
21 May
Molotov is said to be in London. I don’t believe this.
22 May
It is said that Molotov is not only in London but that the new Anglo-Russian treaty is already signed. This however comes from Warburg who is alternately over-optimistic and over-pessimistic — at any rate, always believes in the imminence of enormous and dramatic changes. If true, it would be a godsend for the filling-up of my newsletters. It is getting harder and harder to find anything to put into these, with nothing happening except on the Russian front, and the news from there, whether from Russian or German sources, growing more and more phoney. I wish I could spare a week to go through the Russian and German broadcast of the past year and tot up their various claims. I should say the Germans would have killed 10 million men and the Russians
must have advanced to somewhere well out in the Atlantic Ocean…
22 May
More rumours that Molotov is in London. Also cryptic paras in the papers suggesting that this may be so (no mention of names, of course).
30 May
Almost every day in the neighbourhood of Upper Regent Street one can see a tiny, elderly, very yellow Japanese, with a face like a suffering monkey’s, walking slowly along with an enormous policeman walking beside him. On some days they are holding a solemn conversation. I suppose he is one of the Embassy staff. But whether the policeman is there to prevent him committing acts of sabotage, or to protect him from the infuriated mob, there is no knowing.
The Molotov rumour seems to have faded out. Warburg, who accepted the Molotov story without question, has now forgotten it and is full of the inner story of why Garvin89 was sacked from the Observer. It was because he refused to attack Churchill.
The Astors are determined to get rid of Churchill because he is pro-Russian and the transformation of the Observer is part of this manoeuvre. The Observer is to lead the attack on Churchill and at the same time canalize the gifted young journalists who are liable to give the war a revolutionary meaning, making them use their energy on futilities until they can be dispensed with. All inherently probable. On the other hand, I don’t believe that David Astor, who acts as the decoy elephant, is consciously taking part in any such thing. It is amusing to see not only the Beaverbrook press, which is not plus royallste que le roi so far as Russia is concerned, but the T[rade] U[nion] weekly Labour’s Northern Voice, suddenly discovering Garvin as a well-known anti-Fascist who has been sacked for his radical opinions. One thing that strikes one about nearly everyone nowadays is the shortness of their memories. Desmond Hawkins90 told me a little while back that he recently bought some fried fish, wrapped up in a sheet of newspaper dating from 1940. On one side was an article proving that the Red Army was no good, on the other a write-up of that gallant sailor and well-known anglophile, Admiral Darlan91…
89. J. L. Garvin (1868-1947), rightwing journalist, editor of the Observer 1908-42. At the beginning of the war, when he was of advanced age, he disagreed with Viscount Astor, the proprietor of the paper, about the suitability of Churchill being at the same time Prime Minister and Minister of Defence — Lord Astor querying the advisability of this. Lord Astor had made his second son, the Hon. David Astor (1912- ), a minority shareholder in the paper and, although David Astor spent the war in the Marines, he had a voice in the paper’s affairs. At the end of the war the Astors made the Observer into a trust. In 1946 David Astor became its foreign editor and from 1948 he has been its editor. He met Orwell at the beginning of the war and they remained friends until Orwell’s death.
90. Desmond Hawkins (1908- ), novelist, literary critic and broadcaster, who did much freelance work with the Indian Service of the B.B.C. during the war.
91. Admiral Darlan (1881-1942), French naval officer and politician. He commanded all the French naval forces until the fall of France in May 1940. He became Naval Minister in Pétain’s Government and was regarded as being next in succession to him. He was in North Africa at the time of the invasion in November 1942 and his transfer of support to the Allied side and his appointment as Chief of State in North
Africa caused wide controversy. He was assassinated by a young French anti-Fascist in Algiers in November 1942.
4 June
Very hot weather. Struck by the normality of everything — lack of hurry, fewness of uniforms, general unwarlike appearance of the crowds who drift slowly through the streets, pushing prams or loitering in the squares to look at the hawthorn bushes. It is already noticeable that there are much fewer cars, however. Here and there a car with a fuel converter at the back, having slightly the appearance of an old-fashioned milk cart.
Evidently there is not so much bootleg petrol about after all.
6 June
The Molotov rumour still persists. He was here to negotiate the treaty, and has gone back, so it is said. No hint about this in any newspaper, however.
There is said to be much disagreement on the staff of the New Statesman over the question of the Second Front. Having squealed for a year that we must open a Second Front immediately, Kingsley Martin92 now has cold feet. He says that the army cannot be trusted, the soldiers will shoot their officers in the back etc. — this after endeavouring throughout the war to make the soldiers mistrust their officers. Meanwhile I think now that a Second Front is definitely projected, at any rate if enough shipping can be scraped together.
92. Kingsley Martin (1897-1969), leftwing journalist, editor of the New Statesman 1931-60.
7 June
The Sunday Express has also gone cold on the Second Front. The official line now appears to be that our air raids are a Second Front. Obviously there has been some kind of government hand-out telling the papers to pipe down on this subject. If the government merely wishes to stop them spreading misleading rumours, the puzzle is why they weren’t silenced earlier. It is just possible that the invasion has now been definitely decided on and the papers have been told to go anti-Second Front in order to throw the enemy off the scent. In this labyrinth of lies in which we are living the one explanation one never believes is the obvious one. Cf. David Astor’s story about the two German Jews meeting in the train:
First Jew: “Where are you going to?”
Second Jew: “Berlin.”
First Jew: “Liar! You just say that to deceive me. You know that if you say you are going to Berlin I shall think you are going to Leipzig, and al the time, you dirty crook, you real y are going to Berlin!’
