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COMMUNISM IN MOTION PICTURE INDUSTRY 89
Mr. Wood. Well, at that time
Miss Raxd. I don't know. It is a question.
Mr. Wood. We were furnishinji;, Russia with all the lend-lease equipment that our industry would stand, weren't we'^
Miss Rand. That is right.
Mr. Wood. And continued to do it ?
Miss Rand. I am not sure it was at all wise. Now, if you want to discuss my military views — I am not an authority, but I will try.
Mr. Wood. What do you interpret, then, the picture as having been made for ?
Miss Rand. I ask you: What relation could a lie about Russia have with the war effort? I would like to have somebody explain that to me, because I really don't understand it, why a lie would help anybody or wh}^ it would keep Russia in or out of the war. How ?
Mr. Wood. You don't think it would have been of benefit to the American people to have kept them in ?
Miss Rand. I don't believe the American people should ever be told any lies, publicly or privately. I don't believe that lies are practical. I think the international situation now rather supports me. I don't think it was necessary to deceive the American people about the nature of Russia.
I could add this : If those who saw it say it was quite all right, and perhaps there are reasons why it was all right to be an ally of Russia, then why weren't the American people told the real reasons and told that Russia is a dictatorship but there are reasons why we should cooperate with them to destroy Hitler and other dictators? All right, there may be some argument to that. Let us hear it. But of what help can it be to the war effort to tell people that we should associate with Russia and that she is not a dictatorship?
Mr. Wood. Let me see if I unclersand your position. I understand, from what you say, that because they were a dictatorship we shouldn't have accepted their help in undertaking to win a war against another dictatorship.
Miss Rand. That is not what I said. I was not in a position to make that decision. If I were, I would tell you what I would do. That is not what we are discussing. We are discussing the fact that our country was an ally of Russia, and the question is, What should we tell the American people about it — the truth or a lie? If we had good reason, if that is what you believe, all right, then why not tell the truth? Ssij it is a dictatorship, but we want to be associated with it. Say it is worth while being associated with the devil, as Churchill said, in order to defeat another evil which is Hitler. There might be some good argument made for that. But why pretend that Russia was not what it was ?
Mr. Wood. Well
Miss Rand. What do you achieve by that ?
Mr. Wood. Do you think it would have had as good an effect upon the morale of the American people to preach a doctrine to them that Russia was on the verge of collapse ?
Miss Rand. I don't believe that the morale of anybody can be built up by a lie. If there was nothing good that we could truthfully say about Russia, then it would have been better not to sav anvthing at all.
Mr. Wood. Well