(5) to consider the development of political and economic cooperation as contemplated in article 2 of the Treaty.

This list of tasks is worth citing in full in order to emphasize the importance of the work which is to be undertaken by the deputies and the need of securing from each country a man of the highest qualifications who will have the complete confidence of his own and other Governments. The ability of the Organization to get on with its job will very largely depend on the calibre of the men who are appointed as deputies. It will equally depend on the support they receive from all branches of their Governments and their peoples.

PRINCIPLE OF BALANCED COLLECTIVE FORCES

Perhaps, the most important action of the Council was the recommendation of a principle to governments to guide the development of the common defense. This principle is the creation of balanced collective forces, rather than the duplication by each nation in a large or small way of what every other nation was doing. After a careful review of the plans which have been prepared, it became evident to each of us that the principle of balanced collective forces was the only principle which could reconcile the resources available with the demands upon them. It is the only way in which forces can be developed to meet successfully any initial attack and to carry through to a successful conclusion any war that is forced upon us. For the task of providing an adequate common defense and adequate standards of living is so large that waste and unnecessary duplication will prevent its accomplishment.

Also, this principle, more than any other, reconciled the security needs of each member country with the security needs of the community as a whole.

This principle of balanced collective forces is of great and perhaps revolutionary significance. It has its legislative origin, so far as this Government is concerned, in the Mutual Defense Assistance Act of 1949 which stipulated that the assistance to be granted by the United States to other North Atlantic Treaty countries should be used to promote "the integrated defense of the North Atlantic area." It demonstrates that each country will rely on every other member of the community and that the community will look to each country to contribute what it is best able to contribute to the common defense in accordance with a common plan. It demonstrates that each country recognizes that its own security is no better than the security of the community as a whole. It will give tangible proof to an aggressor that he must face the combined resources of the community, that there will not be opportunities to pick off one member at a time.

The United States, as the most populous member of the North Atlantic community and the one with the largest and most productive plant, has necessarily a leading role in building balanced collective forces. If we faithfully observe this principle and direct our energies

1 Act of Oct. 6, 1949; A Decade of American Foreign Policy, pp. 1356–1364.

to the creation of such forces, we will find a corresponding response from the other Treaty members.

1

The President has authorized me to say that he supports Secretary Johnson and me in our view that we must make this principle work, for we can see no other way to accomplish the job of defense and at the same time to get ahead with the constructive task of building a successfully functioning economy in the free world.

The job cannot be done unless we do our full part which includes the provision of mutual defense assistance. If we and our Atlantic community partners each take our respective share of the common burden, the goal can be attained. I am confining my present remarks on this vital point to this reference since, within the week, I shall appear before the appropriate Congressional committees in support of the Mutual Defense Assistance Program when I shall discuss this problem in full.2

If we put this principle into practice, it follows that the members of the Atlantic community will have to intensify their practice of developing common policies on the major problems of common concern in the field of foreign affairs and that they must also develop even closer and more cohesive economic policies.

It is in these corollaries of the principle of balanced collective forces that its implications become clear. It is because of these implications, as well as for the progress on other matters, that this conference marks the beginning of greater unity of thought and action among the free countries of the Atlantic community.

At the conclusion of our Council meeting, we made a statement of our principles, our determination, and our faith. That statement has been published, but I wish in closing to cite a part of it because I believe it expresses well the purpose that guides us: "They are determined that freedom, which is the common basis of their institutions, shall be defended against every threat of aggression or subversion, direct or indirect. Freedom means the independence of nations, the respect for spiritual values, and the dignity of man. Only a free society can guarantee the individual the benefits of economic and social betterment.

.. To the immense resources of the free world, and its industrial and scientific development, the peoples of the North Atlantic community bring the spiritual strength that comes from freedom."

These are the main outlines of what was accomplished in the meetings in Paris and London.

Most of what was done was a beginning of still further progress. Beginnings, of course, are very important. It is an inexperienced and naive traveler who does not make sure that he is on the right road at the beginning. The Atlantic community is on the right road; we have gone some distance down it, and we know where we are going. We have the machinery to carry us much farther. We 1 Louis A. Johnson, Secretary of Defense.

2 See Secretary Acheson's statement of June 2, 1950, before the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees; Department of State Bulletin, June 12, 1950, pp. 940-944.

Infra, pp. 1604-1606.

have learned much regarding the cooperation necessary to make the machinery work.

How far and how fast we go depends on each country, but perhaps especially on the United States. These meetings will be just as important as the Government and the people of America choose to make them. If we now support on a sustained basis the measures necessary to make this cooperative venture a success, we will not find wanting a similar response from our friends and allies. Together we shall make a major contribution to the United Nations whose Charter remains our basic guide.

This road is the road to peace. The concept of the free community is one which can bring peace and prosperity to the world. Individually, no one of these countries, including the United States, has the strength, even if it had the desire, to determine the course of the future. Together, this community has the human and material resources, the skills, the initiative, the tradition and the devotion of free men, and a dynamic idea which can give us confidence that the future belongs to freedom. In our unity, there is strength. And, in our strength, is the foundation of peace.

2. ADDRESS BY THE SECRETARY OF STATE,

1

FEBRUARY 12, 1953 1

I returned this week from a trip to Europe in company with Mr. Stassen, the Director of our Mutual Security Agency.

We have reported to the President; I have met, and shall meet further, with congressional leaders. Now I wish to report to you. You may wonder why, with so much to do at home, we went so quickly abroad. The reason was the tremendous importance to the Ünited States of real unity in Europe and the fact that it seemed that some of our European friends might be changing their minds about moving to this goal.

