OIL HEATS UP COLD WAR
STOUT, JONATHAN
Washington and the Nation Oil Heats Up Cold War By Jonathan Stout New Leader Washington Correspondent WASHINGTON, D. C. THE AGREEMENT TO LIFT the Berlin blockade has raised the question in...
...One of the first points of conflict arose between Lucas and labor strategists who advocated a two-package plan in repealing Taft-Hartley...
...The Communists have for some years concentrated upon efforts to control the oil workers unions in Venezuela, Coloml)ia, Mexico, Brazil and elsewhere...
...That campaign hooks up with the Soviet Union's aggresions against Iran...
...The other Latin nations contribute another 500,000 barrels a day...
...Russia's interest in Latin-American oil fields is further indicated by its choice of abassador to Venezuela, Foma Trebin, who was previously professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Moscow...
...Neither arc babes. in-the-woods on the subject of dealing with the Russians...
...and it is too late for the revival of America's former policy of appeasing Russia...
...All of these are the battlefields of the cold war, of course, and as long as the battles go on so will the cold war...
...Late this week Secretary Acheson sent two of his top State Department aides to confer with the British and French foreign offices in preparation for the Foreign Ministers meeting next week...
...Shortly thereafter it was announced by Lucas' office that the Senator had suffered an attack of stomach ulcers...
...A diligent sampling of official opinion in Washington shows no basis for such concern...
...In this hemisphere, Venezuela alone docs as well, producing more than 1,000,000 barrels a day...
...Lucas opposed the twopackage strategy and sold the White House on the one-package plan, which involved delay and loss of time...
...to a restored Wagner Act The labor people were afraid of what finally did happen, that if given time the Republicans and Dixiecrats would work out their coalition...
...The oil facts are about as follows...
...The labor people felt the best chance of doing the job was to get a quick vote on repealing the obnoxious act and then follow it with subsequent action on amendments...
...His successor is likely to be Senator Francis J. Myers of Pennsylvania, currently majority whip of the Senate...
...No one believes for a moment that anything' but military considerations govern the Soviet attitude...
...Outside of these two, the major oil pools lie in ban and Saudi Arabia in the Near East and in the Central American nations of Venezuela, Mexico and Colombia...
...One is the campaign of propaganda and sabotage being waged by Russian agents against the United States in Central and South America...
...The fact of the matter appears to be . that the Russians cannot retrieve the mistake they made when they embarked on the cold war...
...Washington and the Nation Oil Heats Up Cold War By Jonathan Stout New Leader Washington Correspondent WASHINGTON, D. C. THE AGREEMENT TO LIFT the Berlin blockade has raised the question in some quarters wjiether a new period of appeasement is in the offing...
...Bohlen, particularly, has had long and intimate experience with the nature of that problem and understands it on an extraordinarily high level of political intelligence...
...That is behind the Soviet Union's imperialist aggressions against Iran and its effort to dominate that country and the Near East...
...The sampling of official opinion makes it clear why it is too late for appeasement...
...ONE FACTOR that has held down development of Latin-American oil fields is the campaign of Communists in those countries against such growth...
...Iran and Saudi Arabian oil wells, although far from being developed as yet, are already producing about double the Soviet output, or well over 1,000,000 barrels a day...
...Iran and the Near East contain the richest producing oil pool in the world outside the United States...
...They are Department Counselor Charles E. (Chip) Bohlen and roving Ambassador Philip C. Jcssup...
...And, significantly, Latin-American oil fields are far from fully developed...
...As the analysts put it, oil and steel are the basis of international military power today...
...Neither are the kind from whom grave political mistakes can be expected...
...U. S. oil wells are averaging about 5,300,000 barrels a day...
...But there arc less obvious reasons which may be even more important...
...It is known that after the failure of <Tt» Administration program, President Truman called in Senator Lucas and spoke to him in sharp language...
...Trebin also is a petroleum engineer...
...Dissatisfaction with Lucas' leadership in the Senate manifested itself early in the Congressional session...
...Lucas to Step Down ONE OF THE RESULTS of the failure of the attempt to repeal TaftHartley is the lively prospect that Senator Scott Lucas of Illinois will shortly step down as Administration majority leader of the Senate...
...RUSSIA WANTS OIL for itself and Wants also to block Western access to oil...
...The story centers about oil...
...On the contrary, there is scarcely a possibility even of a cessation of the cold war...
...THE TASK OF BOHLEN and Jessup 5s to prepare a common front with the British and French for next week's conference with the Russians, in which Secretary Acheson will meet Russia's Andrei Vishinsky, France's Robert Schumun, and Britain's Ernest Bevin...
...To mention two obvious ones, there can be no possibility of appeasement as long as Communist armies are sweeping down the lengtii of China, or while the Russians continue their aggressive actions against Iran...
...To a large extent they have succeeded, although there are now signs that the Communists of Latin-America are in retreat as they are throughout the western* world...
...From this center, Venezuela, flows a campaign of propaganda against the U.S., depicting Uncle Sam as an "oil . imperialist" Internally in Venezuela and the other Latin nations, the Communists exert utmost pressure to prevent their countries from making oil available to the U. S. Oil for the Soviet Union, not for the United States, is their campaign slogan...
...The Soviet Union's own 6il wells are Producing about 600,000 "barrels of oil a day...
Vol. 32 • May 1949 • No. 20
