The Press SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1956. Countering The Rouble Offensive

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27860, 7 January 1956, Page 8

The Press SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1956. Countering The Rouble Offensive

The Western democracies will have to make substantial sacrifices in the next few years if they are not to lose on the economic front in the cold war much that they have fought hard to secure on the diplomatic and political fronts. Although Russian performance in the field of economic aid has usually fallen far short of the promise, there should be no disposition in the west to underrate the effect of the present rouble offensive in the Middle East and South Asia. International observers are largely agreed that the West must take up this challenge by raising their bids for the goodwill of the under-developed countries. What is more, they must do this on a grand scale. If their aid appears to have been wrung from them as a reluctant concession to Russian competition, Russia will gain much of the credit in the assisted countries without having to spend a single rouble. The United States and Britain showed no great enthusiasm for Egypt’s High Assouan dam project until there was a real prospect of Russia providing the capital and taking the huge contracts. Here the West belatedly won an economic victory at the cost of a diplomatic defeat. Although it is now quite clear that the impact of Mr Khrushchev and Marshal Bulganin on the people of India was much greater than on Mr Nehru and his Government, which has taken several opportunities of re-emphasising India’s continued heutrality in the cold war, the Russian leaders’ spectacular tour is bound to influence the West’s attitude to and relations with India. For one thing, no-one can be sure how long the Indian Government will remain unaffected by the wave of popular enthusiasm for the Russians. Much will depend, of course, upon whether Russia makes good its promises, which are certainly more than generous. Russia has promised India 1,000,000 tons of steel in three years—at a very high price, admittedly; but costs will be a secondary consideration compared with the success of India’s second five-year plan, which depends heavily on steel. China has also offered 60,000 tons. All that India could obtain from Britain, after the most earnest pleading, was an' assurance of 50,000 tons a year. Russia and China cannot spare these supplies from their own capital programmes any more easily than the Western countries, as India has been told unofficially and perhaps officially. But suppose the Communist countries make the sacrifice and deliver the goods? The goodwill earned in India will then be magnified not only by the failure of the West to meet India’s need but by the West’s scoffing at Russian pretensions to be able to do better. Russia undoubtedly wants to be identified closely with India’s fiveyear plan. Of the four steel works so far promised by other countries, the Russian one is offered on the most favourable terms. Western countries have already undertaken to provide some two-thirds of the £ 1,500,000,000 outside capital needed under the plan; and the Russian leaders gave more than one hint that Russia would be willing to fill the gap which, sooner or later, will begin to loom larger in Indian calculations than the finance that is assured. Russia, in short, may secure more kudos than the West from an investment only half as large. These things point to the need for a reappraisal of the possibilities of Western aid to the developing countries of the Middle East and Asia. The Colombo Plan is not enough; something approaching the scale of'the Marshall Plan may well be needed. Perhaps, as one writer has suggested, the most important thing in promoting friendship and understanding with these countries, is that they should be treated as equals. They will not be patronised; they will not be tutored. They may hot always make the best use of the aid they are given; but they want the right to learn from their own mistakes.