European Diary, 1977-1981 (25 page)

FRIDAY, 4 NOVEMBER.
Brussels.

A visit from the Spanish Prime Minister, Suárez,
²⁰⁵
and Oreja, his Foreign Minister: a very impressive couple, probably the best pair that any European country could produce. Suárez at forty-three is a good-looking, sharply cut man, who can speak nothing but Spanish. But we nonetheless had a good talk with him before, during and after lunch. Spain has had a remarkable evolution, though they face a pile of almost insurmountable economic difficulties.

In the afternoon I addressed the European Federalists' Conference, with an enthusiastic reception, due no doubt to Florence. Then saw Cheysson, who told me of conversations with Barre and Giscard. Barre very friendly, Giscard less so—doesn't like the Commission, Cheysson said, but added surprisingly that Giscard's complaint about the Commission now was that we didn't put forward enough positive proposals. ‘In previous years we needed the Commission just to manage things; now the state of Europe is such that we need them to do more: Jenkins has put forward his monetary union hobby horse. That is all right in theory. I am not sure it is practical, but it is a good thing he should have said it. However, I would like more proposals, more plans, of this sort to be forthcoming.' I have my doubts about the reliability of Cheysson's reporting, but at any rate this was mildly interesting.

MONDAY, 7 NOVEMBER.
Brussels.

To dinner at Beloeil, the very grand mansion beyond Mons and close to the French frontier where the Prince de Ligne holds court in
considerable style. Great flag-flying, illuminated facade, men in swallow-tail coats and knee-breeches bearing flaming torches on the way in, etc. The house unfortunately was mostly burnt down, in I think 1901, and therefore the main part is an Edwardian rebuild. There are, however, some eighteenth-century pavilions left and some fairly good contents. But the point is more the scale and style than any outstanding furniture or architectural glory.

The Princesse de Ligne, sister of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, has the appearance of a neat, agreeable-looking schoolmistress. Also present were the Archduke Rudolf of Austria, plus his second and younger wife, who is a sister of Antoine de Ligne—all very
Almanach de Gotha,
but broadly speaking (apart from the English element, which included the Dunrossils,
²⁰⁶
as well as General Tuzo
²⁰⁷
and wife) representing what one might call the King Baudouin side of Belgium society, more serious-minded and less money-oriented than the
demi-gratin
of La Hulpe.

TUESDAY, 8 NOVEMBER.
Brussels.

Lunch for Reuters who brought over an impressive group of newspaper publishers—Garrett Drogheda
(Financial Times),
Vere Harmsworth
(Daily Mail),
Barnetson as Chairman of Reuters, and Denis Hamilton. I had Barnetson on one side of me and Denis Hamilton on the other at lunch and heard a lot of good, interesting
Observer
gossip into one ear and
Sunday Times
gossip into the other.

Evening meeting with Ortoli about how we handle the preparation of the paper on economic and monetary union for the European Council. He wants to go along the traditional lines of a catalogue of minor economic measures and avoid any dramatic leap. It will be quite difficult to work out a sensible compromise.

THURSDAY, 10 NOVEMBER.
Brussels, Bonn and Lisbon.

Avion taxi to Bonn, and lunch with Schmidt. The Chancellery was ringed with tanks, and Schmidt was still suffering from the aftermath
of the Lufthansa hijacking and the Schleyer murder. We talked for the first hour about terrorist matters, including our Irish experiences, and I explained to him some of the SAS methods. He was interested and ill-informed about our siege techniques.

Then on to a run-up to the European Council. He was mostly in a negative mood, which is not unusual, but he at least recognizes that there are a lot of questions to which he doesn't know the answers. He is not unnaturally proud of the way in which he has run the German economy—‘kept the garden tidy' is the phrase which I think I used, and he agreed with, but he also feels that it is a walled garden the way out of which he doesn't see. The room for initiative is very limited, the German economy is materially sated; people don't want to consume more, so he says; if you pump more money in it goes into savings rather than into consumption, and the only way you can stimulate investment is in export-directed investment, and this makes the balance-of-payments position still more favourably unbalanced. Therefore a very boxed-in position and a pessimistic view on his part about the future German competitive position and the world economic situation generally.

