Some others in the Foreign Office and the British Control Commission in Germany took an opposite view. In December 1947 a member of the Political Division in Germany was transferred to other work because of his support of Moral Re-Armament. His superior informed him, 'The attitude of HM Government to Moral Re-Armament in Germany is a strictly negative one . . . and it is not really possible for you to keep that detached (call it cynical if you like) attitude which is so important for sizing up and dealing with old foxes like Adenauer.' The recipient protested to General Robertson, who assured him that 'it is quite wrong to say that the policy of His Majesty's Government is a negative one; it is not'. The same division is apparent in the Foreign Office files. London-based officials frequently took a doubting, or even a hostile, line, but these were countered in memos by Lord Pakenham and another Under-Secretary of State, Christopher Mayhew.22

Leaving strong teams to follow up in Germany, in the British coalfields and in the French industrial North, where Irène Laure and industrialists she had met at Caux held an industrial assembly for a thousand at Le Touquet, Buchman sailed for New York on 10 October 1947, ten days after the Caux assembly ended. He had again been advised that he should seek a warmer climate for the winter but he did not, in fact, reach California until 16 January.

Buchman wanted to return to the United States to encourage his countrymen to become aware that the practical aid being provided by the Marshall Plan would be inadequate without a moral and spiritual infra-structure. He also wanted to offer Congressmen and Senators first-hand information, rare at that period, on the current European scene. In Mackinac, during his absence, the theatrical team which had been developed during the war had been at work. They had written a musical show which, when combined with the thoughts and talents of the young Europeans whom Buchman brought with him, became known as The Good Road. It dramatised the spiritual heritage of the West, tracing its Christian roots back to personalities in European and American history and applying their principles to the circumstances of the post-war world. This musical was presented in New York, Boston, Montreal, Ottawa and Washington, where it was seen by a third of all Senators and Congressmen.

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