"LIBERAL" FIFTH COLUMN
281
explosion which blew the war honeymoon to bits, ushering in the new
groupings in world politics and opinion.
Humanity had good reason to be afraid now that the atomic
bomb had arrived. But in the first rush of journalistic panic it was not
always easy to distinguish those afflicted with fear and trembling from
those- who were merely glad of an occasion to don the robes of
prophecy and pontification. The "liberals" seized upon the occasion
to launch a new campaign of war hysteria. War in 90 days!
The
New .Republic
screamed on the first page of one of its issues-which
appeared, by the way, more than 90 days ago. The "liberals" fell
all over themselves to violate elementary logic: the bomb was no
secret, therefore the secret should be given immediately to Russia;
or to violate common sense: the secret itself would e:kplode-as if
the secret were a ticking infernal machine, and human hands, with
definite political purposes, were not required to make a bomb and
set it off.
But behind all these antics the essential point of the rcliberal"
attack was simply that the United States had the bomb and Russia
did not.
Here was the first clear-cut indication that a new standard .of
judgment for all political and social questions had been found: the
potential advantage or disadvantage to Soviet Russia. The "liberal"
distrust of the United States was as unbounded as their confidence
in Russia: in American hands the atomic bomb constituted a threat
to the peace of the world, but of course, if Russia had possession of
it, the world could rest secure. The millions of Stalin's political
victims, if they could speak from the grave, might have a wry com–
ment to make upon this.
The Fifth Column developed steadily through the period of the
first meeting of Prime Ministers
in
London. Molotov wrecked that
conference on a legal technicality, which brought an enormous ad–
vantage to Russia. The longer Europe remains unsettled by treaty,
the longer it remains prey to the occupying Red Army and the So–
viet secret police. Stalin can be counted upon to continue this delaying
tactic as long as he can get away with it. (The Russian evasiveness
when Byrnes recently offered a Security Pact, which would take the
Red Army out of certain parts of Europe, was another illustration
of this tactic.) Molotov also began to fiddle another tune to which
our "liberals" were· soon jigging. He accused the United States of
playing "atomic power politics," although up to that point Byrnes
-considerably to Bevin's disgust-had been giving a remarkable
imitation of a diplomatic Caspar Milquetoast. But
this
did not bother
the "liberals." They were showing that they could dance just as
