European Diary, 1977-1981

by Roy Jenkins

85 Robert S. McNamara, b. 1916, was US Secretary of Defense 1961–8, and President of the World Bank 1968–81.

  86 The career of William Clark, 1916–85, ranged from being diplomatic correspondent of the Observer 1950–5, to a vice-presidency of the World Bank 1974–81.

  87 Thea Elliott, widow of Anthony Elliott, 1921–76, British Ambassador in Finland and then Israel and a close friend from Oxford days.

  88 Joint European Torus, a major research undertaking into the possibility of producing nuclear power by fusion rather than fission, which was likely to be sited either at Garching in Bavaria or Culham in Oxfordshire.

  89 Jean François-Poncet, b. 1928, was Secretary-General at the Elysée 1976–8, and French Foreign Minister 1978–81.

  90 Edward Jenkins, b. 1954, is our younger son, now a barrister.

  91 Henry H. (Joe) Fowler, b. 1908, was in 1968 US Secretary of the Treasury.

  92 I now realize, which I did not then, that it was almost certainly the room to the window of which President Truman rashly rushed on 1 November 1950, when the Puerto Rican assassination attempt on him led to two deaths in the street outside.

  93 Cyrus R. Vance, b. 1917, was US Secretary of State from 1977 to the summer of 1980, when he resigned. Zbigniew Brzezinski, b. 1928, was National Security Adviser at the White House throughout the Carter administration. He and Vance did not get on very well together. I preferred Vance.

  94 Henry Owen, b. 1920, formerly of the Brookings Institute, was the American ‘sherpa’ (as they came to be called) for ascents to and descents from the Western Economic Summits, and as such the opposite number of Crispin Tickell, the British Cabinet Secretary (Sir John Hunt), the Governor of the Bank of France (Bernard Clappier) etc.

  95 Michael Blumenthal was then US Secretary of the Treasury, Robert Strauss was Special Trade Representative, and Richard Cooper was Under-Secretary for Economic Affairs at the State Department.

  96 Jean Sauvagnargues, b. 1915, a career diplomat, was French Foreign Minister 1974–6, and Ambassador to London 1977–81.

  97 MTNs: negotiations for the implementation of the so-called ‘Tokyo Round’ of tariff reductions in the GATT, which was the main formal business between the Commission and the US Government.

  98 Averell Harriman, 1891–1986, former US Secretary of Commerce, Ambassador to Moscow and London, and Governor of New York, had married Pamela Digby, formerly Mrs Randolph Churchill, in 1971.

  99 David Bruce, 1898–1977, who had married Evangeline Bell in 1945, was the most distinguished American diplomat during the plenitude of his country’s power. He was Ambassador to Paris 1949–52, Bonn 1957–9, London 1961–9, and NATO 1974–6, the intervals being filled with major ad hoc appointments.

  100 Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr, b. 1917, historian of the ages of Jackson, Roosevelt and Kennedy, was married to Alexandra Emmet.

  101 Joseph W. Alsop, b. 1910, wrote for thirty years a famous political column, at first with his brother Stewart Alsop and then alone, until he tired of politics and turned in 1974 to old furniture and the history of art.

  102 John Lindsay, b. 1921, Mayor of New York 1965–73. Much discussed as a possible Democratic presidential candidate (even though he had been elected as a Republican) for 1972.

  103 McGeorge Bundy, b. 1919, was National Security Adviser to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson 1961–6, and head of the Ford Foundation 1966–79.

  104 Lord Mountbatten was in Brussels partly to lobby me in favour of his Atlantic College at St Donat’s in the Vale of Glamorgan.

  105 Eugenio Plaja, b. 1914, was Italian Permanent Representative to the UN 1973–5, and to the European Community 1976–80.

  106 Walter Hallstein, 1901–82, former German State Secretary, had been President of the Commission 1958–67, and was ‘the Pope’ to de Gaulle’s ‘Emperor’ during the 1960s disputes between supranationalism and sovereignty.

  107 François Mitterrand, b. 1916, was then preparing to lead the Socialist challenge to President Giscard’s majority in the National Assembly at the French legislative elections due in ten months’ time. He had been unsuccessful candidate for the presidency of France in 1965 and 1974. He was elected President of the Republic in 1981 and re-elected in 1988.

