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American Foreign Policy and European Integration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2011

Hajo Holborn
Hajo Holborn
Affiliation:
Yale University
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Extract

The prospect of a European federation has aroused great enthusiasm in the United States, but at the same time the difficulties encountered in its realization have generated a host of frustrations. It is not unusual, after five years of costly effort, to hear that the moment of crisis has arrived; that we must either push ruthlessly toward the goal, or abandon not only integration but possibly assistance to Europe as well. Perhaps these are the only alternatives that confront the United States. But before we fasten on to them irrevocably, it may be well to ask once more: What is the nature of the area that we are attempting to integrate, and how has our thought on the subject developed? Some appreciation of the recent history and problems of Europe, and of the circumstances that inspired postwar American policy, may help to determine whether or not the range of choice is as narrow as it looks at present to the United States.

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , October 1953 , pp. 1 - 30
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1953

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References

1 Cf., most recently, Greiner, Helmuth, Die Oberste Wehrmachtführung, 1939–1943, Wiesbaden, 1951.Google Scholar

2 Churchill, W. S., broadcast from London, March 21, 1943, in International Conciliation, No. 391, June 1943Google Scholar; Churchill, W. S., The Second World War, IV: The Hinge of Fate, Boston, 1950, pp. 800ff.Google Scholar; Holborn, L. W., ed., War and Peace Aims of the United Nations, Boston, 1948, II, pp. 407ff.Google Scholar

3 Dulles, John Foster, War or Peace, New York, 1950, p. 214.Google Scholar

4 On the economic development of Europe, cf. Ellis, Howard S., The Economics of Freedom: The Progress and Future of Aid to Europe, New York, 1950Google Scholar; Die-bold, William, Trade and Payments in Western Europe, New York, 1952Google Scholar; Triffin, Robert, Monetary Reconstruction in Europe, New York, 1952 (International Conciliation, No. 482)Google Scholar; United Nations, Department of Economic Affairs, Economic Survey of Europe Since the War, Geneva, 1953 (UN Publication 1953.II.E.4).Google Scholar

5 First Annual Report to the Standing Group, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, from General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, Paris, April 2, 1952.

6 Through the Balkan pact of February 28, 1953, between Greece, Turkey, and Yugoslavia, the latter state has been indirectly tied to NATO. An agreement between the US government and Spain on naval bases has also brought Spain closer to NATO.

7 Some of these organizations are discussed by Goormaghtigh, John, European Integration, New York, 1953Google Scholar (International Conciliation, No. 488).

8 Stebbms, Richard P., The United States in World Affairs, 1951, New York, 1952, p. 360.Google Scholar The preamble of the Mutual Security Act of 1951 stated that one of its purposes was “to further encourage the economic unification and the political federation of Europe.”—In November 1951 a delegation of both houses of Congress held discussions with members of the European Consultative Assembly. Cf. Conference of Strasbourg Between Delegations of the United States of America and of the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe, Official Record of Debates, Strasbourg, November 19–23, 1951 (issued by the Secretariat-General of the Council of Europe); and The Union of Europe: Its Progress, Problems, Prospects, and Place in the Western World, 82nd Congress, 2nd Session, U.S, Senate, Document No. 90, Washington, D.C., 1952.

9 European Unity. A Statement by the National Executive Committee of the British Labour Party, published by the Labour Party, Transport House, London, 1950. A discussion of the attitudes of the two British parties toward European integration is contained in “The Socialist Parties and European Unity: A British Labour Party View,” The World To-day, VI (October 1950), pp. 415–23; and “European Unity: A Conservative Party View,” ibid., vu (January 1951), pp. 21–30.

10 This is also the opinion of the “Chatham House Study Group” that presented the valuable report, Atlantic Alliance: NATO's Role in the Free World, Royal Institute of International Affairs, London, 1952.Google Scholar

11 The secretariat of the Economic Commission for Europe in its study of the postwar economic development of Europe (Economic Survey of Europe Since the War, p. 50) concludes: “There are indications that if the present rates of expansion are maintained, by the end of this decade production and consumption of major industrial raw materials in the Soviet Union will be equal or superior to that in the seven most industrialized countries of western Europe” (i.e., “Little Europe” plus Great Britain).

12 Marcel, Gabriel, Man Against Mass Society, Chicago, 1953.Google Scholar

13 Cf. Sturmthal, Adolf F., “Workers' Control: Freedom and Authority in the Plant,” Freedom and Authority in Our Time, ed. by Bryson, L., Finkelstein, L., Mclver, R. M., McKeon, R., New York, 1953, pp. 53ff.Google Scholar; and idem, “Democratic Socialism in Europe,” World Politics, III (October 1950), pp. 88ff.

14 See note 9 above. Cf. also the discussion of the wider ramifications of the problems involved by Knorr, Klaus, “The European Welfare State in the Atlantic System,” World Politics, III (July 1951), pp. 417ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15 Manchester Guardian (weekly edition), December 13, 1951.

16 Cf. Ad hoc Assembly Instructed to Work out a Draft Treaty Setting up a European Political Community, Draft Treaty Embodying the Statute of the European Community, Information and Official Documents of the Constitutional Committee, October 1952-April 1953, published by the Secretariat of the Constitutional Committee, Paris, 1953.Google Scholar