THE CHOICE ON FOREIGN POLICY
The Choice On Foreign Policy THE newly adopted platform of the Republican Party has baen described by a professional Democrat as a "mumbo-jumbo of weasel-worded evasions," and by a professional...
...But it isn't the domestic planks of the Republican platform that concern us here this week...
...Roosevelt's recent declaration must certainly be the basis of anything the Democrats finally write...
...It appreciates the fact that there are "basic causes of world disorder" which must be dealt with by cooperating nations...
...Roosevelt and the Republicans have joined in spurning the two essentials of the rampant and extremist internationalists—a world state and an international police force...
...Revolutionary Progress ONE of the postulates of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin (old style) was that the socialized state must chuck overboard capitalistic concepts like private profit, private enterprise...
...on the form of the organization, rather than on the substance of the peace...
...The purpose of the [in-t e r n ational organization] would be to maintain peace and security, and to assist the creation, through international cooperation, of conditions of stability and well-being necessary for peaceful and friendly relations among nations...
...There would also be an international court of justice to deal primarily with justiciable disputes...
...Roosevelt, squander away their fine talking points by failing to act on their own recognition that we must get at the "basic causes of world disorder" (GOP) or create "conditions of stability and well-being necessary for peaceful and friendly relations among nations" (Mr...
...But the Republicans, like Mr...
...Recently Premier Josef Stalin (new style) had a two-and-one-half hour friendly interview with Eric Johnston, president of the U. S. Chamber of Commerce, apostolic envoy of private profit, private enterprise...
...Roosevelt's "adequate forces" or the Republicans' "peace forces" will be able to do more than guard temporarily an uneasy truce...
...Roosevelt's recent declaration on foreign policy is placed on the enforcement of the settlement, rather than the terms of the treaty...
...The Democrats, of course, have yet to adopt their platform, but Mr...
...Neither description, of course, has much relation to the truth...
...The Republican platform shows no more appreciation of the deep-going social and economic problems involved in reconversion to a peacetime economy than does the Baruch-Byrnes-Hancock-Clayton crowd which is currently masterminding the reconversion problem at Mr...
...We believe, however, that peace and security do not depend upon the sanction of force alone, but should prevail by virtue of reciprocal interests and spiritual values recognized in these security agreements...
...Stalin will buy a seat in a newly-created Moscow stock exchange...
...IT it difficult for ordinary mortals to appreciate all the fine-points which lead the Roosevelt followers and the Republican spokesmen to denounce each other's newest declarations on foreign policy, although there are a few differences, to be sure...
...Strange all this difference should be "Twixt Tweedledum and Tweedledee...
...Roosevelt did less than a month ago, the Republicans make it clear that they too oppose the surrender of American "sovereignty" to some super-state...
...We favor responsible participation by the United States in postwar cooperative organization among sovereign nations to prevent military aggression and to attain permanent peace with organized justice in a free world . . . The organized cooperation of the nations should . . . promote a world opinion to influence the nations to right conduct...
...We intend to explore them in detail as the campaign progresses...
...Roosevelt's invitation...
...It calls for cooperative effort to promote "a world opinion to influence the nations to right conduct...
...Some of the planks are shot through with vague generalizations and downright evasions—but the platform as a whole is hardly more "weasel-worded" than the platforms of both the old parties have been for the past quarter century or more...
...ROOSEVELT "We are not thinking of a super-state with its own police forces and other paraphernalia of coercive powGOP PLATFORM "We shall seek to achieve [peace and security] through organized international cooperation, and not by ioininor a world state...
...The organized cooperation among nations should . . . . develop international law, and maintain an international tribunal to deal with justiciable disputes...
...Mr...
...Under the Roosevelt doctrine announced to the world a month ago or the Republican platform of last week it is possible to commit us to enforce an intolerable status quo around the world, without at any time coming to grips with what we regard as the basic causes of war—imperialism, competitive armaments, territorial aggrandizement, social dislocations, economic inequalities, racial discriminations, harsh indemnities, and a hate-creating settlement based on revenge...
...Roosevelt...
...We wonder idly whether Mr...
...Any similarity is purely political...
...It contends that peace cannot be maintained by force alone...
...Here, side by side, are the pertinent paragraphs from the Roosevelt and Republican statements on foreign policy...
...Beyond that, the hope of a peaceful and advancing world will rest upon the willingness and ability of the peace-loving nations, large and small, bearing responsibility commensurate with their individual capacities, to work together for the maintenance of peace and security...
...Johnston will come back spouting socialism or whether Mr...
...Like the President, they reject the idea of an international police force...
...THE Republican plank on foreign policy does have several sensible provisions...
...Virtually all the emphasis in both the Republican platform and in Mr...
...Thus, both Mr...
...Johnston wore a red necktie...
...The Choice On Foreign Policy THE newly adopted platform of the Republican Party has baen described by a professional Democrat as a "mumbo-jumbo of weasel-worded evasions," and by a professional Republican as "a great charter for a free, peaceful, and prosperous America...
...As Mr...
...Pending this, we pledge continuing collaboration with the United Nations to assure these ultimate objectives...
...Such organization should develop effective cooperative means to direct peace forces to prevent or repeal military aggression and to attain permanent peace with organized justice in a free world...
...The claim of the professional Republican—that the platform points the way to a "free, peaceful, and prosperous America"—is just as silly a bit of twaddle as the self-righteous charge of the professional Democrat...
...It recognizes the need for working with other nations to seek "conditions calculated to promote worldwide economic stability...
...Without a courageous grappling with these causes of war, neither Mr...
...We are seeking effective agreement and arrangements through which the nations would maintain, according to their capacities, adequate forces to meet the needs of preventing war and of making impossible deliberate preparation for war, and to have such forces available for joint action when necessary...
...What we do want to examine for the present is the GOP declaration on foreign relations—especially as that declaration compares with the known position of the Democratic Party...
Vol. 8 • July 1944 • No. 28
