THE
DOUBLE CRISIS
In world political reality, there are not now active three forces,
but only two. The most curious paradox of all is this: that the United
States, which, objectively, leads and must lead one of these two, is
still governed for the most part by Third Force ideas and men. In
Europe it is not perhaps understood that Washington's current
tough policy toward Communism is, in the minds of many of those
who pursue it, only a tactical variant of the same basic strategy that
formerly dictated the soft policy. They still believe in Washington
that a general and workable agreement with the Soviet Union (that
is to say, with Stalinism, for an agreement with a non-Stalinist Russia
would be easy enough) can be gained by the methods of a shrewd
horse trader.
Malraux:
And among the American groups who sympathize
with the Third Force there are also horse traders.
Let us make a point of history.
It
is a fact that the Soviet Union
recognized the Provisional Government of France before the United
States did. It is not as easily verifiable, but it is my belief that the
State Department made a mistake when it tried to substitute for
General de Gaulle a gallant soldier like General Giraud, who was
as well fitted to undertake the difficult burden of the liberation of
France as I am to be a Chinese actor. Didn't your diplomatic habit
of playing off one Central American General against the other per–
haps have something to do with it? You must understand that General
de Gaulle, because of the role he played from June 18, 1940, was
for us, the only person capable of assuring the continuity of France.
France, as you know, went to Moscow. It seems to me, though,
that President Roosevelt also went to Yalta-and for reasons which,
even today, do not seem so bad to me. Our attempt to reach an agree–
ment with the Russians entailed a liability which was, for France, very
heavy. But would it not have been still heavier if we had refused
even the attempt? I do not think that anyone could have remained
in power in France, or even in the United States, if he had brought
about a break with Russia, which at that time would have seemed
to have no justification. The most recent relations between Russia
and the West had been exclusively military, and what the West then
chiefly knew of Russia was the bravery of her troops and the enormity
of her losses.
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