For Aid With 'Strings'

...The Social Democrats are ready to give in to Soviet blackmail to the point of dropping the NATO alliance...

...Such a government should not get a penny of U.S...

...Even if the United States poured billions into India, the pro-Soviet intelligentsia would never stop complaining that the Pakistanis, who are ready to defend the subcontinent against Soviet invasion, received more help than the Indians, who do everything in their power to sabotage collective defense and to deliver Formosa and Vietnam to Communist slavery...

...they showed clearly that they would allow German unity only on terms which would condemn Germany to the fate of Czechoslovakia...

...Thus, the champions of German and Japanese interests are punished and their enemies rewarded...

...But surely we are not obliged to cooperate in such a suicide...

...Those who are able and willing to participate in the common defense against totalitarian tyranny should certainly have first priority...

...The Soviet Union refused to allow it...

...If the rulers of Egypt want to use Soviet arms to start an aggressive war in the Middle East, let us not force our economic and military aid on them...

...What we are dealing with here is blackmail, and it never pays to give in to the blackmailer-it only increases his appetite...

...The High Dam at Aswan is a meritorious enterprise and should be supported-on condition that Egypt stops flirting with the Soviets...

...We must pay no heed to the threat that refusing to help will push the wavering governments deeper into the Soviet camp...

...Obviously, neither the Germans nor the Japanese have any great love for Russia or the Soviet system...

...It has the right to decide how much of its wealth to give to whom and on what conditions...

...They are merely being "realistic...

...Never was there so much talk that Germany must negotiate independently with Moscow and make a deal behind her allies' backs...

...But, instead, the Japanese Socialists propose a resolution in Parliament blaming . . . the United States...

...Yet, the opposite seems to be true...

...If we cannot help everybody and must make a choice, let us establish an order of priorities...

...But may we not modestly claim the same right for the people of the United States...

...But many countries are in need of industrialization, electrification, mechanization of agriculture, greater efficiency in public administration, and consolidation of their armed forces...

...Every nation in the world has the right to self-determination and to freedom from foreign rule and oppression...

...On the other hand, if they want something from the United States, even something like economic and financial support which is not theirs by right, they can rely on a loud chorus demanding that such support be given "with no strings attached...

...But it should be used to drive home the point that it pays to defend freedom and does not pay to betray it...

...United States agricultural surpluses could certainly be used to great benefit in many places...

...Then, of course, withdrawal of the favor becomes an injury to be resented even though the recipient may have had no actual right to the favor in the first place...

...If India falls into Communist hands, the Indians will suffer and so will we...

...But apply it to international policies and the same people will tell you that the right policy is to offer the left cheek to every blackmailer who has just slapped your right one...

...The Communists came as blackmailers...

...But that obligation is matched by the no less forceful moral obligation of all who are free from totalitarian tyranny to defend freedom that it may not perish from the earth...

...So why not say clearly: Our help goes first to those governments which, in their own interests as well as those of other free nations, are ready to participate in common defense...

...If a non-Communist government wants to barter the common interests of freedom for some economic favors from Khrushchev and Bulganin, or for their support in attacking another free country...

...Take another example: The United States and all the democratic powers supported Japan's membership in the United Nations...

...Why is this so...

...This article seeks to make two points: First, in the worldwide struggle against totalitarian tyranny, America must be prepared to give liberal aid to her friends in this struggle, without pinching pennies or extracting economic privileges for herself...

...We must warn against it, offer our help if the suicidal policy is reversed, and withhold it, openly and clearly, if it is pursued...

...The Western powers came to Geneva supporting the basic goals of the German nation: unification and self-determination...

...If we really resolve to help our friends without penny-pinching, we need not fear a comparison of the countries helped by us with those "helped" by the Kremlin...

...Proclaiming the principle of "no strings attached" only opens American policy to the reproach of hypocrisy...

...Since the need for help is immense and the means limited, America's enemies everywhere will claim that their country did not get enough, while another nation, more friendly to American policy, got more than it deserved...

...Philanthropic aid to the population of non-friendly countries should not be excluded, provided it is distributed to the needy and under such controls that it cannot be misused by the governments (as UNRRA supplies often were in Communist-ruled countries...

...We should support this right equally as regards Indo-China, Tunisia and Morocco, or East Germany...

...If the Afghan Government wants to put its neck in the Soviet noose in return for Soviet aid in its drive against Pakistan, let us tell them to beware...

...Pay an immense price...

...Unquestionably, we have a moral obligation to share some of our wealth with the unfortunate inhabitants of underdeveloped countries...

...Kennan went on to say that the policy of aid cannot be effective unless people feel that, while our favor is a possibility offering certain advantages to them, our disfavor is also a tangible possibility attended by certain disadvantages...

...For decades, the American Federation of Labor had the slogan," Reward your friends and punish your enemies," and no liberal ever found anything wrong with this common-sense maxim...

...Nations with democratic institutions which combine traditional neutrality with a firm resolution to defend themselves against attack-like Sweden or Switzerland-should be given help if they need it...

...The Soviet Union vetoed it...

...For Aid With 'Strings' Our economic support should be generous and unstinting, but we should refuse help to nations when their leaders give comfort to totalitarianism By Peter Meyer The diplomatic struggle between the free and Communist worlds has been marked in recent months by several highly paradoxical developments...

...And nobody seems surprised...

...Take the repercussions which the recent Geneva Foreign Ministers' Conference has had in Germany: At Geneva, the Western powers acted as champions of Germany's basic national interests...

...They demanded German unity...

...Western chancelleries are trembling lest the Government parties follow this lead if something should happen to Chancellor Adenauer...

...The Soviet Union denied the German people this elementary freedom...

...If they want something from the Soviet Union, even such an elementary right as national unity or representation in the United Nations, they have to pay for it...

...At the same time, correspondents report that the whole affair may strengthen Soviet influence in Japan and that the latter may have to yield to Soviet blackmail in the current peace-treaty negotiations...

...The resources are limited, and one must make a choice...

...Thus, the moral obligation is mutual...

...The only possible objection is that peoples should not be made to suffer for the policies of their governments...

...South Korea, Vietnam, Pakistan and Turkey have no less need of the benefits of civilization than countries whose leaders consider it the height of statesmanship to serve as impresarios for the Khrushchev-Bulganin circus...

...The United States Government should greatly increase the scope of its foreign economic aid...

...One can, of course, argue that the right to self-determination includes the right to national suicide...

...America does not have to fear competitor between Soviet and American economic aid...

...But governments which side with the totalitarians and help them, politically and diplomatically, to enslave other parts of the free world certainly cannot expect to receive American aid "with no strings attached...

...America's answer should be: Not with our money, gentlemen...

...Every nation also has the right to decide freely how to organize its economic life and utilize its natural resources: so long as the decision is arrived at in a democratic way, we have to respect it...

...George F. Kennan was right when he wrote, in Realities of American Foreign Policy, that favors habitually granted or unduly prolonged cease in time to be regarded by the recipients as favors and come to be regarded as rights...

...If America succumbs to Soviet power because of the betrayal of neutralists all over the world, the "neutral" countries will be quickly enslaved...

...Czechoslovakia, the Ukraine and Uzbekistan, or Goa and Kashmir...

...This nation does not live by exploiting colonies, and its income is essentially derived from its own resources and its own work...

...They fought for the right of a united Germany to decide by free elections whether to ally itself with the West or the East, or remain neutral...

...One would expect an outburst of indignation against the Kremlin in Japan...

...Second, giving economic help to our enemies or their supporters is stupid, irresponsible and immoral...

...One would expect this to enhance the West's prestige and influence in Germany and destroy that of the Soviet Union...