It never fails 

• 1948 
• Sillince, William 
• Drawing 
• Historical item 

6455169

Drawings / paintings

It never fails

Charcoal, Pen

42.5 x 31.5 cm

1948

Original political cartoon in pen and charcoal on card for Punch magazine, 1948, shows a smiling Soviet leader Stalin peeking round a brick wall at the shadows cast by John Bull, Marianne and Uncle Sam (Britain, France and the United States), tempting them with an ‘agreement’ attached to a piece of string. This refers to the Soviet carrot and stick approach to the west, offering to make agreements and then withdrawing if their terms were not met, or signing agreements and subsequently ignoring them when it suited them to do so. In June 1948, in violation of agreements made with the west, the Soviet Union had cut off surface road access to Berlin, initiating the Berlin Blockade, which cut off all non-Soviet food, water and other supplies for the citizens of the non-Soviet sectors of Berlin and which lasted till May 1949. The western powers were always prepared to try and make agreements (so the Soviet approach ‘never fails’) but it must have been very frustrating to have to deal with such an unpredictable and unreliable ally, which by this time had become an adversary. Published in Punch magazine on 15 September 1948. Card size 42.5 x 31.5 cm (16.75 x 12.5 inch), image size 30.5 x 24.5 cm, signed lower right, caption in pencil in lower border. The borders are dusty and there is a little staining in the image on the upper right-hand side of the brick wall, but image is otherwise in very good condition.