Last Tuesday spent a long evening with Cripps (who had expressed a desire to
meet some literary people) together with Empson, Jack Common, David Owen, Norman Cameron, Guy Burgess93 and another man (an official) whose name I didn’t get. About 2½ hours of it, with nothing to drink. The usual inconclusive discussion. Cripps, however, very human and willing to listen. The person who stood up to him most successfully was Jack Common. Cripps said several things that amazed and slightly horrified me. One was that many people whose opinion was worth considering believed that the war would be over by October — i.e. that Germany would be flat out by that time.
When I said that I should look on that as a disaster pure and simple (because if the war were won as easily as that there would have been no real upheaval here and the American millionaires would still be in situ) he appeared not to understand. He said that once the war was won the surviving great powers would in any case have to administer the world as a unit, and seemed not to feel that it made much difference whether the great powers were capitalist or Socialist. Both David Owen and the man whose name I don’t know supported him. I saw that I was up against the official mind, which sees everything as a problem in administration and does not grasp that at a certain point, i.e. when certain economic interests are threatened, public spirit ceases to function. The basic assumption of such people is that everyone wants the world to function properly and will do his best to keep the wheels running. They don’t realize that most of those who have the power don’t care a damn about the world as a whole and are only intent on feathering their own nests.
93. William Empson, the poet and critic; Jack Common, a working-class writer, editor and friend of Orwell’s; David Owen, Cripps’s secretary; Norman Cameron (1905-53), a poet whose works include The Winter House, a friend and disciple of Robert Graves; Guy Burgess (1911-63), educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge, an unsuspected Communist, of considerable gifts, wit and charm. After working for the British Security Services and the B.B.C. in liaison with the Foreign Office, he joined the Foreign Office. His pro-Soviet activities went undetected until, in May 1951, he suddenly left for Moscow with Donald Maclean and remained there until his death.
I can’t help feeling a strong impression that Cripps has already been got at. Not with money or anything of that kind of course, nor even by flattery and the sense of power, which in all probability he genuinely doesn’t care about: but simply by responsibility, which automatically makes a man timid. Besides, as soon as you are in power your perspectives are foreshortened. Perhaps a bird’s eye view is as distorted as a worm’s eye view…
10 June
The only time when one hears people singing in the B.B.C. is in the early morning, between 6 and 8. That is the time when the charwomen are at work. A huge army of them arrives all at the same time. They sit in the reception hall waiting for their brooms to be issued to them and making as much noise as a parrot house, and then they have wonderful choruses, all singing together as they sweep the passages. The place has a quite different atmosphere at this time from what it has later in the day.
11 June
The Germans announce over the wireless that as the inhabitants of a Czech village called Lidice (about 1,200 inhabitants) were guilty of harbouring the assassins of Heydrich, they have shot all the males in the village, sent all the women to concentration camps, sent all the children to be “re-educated”, razed the whole village to the ground and changed its name. I am keeping a copy of the announcement, as recorded in the B.B.C.
monitoring report.
It does not particularly surprise me that people do this kind of thing, nor even that they announce that they are doing them. What does impress me, however, is that other people’s reaction to such happenings is governed solely by the political fashion of the moment. Thus before the war the pinks believed any and every horror story that came out of Germany or China. Now the pinks no longer believe in German or Japanese atrocities and automatically write off all horror stories as “propaganda”. In a little while you will be jeered at if you suggest that the story of Lidice could possibly [be] true. And yet there the facts are, announced by the Germans themselves and recorded on gramophone discs which no doubt will still be available. Cf. the long list of atrocities from 1914 onwards, German atrocities in Belgium, Bolshevik atrocities, Turkish atrocities, British atrocities in India, American atrocities in Nicaragua, Nazi atrocities, Italian atrocities in Abyssinia and Cyrenaica, red and white atrocities in Spain, Japanese atrocities in China — in every case believed in or disbelieved in according to political predilection, with utter non-interest in the facts and with complete willingness to alter one’s beliefs as soon as the political scene alters.
ATROCITIES (POST 1918)
Date
Believed in by the Right
Believed in by the Left
c. 1920
Turkish atrocities (Smyrna)
Turkish atrocities (Smyrna)
Sinn Fein atrocities
Black & Tan atrocities
Bolshevik atrocities
British atrocities in India
(Amritsar)
1923
French atrocities (the Ruhr)
1928
American atrocities
(Nicaragua) (?)
1933
Bolshevik atrocities
(Ukraine famine)
1934-9
Nazi atrocities
1935
Italian atrocities (Abyssinia
and Cyrenaica)
1936-9
Red atrocities in Spain
Fascist atrocities in Spain
1937
Bolshevik atrocities
Japanese atrocities
(the purges)
(Nanking)
1939 et seq.
German atrocities
British atrocities (the
ss Dunera etc.)
1941 et seq.
Japanese atrocities
13 June
The most impressive fact about the Molotov visit is that the Germans knew nothing about it. Not a word on the radio about Molotov’s presence in London till the signature of the treaty was officially announced, although all the while the German radio was shouting about the Bolshevization of Britain. Obviously they would have spilt the beans if they had really known. Taken in conjunction with certain other things (e.g. the capture last year of two very amateurish spies dropped by parachute, with portable wireless transmitters and actually with chunks of German sausage in their suitcases) this suggests that the German spy system in this country cannot be up to much…
15 June
From B.B.C. monitoring report.
Prague (Czech Home Stations) in German for Protectorate. 10.6.42. Heydnch Revenge: Vil age Wiped Out: Al Men Shot:
ANNOUNCEMENT
It is official y announced: The search and investigation for the murderers of S.S.