  108 Jacques Chirac, b. 1931, Prime Minister of France 1974–6 and 1986–8. Mayor of Paris since 1977. Unsuccessful candidate for the presidency 1974 and 1988.

  109 The reason for my uneasiness about this visit was that I knew the French Government were watching like hawks to make sure that Mitterrand received no treatment above what they regarded as his status or which he could exploit for political purposes. (God knows how; I would not have thought a Berlaymont visit would swing many votes in Château-Chinon or anywhere else.) I wrote a few weeks later: ‘Although there was a great deal of French press comment and some suggestion that this visit had been a considerable additional factor in provoking Giscard to a still harder position over the Summit, I myself doubt whether it was in any way decisive. I had read in the papers on the morning of the visit that Giscard was not coming to the dinner on Friday evening, probably because of my presence, but we had heard hints earlier that he was thinking of not attending this occasion for at least a few weeks beforehand and that in any event it was intended as a slight mark of his displeasure with the British Government over excessive Atlanticism, rather than being exclusively directed towards me.

  ‘Ortoli’s subsequent view, which he relayed to me three or four days later, was that it was a pity that Mitterrand had been allowed to have a joint meeting with several Commissioners, instead of having to go round and see them all individually in their offices (which seemed to me rather foolish) but that in any event the matter was not of great significance; and that this was his view after subsequent contacts with the French Government. Only the French Government, of course, would have reacted at all. That was the point of my remark about Kohl and Mrs Thatcher.’

  110 (Sir) Antony Acland, b. 1930, then British Ambassador in Luxembourg, is now Ambassador in Washington, having in the meantime been Ambassador in Madrid and Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office. Anne Acland died in 1984.

  111 Pierre Elliott Trudeau, b. 1919, was Prime Minister of Canada 1968–79 and 1980–4.

  112 Sir Martin Charteris, b. 1913, Private Secretary to the Queen 1972–7, became Lord Charteris of Amisfield and Provost of Eton College later in 1978.

  113 David Steel b. 1938, had become leader of the Liberal Party in 1976.

  114 Emilio Colombo, b. 1920, Italian Minister of the Treasury 1967–70 and 1974–6, Prime Minister 1970–2, Foreign Minister 1980–3; President of the European Parliament 1977–9.

  115 Euratom was the European Atomic Energy Community, one of the three Communities (the others being the EEC and the Coal and Steel Community) which merged in 1967 to form the European Community. The Vienna Agency was the International Atomic Energy Agency, based in the Austrian capital. The issue was that some Community Governments wished to deal too directly with Vienna, thereby leap-frogging Community competence in civil nuclear power.

  116 Franz Josef Strauss, 1915–88, was President of the Christian Social Union 1961–88 and Minister-President of Bavaria 1978–88; Federal Minister of Defence 1956–62, and of Finance 1966–9.

  117 Hans Friderichs, b. 1931, was German Economics Minister 1972–7, and then head of the Dresdner Bank until 1985.

  118 Peter Jay was then the forty-year-old economics editor of The Times and the son-in-law of the Prime Minister.

  119 Walter Scheel, b. 1919, was leader of the FDP before Genscher, Foreign Minister 1969–74, and President of the Federal Republic 1974–9.

  120 Jack Lynch, leader of Fianna Fáil 1966–79, was Irish Prime Minister (Taoiseach) 1966–73 and 1977–9.

  121 In fact he won handsomely.

  122 Respectively a former Conservative Minister and the Chairman of Sotheby’s.

  123 A well-financed, unofficial but high-level body designed to familiarize Americans, Japanese and Europeans with each other’s
problems.

  124 Sir Ronald McIntosh, b. 1919, former civil servant and Director-General of NEDO, latterly a company chairman, has been a friend since we went to Balliol on the same day in 1938.

  125 Mark (Lord cr. 1986) Bonham Carter, b. 1922, has been a friend for forty-five years and my publisher (on and off) for thirty years. His wife, Leslie (daughter of Condé Nast who founded Vogue), is the mother (by a previous marriage) of Laura Grenfell (now Phillips) who came to Brussels in my cabinet.

