|
|
Article: The brief life of liberal anti-communism.
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- September 15, 1989
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1989 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
IT WAS an exhilarating moment for Arthur Koestler, on the afternoon of Thursday, June 28, 1950, as he called to a crowd of 15,000 in a public park in the British sector of Berlin: "Friends, freedom has seized the offensive!" This was the final day of the international conference called the "Congress for Cultural Freedom," a name resonant of many leftist rallies. Koestier, the 45-year-old author of Darkness at Noon, was exhausted after weeks of planning, days of arguing, and hours of drafting and redrafting a liberal, anti-Communist, anti-neutralist "Freedom Manifesto," which he now proclaimed.
But he was also triumphant: his point about seizing the offensive ...