European Diary, 1977-1981 (40 page)

THURSDAY, 8 JUNE.
Brussels and London.

An 11 o'clock meeting with the Austrian Foreign Minister (Pahr), who was a very sensible and worthwhile man with whom I had an hour's conversation. Then I saw Ronald Butt of
The Times/Sunday Times.
I have never been a fan of his, but he was friendly and sensible on this occasion. Then, suddenly, a request from Sigrist, the German Permanent Representative, to pay an urgent call. He arrived to explain that Genscher had made a diary cock-up for the following week and could not fulfil his luncheon engagement with me for the following Tuesday in Strasbourg. Would I accept Dohnanyi in his place and have Genscher to lunch a few weeks later? It hardly seemed to warrant a special ambassadorial visit, but this was I suppose courteous.

A COREPER lunch which was much as usual. At 3.15 I saw Garland, the Australian Minister for Special Trade Negotiations, an agreeable, youngish man whom I had met before. We had decided beforehand to give him slightly rough treatment in view of the way Fraser behaves and to tell him that there was no future in this. We wanted to improve relations with Australia but we would be damned if we would be bullied into doing so, and if they went on making disobliging statements after every meeting it would make it very difficult to achieve anything. I was not sure how taken aback he was. I think his Ambassador may have warned him, but at any rate he was uneasy and never recovered the initiative. I was able to end the interview more graciously by taking him to the lift and talking about one or two mutual acquaintances.

6.25 plane (semi-punctual) to London, and to the Harlechs
⁷⁸
by 8.15 for the dinner preceding their ball. The dinner was for thirty-two or thirty-six, with a curious mixture of strands: Mrs Onassis, Sam Spiegel, Droghedas, David Cecils, Lee Remick, Peter Hall, for
example. I sat between Pamela Harlech and Jackie, about which I could not complain. Jackie was at her best, I have never had a better conversation with her, not only very friendly but also interesting, with a lot of talk about White House life, mostly when Jack was President, but also her return visits there and her relations with LBJ, towards whom she was surprisingly friendly and favourable, and with Nixon, to whom she was much less so.

Jack, she said, except occasionally, did not much like formally arranged dinner parties, because he could not decide in advance whom he wanted to see. But he would often ring up at 5 or 6 o'clock and say, ‘Get somebody for dinner.' He did not greatly like having Ethel and Bobby, not because he didn't like Ethel, he did rather, and certainly not because he didn't like Bobby, but because Bobby was too much his conscience and kept demanding to know what he had done, what he had decided about this or that, telling him what he ought to do in the future. Bradlees (
Washington Post)
, who turned out to be snakes-in-the-grass, were there a lot. But David and Sissie Gore came more than anybody else, she said, so much so that it became difficult because David would always chuck everything else, which in my view was probably his duty (the main duty of ambassadors is to have close contact with the heads of the government to which they are accredited) but which led to his breaking long-arranged dinner engagements at which he was to be the guest of honour and created some Washington ill-feeling.

Then the dancing guests began to arrive and the whole thing became rather overcrowded and hot for a time, but I sat this out, and subsequently had an extremely agreeable evening-as indeed did Jennifer. We stayed, amazingly, until 3.45, and walked home in the dawn, a thing we haven't done for many years. I even danced three times, led on to the floor the first time by Mrs William Rees-Mogg.

FRIDAY, 9 JUNE.
London and East Hendred.

I had a morning of London errands, including buying some books in Hatchards, where I had a conversation as on a stage with Pam Hartwell, i.e. addressed by her to the whole shop. I then met Robert Armstrong at Brooks's before driving to East Hendred in the afternoon. The Beaumarchais' arrived to stay at 7 o'clock.

SATURDAY, 10 JUNE.
East Hendred.

At 11.30 the Beaumarchais' and I went to Oxford and did a quick tour, including climbing to the lantern at the top of the Sheldonian, which I discovered only six months ago and which gives a splendid view. It is curious how many people one meets in the street in Oxford; between us we saw Isaiah Berlin, Oliver Franks,
⁷⁹
Roger Makins (Sherfield),
⁸⁰
and one or two others. Eric Rolls and the Douglass Caters
⁸¹
to lunch at East Hendred. Drove the Beaumarchais' over the Downs to the Blue Boar on a most beautiful evening.

SUNDAY, 11 JUNE.
East Hendred.

