The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1925-01-07
As BANKER
AMERICA
|5EASY
Payments Will Become In
creasingIy Convenient as
World Trade Grows
By WILLIAM HARD.

by WILLIAM LAM :
All over Europe the United
States is denounced as q SHY
lock- because it insists in principle
that the foreign debts owed to the
United States Treasury shall be
paid-or shall seem to be paid.
Much of what the United States
demands is, in fact, only SEEM
ing payment. -
The terms which we extend to
our debtors enable them to escape
a large part of-what they legally
owe US.
It is the purpose of these ar
ticles to review our general for
eign debt situation and to show
the drastic generosity with which
we are willing to saddle upon cur
selves a considerable part Of the
strictly legal financial burden Of
those Of our debtors who are will
ing to settle with US.
u. 8. Had 20 Debtors.
We have had twenty international
debtors out of the period of the
great war and its aftermath.
Two of these debtOrs-Cuba and
Nicaragua--Were I'm the Western
! Hemisphere. They have lived up to
the letter Of their engagements.
Nicaragua bought some surplus
war material from us and gave us
notes of hers in return. She is
paying these notes promptly and
punctiliously as they mature.
To Cuba we advanced $40, 900. 900.
Cuba fell into a period OF prostra-
ton. She was as PROSTATE imam
cially as any Of our ex-allies in
Europe. Collecting from her was
thought a dream.
Nevertheless. Cuba paid US alto
Rether some two and quarter mil
Hon dollars OF interest and then on
q famous surprising morning she
sent US q little note wanting to
know IL we would let her pay US
Immediately the whole principal OF
her debt to us. $3.50
we gaspfng said we would and
she sent it along-the whole ten mil
lion dollars Of it. She is OF our
books.
Encourages Hope.
Our experience with her encour-
ages our Treasury officials and
our State Department officials and
our Secretary Of Commerce to be-
lieve that even as Cuba recovered
from her prostration, so the coun-
tries of Europe will recover from
theirs and will find their debt
burden to us much lighter than
they have thought it would be.
This view is taken strongly by
Secretary of Commerce Hoover.
He says:
Due to increase in population,
and due to development of science
and of natural resources, the
worlds international commerce
doubles nearly every fifteen or
twenty years. This debt burden.
being a fixed burden, will thus be
a decreasing burden"
In connection with Mr.. HOOver's
statement it is to be noted and
remembered that the standard
terms which we are extending TO
those of our debtors, who are
willing to settle with us, include a
provision by which their payments
to us are spread over a period OF
more than sixty years.
Let US take the approximately
middle year of that period. Let US
take the thirtieth year.
Four Times As Able to Pay.
In that year, according to Hoover
authoritative calculation, the com
rnerce and, therefore; the effective
paying power of the world, will have
much more than doubled. If it
doubles in fifteen years, it will
have quadrupled by the end OF
thirty years.
Then in a world four times as
able to pay as il is now, we shall
be demanding and getting only the
present face value OF the debts
which the world owes us.
The tremendous length Of time
which we. allow to our debtors fol
is in itself fOrgiVing to them of q
large part Of what they owe us.
BY the strict terms of their en-
gagements with us they were II
pay US on demand. We give then
instead two generations in which Il
pay us, and they will accordingly
pay us out Of resources trebly o.
quadruply larger than they are to
day.
The instance of Cuba leads us I,
have a high hope additionally tina
our PROSTATE debtors will within
even a few years find themselves les
PROSTATE than they think they are.
Eighteen Still Owe.
Putting Cuba now and Nicaragu;
to one side, we still are owed b.
eighteen foreign countries in Europe
Asia, and Africa.
In Asia there is Armenia. whicl
owes US about fourteen million do
lars. This is on account of relic
supplies advanced to Armenians b
the American Relief Administrative
and the United States Grain Corpora
ton.
The difficulty about collecting thi
debt, according TO the Treasury DE-
partment, is that we do not at thi
TnAHHN EnN