Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1941-05-30

JOHN CUDAHY.
and 100000 children in Belgium
| This will call for monthly sum OF
$4,000 tons of flour, milk, fats and
soup materials to provide 1,50O
calories for each person a day.
Guarantees have been given in writ
ing by the German government
that none of this food will directly
or indirectly be taken by Germans,
nor will the German Army requisi-
| ton provisions of like character. To
| give double assurance, Mr.. Hoover
| states that he will confine ship
ments to one months supply so
that at no time would it ever be
possible to seize more than enough
to feed the German population for
one day.
Same Obligation Now.
Meanwhile, two Americans of
much skill and experience in famine
relief expeditions, William Mac
Donald and Columbia Murray, have
been waiting in Berlin for word to
organize their mission in Belgium
! These same two men for a year
and half have supervised dealing
out of the food supplies in hungry
Poland, where two depOts have been
set up in Krakow and Warsaw for
distribution to Poles, Jews and
Ukrainians. They tell me there has
been no interference with their
operations by German military
forces, nor has there been any at
tempt to seize any supplies by Ger
mans. Herbert Hoover points to
this example in Poland as proof of
what may be expected from the
German Army in fulfillment of its
undertaking in Belgium. He insists
that if we had moral obligation to
feed starving Belgians a generation
ago, We have the same obligation
now.
So matters stand, and the con-
troversy between high-spirited,
nourished Americans is ener-
| getically batted back and forth
while Rene Colin and 1000 900
other Belgian boys and girls con-
tinue to be tortured by hunger.
went to ask Cardinal Vanrocy,
Archbishop of Malines, about the
workability of the Hoover plan, at
the archbishopric near the ancient
cathedral where the sainted Card
inal MERCER lies at rest after his
indefatigable labors during the last
war
The primate, in maroon cassock
and cardinal beret, contrasting
with his white hair, spoke with
deep emotion. He looked an aus
tere, commanding figure when he
said defiantly that the Belgian
people would rather starve a
thousand times if relief meant any
jeopardy of independence. I did
not have to acquaint His Eminence
| with details of the latest Hoover
plan. He knew the proposal and
authorized me to state to the
American people that it had his
| unqualified approval.
Moscow Refuses Help.
He said the plan should be given
trial and he was certain it would
meet with success, for the methods
suggested had stood the test Of
experience. In the last war the
Germans had respected their COM
mitments and there was no reason
to suppose they would be less faith
full to their pledged word now. The
cardinal added that there was no
present prospect of relief unless
America came forward as it had
done before.
This was evident from an eco
nomic survey. Even before the
war, in this little industried
country, each inhatitant ate
daily bread portion of one pound.
Two thirds of all its cereals came
from foreign sources and three
quarters of these importations
were from Canada, the United
States and Argentina. Butter and
dairy products were brought from
Holland. Now even the thrifty
Dutch were feeling the pinch of
scarcity and were made to pay
through the nose. So there was no
hope of help from that quarter.
There remained Russia and the
granary of tine great Ukraine, but
the story of the Belgian negotiations
with Russia is discouraging one.
Two months ago a commission filled
with high hope went to Moscow,
confident that they could purchase
Russian wheat, for they had a great
treasure of gold stored in American
bank vaults which, the former
finance l<inister told me, had value
of $175,000,000 In Moscow a shock
awaited them, for the Russians
placed no value upon this American
gold What they wanted for their
wheat was technical machinery
which Belgian factories alone could
produce and also some of the more
useful commercial metals of the
country.
Food Is BoOtlegged.
In the end, after weeks of negotia-
lions, the commission came back
with nothing more than the pro-
mise of 10 days wheat ration in
exchange for the only available zinc
in Belgium. 1t will be year before
the complicated machinery which
the Russians demand in immediate
exchange for more wheat can be
shipped from Belgium.
While Belgian gold lies idle, pieces
of paper put out in profusion by
bankrupt governments purchase de
luxe delicacies such as butter and
eggs. That curious currency, kredit-
mark, which proclaims its inherently
spurious character by the threat of
punishment for counterfeiting which
is written on its face, and which has
back of it nothing but the fiat of
an occupying army, now has an ex-
change value 1919 times that of the
Belgian franc.