Evening star., 1945-08-13
Loski Replies to IS. Writers,
Sees dollar Diplomacy Policy
By HAROLD ]. LASKI,

OeeS D0HQr LID
by HAROLD J. LASKI,
Chairman Of the British Labor Party.
LONDON (By Wireless) "A friend
has just sent me two issues Of the
New York Times dated July % and
80. in which two eminent American
journalists Arthur Krock and
Henry Hazlitt, discuss the impact of
the British elections upon what
Krock calls "realists" in the United
States, by which term he describes
men like Cordell Hull, B. M. Baruch
and Jesse Jones. He explains that
their international economic policy
aimed at preservation OF our ma
tional economy and living standard"
purpose he seems to regard as diff
ferent from that entertained by
New Dealer-I use Krocks term
like Henry Wallace.
He explains that these influential
men will, on the return Of President
Truman, seek to impress" him that
the Labor governments program Is
more than Great Britain can afford
and can only be financed by Amer
lean aid. They'll tell him that
America ought to assist Britain ito
all ends that will make for good
Anglo-American relations and help
restore peacetime conditions" every
where as an outcome OF Labor's
program and that it should not
underwrite state socialism"
Now they think American eco
nomic policy must be revised. Haz-
lit writes, If more generally, in
much the same strain. He says
ut would seem a strange paradox
If American capitalism were to be
asked to subsidize British or conti-
mental Socialism in its early stages" !"
The impression they create is that
Anglo economic relations
have been profoundly and adversely
affected by the failure Of Britain
to fulfill the expectation OF free
enterprise" irf the United States
that Churchill would win with
working majority.
Summary Of Opinion.
think this is a fair summary of
what Krock and Hazlitt described
as the climate of American business
opinion generally. and of an i'm
portant group known to have great
influence in the White House in
particular. The inferences which
follow it are of outstanding import
ance. II Krock and Hazlitt are cor
rect, President Truman is to be in
fluenced toward presenting Prime
Minister Attlee and his colleagues
with what amounts to the following
body of theories:
Fipsts-aAmerican economic policy
in the foreign sphere was built on
the expectation of Churchills VIC
tory, the administration would then
have been encouraged to cooperate
with Britain in every way.
+ We are not told with precision
what changes: but we are led to as
sumo that cooperation could be
extended to Churchill which Attlee
could not expect unless he aban-
doned the program for which he
was elected. Attlee must therefore
either refuse to implement his man
date or, as I understand the
Krock- -Hazlitt thesis, Truman will
be urged to return to economic
isolationism.
Still omitting the second theorem,
the Krock- -Hazlitt thesis by impli-
cation goes very much further. It
informs British bankers and manu-
facturers that important American
circles regard an attempt to carry
out the will Of the British people as
likely to result in a "demoralized
British economy" for which there
will be no American aid. This be-
comes virtually an invitation to
them to urge British public opinion
either to throw out the Attlee gov
ernment or compel it to practice
continuity in economic policy" with
the Churchill government.
Second, but Britain returned Att
lee with a sweeping Socialist ma
jority for naturalization of certain
industries. We do not believe this
can be accomplished without Ameri-
can aid.
Three, but once we believe that
if this aid is given the Socialist
program would result in "demoral-
lied British economy" we recon-
mend that such aid be given.
Four. we believe further that this
program is a threat to American
free enterprise
Five, American capital must not
be used to assist any state which
favorS Socialism.
Six, we are all for helping Britain
and promoting peace the world over
as long as economic policy abroad
conforms to our requirements.
Suggestion Challenged.
! omit for the moment the ques-
tion of whether Attlee's government
can fulfill their election pledges
without financial aid from America
This apart, the Krock- -Hazlitt pro-
gram is an announcement that on
the economic plane the -Four Free
doms can only be achieved in q
capitalist way. Any attempt to
realize them in Socialist terms will
lead to changes in the economic
foreign policy of the United States.
Policy Assailed.
To speak quite frankly, this is
dollar diplomacy in excelsis. 1t is
like an unofficial Potsdam declara-
ton with the Attlee government in
stead of the Franco government as
the object to be destroyed. On the
one hand. 1t is indicating with, of
course, the delicacy of indirectness
that the sovereign power of Britain
Is in fact resident in Washington;
" vSinfOnietta