Congress Leaders Insist – No “Moral Commitments

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 22872, 16 February 1949, Page 7

Congress Leaders Insist - No “Moral Commitments

(N.Z.P. A.—Reuter —Copyright.) (10 a.m.) LONDON, Feb. 15. The Daily Mail carried under banner headlines statements by the United States Congress leaders that there must be no “moral commitment” obliging America to go to war under the terms of the proposed Atlantic Pact. The Conservative Daily Mail’s correspondent in Washington, said that, in spite of the view held in some European circles, the Congress stand “draws the teeth of the Atlantic Pact." No Doubt of U.S. Integrity State Department officials hold a different view, the correspondent adds. “I learn on the best authority they consider that the one simple basic fact answers all these doubts concerning the United States integrity,” he says. “It is this —so long as United States troops remain in Germany no Russian attack can be made on France, Netherlands or Britain without automatically involving the United State’s troops in the first day’s hostilities. "Any alleged watering down of the pact by omitting the word “military” from the type of automatic aid to be accorded an attacked country had one

specific purpose, which is fully supported by the British negotiations—to allow the draft to be rushed through Congress at the earliest possible moment.” The Norwegian Foreign Minister, Mr. Lange, stated one of the purposes of his talks with Mr. Bevin on Monday was to examine what obligations the countries taking part in the mutual assistance pact for the Atlantic area would have to accept and what support they could expect in return in event of attack. Bases in Norway Not Sought Mr. Lange said that during his visit to America, the United States Government assured him it had not been and was not the intention of the Western Powers to ask for bases on Norwegian territory. Mr. Lange said that in all his talks he had emphasised the disadvantages of a solution that involved Norway going one way and the other Scandinavian countries another way. ' The Manchester Guardian, in a leading article on Mr. Lange’s visit to Washington, said: “It is regrettable that the first small Power to apply to Washington for further information about the pact should first have been led to expect a more definite reassurance than can yet be given.” The Manchester Guardian added, however, that the situation was not as serious as it would have been had Mr Dean Acheson encouraged Mr. Lange to believe that the might of the Western Powers would be at his country’s disposal at a moment’s notice and under any circumstances. If the Red Army occupied Finland .tomorrow, there would be little that the Western Powers could do to stop it.