Obergruppenführer Gen. Heydrich has established unimpeachable indications (sic) that the population of the locality of Lidice, near Klando, supported and gave assistance to the circle (sic) of perpetrators in question. In spite of the interrogation of the local inhabitants, the pertinent means of evidence were secured without the help of the population. The attitude of the inhabitants to the outrage thus manifested, is emphasized also by other acts hostile to the Reich, by the discoveries of printed matter hostile to the Reich, of dumps of arms and ammunition, of an il egal wireless transmitter, and of huge quantities of control ed goods, as wel as by the fact that inhabitants of the locality are in active enemy service abroad. Since the inhabitants of this vil age (sic) have flagrantly violated the laws which have been issued, by their activity and by the support given to the murderers of S.S. Obergruppenführer Heydrich, the male adults have been shot, the women have been sent to a concentration camp and the children have been handed over to appropriate educational authorities. The buildings of the locality have been level ed to the ground, and the name of the community has been obliterated.
(Note: This is an identical repetition, in German, of an announcement made in Czech from Prague at 19.00, when reception was very bad.)…
No question now that the Second Front has been decided on. All the papers talk of it as a certainty and Moscow is publicizing it widely. Whether it is really feasible remains to be seen, of course.
21 June
The thing that strikes one in the B.B.C. — and it is evidently the same in various of the other departments — is not so much the moral squalor and the ultimate futility of what we are doing, as the feeling of frustration, the impossibility of getting anything done, even any successful piece of scoundrelism. Our policy is so ill-defined, the disorganization is so great, there are so many changes of plan and the fear and hatred of intelligence are so all-pervading, that one cannot plan any sort of wireless campaign whatever. When one plans some series of talks, with some more or less definite
propaganda line behind it, one is first told to go ahead, then choked off on the ground that this or that is “injudicious” or “premature”, then told again to go ahead, then told to water everything down and cut out any plain statements that may have crept in here and there, then told to “modify” the series in some way that removes its original meaning; and then at the last moment the whole thing is suddenly cancelled by some mysterious edict from above and one is told to improvise some different series which one feels no interest in and which in any case has no definite idea behind it. One is constantly putting sheer rubbish on the air because of having talks which sound too intelligent cancelled at the last moment. In addition the organization is so overstaffed that numbers of people have almost literally nothing to do. But even when one manages to get something fairly good on the air one is weighed down by the knowledge that hardly anybody is listening.
Except, I suppose, in Europe, the B.B.C. simply isn’t listened to overseas, a fact known to everyone concerned with overseas broadcasting. Some listener research has been done in America and it is known that in the whole of the U.S.A. about 300,000 people listen to the B.B.C. In India or Australia the number would not be anywhere near that. It has come out recently that (two years after the Empire service was started) plenty of Indians with shortwave sets don’t even know that the B.B.C. broadcasts to India.
It is the same with the only other public activity I take part in, the Home Guard.
After two years no real training has been done, no specialized tactics worked out, no battle positions fixed upon, no fortifications built — all this owing to endless changes of plan and complete vagueness as to what we are supposed to be aiming at. Details of organization, battle positions, etc. have been changed so frequently that hardly anyone knows at any given moment what the current arrangements are supposed to be. To give just one example, for well over a year our company has been trying to dig a system of trenches in Regents Park, in case airborne troops should land there. Though dug over and over again these trenches have never once been in a completed state, because when they are half done there is always a change of plan and fresh orders. Ditto with everything.
Whatever one undertakes, one starts out with the knowledge that presently there will come a sudden change of orders, and then another change, and so on indefinitely.
Nothing ever happens except continuous dithering, resulting in progressive disillusionment all round. The best one can hope is that it is much the same on the other side.
24 June
Listened in last night to Lord Haw-Haw — not Joyce, who apparently has been off the air for some time, but a man who sounded to me like a South African, followed by another with more of a cockney voice. There was a good deal about the Congress of the Free India movement in Bangkok. Was amazed to note that all Indian names were mispronounced, and grossly mispronounced — e.g. Ras Behari Bose rendered as ‘Rash Beery Bose’.94 Yet after all the Indians who are broadcasting from Germany are available for advice on these points. They probably go in and out of the same building as Lord Haw-Haw every day. It is rather encouraging to see this kind of slovenliness happening on the other side as well.
94. Ras Behari Bose, an Indian nationalist who had worked for his country’s independence since 1911. He
was held responsible for the organization of certain terrorist movements and in 1915 went to Japan to try to mobilize Asian support for the Indian Independence League which organized the Indian International.Army. In 1943 the leadership of this army passed to Subhas Chandra Bose.
26 June
Everyone very defeatist after the Libya business.95 Some of the papers going cold on the Second Front again. Tom Driberg (“William Hickey”) wins the Maiden by-election, scoring twice as many votes as the Conservative candidate. That makes 4 out of the last 6 elections that the Government has lost.
95. On 20 June Tobruk had fallen to the Germans, marking a bad set-back in the North African campaign.
1 July
At Callow End, Worcs (staying on a farm). No noise except aeroplanes, birds, and the mowers cutting the hay. No mention of the war, except with reference to Italian prisoners, who are working on some of the farms. They seem to be considered good workers, and for fruit-picking are preferred to the town people who come out from Worcester and are described as “artful”. In spite of the feeding difficulties, plenty of pigs, poultry, geese and turkeys about. Cream for every meal at this place.
Huge bombers flying overhead all day. Also aeroplanes doing extraordinary things, e.g. towing other planes by a wire (perhaps gliders?) or carrying smaller planes perched on their backs.
