The old man wanted very much to see me. I came for lunch and we spent two hours in lively conversation.

Naturally, we spoke mostly about the war and related matters. I asked Lloyd George whether Britain would fight in earnest.

‘Yes, it will,’ Lloyd George replied with a toss of his grey mane. ‘Chamberlain, of course, wants peace. He’d be ready to make peace with Hitler tomorrow and pull off a second Munich. But he can’t do it. The country is against him.’

I pointed out the absence of military enthusiasm or of a visible patriotic surge such as had occurred at the beginning of the last war, but Lloyd George demurred: ‘Yes, that’s true. Today, you’ll not see that somewhat light-headed military enthusiasm which was so striking in 1914. I remember how easy it was then to arrange a noisy meeting in any village, with patriotic speeches and victorious shouting. You couldn’t do that now. But do not delude yourself: there is a grim determination in the masses – among workers, farmers, shopkeepers, intellectuals and the “middle class” – to carry the war to the end. A government that decided to ignore this would not last a fortnight.’

To prove his point, Lloyd George told me the story of how war was declared (about which I wrote on 2 and 3 September).

Lloyd George considers the so-called ‘reconstruction’ of the government carried out by Chamberlain to be a temporary tactic. In the near future, when the war starts in earnest, a quite different government will have to be formed, one truly capable of conducting a war.

I enquired whether the prime minister had offered Lloyd George a Cabinet position. Lloyd George burst out laughing, loudly and infectiously: ‘Neville would rather lose the war than let me into his government!’

Lloyd George is absolutely certain that any peace proposals made by Hitler after the Polish campaign will be rejected by London. The war will continue, but what kind of war?

After Poland’s defeat, which Lloyd George considers inevitable, the war will essentially take the following forms:

(1) Air warfare.

(2) Limited military operations on the Franco-German border. A breakthrough on the Siegfried Line would be likely to cost 1–2 million lives, which is a risk the French will never take. As for Britain, it will be a long time before it builds a large army for the continent.

(3) The blockade. This should do the main job, namely, strangle Germany’s economy, supply of provisions, and so on.

As a result, there will be a revolution in Germany, and this will solve the problem of the war. But before things get to that stage, two or three years may pass.

Then Lloyd George moved on to the USSR.

‘Chamberlain’s greatest crime,’ he exclaimed, ‘are the Moscow talks! History will never forgive him! At the root of it, of course, is the prime minister’s class hostility to a socialist state. Narrow-minded, stupid hostility. Who is Chamberlain?’

Lloyd George shook his mane again, laughed, and exclaimed: ‘He is a manufacturer of iron beds! Yes, iron beds, and not very good beds at that! That is his place in life and that is the range of his vision! And this man currently stands at the head of the British Empire! He will destroy the Empire!’

Lloyd George liked Comrade Molotov’s speech,

In his speech to an extraordinary meeting of the Supreme Soviet, Molotov explained the circumstances which led to the pact with Germany and warned against the ‘warmongers

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who are accustomed to have other people pull their chestnuts out of the fire’; D.N. Pritt (ed.), Soviet Peace Policy: Four speeches by V. Molotov (London, 1941).

finding it sensible and convincing. Lloyd George understands our policy very well. It was the only way to act. But is the break between Britain and the USSR really final? Couldn’t something be done to restore more friendly relations between the two countries?

‘In the world of politics,’ I replied, ‘nothing is final. Everything is in flux. But for the moment, in all honesty, I see little likelihood of our countries drawing closer in the immediate future.’

Lloyd George shook his head and said: ‘For the moment, of course, Neville is in power, and there is little chance of a rapprochement. But what if he leaves office? And if a very different government comes to power?’

Lloyd George began talking quickly and fervently about how war in Britain would end with the triumph of socialism. I didn’t try to ask him exactly what kind of socialism he meant. That is not so important at this stage of development. What does matter is that a man like Lloyd George sees no way out for Britain but to replace the capitalist system with a socialist one.