Confidential report from Con Cremin to Seán Murphy (Dublin)
'British Prime Minister'¹
(Confidential)

While Sir Anthony Eden’s state of health furnished the occasion for his withdrawal from the post of Prime Minister at this time the major, if not an exclusive, role in this event must naturally be ascribed to the complex and difficult situation, at home and abroad, created by his decision to take action in Suez at the end of October. In the relative calm of the House of Lords Halifax,² who, although no longer active in politics is one of the elder statesmen on the Conservative side, was forced to admit that ‘probably the most ardent champion of Her Majesty’s Government today would not be tempted to deny the grim character of the balance sheet that emerges from a stocktaking on paper of the events of recent months; indeed to sit down and access the different items in that account is to engage upon a study of unrelieved gloom’. Even Lord Home, Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations, in replying to the debate on 12th December, confessed that ‘our action was a shock. It was a shock to the Commonwealth, to the United States and to ourselves, that, as I have said before, a country, which built up the League of Nations and has done more than any other nation (I think we can say that without arrogance) to sustain the United Nations, should be compelled to take action of this kind.’ And leaving aside more forthright criticism from organs which were avowedly hostile, the Times which could not be accused of marked hostility to the Government at least in the early weeks wrote on 21st December that ‘it cannot be emphasised too often that nothing can be quite the same after Suez. Every issue of international relations, diplomacy, politics, and economics has to be rethought’.

2. Eden had thus, even in conditions of complete harmony within his party, an arduous task ahead. The magnitude of that task, the dissensions within the party with pressures from different sides, his inability to adjust himself to the new situation (since his return from Jamaica he has said that if he had to begin again he would behave in precisely the same manner) combined with the personal shock which he probably suffered through his ‘fatal misjudgement’ and with his continued ill-health to persuade him that he should leave and leave now. That he should take this decision was not unexpected; that he should take it at this time provoked considerable and quite general surprise. Many of my more experienced colleagues, as I mentioned in my report of 18th December,³ felt he would have to go, but as far as I know, none of them thought that this would happen for three or four months.
3. All the indications suggest that the decision to leave now was taken suddenly – although this does not of course exclude the possibility of Eden’s obeying some immediate pressures. The Conservative leaders in his own constituency, which he has represented for the past 33 years, seem to have been taken entirely unawares – the suggestions from there recently that he should have a frank discussion with his constituents bore no overt connotation of hostility on their part towards him. One might in the normal way have expected that he would wait at least until Parliament reassembles on 22nd inst. and make a more orderly exit after contact with e.g. the 1922 Committee which acts as the forum for Conservative opinion. And the manner of his retreat is in striking contrast with the rather jaunty tone of his declarations on his return from Jamaica a bare three weeks earlier. Until other evidence comes to light it is reasonable to assume that the doctors’ verdict was the principal factor determining his leaving now.
4. Granted that Eden was to leave (and, as observed, that he should do so soon was not unforeseen) the choice of successor is somewhat surprising. Macmillan was, of course, in the running being bracketed with, but behind, Butler. Neither man was the obvious choice – this was, you will recall, held to be one reason why Eden might be able to stay. Generally speaking Macmillan’s selection must mean that the right wing or diehard element of the Conservatives had their way, even if Randolph Churchill’s statement mentioned below is true. Macmillan was held to have been of those who supported Eden in the original decision and to have stood by him staunchly throughout the Suez crisis. The first part of this opinion is perhaps true although some say that the original decision was not really deliberated in the Cabinet at all but was taken solely by Eden and, so to speak, imposed on the Cabinet. However, this may be (Macmillan was one of the Ministers who later spoke, among friends, of the Suez policy as if it were something with which they had had nothing to do) it appears to be a fact that in such divisions as took place in the Cabinet Macmillan tended to side with Eden. According to one account I have heard, he was with him up to the cease-fire and during the early consideration of that step. When, however, Eden in the course of a Cabinet session dealing with the subject telephoned Eisenhower to seek certain assurances (particularly for the eventuality of the Russian threat of ‘volunteers’ being put into effect) and was very rudely treated by Eisenhower, Macmillan, it is alleged, said that in those circumstances he could not favour the continuation of hostilities, and came down in favour of a cease-fire.
