Arizona republican., 1906-01-31
The War Gut if to Some
 Extent
The United States is Furnishing Russia About One-Tenth of all its Imports.

ports of the United States to Russia. These figures are somewhat lower
 than the figures for the preceding
 year. when the total trade figures were
 in excess of 31.3 millions (of which
 11.9 millions were imports and 19.4
 million exports). The shrinkage is due | largely to the war and the unsettled l condition of the country.
 It should be noted that these figures | do not include the entire trade move
 ment between the countries. Owing to l the absence of direct steamship con | nections between the two countries, | goods shipped Tom this country and 1 ultimately reaching Russia, and vice versa, are in many cases consigned to
 various European ports (Liverpool, | Bremen, Hamburg and others), and
 thence trans-s shipped to the ports of
 ultimate destination, or in the case of American shipments to Russia, placed aboard the railroad cars for overland transportation. This is particularly true of raw cotton, by far the largest item of eXportation to Russia from this country. As a matter of fact, the of ficially recorded imports of American cotton into Russia during the five year period ending Dec. 31, 1904, were 919,534,00 pounds. while our exports to that country during the five-year period ending June 30, 1904 are stated
 in the official reports of the bureau of statistics to have been 266, ,0O6,0OO pounds or less than 30 per cent of the
 direct imports recorded by the Russian
 custom authorities. Nor can it be said that the Russian figures credit this country with all the cotton shipments originating here Taking for example
 the Russian figures of cotton imports
 for the calendar year 1903, the latest period for which imports by countries are available we find that besides 19.5
 million dollars worth of raw cotton credited to the United States, imports of cotton to the amount of 243 million
 dollars are credited to Great Britain, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, France. Sweden and Norway, all countries
 which do not produce cotton bur re- ceive the greater part (about 75 per
 cenD of their supply from the United States.
 Assuming the same ratio for the in-
 direct imports of raw cotton into Rus
 sia via northern European ports as applies to the countries just named. the value of the imports of American cotton via these ports would be 1S.c million dollars, and the total Value of American cotton imported into Rus sia SIS million dollars. a figure more than double the officially reported val ue of total United States exports to that country. The total imports Into Russia from the United States for the calendar year 1903 are stated by the
 Russian authorities as 32.5 million dol lars. to which should be added 1S.2 million dollars, the calculated value of American raw cotton imported via northern European ports thus making
 the total imports into Russia of mer- chandise originating in the United States more than 50 million dollars. While the figures for the calendar year 1903 are unusually large, partly because of the high price of cotton, there is no doubt that our export figures are considerable under-esti- mates of the actual movement of com modities from this country to Russia.
 It is clear that, for the reasons just stated the figures of our imports from Russia are a better index of the move ment of commodities from Russia to. the United States than the Russian ex- port figures As a matter of fact, the annual average of Russia exports to this country for the fiye-year period 1S99-1903, 2.2 million dollars, bears an even smaller proportion to the core spending import figures of S.5 million dollars recorded by the Bureau of statistics for the five-year period end- ing June 30, 1904, than the American export figures bear to the correspond ing Russian import figures.
 A conservative estimate of the total value of the commerce, both direct and indirect, would place the value at not less than 55 to 60 million dollars of which 45 to 50 million dollars repre- sent the value of goods shipped to Rus sia from this country, and about 10 million dollars the value of goods ship ped from Russia to the United States. Russia. being still an agricultural country mainly and our principal com petitor in the European grain markets, the principal imports from the United States consist of raw materials such as are not produced there at all (just. manila hemp, etc), or produced in suf- ficient quantities, as raw cotton, cop per and other metals, and manufac- tures principally machinery and other manufactures of iron and steel. which, because of their superior quality, have overcome the competition of similar German and British products. The principal imports into Russia from the United States for the calendar year 1903, the latest year for which com plete returns for the entire empire are available, ara as follows:
 Raw cotton, valued at S24, 4,33S, 900, which includes the value of direct lm-
 ports only. Next in order of import
 ance comes machinery, chiefly agri-
 cultural machinery Of the more com
 pieX type, such as self-acting harvest
 CTS and binders, steam thrashers,
 horserakes, the total value of which
 for the calendar year 1908. was S2.- 574,00O; agricultural implements of the
 simpler type, s652 ,OOO; machinery for
 industrial purposes, mainly tor wood
 and metal working, S21.491; and type
 writers, $7S,00O worth out of a total of
 SI33,00G imported from all countries in
 1903. Hand tools valued at $64.532. and
 iron and steel manufactures not specI-
 fled. of the value of S67 555, make up
 the larger part of the iron and steel
 InpOrtS from thie cnl1ntrv moi mi