New-York tribune., 1919-02-13
How Shall the
World Paw Us?

1.-The world owes us largely, very large
ly. We who were always debtors until
the war have now become creditors on
a colossal scale, so that the nations
owe US in one or another form about
ten billions of dollars. This very
wealth due US creates a problem. For
how can the nations pay. not only
what they now owe, but for those things
they need must buy and which we dc
sire to sell? There are certain simple
ways in which payment of debt can be
made. A debt may be paid by services,
by cash, by goods. The nations of the
world are not able to pay US cash. The
opportunity for services is only open
to part of them, not in sufficient part
to those. They must pay US partly at
least in goods. Furthermore, in order
to pay what they owe they must be
careful not to acquire further great
debts, but rather to conserve their
buying power in our own interest as
we'll as theirs.
Here lies the solution Of the So
called embargo that Great Britain has
recently established, concerning which
some complaint here and there ap-
pears. 1t would not, perhaps, be un-
fair to remind ourselves, ere we COM
plain of this embargo, that we have
ourselves recently established not a
temporary, but permanent embargo
against certain lines of manufactures
in which Great Britain and France
have both done business with US.
imagine that English and Scotch whis-
key and ale manufacturers and the
wine producers of France have their
own thoughts respecting the perma-
nent embargo we have placed against
!
reflect whether if this fact, which |
do not criticise, ought not in some
measure at least to temper our thought
when we reflect upon what others have
done to US.
"There is, however, an essential diff
ference between the two. The advo-
Gates of our embargo would allege it
to be made on moral grounds, needful
for our welfare. Let that be, for the
time, conceded. The embargo which
Great Britain has established is also
on grounds necessary for her welfare,
indeed, for her safety. She owes us
something over FIVE billions of dollars
Should it be claimed that under these
conditions, with her industries in dis
order and her earning power impaired.
she should still be not so much in
vited as expected to continue large
purchases from us until such time as
the necessary arrangements for financ-
ing her obligations had been COM
pleted? What would be your outlook
toward a friendly concern at once a
competitor and your largest customer,
as is the case with Great Britain, who
under conditions Of peculiar stress
had come to owe you very largely?
Would you feel that such a time was
one in which you should insist upon
their continued purchases on a great
scale, knowing that the debtor was
striving to rearrange his affairs, that
he was perfectly solvent and capable
of paying and anxious to pay, but
needed to rearrange his finances?
" ould you, | say, press goods upon
him at such a time and complain if he
were to say to you that he preferred
not to buy largely for season? Would
you not rather feel that the conserva-
tism shown by refraining from large
purchases added to his credit. ostab-
lished him more securely, and was the
one step that would most inspire YOU
to confidence in him and lead you to
anticipate continuance in the future on
a larger scale of the mutual relations
that had IN the past existed?