U.S. AID TO EUROPE

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27065, 13 June 1953, Page 7

U.S. AID TO EUROPE

House Committee Threat (Rec. 9 p.m.) WASHINGTON, June 11. The House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee voted today to refuse any new military aid to the five Western European nations until they ratify the unified European Army plan. The Congressmen made a series of reductions in military aid funds for Europe, military aid funds in the Near East and the defence support funds for Europe. Mr James Richards (Democrat), who sponsored the amendment to withhold new military funds from Europe, said the measure would force the European nations to “shut up or put up.” The proviso applies to France, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, and Luxembourg. Germany, the sixth partner in the proposed army, has already approved the agreement. Mr Richards said his amendment would affect about half of the 2,079,689,000 dollars the committee had approved for over-all European militarv aid. He said it would not affect economic aid. nor aid to France to carry on the Indo-Chinese war. He thought the restriction on funds would help the leaders in the countries affected to get their governments to ratify the unified army as they could now tell their parliaments that United States aid depended on approving the defence plan. The committee also chopped 800,000,000 dollars from Mr Eisenhower’s trimmed-down foreign aid requests, with the possibility ‘that further cuts may be ordered later. Mr Eisenhower had requested 547,000,000 dollars in foreign aid.