AMERICA APPRAISES BRITAIN
By GUNTHER STEIN New York SOMEWHAT warily, the American mind is opening itself a little more to the stark reality of Britain's crisis. Countless families in the old country shivering in unheated homes, millions of workers suddenly losing their jobs in coal-starved factories here, in a familiar setting, is the kind of human drama that makes Americans look abroad with interest and sympathy. A crisis not only of Britain but of Socialism—here is a significant link with the United States' main domestic issue, free enterprise versus a planned economy. Britain's economic plight is expected to affect her foreign policies. Here is a new angle to America's main international problem, the Soviet-American balance of world power. The ratification of the loan last year ended a cycle of un- precedented American controversy about Britain, its Socialist experie meat, its role in world affairs, its claim roo help from the United States. The British problem, Americans thought, had at last been disposed of. But the coal emergency suddenly showed them that they were wrong, and has started them on another cycle of con- troversy. Some middle-of-the-road Americans are frankly admit- ting that Britain was given too little help and will soon need more. Ignoring the opposition of the economf-minded Republican Congress to liberal foreign-loan policies, they are slowly preparing for a future campaign in favour of further accommodation for Britain before the initial loan is exhausted. Their Right- and Left-wing critics, too, are beginning to build up their respective positions for another fight. Already the British problem is being tied in with the .slowly-starting 1948 Presidential election campaign and with the domestic struggle that tries to apportion responsibility for the expected American business recession before it has actually begun. Britain is becoming, more than ever, an integral part of the inner-American political struggle. Meanwhile, all camps are evaluating the causes and im- plications of the British crisis.
On the Right, there is a strong tendency to attribute the crisis almost exclusively to Labour. Not only in their propaganda but in their own minds, the ultra-conservatives in business and politics minimise the inter-war and war sufferings of the British economy which more objective observers consider the fundamental causes of the present emergency. Those ardent partisans of rugged indi- vidualism do not hide their satisfaction at what they consider the certain doom of Labour's Socialist experiment. Its failure, they argue, will be a great boon to the United States. For it will dis- illusion all Americans in small business, in the professions and among the solid core of trade unions who have been looking to Britain for the development of a new social system half-way between untamed free enterprise and coercive planning, hoping that it may get ready to show the United States the way to a solution of its economic problems by the time the next deep depression occurs.
These are the people who shudder at the idea of further financial help to Britain. They want to believe that the British economy would almost automatically find the way back to free enterprise if it were not for billions of American dollars at the disposal of the Labour Government, and that another loan would only retard that desirable development. But increasing economic difficulties will mean a further weakening of Britain as a world Power they are told, and with it a great loss to the American position vis-a-vis the Soviet Union. This is where the ultra-conservatives differ in their views. Those of an isolationist hue profess not to care. America is strong enough to see to its own security if only it follows proper policies at home and abroad. Anyway, they add, a Socialist Britain cannot be trusted "politically. Whenever suitable, it will seek its advantage in coining to terms with the Soviet Union and in under- mining the American foreign-trade position the world over. To others who are more internationally minded, British political weak- ness in consequence of continued economic crisis appears as a real danger. But they feel it will not be too late to postpone more help for Britain until the Socialist malady has run its course, nor too risky to harm the British people together with their Labour Govern- ment.
On the Left, much blame for the British dearth of labour and materials and the crisis it brought about is put on the maintenance' of an excessive military establishment and of imperialistic commit- ments abroad. The American loan, the Leftists argue, has enabled the Labour Government to indulge in a foreign and military policy along Tory lines, harmful to the spirit of the British workers, to the British economy and to world peace. Another loan. many Leftists believe, would only retard a gradual reorientation of British foreign policy more in consonance with professed Labour ideals. Since the present Congress and its probable successor in 1948 would certainly discourage, rather than try to stimulate, a change toward a more liberal British foreign policy as a concomitant to another American loan, there would be additional reason for opposition if the Republicans came to favour it.
Opinion in the Centre is more fully aware of the complexity of the causes and perspectives involved in the British situation. But here, too, the early pioneers of another loan are likely to find a good deal of opposition, mainly caused by the special interests of one group or another. Many business-men engaged in foreign com- merce, for example, are critical and suspicious of Britain's inter- national trade policies. They make `much of such incidents as the clause in the Anglo-Argentine agreement that violated the terms of the Anglo-American loan and Mr. Hugh Dalton's refusal to welcome in Britain branch-factories of American companies unless they brought with them new technological processes. They fear that the expansion of British world trade, shipping and aviation will give less benefit and do more harm to their own interests than they had believed when the loan was concluded. And they point to the fact that the American economy, already running somewhat short of domestic purchasing power, may soon conic to depend more than ever on a thriving export trade. Others, whose international interests are focused on Germany or Palestine, are disgruntled at British policies there. Still others, as economy-minded as the most con- servative Republicans, feel that another loan would enhance the danger of inflation in the United States. Moreover, what optimism there was in the American business world that Britain would be able to repay last year's loan within the stipulated perk:4s is at a rather low ebb now. And a good many liberals, giving sympathetic ex- pression to their belief in Britain's uncanny powers of gloriously muddling through, are still doubting whether the Labour Govern- ment may have to ask for further accommodation.
But it is not so much the fate of Britain that is considered whey the British crisis comes up for discussion in the United Stags today as the application of the lesson of British Socialism to the American economic problem. The Left and the Centre are still far from convince that the British Labour experiment is likely to fail. Many of them feel that, eventually, the British problem of over- coming scarcity may prove easier to solve than the slowly recurring American problem of preventing plenty from growing into glut and depression. It is in this way that talk about Britain's plight usually ends with speculation about the problems of the American economy. There are comparatively few today who seem to believe that these common problems will, as they could, be solved tcgether, the one through the other, by means of sufficiently speedy and thorough efforts towards the creation of one economic world.
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