Did Bertrand Russell advocate for a preemptive nuclear attack on Russia?

What Did Russell Say At Westminster School in 1948?

In the immediate post-WW2 period, Bertrand Russell got it into his head that it might be a good idea to drop a nuclear bomb on non-nuclear Russia. Usually, he couched his idea in conditional terms (if Russia doesn’t do some x, then…), and often suggested that the USSR could be cowed merely by the threat of nuclear armageddon, but there is no doubt he envisaged circumstances in which it would be right to annihilate Russian citizens via the mechanism of an asymmetrical nuclear strike.

The standard form of Russell’s argument was utilitarian: If the USSR were allowed to develop its own nuclear bomb, the chances of a global nuclear conflagration would increase massively. A way to mitigate against this would be to bring all atomic energy under international control. In a situation where only one country has the nuclear bomb (i.e., the United States), it would be possible to win a war against any adversary that refused to play ball. Therefore:

If the whole world outside of Russia were to insist upon international control of atomic energy to the point of going to war on this issue, it is highly probable that the Soviet government would give way on this issue. If it did not, then if the issue were forced in the next year or two, only one side would have atomic bombs, and the war might be so short as not to involve utter ruin. (“International Government”, New Commonwealth, 9)

So it's a utilitarian argument: If Russia gets the nuclear bomb, then all hell will break loose. It’s better for the West to use their current nuclear superiority to bully Russia into submission while it still can. Yes, it might end in war, in which case Moscow and other Russian cities would be destroyed by nuclear strikes, but even this worst case scenario is better than the inevitable global armageddon that would occur if Russia were allowed to continue on its current path to nuclear parity.

It’s a bad argument on multiple levels, but we’ll leave our analysis of it for another day. Instead, let’s focus on a version of the argument he outlined at a talk at the Westminster School in London, where he gets perilously close to arguing for an immediate preventive war against the USSR.

His talk itself was relatively uncontentious, recommending that the Western Alliance strengthen morally and physically as much as possible in order to make it clear to the Soviets that they couldn’t win a war. Russell also talked up the benefits of a world government backed by armed power, suggesting that it could be forced upon reluctant nations until such time as “the world has been educated into unified sanity.”

So far, so good—a bit batty, but nothing to suggest preemptive nuclear strikes. The problem came in a Q&A session, when he outlined the ways the West might deal with an unrepentant expansionist Russia:

As he saw it there were three alternatives if the present aggressive Russian policy was persisted in: (a) War with Russia before she has the atomic bombs, ending fairly swiftly and inevitably in a Western victory; (b) war with Russia after she has the atomic bombs, ending again in Western victory, but after frightful carnage, destruction and suffering; (c) submission.... This third alternative seemed to him so utterly unthinkable that it could be dismissed; and as between the other two the choice to him, at least, seemed clear. (“Atomic Energy and the Problems of Europe”, Nineteenth Century and After, vol. 145. p. 43)

His preference for the first alternative was taken by many people present as indicative of his support for an immediate preventive war against the Soviet Union. Hence, the next day, the Observer ran the following report from the Associated Press:

Lord Russell told 400 London students and schoolteachers, at a New Commonwealth Schools Conference, at Westminster School yesterday: “Either we must have war against Russia before she has the atom bomb or we will have to lie down and let them govern us.

Like all dictators, Stalin and other Soviet leaders are living in a fool’s paradise. They don’t realise the strength of our resources and that the United States, Britain, and the commonwealth, and other Western Powers, would win any war now. (November 21, 1948, p. 1)

The Daily Worker was even more direct, titling its report, “Earl Russell calls for atom war”, and declaring his sabre rattling “monstrous” in an editorial (November 22, 1948, p. 3).

Russell was not in the least bit amused by what he took to be the inaccuracy of the reporting, denying in a press release that he had urged immediate war with Russia. He claimed that what he had in fact said was that it should be made clear to the Soviets that Western powers would be prepared to use force if necessary.

It has become obvious that the Communists, like the Nazis, can be halted in their attempts to dominate Europe and Asia only by determined and combined resistance by every means in the democracies’ power–not excluding military means, if Russia refuses all compromise. (The Observer, November 28, 1948, p. 3)

The trouble is Russell is dishonest on this issue (see Ronald Clark, The Life of Bertrand Russell, Chapter 19, for further details), so we can’t take his denial at face value. In a letter to the New York Nation, he claims he was stitched up by a communist journalist:

The story that I supported a preventive war against Russia is a Communist invention. I once spoke at a meeting at which only one reporter was present and he was a Communist, though reporting for orthodox newspapers. He seized on his opportunity, and in spite of my utmost efforts I have never been able to undo the harm. (Nation, October 1953)

The trouble with this explanation is that other people at the Westminster meeting, who were decidedly not communists, also heard him advocating for a preventive war—or at least thought they did. One of them was Nigel Lawson, former British Chancellor of the Exchequer, who had this to say about Russell’s denials:

I happened to be present at the occasion in 1948 on which Russell made his surprising plea; and his habitual clarity of expression was such that there was no possible room whatever for doubt about his meaning…His thesis, I remember, went roughly as follows: (i) the history of man is one of a seemingly endless succession of wars, but (ii) the number of wars steadily diminishes, as the number of countries, empires or blocs in the world diminishes, since after each war the victor absorbs the vanquished. Hence (iii) war will come to an end only when there is but a single bloc or power-centre left. At the present time (this had, in 1948, a superficial plausibility) we are down to two players, East and West, so (iv) there is only one more war to come. But (v) Russia will soon get the atom bomb, too, which means that the war to end wars would then become the greatest disaster the world has known. Hence (vi) we must go for a merciful quick kill now, while we have the bomb and Russia hasn't. (Spectator, 13 February 1970)

