Evening star., 1947-09-12
Paris Farley Windup
Delayed 10 Rewrite
Marshall Plan Report
BY the Associoted Press

PARIS, Sept. 12.-The British
Foreign Office announced today
that Foreign Secretary Bevin
had postponed the scheduled
windup session of foreign min
listers of 16 nations on the Mar
shall plan, because of United
States criticism of final" re-
port on Europe's needs.
A Foreign Office spokesman in
London said Mr.. Bevin, as chair
man of the final session scheduled
for next Monday, had advised the
foreign ministers of the decision
and that no alternative date had
been suggested. Authoritative Lon
don sources said they expected the
delay would be at least a week, and
possibly two, so that the 16 nations
delegations could act on American
advice to prune their estimates.
"A secretariat source here said it
was possible the conference would
remain in session for almost three
additional weeks to rewrite their
report, said now to call for nearly
$4,000 100000 in American aid in
the next four years.
Report Held "Indigestible."
This informant said William L.
Clayton, American Undersecretary
of State for Economic Affairs, told
the conference Executive Committee
Wednesday night he found the re-
port too indigestible" in its cur
rent form and objected to the
method OF presenting statistics.
. Mr.. Bevin, who remains in Lon
don. was expected to confer today
with Mr.. Clayton. British officials
were believed to be particularly
concerned with the American blast
at the report, because they had
been claiming all the initiative and
most of the credit for framing the
report.
French Foreign Minister Georges
Bidault, addressing the French Ma
tional Assembly's Foreign Affairs
Committee, expressed optimism that
satisfactory report would be
framed He praised the United
States as the only nation to offer
aid to Europe.
No Objection to Amount.
The report is being drawn up in
response to Secretary of State Mar
shar's June proposal that Europe
plan a program for its economic
recovery by self-help combined with
American aid. 1t is expected to set
forth the amount of consumers and
productive goods the Is nations fig
ure they must have for 1948 through
1851 and the amount of American
dollars they estimate they will need
to help them obtain these goods.
The secretariat source said Mr..
Clayton did not object to the
amount of American help requested
In the report.
Another informant reported that
the full committee of the confer
ence-the Cooperation Committee
trimmed this amount yesterday
to slightly less than s18,000,000, 900.
This committee had before it a
reported subcommittee estimate
that the four-year. overall, bal
ance-of- payment deficit between
the 16 nations and the whole world
the amount the United States
would be asked to underwrite-
would be 726,000O00.
Estimates Reduced.
The informant said the committee
pared this estimate to a little less
than 100000 900 mainly by down.
ward revision of estimated future
prices of needed commodities.
For example, he said, wheat costs
had been figured on the basis of a
bushel price of $190, but the full
committee cut this to sl70, the
price at which it estimated wheat
would be selling in 1949
The Iron and Steel Subcommit-
tee, meanwhile, disclosed plans to
boost Western Europe's output of
crude steel to 55,400.000 metric tons
and of finished steel to 43.900,000
tons in 1851.
The current production rate is
3o,3o0,000 tons of crude steel and
23,700000 tons of finished steel a
year. The 1888 production was As
100000 tons of crude steel and
34.100,0o0 tons of finished steel. |
The subcommittee said the prof.
ected tonnage could be achieved if
the :. 16 nations themselves could
supply 66,000,0O0,0O0 tons of hard
coke by 1948 and could import suf-
ficient scrap steel from other