BRITAIN'S FUTURE

...As the war came to an end, it became increasingly * clear to British industrialists that the future would not be like the past...

...This was what Mr...

...Without American aid our standard of living is bound to fall much below that austerity to which it has been reduced in the cause of war...

...Clearly, if Britain was to regain her former rank as a first-rate economic power, her Tory manufacturers would have to retool, find new products, and cut profits...

...And, continued the Right Honorable Gentleman, turning the knife in the wound while the Opposition cheered and the Labor benches cried "very mischievous," if Britain wished assistance from the United States, "we must be careful not to sneer at and criticize private enterprise...

...Not for years has an American visitor to the United Kingdom failed to remark, in mingled scorn and wonderment, at the cumbersome and eccentric "W„C.'s...

...They would bring into the markets electrical systems of equal obsolescence...

...The markets of the world must be taught to "Buy British...

...Clinging to their traditions, the British sneer at the chromium shininess of American gadgetry, ridicule the annual models, the fantastic kaleidoscope of style changes, the rush of Americans for newness...

...Lyttleton's friends among the manufacturers...

...Ernest Bevin's statement on foreign policy had rejected the major part of Labor's campaign oratory in order to endorse Churchill's and America's established program in Europe...

...And, so long as Britain was abhvto control the credit of India's enormous market, or to hold Hong Kong as an entering wedge into China's millions, there was no reason to change the models, discard the dies, or experiment with new processes and new products...

...The answer is bound up in Britain's foreign trade, and every British spokesman, whether he was born a little Liberal or a little Conservative, emphasizes in editorials, speeches, and communiques that something must be done to revive and strengthen foreign trade...

...Within its first week, Mr...

...Oliver Lyttleton had in mind when he mischievously reminded the Labor Government that the British standard of living "depended on our receiving sympathetic help and a large measure of financial aid from the United States...

...They are still able to compete in cottons, in cutlery, and in silver...

...If Lend-Lease continued long enough—until workers could be "demobbed," until the profits began to come in from Burma, and Hindustan, and Hong Kong—until the "sterling bloc" could be strengthened—then England might develop again her overseas trade...

...On the first day, the press reported the news without comment...

...No Chinese community would pave a crooked road for miniscule motors after it had witnessed" the geological changes wroupht by American bulldozers...

...Implicit in both his queries and in Dalton's reply is the question whether the United Kingdom can regain its former position as a Great Power, or whether it shall content itself with a second-rate position...

...These gadgets are the pull-chain type with ceiling-high water tank which were popular in the 1890's and have the unpredictable characteristics of a Missouri mule...

...Nationalization of the Bank of England, he explained, wouldn't hurt much, while the control of investments "in the national" interest, would avoid inflation, secure full employment, and encourage moderate overseas investment...

...Nor would any Ganges Valley Authority install British electrical equipment—and deprive itself of American gadgets—if dollar credit w'e available...

...Undoubtedly it is cheaper to manufacture the old models, from old dies, in the old way...

...In Parliament, as the news of the American action came, Oliver Lyttleton, Conservative M. Pn arose to question the new Ministry's policy on trade, industry, and finance...

...But, at the same time, it weakened the credit structure of the Empire and made England itself dependent upon the United States...

...They not only vote Tory, they think Tory...

...That America holds just about all the trumns is clear to everyone here, and in a subsequent article I want to discuss American influence in Britain for readers of The Progressive...

...They not only cling to ancient ways in politics, they follow the beaten pathways in economics...

...A substantial number of Germany's industrial plants were moved bodily to Russia, and the Soviet's industrial capacity was an unknown quantity...

...They must be convinced that "British and Best" is an accurate slogan...

...On the second day, it repeated the story...

...And, at the other end of the scale, they would offer warm and insipid soda pop and unattractive "sweets" in competition with chewing gum and the carbonated "Colas...

...THE "abrupt" ending of Lend-Lease, practically coincidental with Lyttleton's queries, was not so simple as American editors and political commentators implied...