3 July
Vote of censure defeated 475-2. This figure means that there were very few abstentions. The same trick as usual — the debate twisted into a demand for a vote of confidence in Churchill himself, which has to be given, since there is no one to take Churchill’s place. Things are made much easier for the Government by the obvious bad motives of some of its chief attackers, e.g. Hore-Belisha.96 I don’t know how much longer this comedy can go on, but not much longer.
96. Leslie Hore-Belisha (1898-1957), M.P. (National Liberal 1923-42, Independent 1942-45). He became Secretary for War in 1937, and was dismissed by Chamberlain in 1940. Churchill did not give him a place in his government and throughout the war Hore-Belisha remained out of office.
No reference to the Second Front in Churchill’s speech.
The Japanese are evidently going to attack Russia fairly soon. They appear to be firmly lodged in the outer Aleutians, which can’t have any meaning except as a move to cut communications between Russia and the U.S.A.
The pinks are panicking to an extent they haven’t equalled since Dunkirk. The N.S.’s leading article is headed “Facing the Spectre”. They take the loss of Egypt for granted. Heaven knows whether this will actually happen, but these people have prophesied the loss of Egypt so often before that their doing so again is almost enough to
persuade one that it won’t happen. It is curious how they always do what the Germans want them to do — e.g. for some time past, demanding that we stop the raids on Germany and send our bombers to Egypt. A little earlier we were to send our bombers to India. In each case the same move as was being demanded by the German “freedom” stations. A thing that strikes me also is the airy disdain with which all the pinks talk of our air raids on Germany — air raids make very little impression etc. etc. And these are the people who squealed loudest during the blitz on London…
10 July
A day or two ago a couple of lorries belonging to the navy arrived with a party of Wrens 97 and sailors who put in several hours work weeding out the turnips in Mr Phillips’s field. All the village women delighted by the appearance of the sailors in their blue trousers and white singlets. “Don’t they look clean, like! I like sailors. They always look so clean.” The sailors and Wrens also seemed to enjoy their outing and drinks in the pub afterwards. It appeared that they belonged to some volunteer organization which sends workers out as they are needed. Mrs Phillips explains it: “It’s the voluntary organization from Malvern. Sometimes it’s A.T.S.98 they send and sometimes it’s sailors.
Of course we like having them. Well, it makes you a bit independent of your own workpeople, you see. The workpeople, they’re awful nowadays. Just do so much and no more.
They know you can’t do without them, you see. And you can’t get a woman to do a bit indoors nowadays. The girls won’t stay here, with no picture-house in the village. I do have a woman who comes in, but I can’t get any work out of her. It helps a bit when you get a few voluntary workers. Makes you more independent, like.”
97. Women’s Royal Naval Service.
98. Auxiliary Territorial Service, the woman’s branch of the army.
How right and proper it all is, when you consider how necessary it is that agricultural work should not be neglected, and how right and proper also that town people should get a bit of contact with the soil. Yet these voluntary organizations, plus the work done by soldiers in haymaking, etc., and Italian prisoners, are simply blackleg labour…
The “Blue Bell” again shut for lack of beer. Quite serious boozing for 4 or 5 days of the week, then drought. Sometimes, however, when they are shut the local officers are to be seen drinking in a private room, the common soldiers as well as the labourers being shut out. The “Red Lion” in the next village goes on a different system which the proprietor explains to me: “I don’t hold with giving it all to the summer visitors. If beer’s short, let the locals come first, I say. A lot of days I keep the front door shut, and then only the locals know the way in at the back. A man that’s working in the fields needs his beer, ‘specially with the food they got to eat nowadays. But I rations ‘em. I says to ‘em, ‘Now look here, you want your beer regular, don’t you? Wouldn’t you rather have a pint with your dinner every day than four pints one day and three the next.’ Same with the soldiers. I don’t like to refuse beer to a soldier, but I only lets ‘em have a pint their first drink. After that it’s ‘Half pints only, boys.’ Like that it gets shared out a bit.”
22 July
From Ahmed Ali’s last letter from India:
Here is a little bit of old Delhi which might interest you.
In a busy street a newsboy was shouting in Urdu: “Pandit Jawaharlal saying his rosary the other way round.” What he meant was that he had changed his attitude towards the Government. Questioned he said: “You can never be sure of him; today he says side with the Government and help in the war effort, tomorrow just the opposite.” He turned away from me and began shouting his cry, adding: “Jawaharlal has given a chal enge to the Government.” I could not find this “chal enge” in the papers.
Other newsboys sel ing Urdu papers: “Germany has smashed Russia in the very first attack.” Needless to say I read just the opposite in my English papers the next morning.
Obviously the Urdu papers had reported what Berlin had said. No one stops the newsboys from shouting what they like.
One day going in a “tonga” I heard the driver shout to his horse as he shied: “Why do you get back like our Sarkar! Go forward like Hitler,” and he swore.
It’s rather fun going out to the bazaars and markets and listening to the loud gossip -provided, of course, it is not unbearably hot. I shal tell you more from time to time, if you are interested.
23 July
I now make entries in this diary much more seldom than I used to, for the reason that I literally have not any spare time. And yet I am doing nothing that is not futility and have less and less to show for the time I waste. It seems to be the same with everyone -the most fearful feeling of frustration, of just footling round doing imbecile things, not imbecile because they are a part of the war and war is inherently foolish, but things which in fact don’t help or in any way affect the war effort, but are considered necessary by the huge bureaucratic machine in which we are all caught up. Much of the stuff that goes out from the B.B.C. is just shot into the stratosphere, not listened to by anybody, and known to those responsible for it to be not listened to by anybody. And round this futile stuff hundreds of skilled workers are grouped, costing the country tens of thousands per annum, and tagging on to them are thousands of others who in effect have no real job but have found themselves a quiet niche and are sitting in it pretending to work. The same everywhere, especially in the Ministries.