Took the Beaumarchais' to Sevenhampton, where Ann also had Bonham Carters, Levers and Mark Amory
⁸²
for lunch. Then a tremendous afternoon of games. I played croquet with Mark Amory, who is a very good games-player, but who didn't know croquet very well, and beat him rather easily; then three sets of tennis (again a satisfactory result), and then croquet again. Stayed until 7.30. A perfect day, not very hot, but strong sunshine, and altogether very satisfactory.

WEDNESDAY, 14 JUNE.
Strasbourg and Paris.

Commission meeting at 9.00, then into the Parliament for a short time before reluctantly leaving for Paris by avion taxi. To a luncheon at the Quai d'Orsay given by Guiringaud for the OECD ministers. A confused, disorganized lunch. I admittedly had not said that I was going until that morning, but at first there was no place for me, nor was there a place for Blumenthal (US Secretary of the Treasury) or for the Austrian Vice-Chancellor (Androsch), but eventually things were vaguely sorted out.

In the afternoon to the Château de la Muette for a series of bilateral meetings which were the purpose of my Paris visit. First, three-quarters of an hour with Blumenthal, in which I ran through my thoughts about European monetary stability, explained what we had in mind, and got a very satisfactory acceptance by him that the Americans were in effect perfectly happy about this.

Then a meeting with Malcolm Fraser of Australia. Perhaps as a result of my meeting with Garland and pressure from his officials, he was for once out to be pleasant. He wished to have a wide-ranging conversation about the Summit, the Third World, etc. That went more or less all right, and at the end we had a quick exchange of views about bilateral relations in which I stated our position, and we broke up without too much difficulty.

After this I had a meeting with Vance, who is very good, compared with Fraser or Blumenthal, at making these courtesy bilaterals easy and interesting. There was a curious element of American grandeur, not in his manner at all–very much the reverse–but in the room: the standard of the United States, the standard of the Secretary of State, the seal of the United States were all erected behind the desk in this rather small, temporary room in the Château de la Muette which he was occupying for thirty-six hours, and there was even half a platoon of marines outside. With three or four other people present we talked mainly about MTNs and the forthcoming Summit.

Then I went into the Plenary Session for twenty-five minutes and made a perfectly sensible, pointless seven-minute speech, which the officials were very keen that I should make, about the trade pledge.
⁸³
I then left at about 6.30 escorted by two
motards
and had the most terrifying, ludicrous, ridiculous drive to Le Bourget. It was the peak of the rush hour around the Périphérique and the traffic was absolutely jammed up. But these two motorcyclists carved their way through so that we got there in twenty-three minutes, mostly going between 50 and 70 miles an hour, with the chance of a major accident at least one in five I would have thought. How ordinary French motorists put up with this behaviour I cannot understand. The
motards,
given the fact that they were trying to perform this lunacy, did absolutely spectacularly; they thumped
and occasionally kicked small cars out of the way, with their feet off the pedals of their motorbikes.

I couldn't look most of the time. I fastened my seat belt in the back, a thing I have never done before, and tried to read the newspapers. We hit one car a glancing blow and bounced off a sort of balustrade on another occasion. However, we eventually got there without any grave damage to anybody, but I do not think it is a sensible way for the French police to behave, and it is certainly a disagreeable way to go through Paris on a particularly beautiful early June evening. I suppose it cut an hour off the drive, but this was hardly worth it, particularly as I had nothing serious to do at the other end.

I never thought I would find a little avion taxi such a haven of peace, like a hammock in a summer garden. We flew off into a cloudless sky, over the valley of the Marne and the plains of Champagne, through Lorraine, over the Vosges and down into Colmar. Drove to La Clairière (hotel) at Illhaeusern, where Jennifer, Hayden and Laura already were.

THURSDAY, 15 JUNE.
Strasbourg and Brussels.

Drove into Strasbourg and to the Parliament at 11.15. Then with Jennifer took Tam Dalyell
⁸⁴
to lunch. We much enjoyed talking to Tam, who, although slightly dotty, is in a curious way a first-rate man, with great self-confidence and interest. To the Parliament to answer questions for forty-five minutes mainly about languages in the enlarged Community, and then back to Brussels by avion taxi.

FRIDAY, 16 JUNE.
Brussels.

A day of Berlaymont meetings, including two with Gundelach. These were intended to be a general run round agriculture and fisheries policy and also something of an attempt to repair one or two slightly damaged bridges between him and me. I find it very difficult to make up my mind completely about Gundelach. His
qualities are great; is his trickiness equally so?
⁸⁵
Home at 7 o'clock, where the Jakie Astors had arrived to stay.