He was full of his normal German neuroses: the world needed a lead, but he couldn't give it; Germany was at once too big and too small to do that; it aroused too much antipathy, too much jealousy. A small country might …. I said, ‘Which small country?' He said, rather dismissively: ‘I don't know; maybe Holland, maybe Belgium, but they are not big enough. The United States almost effortlessly could, but Carter shows no signs of doing so.' Less so than on previous occasions, however, he was not obsessed by complaints against Carter. Nor was he full of praise for any of his European colleagues. There was noticeably throughout the whole long conversation no mention at all of ‘my friend Valéry'. There was a good deal of complaint about the attitude of the French (and Italian) press towards the Germans. There was also complaint that he had been accused of being a new Hitler, I am not quite sure by whom. The Swedes, he mentioned darkly, had been particularly unhelpful.

The London press, he allowed, had not been similarly difficult, although he had begun the general conversation by saying that he was pretty fed up with the British. He had done a great deal to bring them into the Community, and now he was blamed by other people
and given the responsibility for their generally unhelpful attitude. I asked him of what exactly this consisted, but he was vague, muttering something about direct elections and agricultural policy, but not taking a strong or precise line.

He ended by agreeing that he didn't know the way out, perhaps nobody did, but accepting my remark that, this being so, he should not be too sceptical, or slap down attempts like my monetary union plan to get some movement. He said he was in favour in principle of monetary union, but against it if it meant German inflation going to 8 per cent. I said I would be too; the great thing was that the best part of German policy should be accepted by other countries; and what was absolutely essential was that both the strong and the weak economies should feel that they had something to gain. He expressed himself with remarkable enthusiasm about enlargement and said that it was a central duty of the Community; he was totally dedicated to assisting the Greeks, Spaniards and Portuguese in this way.

I am not sure how much this long discussion advanced things, but it was a good free-ranging talk with an easy atmosphere, and we both came out looking quite pleased. I flew for a short hour to Geneva, and then on to Lisbon. A most beautiful day all across Europe, particularly at Geneva, where the Alps in the fading light were suffused in a rose-coloured glow. Met at Lisbon airport by the Prime Minister (Soares) and various other dignitaries and drove to the Ritz Hotel, a twenty-year-old building filled with typical mock-Empire Ritz-style furniture. Restaurant dinner given by the deputy Foreign Minister (there being no Foreign Minister, Soares holding the portfolio himself); amiable but not pointful discussion.

FRIDAY, 11 NOVEMBER.
Lisbon.

My fifty-seventh birthday, not greeted with great pleasure, particularly as no celebrations were scheduled during the extremely hard day ahead. I began with Constâncio,
²⁰⁸
an effective young man about thirty-five, who is in charge of the Portuguese negotiating team and seems to be the most sensible economics man in the Government. Then back to the hotel for an hour to receive the leaders of the five
political parties in quick succession, followed by a deputation of industrialists. Cunhal, the hardline Stalinist Communist leader, was the most interesting, and not ostensibly particularly hardline. He was against Portugal's entry more on economic than on political grounds, which is not entirely without sense, and he was in favour of loans from outside, but not primarily from Germany or America. He thought from Britain and Italy, with a rather touching faith in the ability of these countries to have any money to lend.

Then to see Soares: eighty minutes of French exposition from him, with a few questions from me. He gave a lucid analysis of the political situation in Portugal and how he hoped to deal with it by forming a common platform to get the hard budget through, but not by a coalition which would be either impossible or undesirable. He has a good logical mind on political questions, and drew a very effective little socio-political map of Portugal, on which he pointed out the various groupings on the ground of the party forces in a way that I found easy to follow and helpful. On economics he is much less sure; he knows he has got to be fairly tough, though he is complaining a good deal, as all the Portuguese are, about the IMF terms.
²⁰⁹
I told him fairly bluntly that in my view they had little alternative but to accept them, though I thought that the IMF after their return from Washington would be a little more reasonable, as was their habit. The Portuguese must get the IMF money and, indeed, in the position they were, it was no good saying that this might prevent sustained expansion, since a policy of
reculer pour mieux sauter
was inevitable.