5. Macmillan has, on the other hand, on at least two occasions (in the House on 12th November and 6th December) publicly defended the attitude attributed to him, i.e. that he was in favour of going into Suez on the ground that (a) the policy of appeasement in the late thirties is now universally held to have been a mistake; (b) if the ‘right’ policy had been adopted then it would have meant ignoring the Kellogg Pact,⁴ the Locarno Pact⁵ and the League of Nations; (c) therefore those who condemn the appeasement policy in 1936-38 cannot condemn the Suez action as ignoring the United Nations or other contractual obligations towards third parties. It is also a fact that he exercised greater influence with the right wing section of the Conservative party when he and Mr. Butler appeared before the 1922 Committee in connection with the acceptance of the United Nations injunction to withdraw from Egypt. (This was, incidentally, the occasion on which Macmillan made some jocular remarks about his receiving a Viscountcy that were interpreted as indicating his intention to retire from active politics). And despite his very emphatic assertion in concluding the big debate on the Suez in the House on 6th December, that he ‘unhesitatingly supported the Government in this venture’ a widespread feeling has persisted that Butler did not back Eden throughout the crisis or support him loyally – in fact that he strove to undermine him and in a rather subtle and evasive way. One may note in this connection that Randolph Churchill, who has been fairly accurate in his prognostications during the past few weeks and who forecast Macmillan’s appointment, said in yesterday’s Evening Standard that after the Cabinet Session (on Wednesday) at which Eden announced his resignation Salisbury and Kilmuir⁶ (Lord Chancellor) sounded the members of the Cabinet one by one about the succession and found them ‘overwhelmingly in favour of Mr. Macmillan rather than Mr. Butler’.
6. The feeling in the party, or at least the vigour with which opposition to Butler as Eden’s successor was expressed by what is probably only a minority (perhaps not a big minority) hostile to Butler’s selection, may have been reinforced by personal sympathies or antipathies. As you know Salisbury (Conservative leader in the Lords) and Churchill were called into consultation by the Queen before she made her choice – just as Salisbury’s father and Balfour, the sole surviving earlier Conservative Prime Minister, were called into consultation by her grandfather on the resignation of Bonar Law in 1923 and when there was, as now, no one ‘heir apparent’. Lady Salisbury and Mrs. Macmillan are close relatives – the one the daughter of a Cavendish and the other of the 9th Duke of Devonshire. Furthermore Macmillan opposed Munich and Salisbury also, you will recall, joined Eden in resigning after Munich from the post of Foreign Under-Secretary which he then held as Viscount Cranborne (his place being indeed, I think, taken by Butler) – although it should be added that many people here thought that Salisbury who was ill when the decision on Suez was taken on 30th October did not quite agree with it and would hence not sympathise with the Conservative diehards. Churchill was of course a notorious ‘anti-Munichois’ and, it is claimed, has never been enthusiastic about Butler. As far as one can judge he was also not over-enthusiastic about the Suez operation but it is widely believed that in this conjuncture he, like Salisbury, favoured Macmillan. What advice, if any, Eden tendered is hard to say. A priori his opinion should have received great weight but it is true that the circumstances in which he found himself, with a serious split in his own party, would rather take from the force of whatever he had to say.
7. There is of course no suggestion that Macmillan will call a general election. The case for such a course is not obvious and he has in fact said that there will not be one.
8. The City has reacted well to Macmillan’s appointment. I understand that he is liked there and in fact better liked than Butler, for the reason apparently that he is more direct and less ambiguous than Butler sometimes is.
9. Considerable changes in the Cabinet are expected. They will be known by Monday (14th) or perhaps even tomorrow night. There is little point in endeavouring to anticipate them. Thorneycroft⁷ is however widely mentioned for the Treasury and Makins⁸ (Joint Permanent Secretary) thinks he will probably get the post.