Dear
Winston: I have been thinking over some of the conversations we had during your recent visit, particularly those dealing with our joint pronouncement on the principles and purposes which will guide our international behavior.1 I have in mind also your confidential statement that within a reasonable time you want to shift the responsibility of the Premiership to other shoulders--one reason being that you wish to give to your successor a chance to establish himself politically before the next elections.2
Considering these two matters together, I am certain that you must have a very deep and understandable desire to do something special and additional in your remaining period of active service that will be forever recognized as a milestone in the world's tortuous progress toward a just and lasting peace. Nothing else could provide such a fitting climax to your long and brilliant service to your sovereign, your country and the world.
I am sure that some such thought of your conscious or subconscious mind must be responsible for your desire to meet Malenkov and to explore, so far as is possible, the purposes of his heart and the designs of his brain.3
As you know, while I have not been able to bring myself to believe wholeheartedly in the venture, I most earnestly pray that you may develop something good out of what seems to me the bleakest of prospects. This I say not primarily because of my deep affection and respect for an old and valued friend and the satisfaction I would take in such a personal triumph of yours, but because the world so desperately needs to be strengthened in hope and faith and confidence that anyone who would not pray for the success of your venture would indeed be wicked.
Having said this, I must also say that because of my utter lack of confidence in the reliability and integrity of the men in the Kremlin and my feeling that you may be disappointed in your present hopes, my mind has been turning toward an exploration of other possibilities by which you could still give to the world something inspiring before you lay down your official responsibilities. It should be something that would so well serve the cause in which we believe that it would indeed be considered one of your finest contributions.
Another factor to be considered is that in far too many areas the Kremlin is pre-empting the right to speak for the small nations of the world. We are falsely pictured as the exploiters of people, the Soviets as their champion.
I suggest to you a thoughtful speech on the subject of the rights to self-government, so vigorously supported in our recent joint communique.
At first glance, this seems a thorny nettle to grasp. But I believe that by looking closely we can find that this is not necessarily so.
In our conversations, we agreed that in a number of areas people are not yet ready for self-rule and that any attempt to make them now responsible for their own governing would be to condemn them to lowered standards of life and probably to communistic domination. At the same time, we must never allow the world to believe that we are ready to abandon our stated purposes merely because of this obvious, negative, truth.
Colonialism is on the way out as a relationship among peoples. The sole question is one of time and method. I think we should handle it so as to win adherents to Western aims.
We know that there is abroad in the world a fierce and growing spirit of nationalism. Should we try to dam it up completely, it would, like a mighty river, burst through the barriers and could create havoc. But again, like a river, if we are intelligent enough to make constructive use of this force, then the result, far from being disastrous, could redound greatly to our advantage, particularly in our struggle against the Kremlin's power.
To make use of the spirit of nationalism, we must show for it a genuine sympathy; we must prove that the obstacles that now prevent self-government in certain regions genuinely concern the free world and engage our earnest purpose to work for their elimination. This you and I stated in our joint communique. But to make it a real and vital thing in the lives of so many peoples throughout the world, we ought, I think, to make the whole matter a subject of more detailed explanation both as to objectives and as to methods for attaining them.
A speech on the matter--and no other could so well do it as you--should deal with the need for education and announce the cooperative purpose of great nations in the Western World to bring educational opportunities to all peoples we are able to reach.
The talk would not, of course, ignore the economic requirements of independent existence and would certainly dwell at length upon the advantages of voluntary agreements and associations in order to promote the freest and most fruitful kind of commerce. There would have to be discussed the burdensome responsibilities of self-rule; internal and external security; proper systems for the administration of justice; the promotion of health and the general welfare.
Finally, it seems to me that such a talk should announce a specific hope or aim in terms of the time limit for the attainment of announced objectives. Possibly it might be said that our two nations plan to undertake every kind of applicable program to insure that within a space of twenty-five years (or by some other agreed upon, definite, date), all peoples will have achieved the necessary political, cultural and economic standards to permit the attainment of their goals.
If you could then say that twenty-five years from now, every last one of the colonies (excepting military bases) should have been offered a right to self-government and determination, you would electrify the world. More than this, you could be certain that not a single one of them would, when the time came, take advantage of the offer of independence. Each would cling more tightly to the mother country and be a more valuable part thereof.
Equally important with this particular announcement would be the outline of the program we propose jointly to undertake to help these nations achieve this level of progress.
The kind of talk that I am thinking of would seek to put this whole matter in such a light as to gain us friends--to be positive rather than negative. The attitude should be that we recognize great difficulties, some of which will take time to overcome, but that we know the job can be done.
Of course, in developing such a subject, one would want to contrast, if only by passing reference, this great purpose and development with the practice of the communists in Eastern Europe and wherever their evil power reaches. A good bit of cold war campaigning could be carried on in such a talk without ever making that particular objective an obvious one. For the same reason, reference could be made again to the plan for making nuclear science serve the peaceful interests of all nations, particularly in those areas where people are starved for adequate power.
I long to find a theme which is dynamic and gripping, and which our two countries can espouse together. In this way, we can exercise the world leadership to which the communists aspire. Also by working together for concrete constructive goals, we can cement our relationship in a way which is only possible if there is fellowship in deeds. We found that fellowship in war, and we must equally try to find it in peace.
The theme I outline seems to me to be the one which best fills the need. It is, however, not a theme which the United States can develop alone without seeming to put the United States into opposition to Britain, which is the very result we do not want. Therefore, I bespeak your cooperation and indeed your initiative in opening what could be a great new chapter in history.4
It seems to me that to say anything more in this letter would merely be repetitive or redundant. I am sending this through the mails rather than by cable because I want no other to see it except you and me.5
With warm personal regard, As ever
