A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK G IVEN the rather questionable decision that the
members of the European Advisory Commission should not be persons of Ministerial rank, no better choice on the British side could be made than Sir William Strang. Strang entered the diplomatic service later than most men, joining it in 1919 after fighting through the European War, and those who look on the Foreign Office as a closed corpora- tion may take note of the fact that he has risen to almost the highest position (that of Assistant Under-Secretary of State) without having resorted to either Eton or Harrow, Oxford or Cambridge. His ability, a little concealed by a studiously unassuming manner, is universally recognised by all who know his work, and his popularity equals it. Having served in Moscow as Counsellor, and gone there last month as Mr. Eden's right-hand man, he is clearly an ideal member of a committee to whose success Anglo-Russian under- standing and confidence is essential. That Strang took part in unsuccessful negotiations with Russia in 1939 is nothing to the point. Those negotiations broke on questions of principle that were decided by the British Government, not by its envoy.
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Incidentally, the appointments made to the European Advisory Commission in London and the Advisory Council for Italy at Algiers suggest that the latter is the more important body, though that can hardly have been the intention of the Moscow Conference. The London Commission consists of two members of Ambassadorial rank, with the third (the American) yet to be appointed. At Algiers there is Mr. Macmillan, who is a Minister of State, and M. Vyshinsky, who is Deputy-Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the Soviet Government ; the third member, Mr. Robert Murphy, it is true, has only the rank of Ambassador, and the fourth, the French, is not yet nominated. On balance the Algiers Council is the weightier body, but I fancy that is more by accident than design.
* * * * The friendship of Uruguay, which broke relations with Germany in January, 1942, has not attracted as much attention as it deserves. That admirably conducted South American Republic is not taking an active part in the war ; there is nothing obvious for it to "do in that direction, but when an opportunity of showing what it thinks of any of the leading Allied nations, Britain in particular, comes along it is made the most of. Particulars have just reached me from Montevideo of the generous and warm-hearted entertainment lavished a few weeks ago on several hundred British soldiers and airmen who, as a Buenos Aires paper instructively put it, were on their way from A to B. The most luxurious hotel in Uruguay, usually closed in winter, was placed at their disposal, the President's wife inspected it in advance to see that everything was as it should be, and privates, many no doubt for the first time in their lives, found themselves installed each in a bedroom with a private bath A Government decree emphasised the ideals for which "Members of the Air Force and the Land Forces of the British Empire now in Uruguay. as passengers in transit " were fighting, and ended with the assertion that " The Executive Power . . . assumes for its account, as an expense involved in a service which is indirectly of a public order because it means the defence of the international structure of our democratic institutions, the cost of maintaining the members of the British Army in the Miramar Hotel." Uruguay understands, I hope, how such courtesies are appreciated here.
Recognise as we may and must the fact that in dealing with cen classes of offenders who ought to be convicted the police can onl secure a conviction by resorting to subterfuges, some of the method employed seem not merely to reach but to overstep the limits the legitimate. In the House of Commons on Tuesday Mr. Peale Under-Secretary of the Home Office, defending police who had insti gated three men to tell a doctor false stories in order that hejnigh give them certificates that they were unfit for work and then prosecuted for doing so, denied strenuously that agents provocateu were countenanced. There was all the difference, he said (basin himself on the Royal Commission on Police Powers and Duties) between " giving opportunities to a person to commit an offence and " inciting " him to do it. There may be ; the question i admittedly difficult. In this particular case the magistrate foul] for the doctor, with costs against the Public Prosecutor, and mad some scathing remarks on the methods adopted. The detective sergeant who had organised the case agreed that the men he ha employed might be regarded as agents provocateurs. Not a pleasan smell.
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This is a story they are telling in Algiers. It was told me as trim Even if it has not that merit it has others. In the course of trans between Washington and Moscow, Mr. Cordell Hull stopped a Algiers to see General de Gaulle. At the hour when he was expecte the General established himself in his' bureau and observed " I sha receive him seated." One of his 'colleagues on the Committee National Liberation demurred respectfully, pointing out what w due to the Secretary of State of the United States, particularly wh he was an elderly gentleman and on his way home from a success mission after an arduous journey. " No," said the General, " I receive him seated, as President of the body which represen France." There was a moment of some tension, but a young attach was equal to the situation. He walked to the window and look out. " Ah," he said, " here is a car coming. I think it must be Mr. Hull's. Yes. It is Mr. Hull's. Ah, and there is General Girau waiting for him on the steps." " What ?" cried the no-longer-seate President of the Committee, making for the stairs. Mr. Hull wa received by General de Gaulle as he arrived at the front door.
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Does the B.B.C., I wonder, make jangling noises because it likes jangling noises itself or because it thinks the public like them? I settled down with lively expectation last Friday to listen to di full hour's programme " The Air is Our Concern," by Nigel Tangy and Cecil McGivern. So far as I could grasp the script behind the noise it was admirable, but the clamour of meaningless music and shouting men was such that I found it impossible re stay more than half the course. At the same time complaints reach me of the same kind of misfire over-dramatisation in two recent items, the Travellers' Tale of November 14th and the story of the Scottish hydro-electric scheme the next day. I suppbse producers must be given their heads, but I wish their heads were a little nearer the ground—where so many of us live.
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Mr. Wendell Willkie's .book, One World, has been re-christened (I think a little undeservedly) by a very eminent British critic
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