TNAG-0115-FCO40-151-Departmental-briefs-for-Commonwealth-Prime-Minister-s-and-ot-1969 — Page 128

24. I come finally to my main theme, which is also the

major pre-occupation of my country, Europe and the

Atlantic Alliance.

countries outside the NATO area as to the members of NATO

themselves. As was recognised during the last war, when

it seemed in 1941 possible that Hitler's Germany might

bring almost the whole of Europe, from the Urals to the

Atlantic, under Nazi control, anyone able to dispose of

the full resources of Europe would be well placed to

dominate the whole world. Should the Atlantic Alliance

ever cease to be united and prepared, and the way ever be

opened to the Kremlin to extend to the remaining countries

of Europe the control it now exercises over those of the

Warsaw Pact, the balance of power between the USA and the

USSR, on which the peace of the world at present mainly

depends, would be fatally over-turned. From a Europe

united under communist domination the Middle East and

Africa would have no means of defence, and even the Western

Hemisphere would be most seriously threatened. I trust

therefore that no one, regretting the transfer of British

forces from extra-European bases to Britain and Europe,

will regard the increased contribution which we could then

make to the defence of free Europe as of no value to

countries outside that continent.

This should be of as much concern to

Everyone's first line

of defence against any threat of Soviet communist

domination is the Atlantic Alliance.

25. That that threat has not lost its reality was proved

again last summer with the invasion and occupation of

Czechoslovakia by Soviet forces, supported by those of 4

/of the