Czechoslovakia

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 26 August 1968.

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Photo of Mr Michael Foot Mr Michael Foot , Ebbw Vale 12:00, 26 August 1968

If the right hon. Gentleman wishes in advance to say that he repudiates the speeches of the right hon. Members for Streatham and Kingston- upon-Thames, no one will be more gratified than myself. By the simple way in which I have illustrated the difference between them, I hope that it will almost be unnecessary for the right hon. Gentleman to make a speech at all.

But let us suppose that the speeches of the right hon. Members for Streatham and Kingston-upon-Thames were to be flashed across to the Kremlin during the present discussions. Nothing could play into the hands of the "hawks" in the Kremlin more. Those speeches, if reported there, could be used against Mr. Dubcek and his colleagues, who I am sure, are doing everything they can to stand up for the rights of Czechoslovakia. It is, therefore, disgraceful that such speeches should have been made. This is partly because they show such a misreading of the situation. If it were the case that such a second development were to arise, then what will have happened will accord much more closely with the analysis of the situation given by the hon. Member for Bute and North Ayrshire (Sir F. Maclean), who speaks with much more authority on these matters than either the right hon. Member for Streatham or Kingston-upon-Thames—and pretty well the rest of the other side of the House put together.

The hon. Member knows a good deal about it. And what is the central point of his analysis—contradicted, I am sorry to say, by some of his conclusions? In my opinion, it is that the Soviet Government have not merely committed a crime—we all agree about that—but have committed also a gigantic blunder, one which does enormous damage to Soviet power and influence throughout the world. That is the case, and what we are dealing with is not an act of strength by the Soviet Government, but an act of weakness. This weakness could be such that instead of living in the presence of an event which may be compared primarily to what happened in 1948 or 1938, we may instead be living in the presence of something quite different—in the presence of something which might be called a gigantic Bay of Pigs operation, or a gigantic Suez operation, if that is not a reference too indelicate for hon. Members opposite. It may be that a great Power will be compelled to retreat. That is the hope we must all have and work for.

In my opinion, such a development would accord more with the facts as we see them than the other alternative explanations. If one looks at Soviet policy over the last three or four years it is not one that impresses us as that of a Government with a single-minded, steadfast idea of how to serve its best interests throughout the world. That has not been the aspect presented by the Soviet Government—it has been much more a policy which has turned this way and that, not knowing exactly how a foreign policy should be conducted. The people in the Kremlin have been in a position of weakness partly because of these events in Eastern Europe. They have not known how to deal with them. How to deal with the upsurge of freedom does not appear in the Soviet textbooks, and they have not known how to deal with it.

One of the most intelligent ways to which we might try to deal with this new situation was suggested, strangly enough, by the right hon. and learned Member for Wirral (Mr. Selwyn Lloyd). He was one of the few Members who so far have put their fingers on a very important aspect. He said—and I do not mean that this provides any excuse whatever for Soviet action—that these developments are concerned with security in Central Europe. Of course they are. If we all get what we are hoping for—an agreement whereby Russian troops withdraw from the places that they now occupy—there may be a fresh opportunity for a new security agreement. That was one of the hopes that the Czechs had. If we had had negotiations previously providing for a new security pact in Europe which would help to lift the fears of people in East and West, it might be that this appalling crime and tragedy in Central Europe would not have occurred.

The major conclusion which we should draw from this situation, contrary to what has been said opposite, is not military, but diplomatic. The right hon. and learned Member for Wirral was perfectly correct when he said that we should look afresh at how we should make proposals for providing for the security of Central Europe. There will have to be a new security system, according to which can give legitimate guarantees to the Soviet Union and the other countries in between.

We will have to do this precisely because of the upsurge of freedom in all these countries. It is not the peoples of the Warsaw Pact countries who have wanted to commit this crime against Czechoslovakia. Many are no doubt aghast at what has been done in their name. All these countries want to follow, in one way or another, the kind of road taken by Yugoslavia or Rumania, or the road which the Czechs were seeking.

How will we encourage them to do it? By saying, "Oh no. We are to encourage you to develop in a much freer way on your side of Europe by consolidating the N.A.T.O.bloc into a much tighter military organisation."? That is the very opposite to what we should do. If that is our reaction and if, Heaven forfend, the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Streatham became the policy of Her Majesty's Government, we would have drawn all the wrong conclusions from these events, and would now be heading back towards the worst days of the cold war.

It has been rightly said on both sides of the House, although not by the right hon. Gentlemen I mentioned, that it would be extreme folly for us to say that the whole idea of the possibility of adétente is gone, particularly, and the whole of my speech is delivered on this basis, as we are still speculating about what may be the outcome of these present critical negotiations in Moscow.

There has been some reference to Vietnam. I will not delay the debate by elaborating on this, but I must say this much: there are tens of millions of people all over the world who think that there is a very close parallel between Vietnam and what has happened in Czechoslovakia. There are 600,000 American troops in Vietnam. In my opinion, they are there in defiance of the Charter of the United Nations. Certainly, the massive and continued bombing of people in North Vietnam is in defiance of any rights accorded to any power under the United Nations. Such action has been condemned time and again by the Secretary-General of the United Nations and it has been condemned, whatever may be the various arguments of hon. Gentlemen, by the vast masses of people all over the world.

There is an almost unanimous verdict of condemnation of what the Russians have done in Czechoslovakia, but equally there is a very wide measure of condemnation of what the Americans still seek to do in Vietnam. Our Government would be in a much stronger position to put forward their policies for Europe if they were carrying out the same policies, and standing by the same principles in Asia—and, incidentally, thereby executing the official policies of the Labour Party—in opposing what we regard as American aggression in Vietnam.

These; two operations in different continents cannot be separated and it is foolish in a debate of this nature for us to think that we can talk only of Europe and leave aside affairs in Asia, when more have been killed in Vietnam in the last week than in Europe.

One more matter. I do not say this offensively to the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire, but I do say it directly. I think that it is a pity that the Opposition selected him to speak on this occasion. In dealing with Czechoslovakia it is wrong and unwise, and not in the interests of this country, that one of the main spokesmen in this House should be one of the few surviving "men of Munich ". It would be more graceful if he had forgone this privilege.

I remember very well, I shall never forget, the last broadcast that came out of Czechoslovakia when the right hon. Gentleman and his friends were helping to deal with the affairs of that country. I remember when the German troops marched into Prague the radio stations were closed down. They were not able to conduct the brilliant operations that the Czechs are managing this time. I shall remember to my dying day the last message that came over the radio from Prague: We bequeath our sorrows to the French and English people. That is what happened in March, 1939. For the reasons I have given, I believe that we can have more hopes now, but I think that this depends partly upon the wisdom with which we act. I believe that the way in which the Government have approached the question shows that they have that wisdom in dealing with this situation. I think that they will continue to display that wisdom all the better by rejecting the advice of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Streatham and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames all the old cold warriors who have gone into battle again so eagerly in this debate-—and by rejecting, also, the advice that may come from an old "man of Munich", however much he may have suffered a conversion in the interim.