SATURDAY, 17 JUNE.
Brussels.

A remarkable three-hour expedition to the battlefields in the Ypres salient. We had a key prepared in Donald Maitland's office, which was extremely valuable, for otherwise I think we would have been completely lost. We went to Menin and then along the Menin Road between there and Ypres and turned off and saw a system of trenches and a museum. Then on to Hill 60, Hellfire Corner, and into Ypres itself to see the Menin Gate with its vast panels of names (56,000,1 think) of those who did not have individual graves. Then on to Passchendaele, to the huge cemetery there. The whole expedition was interesting, even fascinating, but harrowing and oppressive, and we were glad at the end to get out of the area. Why does Waterloo have no similar effect? Is it a difference of numbers or a difference of a hundred years? We drove to Bruges where we lunched without much appetite, went to see the Memling and returned to Brussels.

SUNDAY, 18 JUNE.
Brussels.

We took the Astors (and Phillips' with children) on a surprisingly beautiful day and picnicked in the field near Maillen in the near Ardennes where we had been before. The site wasn't as successful as previously because we had forgotten that in June, as opposed to April or October, the ‘corn is as high as an elephant's eye', and as a result the view was almost blocked out. After lunch we played cricket on the road, organized by Hayden, interrupting–or interrupted by–a local bicycle race, so that there was a certain clash of English and Belgian cultures. However, no trouble.

MONDAY, 19 JUNE.
Brussels.

A 12.30 meeting with the President of Mali. An agreeable man, accompanied by two or three others in magnificent robes. There was not a great deal to talk about.

Then with Hayden and Roger Beetham to give Larry Lamb and the
Sun's
political editor (Anthony Shrimsley) lunch. It ought to have been more successful than it was. Lamb, who had impressed me greatly in Manchester six weeks before, seemed on rather bad form. Shrimsley quite intelligent, but the whole thing not as pointful as it should have been.

TUESDAY, 20 JUNE.
Brussels.

10.30 meeting with Raymond Vouël, who complained, with some justification, about Davignon running around and organizing all sorts of cartels which were offending the competition rules of the Commission. Then Andreas Whittam Smith, the City editor of the
Daily Telegraph
⁸⁶
who was an extremely good interviewer, agreeable, and taking points very quickly. And then, at noon, an extraordinary ceremony organized by the Anciens Combattants de l'Europe, who gave me a medal. It was mainly got up by the French, but there were about eight high British Legion officials, and the actual presentation was made by Rommel's Chief of Staff, who not surprisingly was extremely old, an
echt
Iron Cross German General, who did it all with considerable style.

WEDNESDAY, 21 JUNE.
Brussels.

Day-long Commission over by 6.00. Dinner for the change of presidency from the Danes to the Germans, which, at Astrid von Hardenberg's
⁸⁷
good suggestion, we had arranged at the Maison d'Erasme in Anderlecht. I don't think Erasmus had actually lived there for more than six or seven months–did he ever live anywhere for much longer? - but it is an attractive sixteenth-century house, well run as a museum, and a good place for a dinner. The dinner went very well. I had Madame de Nanteuil and Frau Sigrist on either side of me. I made a rather erudite speech, partly about Erasmus, partly about the Vikings, partly about Greenland, which Hayden had prepared very well for me, and we then listened to a good, sensible, rather long speech from Riberholdt, followed by a somewhat misty one about the Nibelungen from Sigrist.

THURSDAY, 22 JUNE.
Brussels, Paris and Brussels.

11.43 TEE to Paris with Crispin. Worked extremely hard all the way and then lunched very late in Paris. At 4.45 to the Elysée. Giscard rather impressively received us two minutes ahead of time, and we talked for about an hour and a half. It was one of the best conversations I have had with him. We talked a little about economic growth, in which we agreed that we had the tactical and cosmetic problem of making the Bremen European Council seem worthwhile while knowing that Schmidt was not willing to say very much until he got to the Bonn Western Summit. Then we went on to monetary arrangements in Europe, in which Giscard was extremely hard and firm and clearly determined to go ahead. The curious effect of this was that, perhaps because he was more interested, because we were discussing something more closely, interrupting each other a good deal, he became, if anything, rather smaller, less like a would-be Louis XIV, or even General de Gaulle, and more as I remember him as a Finance Minister; less making pronouncements as a head of state, more discussing a real subject.