Evening star., 1952-06-04
For Prompt Ratification

The Senate should move as swiftly as possible
In ratifying the two historic documents that
President Truman has placed before 1t. The first
OF these documents is the Anglo French -Ameri-
can contractual peace agreement with West
Germany. Under the second, the latter is guar
anteed-in the form of protocol to the North
Atlantic Treaty-the protection Of the mutual
defense clause of the NATo alliance, which means
that II it is attacked from any quarter all the
IA full-hedged members of the alliance will re-
gard that attack as an attack upon themselves,
to be dealt with accordingly
AS the President has told Congress, and as
Secretary of State Acheson has declared in
national address, both the peace contract and
the protocol are directly intertwined with the
treaty establishing the European Defense Com
munity. Under that treaty West Germany has
committed itself to join France Italy, Belgium,
the Netherlands and Luxembourg in organizing
a six-nation supranatonal army, within the
framework of the Atlantic pact, to protect the
free part of the continent against the threat of
Red aggression. In SO doing, Chancellor Ade-
nauer's government at Bonn-Which will be vir-
tually sovereign under the contractual agree
ment, in the sense that 1t will no longer be
subject to the Anglo lo-French-American occupa-
ton statute-has undertaken risks that clearly
entitle 1t to the protection of NATO's special
guarantees of one-for- and all for one mutual
assistance against attackers. This point is hardly
open to dispute, and 1t should therefore occasion
little or no debate in the Senate.
The same holds true for the peace contract.
With no secret or undiscloSed commitments in
volved, the contract-like the NATO protocol
is designed to make West Germany an active
partner, on an equal footing, in the defense Of
free Europe. It has come into being only because
Soviet policy-which aims at converting Hitler's
defeated and partitioned Reich into another Red
satellite-has deliberately and Systematically
blocked every effort to achieve German uniflca-
tion on genuinely independent and democratic
basis. Interpreted in the light of such policy,
the Anglo-French- h-American agreement with
Bonn speaks pretty much for itself as an impera-
tive stopgap measure to serve the security of the
free Germans and the Atlantic Community as
whole while simultaneously leaving the door open
for bona fide unifying moves. Plainly enough,
there is nothing here to justify Senate hesitation
in taking the "early and favorable" ratifying ac-
tion that the President has asked for.
These measures, of course, are of vast poten-
tial Importance. Short-range, they are aimed at
adding German power to the Atlantic Community
in way that should constitute, as the President
has said "a great forward stride toward strength
ening peace and freedom" Beyond that, long
range, they represent what Mr.. Acheson has called
tine DrLn OF 3 new GerInany, new EuIoPe anu
a new period in history period that holds out
very bright promise. But that promise is still
only promise Before it can even begin to be
fulfilled, the necessary documents must first be-
ratified. In the teeth Of Soviet threats, the
United States Senate should move as fast as it
can in acting afrmatively If it does, the threats
will hardly be enough to stop the parliamentS or
the other signatory nations from doing likewise
for the common security Of the free Western
world.