NEWS OF THE WEEK
FOR the first time this year the general prospect of quick and adequate Marshall aid to Europe has begun to improve. The temporary swing of the pendulum in favour of the isolationist remnant has been reversed by the successful passage of the Bill through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and once again the highest praise is due to the steady skill and enlightenment of the Republican Senator Vandenberg. The attempts to reduce the appropriation, gener- ally led by Senator Taft, have been neatly side-stepped, first by the inexpensive concession that $5,300 million should be granted for the twelve months commencing April ist instead of $6,800 million for fifteen months, and second by the earmarking of $3,000 million from the revenue surplus of the present financial year for use in aid of Europe in the new American financial year, which begins on July rst. These financial conjuring tricks have satisfied the supporters of the European Recovery Programme without offending its opponents, whose opposition is in any case a rearguard action. Of more immediate importance to European governments is the fairly clear invitation to proceed to a further stage of economic co-operation which is contained in the preamble to the Bill as it leaves the Foreign Relations Committee for the floor of the Senate. This clears the way for a new meeting of the sixteen nations who stand to benefit under E.R.P. The presumption that they will want such a meeting has been strengthened by the appointment to the Washington Embassy of Sir Oliver Franks, who has always been the main driving force of these meetings, and by the fact that the tour of an Anglo-French mission round the sixteen capitals is now ending in Stockholm without any sign of serious opposition to a new conference. Both the State Department and the countries of Western Europe will be well advised to take full advantage of the present favourable situa- tion. As the presidential election approaches the swings of the pendulum are certain to grow shorter and shorter until they come down to that final hurried ticking in which foreign affairs are for- gotten and American domestic politics are everything.