However, the bread one casts on the waters sometimes fetches up in strange places. We did a series of 6 talks on modern English literature, very highbrow and I believe, completely unlistened-to in India. Hsiao Chi’en, a Chinese student, reads the talks in the Listener and is so impressed that he begins writing a book in Chinese on modern western literature, drawing largely on our talks. So the propaganda aimed at India misses India and accidentally hits China. Perhaps the best way to influence India would be by broadcasting to China.
The Indian Communist Party, and its press, legalized again. I should say after this they will have to take the ban off the Daily Worker; otherwise the position is too absurd.
This reminds me of the story David Owen told me and which I believe didn’t enter in this diary. Cripps on his arrival in India asked the Viceroy to release the interned
Communists. The Viceroy consented (I believe most of them have been released since), but at the last moment got cold feet and said nervously: “But how can you be sure they’re really Communists?”
We are going to have to increase our consumption of potatoes by 20 per cent, so it is said. Partly to save bread, and partly to dispose of this year’s potato crop, which is enormous.
26 July
Yesterday and today, on the Home Guard manoeuvres, passing various small camps of soldiers in the woods, radiolocation stations etc. Struck by the appearance of the soldiers, their magnificent health and the brutalized look in their faces. All young and fresh, with round fat limbs and rosy faces with beautiful clear skins. But sullen brutish expressions — not fierce or wicked in any way, but simply stupefied by boredom, loneliness, discontent, endless tiredness and mere physical health.
27 July
Talking today with Sultana, one of the Maltese broadcasters. He says he is able to keep in fairly good touch with Malta and conditions are very bad there. “The last letter I get this morning was like a — how you say? — (much gesticulation) like a sieve. All the pieces what the censor cut out, you understand. But I make something out of it, all the same.” He went on to tell me, among other things, that 5 lb. of potatoes now cost the equivalent of 8 shillings. He considers that of the two convoys which recently endeavoured to reach Malta the one from England, which succeeded in getting there, carried munitions, and the one from Egypt, which failed to get there, carried food. I said, “Why can’t they send dehydrated food by plane?” He shrugged his shoulders, seeming to feel instinctively that the British government would never go to that much trouble over Malta. Yet it seems that the Maltese are solidly pro-British, thanks to Mussolini, no doubt.
The German broadcasts are claiming that Voroshilov is in London, which is not very likely and has not been rumoured here. Probably a shot in the dark, to offset their recent failure over Molotov, and made on the calculation that some high-up Russian military delegate is likely to be here at this moment. If the story should turn out to be true, I shall have to revise my ideas about the German secret service in this country.
The crowd at the Second Front meeting in Trafalgar Square yesterday estimated at 40,000 in the rightwing papers and 60,000 in the leftwing. Perhaps 50,000 in reality.
My spy reports that in spite of the present Communist line of “all power to Churchill”, the Communist speakers in fact attacked the Government very violently.
28 July
Today I have read less newspapers than usual, but the ones I have seen have gone
cold on the Second Front, except for the News Chronicle. The Evening News published an anti-Second Front article by General Brownrigg on its front page. I remarked on this to Herbert Read who said gloomily, “The Government has told them to shut up about it.” It is true of course that if they are intending to start something they must still seem to deny it. Read said he thought the position in Russia was desperate and seemed very upset about it, though in the past he has been even more anti-Stalin than I. I said to him, “Don’t you feel quite differently towards the Russians now they are in a jam?” and he agreed. For that matter I felt quite differently towards England when I saw that England was in a jam.
Looking back, I see that I was anti-Russian (or more exactly anti-Stalin) during the years when Russia appeared to be powerful, militarily and politically, i.e. 1933 to 1941. Before and after those dates I was pro-Russian. One could interpret this in several different ways.
A small raid on the outskirts of London last night. The new rocket guns, some of which are now manned by Home Guards, were in action and are said to have brought down some planes (8 planes down altogether). This is the first time the Home Guard can properly be said to have been in action, a little over two years after its formation.
The Germans never admit damage to military objectives, but they acknowledge civilian casualties after our bigger raids. After the Hamburg raid of 2 nights ago they described the casualties as heavy. The papers here reproduce this with pride. Two years ago we would all have been aghast at the idea of killing civilians. I remember saying to someone during the blitz, when the R.A.F. were hitting back as best they could. “In a year’s time you’ll see headlines in the Daily Express: ‘Successful Raid on Berlin Orphanage. Babies Set on Fire’.” It hasn’t come to that yet, but that is the direction we are going in.
1 August
If my figures given are correct, the Germans have lost about 10 per cent of their strength in each of the last raids. According to Peter Masefield99 this isn’t anything to do with the new guns but has all been done by the night fighters. He also told me off the record that the new F.W. 190 fighter is much better than any fighter we now have in actual service. An aircraft construction man named Bowyer who was broadcasting together with him agreed with this. Oliver Stewart1 considers that the recent German raids are reconnaissance raids and that they intend starting the big blitz again soon, at any rate if they can get their hands free in Russia.
99. Peter Masefield (1914- ), air correspondent of the Sunday Times 1940-43, personal adviser to Lord Beaverbrook 1943-5; now Chairman of the British Airports Authority.
1. Major Oliver Stewart, M.C., A.F.C., expert on aeronautics, journalist and broadcaster, and air correspondent of the Manchester Guardian, 1941-58.