Then a 2.30 luncheon (though the Portuguese don't in general keep Spanish time), presided over by Constâncio, at the Port Wine Institute. Next to the Parliament to address the Foreign Affairs Commission and answer questions. Then to the Belgian Embassy residence for the ambassadors of the Nine. Then a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs presided over by Soares.

Next out quite a long way to the presidential palace to call on General Eanes,
²¹⁰
the head of state. Crispin thought he was very nervous of me. I don't think this terribly likely. Once again the interpretation was bad. (We must take our own interpreter on
these trips in future.) Eanes is a youngish man, in his forties, hard, rather limited in intellect, but plunged straight into the main issues and gave his explanation of what he thought might or might not happen. Some parts of it, in translation, came through rather horrifyingly, as when he said that the General in the North, whom everybody knew had been recalled because he had been plotting with the doubtfully named Social Democrats and generally making too political an impact, had been recalled to ‘pursue his military studies at a higher level', which had a splendid ring of Nigeria, if not of Eastern Europe. However, Soares had assured me that Eanes was a good democrat and he said nothing else that contradicted this. He was obviously working very closely with Soares, though he complained even more strongly about the IMF terms than the Prime Minister had done. He showed no desire to take over full power himself and hoped that Soares should be able to steer through and carry on.

Then a long drive out to Cintra of Peninsular War Convention fame, where Soares gave a state dinner of 150 in an old castle with a splendid ceiling. I sat between the Minister of State in the Government, who is a sort of deputy Prime Minister, and the Speaker of the Assembly. Both spoke fairly good French. Indeed Lisbon as a whole was remarkably francophone, and amongst the middle-aged and older generation almost equally non-anglophone. Speeches after dinner, then a television interview, and back in thickening mist to Lisbon.

It had been too heavy a day, but worthwhile for getting an impression of the government and the atmosphere in the country. Lisbon has great charm. It is curiously unlike a Mediterranean city. Geographically and almost climatically it is more like a poor San Francisco. It is southern and oceanic, which I suppose is what one would expect it to be. The country is in a mess economically, and there are some elements of post-revolution chaos, but there does seem to be a genuine attachment to democratic and constitutional processes. The Portuguese are a non-violent people and their dedication to coming into the Community also seems pretty strong.

SATURDAY, 12 NOVEMBER.
Lisbon and Cascais.

To the Jeronimus church with its splendid cloisters and magnificent nave: a late fifteenth-century product of the first flood of Portuguese trading wealth, in an architectural style which is quite separate from that of most of Western Europe. Then on to Cascais to the Tinés' flat by lunch. A great sight-seeing tour in the afternoon, round the coast to Cintra, back to Lisbon, and south over the new (still generally called Salazar) bridge with the object of getting on the return the remarkable view of the setting sun on the roofs of Lisbon as they tumble down to the sea. Then around the Alfama part of the old town, which has great attraction and interest. I was very struck by Lisbon and its surroundings. At dinner at a rather smart restaurant I was amazed by the cheapness of the bill, and at first thought there must be a nought missing. It was less than £4 a head, which is unknown elsewhere in Western Europe.

SUNDAY, 13 NOVEMBER.
Lisbon and Brussels.

Back to Brussels after an immense detour over the Atlantic owing to a Spanish air controllers' strike. We were greeted at Zaventem by Michael Emerson who had got locked into a great dispute with Ortoli's
cabinet
about the draft of our monetary union paper.
²¹¹

MONDAY, 14 NOVEMBER.
Brussels.

A rather
pénible
one and a half hours with Ortoli at 9.30, not making much progress. Lunch for John Davies and Donald Maitland, which for some reason or other was conversationally draining.