The Press MONDAY, JANUARY 12, 1948. ERP

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25389, 12 January 1948, Page 6

The Press MONDAY, JANUARY 12, 1948. ERP

Mr Truman’s message to Congress on the state of the Union, bearing his views on the policies necessary in the domestic field and the foreign, interconnected and overlapping as they are, may be said to have introduced the critical debate on the European Recovery Programme, the resultant of what has been called the Marshall Approach .or the Marshall Plan. So far and : so rapidly have events moved since the Secretary of State, in June, ; made the offer that transformed the | political and economic prospects of ’ the world. They were darkened 1 when Mr Molotov withdrew from Paris and the Russian satellites were constrained to stand out; they brightened as the conference proved that 16 European nations could collaborate in proposals which fulfilled the primary condition of the offer —that aid should be furnished for a co-operative reconstruction programme, requiring the utmost possible self-help and mutual help and the utmost possible freedom in European trade exchanges. But it has never been easy to estimate how Congress would finally deal with the Administration’s proposals. The care that has been taken to study American capacity for the strain, to work over the Paris proposals, to inform representatives of both Houses of Congress as witnesses in Europe and as judges in Washington, and to build up bi-par-tisan endorsement of the programme—this care has been essential, as much because the Administration is short of votes and because the domestic problems the programme creates or aggravates involve first-class political issues in an election year as because, in the phrase of a Washington commentator, “ Seventeen billion dollars * ain’t “ ‘ hay —to invest or to risk. It is not easy, even now, to forecast the outcome. The Mind of Congress

.In some respects the chances are better than they have been; in others, worse. They have been bettered, most notably, by the unquestionable rise of General Marshall’s prestige, which has accompanied his success in drawing the ERP doctrine away from the dangerous limits and implications of the Truman Doctrine as it was first stated. He has admirably expounded first principles: that the countries of Europe can restore themselves by a united effort but not singly and in rivalry and not without American aid; that this aid must be delivered soon enough and in large enough volume—“ If a man is marooned on “ a ledge 20 feet below you, it is “no good throwing him a 15-foot “rope”; and that European recovery is the foundation of a genuine peace settlement. The failure of the Foreign Ministers’ conference in London, last month, at least helped to vindicate his view. “ Agreements “ between sovereign States ”, he said afterwards. “ are generally the “ reflection and not the cause. of “ genuine settlements In other words, if Russia and the United States and Great Britain are to agree about the future of Europe, and the agreement is to be wellbased and durable, it will be an agreement, not about that “ political vacuum” which Europe has become, but about the working order of countries restored, stable, and fit to sustain their functions and responsibility within it. So much has been deeply impressed on American opinion. On the other hand, the Administration’s chances of carrying ERP through without significant amendment have been impaired recently, perhaps, in more ways than one. It is quite certain that the aid programme will make some commodities scarcer in the American markets; and if that is not enough to make electors and politicians want to vote it out or cut it down, the prospect of still higher prices is. The alternative to higher prices is restored controls and new controls, an alternative that many electors fear and almost all Republican politicians resist. (Although Mr Truman now calls for controls, it is only a few weeks since he himself casually denounced them as the devices of a “police “State”!) Quite certainly, the programme will break down, if the Republicans refuse the President adequate powers to control its pressure, which must be inflationary; all too probably, they have committed themselves too far to be able or willing to retreat the whole distance. They may. then, tend to compromise on weak controls and cuts in the programme. Unhappily, it is a compromise towards which motives always strong, and never stronger than when they are deceiving, will press and converge. It will save American dollars for Americans; it will save American goods for them and keep the price down without, sacrificing too much freedom. Senator Vandenberg and Mr Eaton, convinced with Marshall that peace can’t be bought at cut prices, will find it hard to swing their party behind them with this counter-argument, when, as a Democrat voice has oracularly observed, “ Politics to-day is the price “ of pork chops—and nothing else It is always easier to feel what chafes at home than to imagine catastrophe on the other side of the world, and all too easy to get the proportions wrong. Has not Senator Taft comfortably said that peoples don’t collapse, they make do with less, work harder, and pull round? Moreover, events in France and Italy have produced a nervous reaction. The defeat of the general strike was hailed with relief; the steadiness of Mr de Gasperi’s Government encouraged American observers. But figures which showed how heavily the strike had set back coal and steel production caused them to think that, whether Mr Schuman and Mr de Gasperi hold the upper hand or not, the Communists can deal blow after staggering blow at ERP: will it not therefore be better to reduce the amount pledged to it under a risk so great? ,i

