Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1950-09-24

iAy ACVoluGlOIldIy Changes IN Lne
again within few days at his
call, as chairman.
Such an agreement will not
mean that the projected COM
army will come into being
overnight. 1t will start things
moving. however. The Councils
Defense, Production and Supply
Committees then can begin trans
lating the basic policy decision
into action, working out all the
detailed questions of command,
finance and supply arrangements.
New Sense of Urgency
The really novel thing about the
New York conferences, the thing
that made it possible for Mr..
Acheson to press for firm policy
decisions before all the details are
buttoned up. is that for once the
United States Government had
made up its own mind as to what
it wanted and what it was pre-
pared to do to help achieve it.
Only last May at the preceding
North Atlantic Council meeting in
London, Mr.. Acheson was able to
answer only in platitudes when
asked if the United States really
was ready to fight in Europe at
the very start of any possible new
war. The concrete proposals and
firm American commitments he
could deliver in plain talk at New
York came as a shock to men who
had grown to expect an American
Secretary of State to be coy.
The explanation is a new sense
of urgency in Washington that
developed after the North Korean
Communist invasion of South
Korea.
Mr.. Acheson feels that the ag-
gresssion in Korea brought out
one overriding. clear, simple fact
that the Soviet government had
taken a decision involving the
possibility of global war. How
ever. little the men in the Kremlin
estimated the chance of provok-
ing total war to be, they were
prepared to take the risk and face
the consequences.
This called for fundamental re-
visions in American thinking
about adequacy of the free worlds
defenses, which led to many
prompt decisions that have come
out since June Is.
Ironically, the decisions that
rocked the French. among others,
back on their heels at New York
developed in part from sugges-
tons that the French government
itself had tossed up in rather
fuzzy way during August.
French memoranda of August
S and August II raised many ques-
tics about strengthening the Or
ganization of the free world. Mr..
Acheson was interested especially
in their August II memorandum,
which had made what he con-
sidered to be some realistic pro-
posals for changes in the military
setup. 1t threw up questions
about Allied contributions to a
unified defense force. and about
an economic organization to di-
rect the production and supply Of
equipment for such force.
Just two weeks yesterday Presi-
dent Truman approved recon-
mendations worked out by the
State and Defense Departments
that supplied the answers to the
French questions-and then some.
For one thing, the proposals
approved by the President got
away from generalities about
command of a unified force. They
insisted such force must have
a really effective authority at
the top, with a staff headed by
one man having actual command
over troops in being and at his
disposal--not just paper or
ganization. And they insisted
that use of German soldiers as
soon as they could be organized,
trained and armed-with proper
safeguards against revival of a
German national army-Was es-
sential to make the combined
Allied force ADEQUATE to have a
chance of throwing back a Soviet
attack.
Revolutionary Departure
With the American proposals
approved only two days before he
left Washington for the confer
ences in New York. Mr.. Acheson
lad the choice of nursing them
w his bosom for a coy dealing
out in old-time diplomatic bar
gaming, or tossing them onto the
table for full discussion. He
chose the latter course.
Mr.. Acheson did not present
any ultimatum or take-it-or
leave-it proposition. But he made
clear feeling by this Government
that the whole project involves
voluntary effort by all the At
lantic Allies to do all they can
for common defense, and that if
enough people do not contribute
enough the whole thing blows up.
For the United States, it is a
revolutionary departure from
peacetime policies to commit a
substantial part of its armed
forces to fight at the drop of a
hat under combined command on
foreign soil-even if the top COM
mander is an American, as seems
inevitable. Doing this can be justi-
fed only if the end result of the
total effort by all concerned is
adequate to the task of checking
Russian aggression in Europe.
All this is understood now by
our North Atlantic treaty part
ners. Mr.. Acheson feels there is
much better understanding as the