WAR DEBTS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 9, 8 December 1932, Page 8

WAR DEBTS

TO THE UNITED STATES. A NEW SYMPOSIUM OF OPINION. Extracts from “We Have Paid Enough,” a collection of current opinion, largely American, on the United States’ policy of insisting upon the payment of war debts from the Allied Governments recently appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald. The book is published by Angus and Robertson and is dedicated “to Frederick W. Peabody, a noble American,” in recognition of his campaign to induce his fellow-countrymen to rate their honour above dollars. In view of the war debts discussions now proceeding between the British and United States Governments these extracts are of more than ordinary interest. They are as follow: •

“Literally, our business interests were being fertilised by the blood of the millions of soldiers who were dying on the battlefields of Europe. “Instead of thinking of the debts of Europe to this country, we should think of the enormous profits made by the people' of the United States in selling to the Allios, at exorbitant prices, a total in four years of 12,000,000,000 dollars’ worth of goods over and above what we had solcf in pre-war, years. “When we remit these debts, if we do, let us not do so with any thought of altruism or benevolence, but merely as a just and summary business transaction, in which the Allies gave more for our salvation than ever can bo measured in dollars.”—American Manufacturers’ Record, September 24, 1925. “We profiteered on the Allies to an extent which we should now look upon with shame and sorrow.” —American Manufacturers’ Record, September 24, 1925.

“America will be rich, prosperous, and wealthy as the result oi this war. We shall nave made untold millions of this wealth out of the woe and swelter of Europe. The money which lias come to us from these people is money in trust, and unless America recognises this trust she will pay dearly and bitterly lor its possession.”—Mr Hoover in a speech at iNew 1 ork, February 1, 1917. 3 * * *

“Europe is in pawn to the United States not lor a year or ten years, but lor this generation and the next, the child in the cradle to-day will be a grey-bearded man before tuis enormous toll is paid and Europe is free. "Germany will be ruined by the terrific levy, but her European neighbours will not be enriched, tor of’tne total debt, under the young scheme, of £I,6UU,vJUu,UO'd, -not less than £l,odo,uoU,(J6o is earmarked for the United btates to meet tlie total allied debts to her. And the eternal wrangle for the odd £506,600,060 will keep the European family in discord to tne end of tne monstrous chapter.

“it is like a fantastic nightmare, and I refuse to believe that any sane American thinks that this urcadful tragedy, can drag on, for sixty yeais, or forty, or twenty, or ten. 1 have never met an intelligent American who defended his country’s action, and few who were not frankly ashamed and humiliated by that action. Why, then, in it persisted in?” —Mr A. U. Gardiner, London Daily News.

“The American taxpayer pays 22.50 dollars in oouu dollars, in itngland it is 000 uoliars, or 30 times as great, in i’ranee, Vo7 dollars; 33 times as great, ill Belgium, b2U dollars, or 2i times as gi-eat; and m Italy, 1025 uoliars, fifty times as great. The American is the most lightly taxed person in the world. Many noble and extinguished Americans are conlessediy sick and ashamed of an American glutted with gold dunning the impoverished European peoples for debts, tlie offspring of crafty nnesse, and of no moral validity. “is it right that your country should be receiving from her friends, who were also hey protectors in tlie Great War, seven-ninths of all the German reparations (which were expressly devised by your own President AVilson, to compensate the allied nations for the destruction and damage done by Germany), while at the same time she declines to accept any penalties from her late enemy?'’—Chapter 111., article by Edward Cavendish. “Our declaration of war was followed by the mobilisation not only of our man power, but also of our material and financial resources. From the latter we made extensive advances to other nations fighting a common enemy. Thus arose the first phase ot the war debt problem. . . . From the record of debates in Congress, it is clear that these advances were not regarded by those who voted them as business transactions, but rather as joint contributions to a common cause.” —From a “Statement on the War Debt Problem,” signed by 45 members of the Faculty of Columbia University—professors of economics, finance and business, public law and social science and history.

“We entered the war in April, 1917, and it was not till Juiy, lylß, that we were holding any appreciable part of the line. During that time many thousands of -French and British boys died while serving as substitutes for American boys. We loaned moneys to our allies, but it was no substitute for the lives of those French and British boys who died that our boys might train in security at home.” —General Ryan, commanding 27th Division, U.S. Army, in France.

“We are looked upon as the Shylocks of the world, exacting Irom starving peoples our pound of go.d. We prate of idealism, of the brotherhood of man, of the hoxie of ending for ever the menace of war, and to a Europe industrially bleeding we offer only advice which is not wanted, and present our bills for money lent.”—Mr James Gerard, formerly U.S. Ambassador to Berlin.

“Tnere is not a single European nation which does not associate its miseries with onr actions and our prosperity with its privations. What strikes me as rather appalling in this country (America) is the total lack of exact appreciation of the depth and vitality of European dislike and distrust of America and Americans, based on the sense of cruel and undoubted injustice and desertion.”—Mr Frank Symonds, a prominent American journalist. ‘‘ln the war situation America lent somo ten billion of dollars to her active Allies. This money so loaned was almost entirely spent in purchases mnde in the United States. So, therefore, we still have the money, and we also have the notes; and we have pressed our Allies coercively for the settlement of this indebtedness, without a single offset, either for sacrifices in our behalf or services rendered by the Allied armies, or the increased peace-time purchasing power of the dollar. “Our Government exercised every pressure possible, and held our money markets closed against our Allies and their nationals to retard their recovery and business restoration, until they should adjust the payments on the socalled ‘advances,’ or war debts.”—By Henry Bourne Joy, Director, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, and Director of U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Extract from a session of the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives, January, 1926:

Mr Mills: The debt that Italy owes us represents not only normal value of goods received, but, in addition, the enormous increase, in prices and the enormously increased profit's made during the year. Mr Winston: That is correct. Mr Mills: And those profits were all derived by citizens of the United States.

Mr Winston: And most of them Hve|c come into the Treasury of the Unf " ' States by way of taxes. ;"p Mr Collier: Have you any apr»lV mated estimate as to how much ofiy 1,600,000,000 dollars was spent ii D ■

purchase of American goods and,' modities? « f quality Mr Winston: I tliink almost alMg rnnxiices that * * * ¥*• . "Never in the world's Uistory| nation declared war, and, for uade soles, of a year, left all the fightingj to 6,3 s Allies* and at the war's close de.Js 3d ; XI pavment for materials and a furnished its Allies to enable VjjjA'rfl-irp do its share of the fighting stitched

Henry Bourne Joy. ..';• i to 6 *** v « "Shyloclc demanded a pound of flesh of his enemy. Our politicians have i placed America in the position of demanding it of her friends."—Mr F. W. Peabody, speech, August, 1927. * * *

Senator Smoot (Funding Commissioner and Chairman of Senate Imance Committee) said at a hearing of the Committee on “Capacity to Pay : “My suggestion on all of these settlements has been to get every single dollar out of these countries we could possibly get out of them and let the countries live.’’

“These debts, utterly uncollectable in anything save goods and services, which all creditors are averse to accepting, probably are destined to hang over the world for an indefinite period, accumulating paper interest paralysing international trade and the industries dependent thereon, and engendering international ill-feeling and enmity, until it is demonstrated by bitter experience that nothing else can be done with them than wipe them off the slate.”—American Commerce and Finance.