Spectator's Notebook
AI write, the Foreign Secretary, Mr Stewart, is in Brussels piously expounding Britain's devotion to Western European unity and expres- sing his horror at General de Gaulle's decision to withdraw unilaterally from NATO. As a practical demonstration of the profundity of our belief in Western solidarity and of our disgust at France's unilateral behaviour, the British government has decided without 'consultation to withdraw unilaterally from ELDO, the European space organisation. (All credit, incidentally. to The Times for its first-class scoop • on this.) Now, its perfectly true that the ELDO project is proving an expensive method of making a pretty small splash in space. But it was our idea; we pushed the Common Market countries into it: and for all its faults they now want to see it through. In spite of all our efforts we've failed to persuade either the French, or the Germans. or the Italians, or the Belgians—or even the Dutch—that it would be a good idea if they were to call it a day. too. So we've gone ahead on our own, no doubt hoping to wreck the whole project in the process.
The only difference, in fact, between de Gaulle's action in NATO and ours in ELDO is that what France is doing is perfectly legal and motivated by a vision of Europe that is wholly admirable. while Britain's move is probably illegal (it's cer- tainly contrary to the spirit of Article 23 of the ELDO treaty, which expressly states that 'A member state may not withdraw from the Organisation before the end of any programme in which it has agreed to participate), and is motivated by parsimony. The overall cost of the current ELDO programme has jumped from £70 million to £158 million, of which Britain's share is £611 million. Since we've already paid £48 million, and are committed to a further £17 million this. year, the total saving from pulling Out now (assuming no penalties for infringement of Article 23) will amount to a pathetic £131 million in 1967/68, by no means all of it in foreign exchange, either.
Oh yes, I almost forgot. There's one other difference between NATO and ELDO. The Americans are in the first but not in the second. Apparently it's quite all right to rat on Euro- peans, so Jiang as -you don't rat on America. That's what makes us . such suitable candi-
dates for membership of the Common Market.
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