Not much to do over the bank holiday weekend. Busy at every odd moment making a hen-house. This kind of thing now needs great ingenuity owing to the extreme difficulty of getting hold of timber. No sense of guilt or time-wasting when I do anything of this type — on the contrary, a vague feeling that any sane occupation must be useful, or at any rate justifiable.
3 August
David Astor says Churchill is in Moscow. He also says that there isn’t going to be any Second Front. However, if a Second Front is intended, the Government must do all it can to spread the contrary impression beforehand, and D.A. might be one of the people used to plant the rumour.
D.A. says that when the commandos land the Germans never fight but always clear out immediately. No doubt they have orders to do so. This fact is not allowed to be published — presumable reason, to prevent the public from becoming overconfident.
According to David Astor, Cripps does intend to resign from the Government and has his alternative policy ready. He can’t, of course, speak of this in public but will do so in private. However, I hear that [John] Macmurray when staying with Cripps recently could get nothing whatever out of him as to his political intentions.
4 August
The Turkish radio (among others) also says Churchill is in Moscow.
5 August
General dismay over the Government of India’s rash act in publishing the documents seized in their police raid on Congress headquarters.2 As usual the crucial document is capable of more than one interpretation and the resulting squabble will simply turn wavering elements in Congress more anti-British. The anti-Indian feeling which the publication has aroused in America, and perhaps Russia and China, is not in the long run any good to us.
2. After the failure of Cripps’s mission to India, Congress had become increasingly intransigent and at the beginning of August Gandhi had inaugurated a campaign of civil disobedience. As part of its attempts to ensure order, the Government of India raided Congress headquarters and seized the text of the original draft of the Resolution on Indian Independence submitted to the Congress Working Committee, which it then published.
The Russian Government announces discovery of a Tsarist plot, quite in the old style. I can’t help a vague feeling that this is somehow linked up with the simultaneous discovery of Gandhi’s plot with the Japanese.
7 August
Hugh Slater is very despondent about the war. He says that at the rate at which the Russians have been retreating it is not possible that Timoshenko3 has really got his army away intact, as reported. He also says that the tone of the Moscow press and wireless shows that morale in Russia must be very bad. Like almost everyone I know, except
Warburg, he considers that there isn’t going to be any Second Front. This is the inference everyone draws from Churchill’s visit to Moscow. People say, “Why should he go to Moscow to tell them we’re going to open a Second Front? He must have gone there to tell them we can’t do it.” Everyone agrees with my suggestion that it would be a good job if Churchill were sunk on his way home, like Kitchener. Of course the possibility remains that Churchill isn’t in Moscow.
3. Marshal Timoshenko was successfully withdrawing across the Don to defend the Volga near Stalingrad.
Last night for the first time took a Sten gun to pieces. There is almost nothing to learn in it. No spare parts. If the gun goes seriously wrong you simply chuck it away and get another. Weight of the gun without magazine is 5½ lb. — weight of the tommy gun would be 12-15 lb. Estimated price is not 50s. as I had imagined, but 18s. I can see a million or two million of these things, each with 500 cartridges and a book of instructions, floating down all over Europe on little parachutes. If the Government had the guts to do that they would really have burned their boats.
9 August
Fired the Sten gun for the first time today. No kick, no vibration, very little noise, and reasonable accuracy. Out of about 2,500 rounds fired, 2 stoppages, in each case due to a dud cartridge — treatment, simply to work the bolt by hand.
10 August
Nehru, Gandhi, Azad4 and many others in jail. Rioting over most of India, a number of deaths, countless arrests. Ghastly speech of Amery,5 speaking of Nehru and Co. as “wicked men”, “saboteurs” etc. This of course broadcast on the Empire Service and rebroadcast by A.I.R.6 The best joke of all was that the Germans did their best to jam it, unfortunately without success. Terrible feeling of depression among the Indians and everyone sympathetic to India. Even Bokhari,7 a Moslem League man, almost in tears and talking about resigning from the B.B.C. It is strange, but quite truly the way the British Government is now behaving in India upsets me more than a military defeat.
4. Abul Kalam Azad, Indian Nationalist Moslem leader, spokesman for Congress in the 1945 negotiations for Independence.
5. Leo Amery (1873-1955), a Conservative politician and M.P., Secretary of State for India 1940-45.
6. All India Radio.
7. Zulfaqar Ali Bokhari, organizer of the Indian Programmes in the B.B.C. Eastern Service.
12 August
Appalling policy hand-out this morning about affairs in India. The riots are of no significance — situation is well in hand — after all the numbers of deaths is not large etc.
etc. As to the participation of students in the riots, this is explained along “boys will be boys” lines. “We all know that students everywhere are only too glad to join in any kind of rag”, etc. etc. Almost everyone utterly disgusted. Some of the Indians when they hear this kind of stuff turn quite pale, a strange sight.
Most of the press taking a tough line, the Rothermere press disgustingly so. If these repressive measures in India are seemingly successful for the time being, the effects in this country will be very bad. All seems set for a big come-back by the reactionaries, and it almost begins to appear as though leaving Russia in the lurch were part of the manoeuvre…
14 August
Horrabin8 was broadcasting today, and as always we introduced him as the man who drew the maps for Wells’s Outline of History and Nehru’s Glimpses of World History. This had been extensively trailed and advertised beforehand, Horrabin’s connexion with Nehru naturally being a draw with Indian listeners. Today the reference to Nehru was cut out from the announcement — Nehru being in prison and therefore having become bad.