Of course, this is just one person’s recollection, so perhaps not reliable, especially given the passage of time. However, a couple of weeks later, the Spectator published a letter from the then Executive Secretary of The David Davies Memorial Institute of International Studies that confirmed Lawson’s account:

I have just seen Nigel Lawson’s article on Bertrand Russell in the Spectator of last week in which he made the point that Russell made a speech in 1948 in Westminster School Hall where he advocated a pre-emptive nuclear attack on Russia before she got the atomic bomb.

I organised the said meeting and Mr Lawson’s recollection is entirely correct. In fact we had the greatest difficulty in explaining away the more obvious implication to the press, more especially as the then Emeritus Dean of Gloucester had taken the chair for Lord Russell! (Spectator, 27 February 1970)

Thirty years later, Lawson told the same story in a letter to The Economist, in response to the claim that Nicholas Griffin, the editor of The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell, had scotched the notion that Russell had advocated for a preemptive nuclear strike against the Soviet Union:

I was in the audience at the public meeting at which Russell advocated precisely this, and it made a big impression on me at the time… Needless to say, Russell advocated a pre-emptive nuclear strike on purely humanitarian grounds. In a nutshell, he pointed out that at the time the Soviet Union did not yet possess a nuclear capability but that it would very soon do so, after which all history made it clear that sooner or later there would be a nuclear war between the two superpowers that would be infinitely more devastating than either of the two world wars through which he had lived. The only sure way of preventing this Armageddon, he concluded with remorseless if unpalatable logic, was for America to launch a nuclear attack on the Soviet Union before it acquired the bomb: after that it would be too late. (The Economist, 4 August 2001, p. 16)

Griffin leapt to the defence of Russell in the next issue of The Economist, arguing that Russell wasn’t suggesting immediate nuclear war, but rather stating the least catastrophic outcome if it turned out not to be possible to deter Russia from its aggressive expansionism. (The Economist, 11 August 2001, p. 14)

Lawson wasn’t buying this defence:

Nicholas Griffin now concedes that, at his 1948 meeting at Westminster School, Bertrand Russell advocated an early pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union, before the Russians acquired their own atomic bomb. But he adds that Russell made it clear that this drastic action should take place “if the present aggressive Russian policy was persisted in.” Mr Griffin insists, however, that Russell “obviously hoped” that this policy would not be persisted in. What in fact was “obvious”—and one of Russell's chief characteristics was his clarity—was that he expected that it would be, and was clear that we could not simply wait and see, as this would give the Russians time to acquire their own atomic bomb.

I was there when Russell spoke: Mr Griffin was not. (The Economist, 18 August 2001, p. 14)

Unsurprisingly, Griffin did not accept he had conceded the point.

I certainly do not concede that Bertrand Russell advocated “an early pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union”, as Lord Lawson claims (Letters, August 18th). What he advocated was a continuation of the West's policy of containment from a position of strength…

Lord Lawson may have been present when Russell spoke but I have a verbatim transcript of what he said. (The Economist, 25 August 2001, p. 18)

Likely the transcript to which Griffin referred is the article published in Nineteenth Century and After titled “Atomic Energy and the Problems of Europe”, which Russell explicitly states is a verbatim transcript of the address that he gave at Westminster School.

However, contra Griffin, he does not say that the portion of the article that deals with the Q&A session is a verbatim transcript. Almost certainly it is not–it’s too short (if it’s verbatim, the Q&A lasted five minutes, max) and the tone is all wrong (too structured, too formal, and so on)—which means it cannot be relied upon as evidence of what Russell actually said during this part of the event. This is a problem since it was during the Q&A session that Russell got himself into trouble.

Nevertheless, a close reading of even this presumably heavily edited section supports Lawson’s version of events, not Griffin’s. Here’s why. The third question of the Q&A is as follows:

Had not Lord Russell a more encouraging message to give to young people? Two succeeding generations had been decimated by war. Was all that he could offer to a third generation yet another devastating war? It seemed a most hopeless and gloomy prospect to be offered by so brilliant and distinguished a speaker. It was a deplorable picture for young people to have to contemplate. (Nineteenth Century and After, vol. 145. p. 43)

This question makes sense if Russell had talked up the inevitability of war–it makes much less sense if he had suggested the serious possibility that the Soviets might be deterred by the policy of “containment from a position of strength”. Particularly, the suggestion that all that he could offer to a third generation was the prospect of another devastating war supports Lawson’s recollection, not Griffin’s version of what was said.

It’s also instructive that Russell did not immediately say in his response that there was still reason for hope. Rather, he accepted that the immediate picture was gloomy, but said none of it was his fault, and he couldn’t really do much about it.

So what should we make of all this? The first thing to say is that we’re not going to get certainty here. Not least there is always the possibility that further evidence exists in the Russell archive that substantiates Griffin’s version of events, thereby vindicating Russell. However, as it stands, it seems likely, on the balance of probabilities, that in the Q&A section, at least, Russell did advocate for a preemptive nuclear strike against the USSR, or at least came as near to that position as you can get, without actually saying, do it, do it now.