The problem in simple terms is this:

Europe is made up of people who possess an essential unity. They have given a clear and special meaning to the concept of Western civilization. Yet Europe has remained politically divided. This has led to recurrent wars, which have involved us. It has so weakened the Western European countries that today no one of them could offer strong resistance to the Red armies.

This situation both distresses and endangers us. Europe is the cradle of our civilization, and its industrial power could cruelly hurt us if it were controlled by our enemies.

It has been clear for some time that the biggest single postwar task would be to end the disunity in Europe which makes for weakness and war.

As the Second World War blazed up, I wrote "Continental Europe

1 Delivered to the Nation over radio and television networks; Department of State Bulletin, Feb. 23, 1953, pp. 287-289.

has been the world's greatest fire hazard. The whole structure is now consumed in flames. . . . when the time comes to rebuild, we should not reproduce a demonstrated firetrap." 1

Today we and the free peoples of Europe are all face to face with that very problem. Shall a demonstrated fire-trap be rebuilt? Or cannot the wit of man devise something better?

When the first program of interim aid to Europe was before the Senate in 1947, I urged, before the Foreign Relations Committee, that in granting European aid "the basic idea should be, not the rebuilding of the prewar Europe, but the building of a new Europe, which, more unified, will be a better Europe." 2 That point of view was emphatically adopted by Congress. It was written into the policy declaration of the Marshall Plan act 3 and into our military assistance acts, and that concept underlay the implementation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the stationing of United States troops in Europe. None of these measures was looked upon as in itself adequate to defend Europe. But these steps, together with the creation of a unified continental Europe, would produce a strength which could deter aggression.

These are the ideas that enlightened European leaders themselves put forth. We have not been trying to impress an American scheme on Europe but to support the plans of the European leaders themselves. WHAT EUROPE HAS ALREADY ACCOMPLISHED

They have already done much. As an outstanding example, they have created, under what is called the Schuman Plan, a single political authority to deal with the coal and iron resources of Germany, France, and the adjacent states. Last Sunday Mr. Stassen and I saw that authority first go into practical operation at its capital at Luxembourg.

Our European friends also tackled the vital problem of military unity. Last May the six continental countries of France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg signed a treaty to create a European Defense Community. Under that treaty each of the six countries would give up having a separate national army on the Continent and would join in building there a single European army. It was contemplated that the treaties could be promptly ratified, so that the plan could be made operative in 6 months.

1 See Mr. Dulles' "Peace Without Platitudes" (Fortune, January 1942, p. 87). The complete text of the paragraph was as follows: "Continental Europe has been the world's greatest fire hazard. This has long been recognized, but it has seemed impractical to do anything about it. Now the whole structure is consumed in flames. We condemn those who started and spread the fire. But this does not mean that, when the time comes to rebuild, we should reproduce a demonstrated firetrap."

2 Statement of Nov. 14, 1947; Interim Aid for Europe: Hearings Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, Eightieth Congress, First Session, on Interim Aid for Europe, p. 241.

3 Act of Apr. 3, 1948; A Decade of American Foreign Policy, pp. 1299-1321. Acts of Oct. 6, 1949 (ibid., pp. 1356-1364); July 26, 1950 (64 Stat. 373); Oct. 10, 1951 (65 Stat. 373); and June 20, 1952 (66 Stat. 141). See infra, pp. 3039-3042 and 3059-3086.

Treaty of Apr. 18, 1951; supra, pp. 1039-1078.

i. e., Feb. 8, 1953.

7 Treaty of May 27, 1952; supra, pp. 1107-1150.

6

We in the United States were delighted that our European friends had taken this bold step toward making Europe strong and vigorous in its own right. However, the 6 months from last May went by without any effective steps to ratify, and the 6 months has now been prolonged to 9 months. This has been somewhat disconcerting to us, because the plans for our own security are based on the assumption that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which does not include Germany, would be bolstered by the European Defense Community, which would draw on German military strength to create a solid continental European military establishment.

U.S. CONTRIBUTIONS

During the past 7 years we have contributed about 30 billion dollars to Europe. We have tens of thousands of our armed forces in Europe. We have made the effort because the security of Europe vitally affects our own security. But our effort will not permanently serve Europe or ourselves or humanity unless it fits into a constructive program for European unity. Nothing that the United States can do will ever be enough to make Europe safe if it is divided into rival national camps. President Eisenhower himself said recently that he was impressed with the "feebleness" of alternatives to the European Defense. Community.

A WILL TO PROCEED

It was to discuss all of these problems that President Eisenhower asked Mr. Stassen and me to go to Europe. We went to seven European capitals-first Rome, then Paris, then London, then Bonn, then The Hague, then Brussels, and then Luxembourg. Our conclusion was that the project for a European Defense Community was not dead but only sleeping. We did not get any concrete promises or pledges from our European friends, and we did not give any. We did come back with the feeling that there is a good chance that the European Defense Community will be brought into being. There are plenty of hurdles to be overcome. But we believe that there is a will to proceed. We hope that in the coming weeks this determination will be translated into concrete evidence that real progress is being made. Without that, future planning will be difficult. Candor requires us to say this.

NATO is now a far-flung organization. It includes not only countries in this hemisphere but in the North Atlantic and in the Mediterranean. But the core of this far-flung structure is the six continental countries of Western Europe, which have made the European Defense Community treaty. Unless their military and economic strength is to be combined, as this treaty contemplates, the whole NATO organization has a fatal weakness. The European Defense Community is needed to give the North Atlantic Treaty Organization a stout and dependable heart.

I do not pretend that it is easy to accomplish this. National habits of thought and traditions have grown strong. The countries concerned have often in recent years been enemies. They have fought