Schuman Plan By Inches
' If the treaty initialled in Paris by representatives of France, • Germany, Italy, Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg is finally signed by their Governments, and if after that it is ratified by their respective Parliaments, then the attempt can be made to see. whether the Schuman Plan for pooling the coal and steel resources of the six countries works in practice. Thus after ten months of almost continuous negotiation, in which they have been sustained by the original inspiring idea of a closer under- standing between France and Germany based on economic co- operation, these countries still find themselves two political steps away from an economic experiment, During that time the difficulties of their task have multiplied rather than decreased. The hope of direct British participation, first brushed aside by the notorious statement of Labour Party policy in which Mr. Dalton took a characteristic hand, has never been allowed to revive, and its place has had to be taken by a practical calculation of the chances that the British coal and steel industries may have one day to come to a firm working arrangement with the Continental group. The forces tending to draw France and Germany together in the face of a slackening demand for coal and steel have been sharply reversed by the war in Korea and the consequent rearmament. Germany, with 50 per cent. of the hard coal and 40 per cent. of the steel production of the group even in 1950, is obviously less anxious to share its economic advantages for the sake of the distant political goal. Dr. Adenauer is going to have some difficulty not only with the Socialist Opposition but also with the Ruhr industrialists. and the American determination to see the plan through will probably count for less in the future than it has in the past. These difficul- ties superimposed on the inevitable resistances to a revolutionary attempt to overcome customs barriers, differing price-levels and labour standards and national security considerations make a formidable list. But they do not alter the fact that the basic idea of the Schuman Plan is a good idea, and if its sponsors, led as ever by M. Monnet, its real creator, are still willing to go on after ten such strenuous monthS, all good Europeans must wish them luck.
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