THE WAR DEBTS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LII, Issue 307, 25 November 1932, Page 6

THE WAR DEBTS.

Folloaving a conference with the President-elect (Mr F. D. Roosevelt) and the Congressional leaders of the Republican and Democratic parties, Mr Hoover has issued a statement Avhich may be accepted to form the substance of the United States’s reply to the British and French Notes seeking* a further moratorium on the war debts, and asking. that the whole question be revieAved. Mr Hoover says that “no facts have been presented which would justify suspension of the instalments due on December 15.” On the face of it, difficulty at once arises in reconciling this view with the reasoned argpments put forward in the British Note, and it is disappointing to find that Mr Hoover maintains his expressed on several occasions, against conceding the relief which is an urgent and vital world problem. At the same time, he suggests the creation of a United States Commission to review the matter and to ‘ ‘report to Congress such recommendations as . they deem advisable.” This is a step further than his recent pronouncement against the revival of the Debt Funding Commission to study the matter. Asserting that the “American people should not be called upon to make further sacrifices,” he holds, hoAVever, that compensation for the cash payments —presumably if the debts were forgiven or reduced —could be found in the extension of markets for American products, such compensations being mutually advantageous. There is little consolation in this, for there is no expressed desire to meet the debtor countries. The world may well feel amazed at the lack of statesmanship in the United States. Mr Hoover has invited Mr Roosevelt’s opinion. The latter replies it is a matter for the present Administration to make decisions, but Mr Hoover faces a Congress that, in the words of the Speaker (Mr Garner, the Vice-President elect), “would decline to create an agency . to discuss debts with the foreign Powers.” Mr Roosevelt has had a wonderful opportunity to cooperate, but it may be presumed that, Avere he to throw his weight into the balance of favour towards suspension, and then revision, Mr Hoover would receive the credit and rise high in the estimation of the rest of the world. Probably apprehensive of this, Mr Roosevelt prefers to remain adafnant, adhering to the Democratic programme against debt revision. The position disclosed is to be regretted. . Lord Reading’s skilful revieAV is a further reminder of how the catastrophic fall in’prices makes the position of debtor countries doubly difficult. . The dignified statements in Britain are to be commended. “WhateA'er the attitude of other PoAvers, Britain will not consider default,” says the Daily . Telegraph’s diplomatic correspondent. That expresses the popular view of a proud and honourable race, but the United States may yet surely find it has, in its present attitude, created a situation which will not only seriously hamper world recovery, but react to its own very great disadvantage, for authoritative opinion holds that the greatest bar to economic recovery is the dead weight of debt due to the creditor Republic. Hope for the debtor nations in the matter of relief would now seem to lie in the rather faint prospect that ■Americans in favour of reduction will raise their voices in an effective protest.