8. J. F. Horrabin (1884-1962), journalist and illustrator; on the left wing of the Labour Party; Labour M.P.
1929-31; achieved a considerable reputation for his educational maps and atlases, combining geography with historical fact to present a broad survey of world economic problems.
18 August
From Georges Kopp’s9 last letter from Marseilles after some rigmarole about the engineering work he has been doing…
9. Georges Kopp had been the commander of the P.O.U.M. unit with which Orwell served in Spain. They remained close friends until Kopp’s death in 1951. He had joined the French Foreign Legion in September 1939, was captured by the Germans in June 1940, had escaped and worked in France as an engineer and British agent until 1943 when he was flown to Britain by the Allies.
I am about to start production on an industrial scale. But I am not at al certain that I shal actual y go on, because I have definite contracts with my firm, which has, I am afraid, developed lately connexions which reduce considerably its independence and it is possible that another firm would eventual y profit by my work, which I should hate since I have no arrangement at al with the latter and wil not, for the time being, be prepared to sign any. If I am compel ed to stop, I real y don’t know what I am going to do; I wish some of my very dear friends to whom I have written repeatedly would not be as slow and as passive as they seem to be. If no prospects open in this field, I contemplate to make use of another process of mine, related to bridge-building, which, you may remember, I have put into successful operation at San Mateo before the war.
Translated: “I am afraid France is going into full alliance with Germany. If the Second Front is not opened soon I shall do my best to escape to England.”
19 August
Big Commando raid on Dieppe today. Raid was still continuing this evening. Just conceivable the first step in an invasion, or a try-out for the first step, though I don’t think so. The warning that was broadcast to the French people that this was only a raid and they were not to join in would in that case be a bluff.
22 August
David Astor very damping about the Dieppe raid, which he saw at more or less close quarters and which he says was an almost complete failure except for the very heavy destruction of German fighter planes, which was not part of the plan. He says that the affair was definitely misrepresented in the press and is now being misrepresented in the reports to the P.M. and that the main facts were: Something over 5,000 men were engaged, of whom at least 2,000 were killed or prisoners. It was not intended to stay on shore longer than was actually done (i.e. dawn till about 4 pm.), but the idea was to destroy all the defences of Dieppe, and the attempt to do this was an utter failure. In fact only comparatively trivial damage was done, a few batteries of guns knocked out etc. and only one of the 3 main parties really made its objective. The others did not get far and many were massacred on the beach by artillery fire. The defences were formidable and would have been difficult to deal with even if there had been artillery support, as the guns were sunk in the face of the cliff or under enormous concrete coverings. More tank-landing craft were sunk than got ashore. About 20 or 30 tanks were landed but none were got off again. The newspaper photos which showed tanks apparently being brought back to England were intentionally misleading. The general impression was that the Germans knew of the raid beforehand. Almost as soon as it was begun they had a man broadcasting a spurious “eye-witness” account from somewhere further up the coast, and another man broadcasting false orders in English. On the other hand the Germans were evidently surprised by the strength of their air support. Whereas normally they have kept their fighters on the ground so as to conserve their strength, they sent them into the air as soon as they heard that tanks were landing, and lost a number of planes variously estimated, but considered by some R.A.F. officers to have been as high as 270. Owing to the British strength in the air the destroyers were able to lie outside Dieppe all day. One was sunk, but this was by a shore battery. When a request came to attack some objective on shore, the destroyers formed in line and raced inshore firing their forward guns while the fighter planes supported them overhead.
David Astor considers that this definitely proves that an invasion of Europe is impossible. Of course we can’t feel sure that he hasn’t been planted to say this, considering who his parents are. I can’t help feeling that to get ashore at all at such a strongly defended spot, without either bomber support, artillery support except for the guns of the destroyers (4-9 guns I suppose), or airborne troops, was a considerable achievement.
25 August
One of the many rumours circulating among Indians here is that Nehru, Gandhi and others have been deported to South Africa. This is the kind of thing that results from press censorship and suppressing newspapers.
27 August
Ban on the Daily Worker lifted. It is to reappear on Sept 7th (same day as Churchill makes his statement to Parliament).
German radio again alleging S. C. Bose is in Penang. But the indications are that this was a slip of the tongue for R. B. Bose.
29 August
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Another rumour among the Indians about Nehru — this time that he has escaped.
7 September
There is evidently trouble in Syria. Hand-out this morning to the effect that -most unfortunately and much against H.M. Government’s will — General de Gaulle is insisting that Syria is still under a French Mandate and it is impossible yet to make a treaty, as in the case of Iraq. General de Gaulle’s attitude is considered most deplorable, but as he is, after all, the accredited leader of the Free French and the whole legal position is very obscure (the matter should be decided upon by the League of Nations which unfortunately no longer exists), H.M. Government is unable etc. etc. etc. In other words
the Syrians will get no treaty, the blame for this is placed on our puppet de Gaulle, and if possible we shall swipe Syria for ourselves. When I heard this hollow rubbish trotted out by Rushbrook-Williams10 this morning, and we all had to listen and keep straight faces, there came into my head, I don’t quite know why, the lines from Hardy’s Dynasts about the crowning of Napoleon in Rome:
Do not the prelate’s accents falter thin,
His lips with inheld laughter grow deformed,
In blessing one whose aim is but to win
The golden seat that other bums have warmed?
10. L. F. Rushbrook-Williams, at this time Eastern Service Director of the B.B.C.
The Daily Worker reappeared today — very mild, but they are urging a. a Second Front, b. all help to Russia in the way of arms etc., and c. a demagogic programme of higher wages all round which would be utterly incompatible with a. and b.