  126 As Keynes had done thirty-one years before on the last evening of his life; he walked down, which we did not.

  127 Noël (Lord cr. 1965) Annan, b. 1916, Provost of King’s College, Cambridge, 1956–66, and of University College London 1966–78, Vice-Chancellor of University of London 1978–81. Married to Gabriele Annan, book reviewer of note.

  128 Special Action was jargon for a crash programme to help peculiarly low-income countries with identifiable development needs.

  129 Karl Carstens, b. 1914, was then President of the Bundestag and became President of the Federal Republic 1979–84.

  130 Sir Isaiah Berlin, OM, b. 1909, the doyen of Oxford intellectual and social life.

  131 Lord Briggs, b. 1921, Provost of Worcester College, Oxford, since 1976, was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sussex 1967–76.

  132 Lord Goodman, b. 1913, a solicitor of unusual influence, was Chairman of the Arts Council 1965–72, and Master of University College, Oxford, 1976–86.

  133 Ann Fleming, 1913–81, was married to the 3rd Lord O’Neill 1932–44 (when he was killed in action), the 2nd Viscount Rothermere 1945–52 (when they were divorced), and Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond, 1952–64 (when he died). She was a great friend and fairly close country neighbour in the years of these diaries.

  134 Lord Hartwell (formerly Michael Berry), b. 1911, was for many years principal proprietor and editor-in-chief of the Daily and Sunday Telegraph. His wife was a daughter of F. E. Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead.

  135 Mrs John Barry Ryan, anglophile New Yorker, is the daughter of financier Otto Kahn and the mother of the Countess of Airlie.

  136 Anthony Lewis, b. 1927, chief London correspondent of the New York Times 1965–72, subsequently a Boston-based columnist.

  137 The countries adhering to the pre-EMS ‘Snake’ or D-mark bloc were Benelux, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and, obviously, Germany. Italy had been a member but had left in 1973. France had twice been a member but had last left in 1976.

  138 Arthur Goodhart, 1891–1978, was an American citizen who had mostly lived in England since 1919 and was Master of University College, Oxford, 1951–63.

  139 Sir Ian Gilmour, b. 1926, a Conservative MP from 1962, a minister throughout the Heath Government ending as Secretary of State for Defence, became Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (with much European responsibility) 1979–81. He and his wife, (Lady) Caroline Gilmour, appear in a variety of places throughout the diary.

  140 William (Lord cr. 1988) Rees-Mogg, b. 1928, was editor of The Times 1967–81, and has subsequently been Vice-Chairman of the BBC and Chairman of the Arts Council.

  141 Lord Blake, b. 1916, historian and biographer, was Provost of Queen’s College, Oxford, 1968–87. He was to be one of my rivals for the Chancellorship of Oxford.

  142 Peter, 6th Lord Carrington KG, b. 1919, succ. 1938, had been Defence Secretary 1970–4 and was to be Foreign Secretary 1979–82, and Secretary-General of NATO 1984–8. In the summer of 1976 I tried to get him to come to Brussels as the second British Commissioner and was surprisingly close to succeeding.

  143 Malcolm Fraser, b. 1930, succeeded Gough Whitlam as Prime Minister of Australia in 1975 and held the office until 1983.

  144 Andrew Peacock, b. 1939, was Australian Foreign Minister 1975–80 and leader of the Liberal Party 1980–5.

  145 John Prescott, b. 1938, has been Labour MP for Kingston-upon-Hullsince 1970, leader of the British Labour Group in the European Parliament 1976–9.

  146 Jim Cattermole, b. 1910, had been my agent when I was adopted as candidate for Solihull in 1945. Subsequently a Labour Party regional organizer and then the organizational linchpin of all pro-European activity within the Labour Party.

  147 We did.

  148 Sir Seretse Khama, 1921–80, was an hereditary tribal ruler who became the first President of the newly independent Botswana in 1966. His 1948 marriage to Ruth Williams of Croydon plunged him into racial controversy and made him a temporary hero of the left in Britain.

  149 Alexander Haig, b. 1924, was Chief of the White House Staff 1973–4, Supreme Allied Commander Europe 1974–9, and US Secretary of State 1981–2.

  150 Lord Plowden, b. 1907, had been Chief Planner at the Treasury under Cripps, Gaitskell and Butler, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Authority 1954–9, and Chairman of Tube Investments Ltd 1963–76.

