General Eisenhower on Europe
to General Eisenhower on Tuesday was a particularly notable occasion, and the observations of the guest of the evening on the European situation were singularly apposite. His claims for the achievements of the North Atlantic Treaty Qrganisation are justified, so far as the construction of a general cadre is con- cerned ; the appointment of a liaison officer between the Standing Group (of the principal N.A.T.O. States) in Washington and the North Atlantic Treaty Deputies in London is one further move making for efficiency ; so is the decision to create a N.A.T.O. Defence College near Paris on the model of the Imperial Defence College in London and similar bodies elsewhere. But none of this disposes of the supreme need for an adequate N.A.T.O. army in Europe. At present adequacy is far in the future. The United States is to have six divisions in Germany, and Great Britain four. What prospect there is of France's ten divisions materialising by the end of the year remains doubtful. Even so, twenty divisions is not enough. That being the case, there is ground for perplexity and some regret that McCloy, the American High Commissioner in Germany, on returning to Germany from Washington on Tuesday, should have used language calculated to discourage the growing disposition of the German Government to raise voluntarily a substantial force for the general defence effort. Quite apart from the military value of such a step, it would clearly help to promote that. European unity on which General Eisenhower laid such stress on Tuesday. He was right to do that, but unity will be better achieved by voluntary co- operation (as-it is being) than by the strait waistcoat of political federation.
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