Understanding

Secretary of State George Marshall wanted a final understanding with the world and the Soviet Union. That thought lighted up with a cold glow the speech he made early last week in Chicago.

He was wrathful over Russia's "calculated campaign of vilification and distortion of American motives in foreign affairs." The U.S. had one objective in Europe: restore Europe's peace and economic equilibrium. With that objective he was going to London to sit with Molotov, Bevin and Bidault on the fate of Germany and Austria. "My purpose [is] to concentrate solely on finding an acceptable basis of agreement to terminate the present tragic stalemate," he said.

Placet. Two days later he took off in the President's Sacred Cow. "I'll do my best," he promised Harry Truman.

The day after Marshall landed in England, Oxford University honored him with a degree of Doctor of Civil Law and broke a tradition by letting him witness the ceremony of his election by the doctors and heads of Oxford's colleges. Would the doctors give the degree to "a man most brilliant in war and peace?" Intoned the doctors: Placet (O.K.).

The university broke another custom by letting "the pride of Virginia, Mr. George Catlett Marshall," speak at the convocation. He recalled wartime conferences with Britons. The idea of understanding lighted his words again, this time with warmth. "We almost invariably reached agreement no matter how complex the issue."

Nancy's Friend. He displayed his understanding of other matters at a tea at Rhodes House. To a group of American scholars he said: "I should ask if anyone here has a girl friend named Nancy." There was: Rhodes Scholar Buckley Whitelach. The Secretary thereupon delivered the message, from Nancy Adams: she hoped soon to be on her way to England.

This week Marshall faced Molotov. He would no longer tolerate Soviet tactics which had turned other conferences into sounding boards for interminable Soviet propaganda. If no agreements were to be reached, then the conference must end and the Soviet Union and the U.S. must go their antithetical ways in Europe. That was what Marshall now intended: an understanding, even if it was an understanding that the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. were in irreconcilable disagreement.

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