War Situation.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 27 January 1942.

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Photo of Sir Stanley Reed Sir Stanley Reed , Aylesbury

I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for having given me the opportunity to speak after the hon. Member for Darlington (Mr. Peat); we have been strengthened and encouraged by the speeches which we have heard from him and the hon. Member for Leigh (Mr. Tinker). They have both put before this House and the country points of view, based on their wide experience, which are of profound significance at this very serious juncture in our history. When the hon. Member for Darlington protested against the intriguing and sniping which go on in parts of this House, the existence of these factors was proved by the vehement protests of indignation aroused by his remarks. I would ask the House seriously to consider what is the major issue behind this Debate. This Debate is not only concerned with the war and the conduct of the war; it is not so much concerned with the Prime Minister and his colleagues, but with a much bigger thing, namely, whether our democratic institutions are going to prove strong enough and enduring enough to beat down the terrible menace of totalitarian efficiency. If our democratic institutions are to carry us through these grievous days to the security we hope and pray for, they can only do it if we lay closely to our he arts the words that have been said to-day and which are of profound significance—absolute loyalty to those to whom we have remitted this dreadful responsibility, and loyalty to the only man who can carry it through to the issue which we so fervently desire.

After listening to the Prime Minister today when he gave his closely-reasoned and, of course, fully informed survey of the situation, I would ask who, with any knowledge of military and naval history and of any part of the world outside his own village or township, cannot accept his exposition of the grand strategy of war? Who is there who cannot accept our policy of aid to Russia in her hour of fearful peril? We are all profoundly moved and heartened by the astounding victories which the Russians have been able to achieve. When we think of the advances which the Russian Armies are making on two, if not three, fronts, let us not forget for one moment the appalling sacrifices which the Russian people have made, and the appalling misery which has been inflicted on the unfortunate people who have been trodden and trampled down by the German armies. Let us not forget the millions of people who are returning to their ruined territory and homes.

We owe the Russian people the deepest debt of gratitude that in all these circumstances they have maintained their incomparable resistance to the German armies and that, with the sacrifices they have made, and the greater sacrifices before them, they are determined to pursue this issue whatever it may cost, and however long it may last, until they have removed the German menace from the face of Europe for as far ahead as we can see. Does any Member of the House seriously, looking at the position of the Russian people, think that our Government could have done anything wiser at that great moment than give them the material aid, and the psychological reaction which followed from it, at that great issue in their history? It was not an easy decision to make. Any man of average intelligence knows that every ship, every gun, every rifle, every round of ammunition was needed in every part of the world-wide battle front. The Government had to take their courage in both hands, and we owe to them a sense of profound gratitude that they took that great decision at that great time and aided the great results that we see in these marvellous Russian successes.

Has every one of those who have criticised the Libyan campaign ever been through the Mediterranean, seen the passages in those narrow seas, realised what the complete recovery of the Mediterranean would mean for us—and what its complete loss would mean for us? Anyone who has ever taken the late Lord Salisbury's advice to look at large scale maps, anyone who has a knowledge of those waters, which I have been up and down 50 or 60 times, anyone with any appreciation of the tremendous importance of the Canal, must realise that the Government did a wise and a great thing in concentrating their military effort, and largely their naval effort, on the North African campaign, with its bearing on the whole situation in the Mediterranean, the Canal zone and the Caucasus. We are all in a state of profound unease over the situation in Malaya and the neighbouring waters. Do hon. Members think that the agony and the distress of those of us who have lived and worked in those areas, to whom it has been for a large part of our lives a second home, are any less than theirs, or do they think that because on broad grounds we support the Government we are any less moved than they are over the unfortunate events now taking place in those islands and those waters?

What is as clear as that night followeth day and what is the one issue in this grand strategy which does not admit of a moment's contradiction? The whole Government plan, the whole broad strategic plan in those waters—we can say it, and must say it, because our great Allies across the Atlantic have said it—was wrecked in an hour in Pearl Harbour—and when the "Repulse" and the "Prince of Wales" were taken into the Gulf of Siam to look for trouble and found it. The Prime Minister, in his masterly history of the World Crisis, said that Lord Jellicoe was the only man who could have lost the War in an hour: Our Eastern strategic plan was wrecked in, possibly, twenty minutes. Obviously the whole strategy of the campaign in the Pacific was based upon a strong fleet in being, based on Honolulu, and a certain number of capital ships based on Singapore. Without those buttresses the whole of the strategic policy was swept away in a few terrible minutes. The Government then had to consider what to do in an unexpected situation. Instead of the Japanese moving their troops in limited numbers from point to point and in the face of imminent attack by strong battle fleets, they were placed in supreme command of the Pacific. With that complete command of the sea they have been able to do a thing which nobody could have anticipated. They have been able to move their troops here and there, to this island and to that, and to land them and to establish them temporarily in relatively absolute security; not absolute, for they have lost and will lose more ships. Nobody could have anticipated the events which have disturbed a strategic plan which I believe the circumstances of the hour justified. It has been thrown into confusion by events for which the Government are in no sense responsible and which no man could have foreseen. We have only to read the papers of yesterday in order to understand what occurred and in order to appreciate events which nobody could have anticipated.

Before the Prime Minister made his masterly résumé of the present str ategical situation to-day I placed my complete and whole-hearted confidence in him. I join with the hon. Member for Darlington (Mr. Peat) in his reasoned protest against the sniping and intrigue which are directed against the Prime Minister. My memory is not as short as that of some hon. Members. I was in my place in the House when, in the darkest hour in our history, the Prime Minister rose from the Front Bench and in words of imperishable import rallied the whole nation and Empire to their salvation.

For that reason alone, as well as for other reasons—and we have countless reasons—I give him now my complete, my wholehearted, my unqualified support, and I join in the protest which has been made against those who seek by sniping to weaken his position in this House, in this country and in the Commonwealth. If there is one man more than another who deserves support in the most abundant degree, it is he, and in giving him that support I will do what every intelligent man in other walks of life does, give him full confidence, including his own colleagues and his own team, in order that he may carry on the work which we have remitted to him which, in all conscience, is heavy enough at all times and in all circumstances.

When the Prime Minister spoke of administrative sacrifices in respect of what has happened in Malaya, I think he misinterpreted those who hold certain views in this matter. It is not because of what happened in Malaya that we shall rejoice to see him exercising a certain discrimination in the retention of certain colleagues but as a protest against a doctrine which, I think, is a thoroughly bad one, and that is the doctrine of continuous Ministerial employment, efficient or inefficient. We feel that when an individual holding three high offices in succession has proved incompetent in each one, it is straining loyalty a little hard to ask us to endorse his retention in a Government which we all support. As I have said, I give the Prime Minister my whole-hearted support. Like the hon. Member for Darlington, I believe in a spirit of loyalty, and I ask hon. Members, divorced as they have been from the constituencies for a long time, to consider many times how they stand with the country and whether, if they are going to weaken the Prime Minister at this supreme hour, they will not weaken the position of this House in the country, and weaken the whole of our Parliamentary institutions—institutions which should and must not only carry us through fair weather but carry us through foul weather as well.

I rejoice that a Vote of Confidence has been put down. I think the Prime Minister was entitled to demand this Vote of Confidence, in order to bring to a head all those unworthy currents which have been setting in and which are still flowing, and if it comes to a vote in the Lobby, I shall feel proud and flattered at the opportunity of recording my vote and of feeling that I, at any rate, poor thing as it may be, played that small part in maintaining in full and unimpaired splendour the magnificent leadership we have had since the day the Prime Minister entered upon his present office.