Britain and the Common Market

...Few of their major national problems are open to solution in a purely European framework, even supposing they could agree...

...NATO has begun to convoke a gathering of parliamentarians in Paris every year...

...It is true that, even after ratifying the treaty, France would have a chance to withdraw at the end of any of the four-year transitional stages...

...A fifth of British African exports went to the six countries of the proposed Common Market last year...

...Most of the enthusiasts for European union would like to keep America outside the framework: The only meeting of the Council of Europe which U.S...

...For Britain, further weakened as she is by the results of Suez, the paramount need is for new sources of power, not new sources of responsibility...

...They have not yet seen any British initiative to make the Western European Union more than a phrase...

...On the contrary, the bilateral action by Eden and Mollet in Egypt was a violation of the spirit of the Treaties...

...Neutral countries like Sweden and Austria do not want to be implicated in military organizations like the Western European Union and NATO...

...The two projects stand or fall together...

...The idea of a European Third Force —as popular in some American circles as it is in Europe itself—is as dangerous and chimerical as ever...

...By excluding agricultural goods from the Free Trade Area, Britain has seriously annoyed her ally Denmark, which exports little else...

...But it is believed that, if the Free Trade Area is established, simultaneously with British participation, France would not be able to isolate herself from the whole of European commerce by contracting out of her commitments...

...Even if British actions do not damage the prospects of either project, there is a danger that Continental opponents of the schemes may try, as so often in the past, to make Britain the scapegoat for their own reluctance to cooperate more closely...

...The situation is delicate...

...The fact is that European unity is not a magic formula...

...It is true that, in the traumatic shock which followed the Suez debacle, many Conservatives saw leadership in a European union as the only way to restore Britain's greatness and to create a counterpoise to the United States within the Western alliance...

...It is doubtful whether any other French government than the present Mollet administration could obtain a majority in the National Assembly for Euratom and the Common Market...

...One of these is the creation of a European Investment Bank whose main function would be to modernize her industries and develop her overseas territories...

...European unity is possible—and desirable—only in the context of a more intimate Atlantic community...

...So if further progress toward Continental union depends on closer unity with Britain, as the story of the Common Market suggests, Britain's readiness to accept the burdens that implies will depend on America's willingness to move closer to Europe as a whole...

...This had put Britain in a serious dilemma...

...Thus, Macmillan will have to show immense tact in seeking safeguards for Commonwealth interests in Europe...

...And now Macmillan is trying to wriggle out of the British military commitments which were the only concrete element in the Western European Union from the beginning...

...Thus, the Continent is watching very closely to see how Britain's present conduct may affect the chances of the Common Market...

...Now his Foreign Secretary, Selwyn Lloyd, has followed in the footsteps of the French King Henry IV by announcing a "Grand Design" for integrating all the existing European organizations into a single majestic edifice...

...As the Bermuda communique admitted...

...She has therefore laid down stringent conditions for her membership...

...Accordingly, it was finally decided to include the overseas territories of the Continental countries in the Common Market itself...

...The Continental countries remember all too well the great propaganda build-up of the Paris Treaties which created the Western European Union less than three years ago...

...So the Continental enthusiasts for the Common Market are desperately trying to force the relevant treaty through as fast as possible...

...Thus, in a sense the Common Market depends on the Free Trade Area as much as the Trade Area on the Market...

...Unfortunately, an issue has arisen on which Britain's stand could be considered as aimed at damaging the Common Market's chances...

...The Bermuda conference aroused suspicions that Macmillan was abandoning France for the United States...

...If French Africa and the Belgian Congo are allowed tariff-free entry to these countries, the British colonies—and the new state of Ghana —will suffer considerably...

...Figaro's revelations about the conduct of the Suez plot are bound to cause anger on both sides of the Channel—especially since they are attributed to a prominent French statesman who acted as a liaison officer between the two countries during the crisis...

...Bonn or Paris...

...The key to European union lies as much in Washington as in London...

...Since France has the most highly protected industry and agriculture in Europe, she has least to gain in the short run by exposing them to free competition with her neighbors...

...Britain and the Common Market Fearing competition from a unified European trade, London is moving closer to the Continent—but not close enough to affect its Commonwealth ties By Denis Healey London When Harold Macmillan took over the leadership of Britain's Conservative government two months ago, he proclaimed "Europe and power" (in that order) as the keystones of his policy...

...No doubt she hopes that she will thus compel her neighbors to take a political interest in her North African problems as well...

...As discussion proceeds, the Continent is becoming equally suspicious about Britain's real motives for supporting a Free Trade Area...

...The countries of Western Europe are still divided from one another on many big issues...

...Already uneasy about Britain's pledge to join the Free Trade Area, the Commonwealth has made strong representations to Britain to use her influence to have Africa excluded from the Common Market...

...But in both Government and Opposition the decisive argument for the Free Trade Area is the fear that without it Germany would obtain a tariff preference in the Continental Common Market which would cripple Britain's European exports...

...What does all this mean in practice...

...Is Britain at last going to realize the dream of so many of her foreign friends by taking the lead in building a united Europe...

...There is, of course, a strong case for reducing to order the welter of international organizations which have mushroomed in Europe since the war...

...There are important sections of British business and the civil service which believe strongly in opening Britain to foreign competition as a good thing in itself and which believe that the efficient British industries will gain greatly by free access to European markets...

...In particular, Europe has no prospect whatever in the immediate future of meeting her critical needs without still closer cooperation from the United States...

...Accordingly, a British minister issued a graceless warning to the Continent that its price for British cooperation in the Free Trade Area might be too high —and his threat was used by some French politicians to justify rejection of the Common Market...

...Even this is achieved at a cost...

...But the Government's acts have thus far belied its promises...

...Congressmen attended was a very mixed success, since the Americans spent their time lecturing the Europeans about their slowness in federating...

...But Selwyn Lloyd's proposal to merge all these assemblies into one Atlantic gathering has had a lukewarm reception...

...One of Macmillan's first acts as Prime Minister was to pledge full British support for the creation of a European Free Trade Area...

...And there is talk of providing an assembly for the Organization of European Economic Cooperation as well...

...But probably the main ground for objection to the so-called Grand Design is Continental suspicion that Britain is more interested in preventing the development of the six-power "Little Europe" than in helping to build a sixteen-power "Great Europe...

...Cooperation with Europe still represents a net drain on her resources rather than a net gain, like cooperation with the U.S...

...Relations between Britain and France have already deteriorated since the Suez invasion last fall...

...It is already a real strain for parliaments to man the three assemblies which operate as part of the Council of Europe, the Schuman Plan and the Western European Union...

...The Common Market and Free Trade Area are likely to produce at least one more parliamentary assembly...

...Ten years before, he had been one of Winston Churchill's closest partners in building the European Movement—an organization from which Anthony Eden always stood conspicuously aloof...

...Other Commonwealth territories, like Malaya and Pakistan, will suffer, too...

...The Free Trade Area is essentially a device by which Britain may share this preference without damaging her commercial relations with the Commonwealth or infringing the rules of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade...

...It follows from the above that if the Common Market never came into existence the decisive argument for British membership in a Free Trade Area would disappear...

...Thus far, judgment must be suspended...

...The Mollet Government is expected to survive until the final collapse of its Algerian policy—which might be any day...

...The Germans were unwilling to accept the responsibility for investment in French Africa unless they also had the right to free trade there...