Another voice
Fighting the funk
Auberon Waugh
Anew season for anti-nuclear protest in the West has opened. There are two e,)(Planations, I suspect, for the often- 'etnarked fact that the bulk of CND's sup- port is middle-class. In the first place, the cluiddle classes have more to lose; in the se- a°11d they are, as a class, more imaginative Ind More given to exercising of their brains. wnuld venture to doubt whether idealism the sense of an altruistic ethical the — plays any very large part in e decision. But it certainly plays a small Pniart' as well as adding powerfully to their ,,?vement's rhetoric and what is nowadays 'led its marketing package. n Although people think it less shameful : iadaYs than formerly to admit to feel- of terror, enough of the old warrior 'hat survives for convention to demand such admissions be accompanied by iesi_ tures of humorous self-deprecation. d uere is nothing humorous or self- and about CND. All is earnestness il high moral purpose. So before examin- (vtrhat part of the movement's inspiration leh derives from funk call it 'realism', prudence, caution — we might glance at the ,idart which derives from altruism — call it whealisilf, a sense of civic responsibility, or kat You will. a r.".,°b°dY can seriously doubt that there is are for saying that all nuclear weapons ra itninoral, that we should be prepared to ince the consequences of our moral purity d reDudiating them. It might have been to brd with exactly such a knotty moral pro- veenrn as this that democracy was first in- aged. My own view is slightly different, to .:(3,118h I would never dream of putting it 4.1 me vote, or trying to organise a mass uplv.i.enlent around it. In fact iny own view is eitbil'elY to recommend itself to anyone on he Side side of the nuclear fence — that f(;'rereas there can be no moral justification Noti,aun.ching a retaliatory strike where the tio,,Ive Is revenge, there need be no objec- po:'' aDart from scandal, to the deterrent Orture; and the only morally justifiable use stririLuclear weapons would be a pre-emptive tha':`e where there is sound reason to believe I' an attack is imminent. th,,"uld go further than this, and suggest ht.„— anY quasi-moral repugnance which has 41-11 felt at my suggestion that the only eni°41+:11.1se of nuclear weapons would be pre- must tend to reveal a latent 'funk' indrrent in the moral posture. Never lop There is nothing wrong with funk so (Lg as one recognises it for what it is, and geTt. not pretend it is anything else. MS, sug- `1°11 that funk is the main ingredient of the mass movement against nuclear weapons is supported. by the fact that the main drive of the Soviet propaganda effort has been directed towards it — not against the dreadful cost of defence (which I am convinced is the Labour Party's main ob- jection) nor against the wickedness of holding such fearful weapons against the peace-loving Russie-wussies. Its chief argu- ment against the deployment of American Cruise and Pershing II missiles in Europe (a development which plainly worries the Soviet Union as much as the earlier threat of the neutron bomb did) is that the short notice involved would require instant nuclear retaliation.
Perhaps this places me somewhere bet- ween Dr Edward Norman, the redoubtable Dean of Peterhouse CI think pacifism is im- moral. It leaves to others the disagreeable task of policing the world. It is an unrealistic view of human nature'), and the increasingly sinister Mr John Silkin (`There is no case, moral or political, for Britain's "independent" nuclear deterrent'). I draw attention to this matter of placing because it seems to me crucial in determining attitudes to what might otherwise be seen either as a moralist's or as a gambler's problem.
I do not suppose for a moment that either Lord Chalfont, or George Gale, or Max Hastings, is a Soviet agent. Nor, I am quite prepared to believe, is another journalist a Soviet agent whose writings seem to me to have many characteristics of the unedited Novosty features service, and who has recently concerned himself to illustrate the horrors of nuclear war in Britain, the gruesome inadequacy of Civil Defence to cope with it. I never quite managed to work out why Lord Chalfont was so eloquent against the development of the neutron bomb, but Mr Gale's opposition to American nuclear bases in Europe can easi- ly be explained by his Little England patriotism (which explains, also, his adop- tion of another Soviet foreign policy aim in opposing Britain's entry into the Common Market). Similarly, Max Hastings's por- trayal recently of Ronald Reagan as a war- mongering psychopath can easily be ex- plained by his very human desire not to be thought unfashionably blimpish.
None of these journalists can confidently be accused of having been manipulated by the Soviet propaganda machine. Their con- clusions, which happen to coincide in these instances with Soviet propaganda aims, are the product of normal middle-class reason- ing processes. All these attitudes, as I say, spring from honest opinions reached inde- pendently of the Soviet propaganda effort.
And so does the natural human condition of funk. It may be magnified by Soviet- - inspired documentaries on the dreadful suf- fering which will follow from nuclear war, but the condition is reached by independent reasoning, which chooses to ignore how much the likelihood of war would be in- creased by removal of the nuclear deterrent.
Conventional war — possibly far more hor- rible in its consequences than a nuclear ex- change — is something which is fairly remote when compared to the heightened awareness of mortality which the nuclear threat affords. Similarly, the prospect of Russian domination — even with intellec- tuals like Bernard Levin being shut up ir concentration camps — is positively to IN welcomed beside the prospect of death.
My quarrel with this attitude is that i confuses a metaphysical — and otiose — repudiation of death with an assessment o likelihoods. Funk is a perfectly valid anc sane reaction to the prospect of death, bu there are more immediate justifications foi funk, among which is the prospect •f* E Labour government.
Soviet domination of Britain, I moulc say, is more likely to come about a the result of a bankrupt, friendless and unstable Labour government appealitg to the Soviet Union for help than it isfrom military conquest. Peter Shore's Brikin is one that will deny the middle classesmore or less immediately every diffetntial benefit which they now enjoy. Why re the middle classes marching against the lomb, rather than stocking their cellars wit wine for years ahead?
As I intimated in last week's Spctator Wine Club special offer, I feel strorgly we should stock up with 1976 burtindies against the years ahead. The '78 clarts will take too long, and '75s are in short;upply and the '70s clarets are already toompen- sive. So are the '76 burgundies, excpt for the re-named Avery brand labels irwhich my hopes for the future largely resie.
In pushing the mystery red burgndy of 1976 called 'Simon d'Artigny' as trail- blazer, I mentioned the 'superb silky finish' and said that it 'drank magnicently now'. So it does if served at 2° abov. room temperature with hot food and loshed around in the glass, about half-way trough the meal. At that point, it gives anindica- tion of its promise. If drunk cold, rithout food, it has the characteristic smelbf dust — in old age called 'violets' — wich in- dicates a latent concentration of efort but otherwise tastes rather like all strop, young burgundies. The superb silky firsh may take 3-5 years to materialise, and is something to look forward to. I ansorry if I misled people about its present rinking performance, although most wl have realised what I meant in the contxt of a young burgundy. Next I hope to itroduce a whole series of 1976 mystery labs, some ideal for immediate drinking, °the; requir- ing many years. Please bear with ie.
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