FRENCH STUDY OF E.D.C.

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27226, 18 December 1953, Page 11

FRENCH STUDY OF E.D.C.

“Intervention Cannot Influence Decision” (Rec. 8 p.m.) PARIS, December 17. The Foreign Affairs Committee of the French National Assembly today affirmed that foreign interventions on the European Army question, even when made by France’s best friends, could not influence French Parlialiamentary decisions. This was regarded as a clear reference to the statement in Paris by the American Secretary of State (Mr Dulles) that the United States would be forced into an agonising reappraisal of her foreign policy unless the European Army was implemented. The French ’ Foreign Affairs Committee decided by 28 votes to 13 to continue its study of the European Army treaty at a speed and according to the method it has already agreed on. Reuter’s Paris correspondent says Mr Dulles’s announebment has reduced the chances of ratification of the E.D.C. by France and has also isolated France inside N.A.T.O. The correspondent says delegates from other European N.A.T.O. countries have privately expressed fears that France would wreck the whole Atlantic system by refusing to adopt the E.D.C. Mr Dulles’s statement seemed to provide a number of small nation representatives with the chance to say to France several things they have wanted to say for months. One delegate said: “It will be* the fault of France if we are deprived of American financial aid and if we are no longer defended by America on our own soil.” Mr Dulles’s statement has already provoked a serious move in the French Parliament to get the E.D.C. modified to bring in Britain and thus ensure overwhelming support in the Upper and Lower Houses. The essential point of this proposal is to remove the supra-national authority and to leave tne Council of Ministers in supreme charge, as in the case of the Atlantic Council. The objective of this would be to enable Britain to join the community and thus overcome the fear of potential German domination.