Out of one private dinner party came a request from a group of delegates for a special performance of The Forgotten Factor. A committee drawn from ten countries asked for it to be put on the official programme, and this was arranged for 3 June.

General Carlos Romulo of the Philippines, chairman of his country's delegation, who had for weeks been a thorn in the side of the British delegation because of his attitude on trusteeship, headed the committee with the British diplomat, A. R. K. Mackenzie. In introducing the play to the audience, General Romulo said, 'I see many of my fellow-delegates here, and that fills me with joy because what you see on the stage tonight is something that can be transferred to our conference rooms.' Many agreed with him. Adlai Stevenson told one of Buchman's friends how 'Scotty' Reston of the New York Times had said to him afterwards, 'This is what your old conference needs. You could do with some of it up in the "Penthouse"' (where Secretary of State Stettinius, Eden, Molotov and others met for private bargaining sessions).12

Romulo himself was as good as his word. After seeing The Forgotten Factor at its first showing, he completely changed the tone of his next speech on trusteeship. When he had finished speaking, he passed a note to Mackenzie with the words, 'The Forgotten Factor?' Alistair Cooke reported that, as the conference dragged on, journalists had been listing the unsolved issues which were preventing them from going home. 'The list last night was formidable, but now to the astonishment of delegates and press alike, it would seem that Dr Evatt,* has undergone a personality change and General Romulo has unaccountably fallen in love with the British.'13

(* Australian Minister of External Affairs.)

From friendships made during the three months in San Francisco came invitations to Buchman to visit Saudi Arabia, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and India. Field Marshal Smuts, however, had picked up a rumour in London and warned his secretary, Henry Cooper, an old friend of Buchman's, 'not to get in too deep as he was told MRA had fascist leanings'. Cooper, unshaken, took answering information back to his master.

When Buchman celebrated his sixty-seventh birthday in the Century Club at the beginning of June, Indian, Chinese, Middle Eastern, South American, Greek, Yugoslav, British and French delegates came to greet him. Carl Hambro had left to accompany his King back to Norway, but Rudolf Holsti, again Foreign Minister of Finland, had just arrived and was present. Rear-Admiral Sir Edward Cochrane presented a pledge on behalf of a thousand servicemen to raise, in the next six months, $50,000 for Buchman's use 'in memory of those who have given their lives' on many battlefronts. Their message to Buchman read in part: 'In the war of arms your vision of Moral Re-Armament has shown us what we are fighting for. In the war of ideas MRA has spearheaded the battle to restore moral standards and the guidance of God to men and nations. On the beaches of Dunkirk and Normandy, on the shell-swept mountains of Italy, on the coral shores of Pacific isles, on the war-torn soil of Asia, through stormy seas and flak-filled skies, your promise not to turn back has given us the steel to advance to victory.' Buchman was moved to tears.

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