HISTORICAL NOTES: The Classic Tune

The two men who gave Jimmy Byrnes the most bother when he was Secretary of State were 1) V. M. Molotov, 2) Henry Wallace. In a book published this week, ex-Secretary of State Byrnes tells the story of the diplomatic struggle in which he took part, from Yalta (January 1945) to the New York conference of Foreign Ministers (November 1946). Written* from records and from onetime court reporter Byrnes’s shorthand notes, Speaking Frankly (Harper, $3.50) is sometimes illuminating, sometimes frank. Byrnes admires Molotov. Towards Wallace he is bitter.

In September 1946, everyone had an ear cocked for Byrnes’s reaction to Wallace’s Madison Square Garden speech, when Wallace denounced the firm policy which Byrnes was trying to carry out toward Russia. Byrnes was then in Paris at a delicately deadlocked peace conference. Byrnes maintained a towering public silence, but six days after the speech he sent a bristling message to the President, now made public for the first time:

“If it is not possible for you, for any reason, to keep Mr. Wallace [then Secretary of Commerce] . . . from speaking on foreign affairs … if it is not completely clear in your own mind that Mr. Wallace should be asked to refrain from criticizing the foreign policy of the United States while he is a member of your Cabinet, I must ask you to accept my resignation.”

The next day he added: “I do not think that any man who professes any loyalty to you would so seriously impair your prestige and the prestige of the Government. . . . You and I spent 15 months building a bipartisan policy … a permanent policy upon which the world could rely. Wallace destroyed it in a day.”

The following day, Harry Truman fired Henry Wallace.

“Nyet, Nyet.” Towards Molotov, Jimmy Byrnes’s feelings were like those of a man confronted by a two-legged monolith.

“He has unlimited patience as well as a fine mind and tremendous energy. Any exhibition of impatience or bad temper by others gives him amusement. At such times it is interesting to watch his serious, solemn expression as he protests his innocence of any provocation.” Molotov was a stickler for procedure. His favorite word was: “Nyet” (“No”), which Byrnes heard so often “I almost accept it as part of my own language. He can say in English, ‘I agree,’ but so seldom does he agree that his pronunciation isn’t very good.”

To Byrnes, the South Carolinian politician, Stalin seemed different. “Where Molotov is devious, Stalin is direct. . . . He was always in good humor and enjoyed a joke.” Jimmy Byrnes now says that he was not fooled, although it took him and President Truman some time to find out Stalin’s true nature. “It clearly has been Stalin who has called the tune,” writes Byrnes, “and Molotov who has made it last as long as a symphony.”

Old Time. What was the tune? Jimmy Byrnes thought he could sing it in his sleep. The music was classical, written in the days of Peter the Great. Russians simply want more—more & more.

Molotov made that clear to Hitler in 1940 during the days of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. Molotov demanded recognition of Russian interests in Rumania, Bulgaria, the Dardanelles and Finland, besides the Baltic states and part of Poland, as the price of continuing friendship. In fact, Byrnes believes that Molotov’s stubborn rooting away at Europe’s fences was what sent Hitler into a rage and precipitated the Nazi invasion of Russia.

In a Decent Manner. Soviet Russia’s ambitions are the same today, only more so. “I do not doubt,” says Byrnes “that their ultimate goal is to dominate, in one way or another, all of Europe.”

For advice on how to handle Moscow, Byrnes turned to no less an authority than Karl Marx, who wrote during another European crisis: “If the other powers hold firm, Russia is sure to retire in a very decent manner.” Writes Byrnes: “For many reasons the Soviets do not want war now. They will, I believe, ‘retire in a very decent manner.’ But if the other powers do not ‘hold firm’ then, as Marx warned us of the Czarist Russians, ‘conquest follows conquest and annexation follows annexation.’ ”

* With the help of Porter McKeever, former South Carolina newsman, now on the staff of the U.S. delegation to U.N.