  151 Professor Dr Karl Schiller, b. 1911, had been Minister of Economics in the Federal German Government 1966–72.

  152 Guido Carli, b. 1914, had been Governor of the Bank of Italy 1961–76.

  153 Morgan Philips Price, 1885–1973, was a fox-hunting squire who, after being Manchester Guardian and Daily Herald correspondent in Russia and later Berlin 1914–23, became a Labour MP 1929–31 and 1935–59.

  154 Josef Van der Meulen, 1914–84, was Belgian Permanent Representative to the European Community 1959–79.

  155 This was the proposal which I had tentatively outlined to Schmidt on 18 March (see page 68 supra) and which we eventually achieved under the name of ‘the Ortoli facility’ (he administered the loans).

  156 Anthony Wedgwood Benn, b. 1925, the foremost advocate of the 1975 referendum ‘to settle the issue’, was then mounting a campaign to ignore that decision and bring Britain out of Europe.

  157 Sir Roy Denman, b. 1924, had previously been a Second Permanent Secretary in the British Cabinet Office. Head of the Commission delegation in Washington since 1982.

  158 In 1947 Scelba was Italian Minister for the Interior and played a notable role in narrowly averting a Communist takeover following a collapse into strike-induced chaos.

  159 Joe (cr. Lord 1982) Gormley, b. 1917, President of the National Union of Mineworkers 1971–82.

  160 Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, b. 1926, now Chairman of English Heritage.

  161 George Howard, 1920–84, was a Balliol contemporary, lord of Castle Howard and later Chairman of the BBC.

  162 Lord O’Hagan, b. 1945. He became a Conservative Member of the European Parliament in 1979.

  163 Article 131 was the provision in the accession arrangements for Britain, Denmark and Ireland allowing a strictly limited adjustment if the budgetary burden upon one country became manifestly excessive.

  164 John Davies, 1916–79. Having been Director-General of the CBI 1965–9, he was a minister throughout the Heath Government and shadow foreign affairs spokesman 1976–8. Mrs Thatcher tried to nominate him as the second British Commissioner in 1976, but I successfully preferred Christopher Tugendhat.

  165 Sir Michael Palliser, b. 1922, was Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office 1975–82.

  166 Geoffrey Rippon, b. 1924, cr. Lord Rippon 1987. Edward Heath’s chief negotiator for Britain’s entry to Europe, 1970–2. Secretary of State for the Environment 1972–4. Leader of the Conservative Group in the European Parliament 1977–9.

  167 Sir Peter Ramsbotham, b. 1919, was Ambassador to Teheran 1971–4, and to Washington 1974–7. Subsequently Governor of Bermuda.

  168 Edmund Dell, b. 1921, Labour MP for Birkenhead 1964–79, was Secretary of State for Trade 1976–8, when he left the Government and became Chairman of Guinness Peat and subsequently of Channel Four TV.

  169 Sir Leo Pliatzky, b. 1919, was an Oxford contemporary who was a Treasury official 1950–77, and Permanent Secretary, Department of Trade, 1977–9.

  170 Frances Morrell, b. 1937, became Chairman of the Inner London Education Authority 1983–7.

  171 Marcelino Oreja Aguirre, b. 1935, was Spanish Foreign Minister 1976–80, an
d has been Secretary-General of the Council of Europe at Strasbourg since 1984.

  172 Jo Grimond, b. 1913, cr. Lord Grimond 1983, leader of the Liberal Party 1956–67.

  173 David Carritt, 1927–81. Highly talented in the attribution of Renaissance paintings.

  174 11th Earl of Drogheda, b. 1910. Managing Director of the Financial Times 1945–70, and Chairman of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, 1956–74.

  175 Diana Phipps, b. 1937, the daughter of a Bohemian family with land in Czechoslovakia (see her mother’s book, The Journey, by Cecilia Sternberg, 1982), married the scion of a well-known New York family who died young, and was settled in England, mainly at Buscot Parsonage, during the period of this diary.

  176 So called because it normally met in the Albany apartment of Harry Walston, b. 1912, cr. Lord Walston 1961. It was composed of embryonic members of the SDP who were strongly pro-European and had supported me for the Labour Party leadership in 1976.