Currency War Would “Suit Communist Book”

Wanganui Chronicle, 27 January 1948, Page 5

Currency War Would “Suit Communist Book”

Recd. 8.20 p.m. London, Jan. 26. The “Daily Mail” declared that the franc devaluation was victory for Russian Communism over the West because it could lead to a currency war among the western nations which “would exactly suit the Communists' book.”

Ex-Chancellor Dalton, writing in the “Daily Herald," said the French Government's refusal to listen to Sir Stafford Cripps' friendly representations was a poor response to Ernest Bevin s constructive proposals for a Western European Union. Mr. Dalton said he feared that if the French free market was not only temporary, “The world may relapse into a state of complete anarchy in its money matters,” he said. The “Daily Telegraph” said the British Government objected rather to the timing and manner of the devaluation move than to devaluation as such. “The Times” said the main source of concern and regret over the French devaluation was that once more a great country had felt itself impelled to take unilateral action which may have dangerous repercussions on the general economic recovery. The “Financial Times” said the French move was a shattering blow to the Bretton Woods Plan for the establishment of a world-wide ordered system of foreign exchanges.