Long-term Contract

j It may from this point of view seem to be a favourable development that, as Senator Vandenberg ‘ has announced, the President has I agreed not to ask for the over-all ! four-year appropriation but only for the first year’s. It may not be so difficult to head off the cutters and carvers when the bill immediately presented is less and when more stress can be laid on the urgent need for humanitarian relief and less on the ultimate need to reestablish Europe as a prosperous customer—and competitor—in world trade. But whatever the political expediency of this tactical change, and whatever, besides, is to be said for the practical wisdom of leaving later charges to be estimated and approved (as ERP develops and as price levels change), there is no little danger in showing Europe a signal to be read or misread as one of weakened resolve—of an inclination to withdraw from a long-term engagement. The conviction and confidence of Europe are vitally important. Europe has entered a long-t®rm engagement, which has required of the States concerned unprecedented commitments and acts of trust—as in the interlocking projects for power, transport, coal, timber, etc.—and binds them to years of sacrificial toil, financial restraint, and reciprocally helpful economic policy. It is for this reason imperative that they should remain fully assured of their American partner’s continuing support. It is for the same reason a disturbing possibility that Congress will again prune the programme, pruned as it has already been (since it left Paris) in such major items as food, fats, farm machinery, fertilisers, and steel. Some of the reasons for knocking down the Paris estimates have perhaps been good; some have certainly been dubious or bad. This, however, is the point. The Paris proposals were designed to bring back the standard of living in Western Europe, by 1952, to a level “ slightly below that of 1938 ”. The American State Department, in its commentary on Mr Truth an’s Marshall Plan message, said that so rapid an achievement was impossible, but admitted that, if Western Europe could reach the export estimates set out in the plan while importing no more than the quantities it now fixes, the participating countries would have to submit to “the most severe strain that free “countries can be expected to bear' “under the circumstances of the “ times ”. They may, and do, hope to battle through. They will lose hope if the politicians prune again where the expert committees have already pruned hard, or if Congress appears unwilling to look steadily ahead to the end of the road. Senator Vandenberg, as well as General Marshall, will have to take care of that, as much as of the uneasy, uncertain Republican vote.

ERP—or Else The maiming of the programme or a long delay—such as greatly impaired the value of the American loan—is more to be feared than its defeat, which could be the result only of an almost inconceivable revolt of party rankers on both sides against Administration leadership and against Republican chiefs ready to back it or at least to come to terms with it. It would be quite inconceivable, but for the explosive quality of the Washington atmosphere, this year, and for-the peculiar genius of Mr Truman in inadvertently touching off his opponents, like fuses. The effect of maiming or delay, unless the programme were brought to disaster in its first stage; could probably be retrieved later, and perhaps would be. But the possibility of defeat, now, must be glanced at long enough to see its significance. It would mean that Western Europe would have literally no chance at all, in any foreseeable future, of recovering its economic strength and its social stability and of reinvigorating on these foundations its splendid tradition of service to humanity. The alternative need not be pursued. “ Thy hand, great Anarch, “lets the curtain fall”: Pope’s line may be as near a prophecy as any other. But the last word here should be used to say that the success of ERP, if it succeeds, will be at once the success of a giant effort, on both sides of the Atlantic, and of a most magnanimous one. Western Europe is called on to increase its pre-war export trade by 30 per cent, in volume: that is to make good its lost investments, and so on. Those who are disposed to talk loosely of dollar diplomacy will do well to reflect that the United States is proposing—certainly to the ultimate advantage of Americans, wisely considered—not to break a competitor or combination of competitors but to make that competition possible and effective, and specifically proposes that the combination should be as close and co-operative as possible. Here there is exposed the falsity of the Russian charge, that Washington is seeking a dollar hegemony over Europe, to which each nation will surrender its sovereign freedom for a little bread, iron, and manure. The truth is that if Washington had sought this end, it would have been by driving a separate bargain with each country of Europe; and this was the very method that was rejected and denounced. “ Divide et “ impera ” is the old, sound rule of exploiter-imperialists. The Americans deserve this honour, at least, that ERP discards it. The greater honour, of having followed their wisdom faithfully to its triumph, has yet to be earned with them and for them in- the world’s greatest task of peaceful co-operation.