@ Story of the little Canadian adventurer’
who misleads 10 million British readers

By GEORGE
MATHEWS

5 ee London Daily Express

has ‘been publishing a so-
called “Life of Krushchev” by
Sefton Delmer, the man who
is always on the spot, but sel-
dom on the mark.

Drawing lavishly on_ his
imagination, he gives, under
the title “The Unknown
Giant,’ what the paper calls
“a unique glimpse into the
mind of the world‘s biggest
enigma.”

It was, in fact, a unique
glimpse into the mind of Del-
mer himself. Unable to com-
prehend the first thing about
a socialist society, he trans-
ferred to another country and
another system the values, ex-
periences and terms of ac-
quisitive capitalist society.

That is why it all seemed so
reminiscent.

Emergence from humble
beginnings, ruthless rise to
power, the rending of friends
—where have we read all this
before?

But if Delmer wanted to
write about such a- career,
there was no need for him to
go to such lengths to coat two
paragraps of fact with half-
a-page of “interpretation” and
speculation.

He had, much closer to
hand a subject made-to-meas-
ure for his colorful pen. It is
the career not of an “un-
known giant,” but of the
“little Canadian adventurer,”
the owner of the London Daily
Express, the employer of Sef-
ton Delmer — Lord Beaver-
brook.

The fascinating facts are
pretty well known and many
of them are set out in Tom
Driberg’s book on Beaver-
brook. But for those who
have never heard them or
have forgotten them here,
briefly, is the story:

*

It is the story of a-man who
shot to power through ruth-
lessness and intrigue.

Some of his schoolmates

called him a “dirty fighter.”
The son of a Presbyterian

minisier in Canada, he began
his business career as a news-
boy. From the outset he ex-
ploited others. Instead of sell-
ing all the newspapers him-
self, he employed other boys
to sell them.

By 26 he was a dollar mil-
lionaire. He was a multi-mil-
lionaire a year or two after-
wards.

Later he gave advice to
young men making their first
$50,000:

“You have to feel these
early deals right down to the
pit of the stomach if you're
going to be a great man of
business.”

By the time he was 30 he
had created every big trust
that then éxisted in Canada.
He merged 13 cement com-
panies into one gigantic mon-
opoly, For these companies he
paid $16.5 million. He sold
them for $29 million.

His business rivals demand-
ed a government inquiry into
his financial dealings.

Later he wrote in his Sun-
day Express, issue of Novem-
ber 6, 1927:

“T have a wide knowledge of
trusts.

“The first one I founded’
was in Canada Cement Fed-
eration. ... I was not con-
cerned with the consumer, one
way or the other. My interests
were twofold.

“The first was to make
money, the second was to sell
the public a sound security
which would enhance and not
diminish my rising reputation
as a merchant banker who
could be trusted to keep faith
with his clients.

“TI succeeded in both these
aims. I made a large sum of
money, and the value of the
shares (not only in the case
of the Canada Cement Com-
pany but of the subsequent
trusts which I launched) far
exceeds today the price at
which I put them on the mar-
ket,”

With this ee ee and
wealth thus acquired, he came
to Britain. Plunging into poli-
tical manoeuvres, he intrigued
against A. J. Balfour and con-
spired to replace him by the
Canadian-born Bonar law.

Soon after,in an even more

Power without
responsibility

prolonged and skilful intrigue,
he helped remove Asquith as
prime minister and replaced
him by Lloyd George.

Within .a few years he had
turned on Lloyd George and
brought about his downfall.

Between world wars he ad-
vocated policies which bols-
tered up fascism and helped
bring about the Second World
War.

Again and again his London
Daily Express, declared “There
will be no war.”

“The Germans will not seize
Czechoslovakia,” it said on
May 23, 1938.

“Britain should not have
any quarrel with Germany,”
it declared on October 14,
1938. “There is no reason for
a German attack on_ this
country and no possibility of
it for a long time to come.”

Members of the Daily Ex-
press staff opposed this policy.
Beaverbrook rode roughshod
over them. °

With appalling cynicism he
declared:

“If we're right everyone
will praise our foresight. If
we’re wrong—nobody will re-
member.”

*

Today 10 million people
read what he wants them to
read. Of the Daily Express,
he said to the Royal Commis-
sion on the press in 1948:

“J run the paper purely for

the purpose of making propa-
ganda.”

LORD BEAVERBROOK

“Purely for making propaganda”

Lord Hailsham said of him:

“I am inclined to compare
him to a mad dog running
along the streets and yapping
and barking, and°I would re-
mind his lordship that the
best way to treat a mad dog,
if you can’t muzzle him,. is
to shoot him.” :

His book, Success, was des-
cribed by one reviewer as “a
first-class handbook for those
was want to be war profiteers
in the next war.”

His attitude to’ culture was
expressed in the phrase:

“Shelley had genius, but he
never would have been a suc-
cess in Wall Street.”

Lord Attlee described him
as “most widely distrusted by
men of all parties” and as
having “a long record of poli-
tical intrigue and political in-
stability, with an appetite for
power.”

Stanley Baldwin said of

Shorter work week

MOSCOW — Over 300,000
miners and metal workers in
the Stalino region, the major
industrial centre of the Uk-
raine, have now gone over to
a shorter working week with-
out any reduction in pay, it
was announced here this week.

Miners are now working a
36-hour week and workers
engaged in metal production,
coke manufacture and coal
preparation are on a 41-hour
week. Increased mechanisa-
tion has proceeded alongside

the reduction in the working
day.

Labor productivity in the
pits has increased and miners
wages have risen by an av-
erage of 25 percent. Wages
and metal workers have also
gone up.

Under the present‘ five-
year plan the shorter work-
ing week is also to be intro-
duced shortly in the engin-
eering, chemical and other
branches of heavy industry in
the Donets industrial area.

February 28, 1958 —

io
him and his fellow DFC ig
Rothermere, that they ~
at “power, and power oot

responsibility — the roi
tive of the harlot thtOW7
the ages.”

He wields great ini
Yet he is responsible ay
one, No one elected hi®
present position.

Who is to be admired y
The. self - made, se:
ing, ambitious press 109)
New Brunswick, climbi? 9
power at the expene
others, with no sense of ©
responsibility and con 7
ing nothing to the full
hts country? ath
Or the Communist. dewey

himself to. the service %
socialist revolution, @
ing hardship for its gv)
working not’ as an ne
but as a member of the * y
of the working class, Wy
sole aim of advancing © y
terests of the working P@

Beaverbrook has said: a

“The chief creator of ¥* Fe
is the man who saves 2 |
employs his capital.”

Khrushchev has said: yl

“Our Soviet state has" f
in existence for 40 yee"
is only in a show that of
young people can see 4 e f
talist. It is now necess® if
create a ‘character’ to im fl
a live capitalist, f0F
Soviet people have no P|
with capitalists. They Wl
their own factories and ? 4
Everything belongs to tb
to the people.” P

History will judge W
man, and which syste +
superior.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAG