Mr. Truman's Challenge
The repercussions of Mr. Truman's address to Congress on aid to Greece and Turkey have yet to be revealed. The sum involved, £roo,000,000, is considerable, but that is comparatively negligible compared with the general issues raised. When he declared that "totalitarian regimes imposed on free peoples, by direct or indirect aggression, undermine the foundations of international peace and hence the security of the United States" the President named no names. There was no need. His speech involved no declaration of hostility to Soviet Russia, but a very definite declaration of hostility to Russia's methods and an unconcealed resolve to fight them by peaceful economic means, an instrument which Russia has not at her command. The challenge is undisguised, and is much better undisguised. There has been much loose, irresponsible and danger- ous talk in America about war with Russia. The President's speech is poles apart from that. Mr. Truman simply aims at preventing the creation of a vacuum, or a chaos, which would constitute an open invitation to Communism. His purpose is purely constructive, and if Congress responds to his lead it may have great effect in encolrag- ing suppressed democratic movements throughout Eastern Europe and arresting contrary tendenc:es which can only be regarded with the gravest misgivings. Russia cannot conceivably object to the proposed action. For her to object to the President's speech in view of many of the speeches of her own leaders would be cynically unreal. Everything now depends on Congress. What is proposed is, of course, something utterly new in American foreign policy. The Monroe Doctrine, insisting on the non-intervention of European Powers in the Western Hemisphere, did not formally involve the corollary of American- non-interference in European affairs, but America has almost always acted as though it did, and old traditions die hard. But the world of 1823 has nothing in common with the world of 1947, and it would oefit the United States least of all nations to pay homage to the static. Bold as the President's pro- posal is, provocative as it may seem in certain aspects, approval of it by Congress would be a substantial contribution to stability in Europe and the world. It might mean the definite turn of a tide.
