The Wilmington morning star., 1947-04-05
VANDENBERG TO THE
RESCUE

VANDENBERG TO THE
RESCUE
If the Administration accepts
the v a n d e n b e r 6 amendment
promptly and generously a large
majority in Congress for the
Greek.Turkish bill ought then to
be assured. The amendment
cures the most serious defects of
the original Truman proposal. 1t
does that exactly, completely and
handsomely, and if adopted it
will not only strengthen the
United Nations, which has been
grievously injured, but will reduce
decidedly the risks of our inter
vention in a tangled. explosive,
distant, and unfamiliar part of
the world.
The heart OF the Vandenberg
amendment is. h G clause which
would make it American law that
"The President is directed" to
withdraw aid III requested by a
procedural vote in the Security
Council or a majority vote in the
General Assembly Of the United
Nations" This disposes at the
outset OF, let US say Mr.. Wal
lace's argument that nothing may
be done except by U. NJ, and
h e Administrations argument
that since U. N cannot act, iii
may be by-passed. Mr.. Vanden-
berg has restored the essential
principle of the Charter which IS
that an important action, affect
ing international security. may
not be carried out unilaterally--
that is to say without submitting
to the authority OF the U n e d
Nations.
The adoption of his amendment
will give to the United Nations
the power to disapprove our in
tervention, and to decide that it
should be discontinued. Therefore,
until and unless the United Ma
tions request US to withdraw we
shall be acting, not or our own
isolated Judgment, not unilater-
ally, but with the consent of the
United Nations.
Nh. Vandenberg has gone the
Limit in seeing to it that the sim
cerity OF the proposal cannot be
questioned. He has not merely re-
nounced the American veto. H e
has also renowned a British veto
on our behalf. Under a ~"procedur-
al VOTE" a majority in the Secu-
rity Council would prevail even If
Great Britain and the United
States were opposed.
If he had wanted to be tricky,
he would have said only that or
a vote, the United States as the
interested party would abstain.
But as everybody knows that
Great Britain is no less an inter-
ested party, and would never vote
to have us withdraw from a coun-
try which it had pressed us to en-
ter, a failure to renounce the Brit
ish veto, would have impaired the
good faith and sincerity of the
whole business.
This is the right thing to do in
view Of our deep commitments to
the United Nations. 1t is also the
most expedient thing to do. For
if ever tn e day comes when a
majority of tn United Nations
are against us in Greece and
Turkey our position will be IN
tenable. It will mean that the
enterprise has failed to do the
very thing which the President
said it was designed to ac-,
complish-to rally and unite the
democratic, or at least the indie
pendent nations, opposed to tn e
expansion of the Communist
power. If we cannot get and hold
the confidence and support Of a
majority Of tn United Nations,
then we had better write off the
intervention as a bad job.
AS a matter of fact we shall
certainly have the support al the
outset Of much more than a ma
jority. We are much more likely
to hold that majority if, as the
Vandenberg amendment would
make necessary, the United Ma
tions have continually to face the
fact that they must share the
moral responsibility because they
have the power to criticize, / o
hold US accountable and. if they
choose, to vote that we should
The V~andenberg
amendment is, therefore a
statesmanlike way of strengthen
ing our position, not only morally
after all we have said about the
United Nations, after all we have
said against Soviet unilateralism.
but also politically in making a
success of this exceedingly d f.
ficult enterprise.
It is exceedingly difficult, es-
pecially the Greek part Of it, and
while the Vandenberg amendment
does not remove the difficulty, it
goes a considerable way toward
correcting a second radical defect
in the original Admin
istration proposal. This was the
offer of unqualified support to the
present Greek government. Re-
ports from Athens. particularly
the confidential and, 1 believe
quite trustworthy report pub
lished by Mr.. Krock on Tuesday,
say that tn e Greek government
has treated the Truman message
as a green light to fight not only
Communists but the moderates
and republicans as well. The re-
ports say that the promise of I'm
qualified American support h a S
been followed by a wave of re-
dictionary terrorism, of arbitrary
arrests and deportations, which
are indistinguishable from the
worst practices which we are de-
N1OriOp and opnnsirr