...They attribute virtue to established ways and deny the facts of obsolescence...

...This interchange probably served its immediate political purposes, but it served to highlight the active interest of the British Government in American reactions...

...It is a trite and common observation that the British pride themselves on their traditions while the Americans boast of their progress...

...The most promising markets at the moment are in warm climates where woolens are not in demand and where cottons, already depressed by overproduction, must compete with test-tube fabrics like rayon and nylon...

...Clearly the new Government did not wish a conflict with the United States, and Mr...

...Lyttleton with words softly designed to turn away American wrath...

...ALTHOUGH Labor members promptly repudiated the implications of Mr...

...But this, unfortunately for the British, is easier said than done...

...Press and publicists, too, quoted the New York Times' Arthur Krock who asserted that the American Government would not underwrite Labor's socialistic experiments...

...BRITISH plumbing is a case in point...

...But the war threatened the monopoly which the British held on these two great undeveloped areas...

...C.'s" an unending source of both exasperation and humor...

...But the job of retooling for a new, and relatively free, market demanded both time and money...

...It was not merely a notice that the United States would not underwrite the Labor Government for * its own sake...

...The war, it is true, bombed German and Japanese industry out of immediate competition...

...They would macadamize the crooked lanes of far-off places— as they did their own—and equip them with 10 horse power automobiles...

...For the most part, they balk...

...And, in simple truth, the British do not produce the goods, in quality or in kind, that the markets of the world demand...

...plumbing systems...

...But these things, once of major importance in world trade, have no longer their former dominance...

...The Government, charged the Conservative spokesman, was ignoring relations with the United States—the "most urgent of all subjects...

...Moreover, said the Tory, "the standard of life of every citizen in this country . . . depends on our receiving sympathetic help and a large measure of financial aid from the United States...

...Yet it is with this plumbing that the British would come into the marketplace...

...It was a notice that if the United States underwrote the retooling of British industry, underwrote the sterling bloc, and allowed the British to reassert supremacy in Hong Kong, it would do it on different terms and perhaps on a more businesslike basis than those it used to underwrite Churchill's Tories and the war...

...There was universal agreement that the American action had been "abrupt" and "precipitate," and political commentators, searching for ready reasons, seized upon PM's hysterical statement that Truman had "jerked the rug" from under the Labor Government...

...Not until the third day after Leo Crowley's and President Truman's first statements did the full implications of the end of Lend-Lease dawn...

...Americans, accustomed to the enameled efficiency of the products of Crane and Koh-ler, find the British "W...

...Lyttleton's remarks, it was already evident that the new British Government was acutely conscious of American opinion...

...Then, as the shocked public found voice, the orators in Hyde Park and the headline writers in the newspapers concentrated their attention on the food shortage, and made, each according to his kind, dire or hopeful predictions about next Winter's diet...

...Hugh Dalton, Chancellor of the Exchequer, replied to Mr...

...That would certainly affront American opinion...

...THE British have an undoubted superiority in woolens, in men's tailoring, and in ships and shipping...

...The products which they bring to the market place bear the ear marks of stolidity and the odor of antiquity...

...The naked lands need clothing, the warm lands need refrigeration, the hungry lands need bread and meat, the dirty lands need sanitary facilities, the dark lands need electric lights, and the slow lands need automobiles...

...Both time and money depended on America...

...But whether or not the mischievous Lyttleton was attempting to call American attention to the contemplated sins of the Labor Government, his remarks raised even deeper questions for Great Britain's future...

...Before the world markets will "Buy British," the British must be able to offer something for sale which can compete with American-made goods...

...These are the markets of the world, and the British have little to offer them...

...No Brazilian mountain town, creating a municipal waterworks, would prefer British to American (or perhaps Russian...

...Fundamentally, the trouble with British industry lies in the gross conservatism of Mr...

...The British rest their case upon tradition...

...upon the cathedrals and thatched roofs, upon the spires of Oxford and the sturdy grilled gates of the Bank of England...