U.S. REPUBLICANS FAVOUR PACT BUT NOT SO SURE ABOUT LEND-LEASE

Grey River Argus, 24 March 1949, Page 5

U.S. REPUBLICANS FAVOUR PACT BUT NOT SO SURE ABOUT LEND-LEASE

Beating Aggressor to His Knees !

WASHINGTON, March 22

Senator Arthur Vandenberg, Republican foreign policy leader, said to-day that the North Atlantic Pact nations would meet any future aggressor with all the force needed “to beat-him to his knees’”.

He said the united opposition to aggression would include that of the United States. “The new defence treaty is the best bet to keep the cold war from getting hot”, saiad said. “I reassert that this is the greatest war deterrent ever devised”.

Mr Vandenberg, who was addressing the conference of American mayors, said he was reserving judgment on the new military lend-lease aid programme to the North Atlantic Powers until the Administration disclosed details of the programme, but he strongly supported the pact as “the best possible peace enterprise in which the United States can engage in the self-interest of its own national security”. Congressional and military sources said to-day that President Truman’s goal of an overwhelming force to counter any attack affecting American security was at least two years away. The sources expressed the opinion that at the outset American arms shipment to Europe would do little more than provide protection against Communist-inspired internal uprisings.