10 September
Lecturing last night at Morley College, Lambeth. Small hall, about 100 people, working-class intelligentsia (same sort of audience as Left Book Club11 branch). During the questions afterwards, no less than 6 people asked, “Does not the lecturer think that it was a great mistake to lift the ban from the Daily Worker” — reasons given, that the D.W.’s loyalty is not reliable and it is a waste of paper. Only one woman stood up for the D.W., evidently a Communist at whom one or two of the others expressed impatience (“Oh, she’s always saying that!”). This after a year during which there has been a ceaseless clamour from Left organizations for the lifting of the ban. One is constantly being thrown out in one’s judgements because one listens to the articulate minority and forgets the other 99 per cent. Cf. Munich, when the mass of the people were almost certainly behind Chamberlain’s policy, though to read the New Statesman etc. you wouldn’t have thought so.
11. The Left Book Club had been founded and published by Victor Gollancz in 1936. It still continued to publish a book a month on anti-Fascist or Socialist topics and the practice of holding group meetings had been revived in the middle of 1942 and some fifty branches formed.
15 September
Ghastly feeling of impotence over the India business, Churchill’s speeches, the evident intention of the Blimps to have one more try at being what they consider tough, and the impudent way in which the newspapers can misrepresent the whole issue, well knowing that the public will never know enough or take enough interest to verify the facts. This last is the worst symptom of all — though actually our own apathy about India is not worse than the non-interest of Indian intellectuals in the struggle against Fascism in Europe.
21 September
Yesterday met Liddell Hart for the first time… . In a great stew about the barbarism of bombing Lübeck. Considered that during the wars of recent centuries the British have the worst record of all for atrocities and destructiveness. Although, of course, strongly opposed to the Second Front, also anxious for us to call off the bombing.
There is no point in doing it, as it can achieve nothing and does not weaken Germany. On the other hand we ought not to have started the bombing in the first place (he stuck to it that it was we who started it), as it merely brought heavier reprisals on ourselves.
Osbert Sitwell was also there… . Both of them professed to be disgusted by our seizure of Vichy colonies. Sitwell said that our motto was, “When things look bad, retake Madagascar.” He said that in Cornwall in case of invasion the Home Guard have orders to shoot all artists. I said that in Cornwall this might be all for the best. Sitwell: “Some instinct would lead them to the good ones.”
22 September
Most of the ammunition for our Sten guns is Italian, or rather made in Germany for Italy. I fancy this must be the first weapon the British army has had whose bore was measured in millimetres instead of inches. They were going to make a new cheap automatic weapon, and having the vast stocks of ammunition captured in Abyssinia handy, manufactured the guns to fit the cartridges instead of the other way about. The advantage is that the ammunition of almost any continental submachine gun will fit it. It will be interesting to see whether the Germans or Japanese come out with a .303 weapon to fit captured British ammunition.
28 September
Open-air church parade in Regents Park yesterday. How touching the scene ought to be — the battalion in hollow square, band of the Coldstream Guards, the men standing bareheaded (beautiful autumn day, faint mist and not a leaf stirring, dogs gambolling round) and singing the hymns as best they could. But unfortunately there was a sermon with the jingoistic muck which is usual on these occasions and which makes me go pro-German for as long as I listen to it. Also a special prayer “for the people of Stalingrad” -the Judas kiss. A detail that gets me down on these occasions is the clergyman’s white surplice, which looks all wrong against a background of military uniforms. Struck by the professionalism of the band, especially the bandmaster (an officer in the black peaked cap of the Guards). As each prayer drew towards its close, a stirring in the band, the trombones come out of their leather suitcases, the bandmaster’s baton comes up, and they are ready to snap into the Amen just as the priest reaches “through Jesus Christ our Lord”.
5 October
New Viceroy of India to be appointed shortly. No clue as to who he will be. Some say General Auchinleck — who, it is said, gets on well with leftwing Indians.
Long talk with Brander,12 who is back after his 6 months tour in India. His conclusions so depressing that I can hardly bring myself to write them down. Briefly -affairs are much worse in India than anyone here is allowed to realize, the situation is in fact retrievable but won’t be retrieved because the Government is determined to make no real concessions, hell will break loose when and if there is a Japanese invasion, and our broadcasts are utterly useless because nobody listens to them. Brander did say, however, that the Indians listen to the B.B.C. news, because they regard it as more truthful than that given out by Tokyo or Berlin. He considers that we should broadcast news and music and nothing else. This is what I have been saying for some time past.
12. Laurence Brander, author, had lectured on English literature in India for twelve years before the war.
From 1941-4 he was employed by the B.B.C. as Intelligence Officer, Eastern Service.
10 October
Today in honour of the anniversary of the Chinese Revolution, the Chinese flag was hoisted over Broadcasting House. Unfortunately it was upside down.
According to David Astor, Cripps is going to resign shortly — pretext, that the War Cabinet is a sham, Churchill being in reality the sole power in it.
11 October
The authorities in Canada have now chained up a number of German prisoners equal to the number of British prisoners chained up in Germany. What the devil are we coming to?…”13
13. See also 37.
17 October
Heard a “Jew joke” on the stage at the Players’ theatre last night — a mild one, and told by a Jew, but still slightly anti-Jew in tendency.
More Second Front rumours. The date this time is given as October 20th, an unlikely date, being a Tuesday. It seems pretty clear that something is going to happen in West or North-West Africa, however.
15 November
Church bells rung this morning — in celebration for the victory in Egypt. The first time that I have heard them in over two years.
Appendix I
BOOKS BY OR CONTAINING CONTRIBUTIONS