Europe: Then Will It Live . . .

(8 of 10)

Long before the war ended, Monnet was planning ahead. In 1943 he went to Algiers to coordinate U.S. aid to Free French forces in North Africa. There, De Gaulle was orating almost daily about "la grandeur française." Monnet told him bluntly: "If you are not very careful, there will be no grandeur. We are a small country, we have been plundered, and our economic base has been largely destroyed. France may become a backwater of Europe." Grumbled De Gaulle: "Well, what do you propose?" In an incisive, seven-page memorandum, Monnet suggested rebuilding France's economy under the guidance of a central committee made up of representatives of labor and management and every French political party. The plan was put into effect in 1947, with Monnet as its chief until 1952; it has since grown into a permanent agency that still supervises the French economy as part of the Common Market.

Unfinished Business. For all their success, Monnet's institutions still have a long way to go toward his goal.

Despite Europe's growing international sentiment, old animosities remain, from the South Tyrol to Flanders, and might flare up again in time of stress. Economically, the biggest stumbling block so far to a fully integrated European economy is agriculture. Like the U.S., the Common

Market nations together are nearly self-sufficient; they produce 90% of the wheat they consume, 70% of the feed grain, 92% of the sugar and 95% of the meat. They actually overproduce pork, potatoes and vegetables. And, as in the U.S., agriculture is everywhere highly protected with state subsidies and price supports.

Another bit of unfinished business consists of cracking down on Europe's notorious net of cartels. For the moment, Europe's continuing boom has provided enough trade for everybody, put the problem of the competition-restraining cartels far down on the priority list. Also, free movement of labor within the Market area is still more theoretical than real. The Community has provided migrant workers with comprehensive social security, but the age-old reluctance of workers to move persists, though Italian workers now provide more than 60% of the Belgian mining industry's labor force. The fact is, unemployment is so low all over the Community that few workers need to migrate. The Market's boom has even reduced chronically underemployed Italy's jobless total to a bare 800,000.

U.S. industry recognized the Market's potential from the start. U.S. corporations have been pouring capital into Europe at a record clip ($844 million in 1960 alone). And though the Common Market was expected to import fewer goods from the U.S., American exports to the six-nation area last year actually soared 42% (to $3.4 billion) over the 1959 level. In time, Common Market manufacturers, including U.S. subsidiaries, will undoubtedly supply a far higher proportion of the consumer goods, from plastic ice buckets to portable TV sets, that now come largely from the U.S. But the loss will be more than canceled out by rising sales of U.S.-made capital goods—sophisticated electronic control systems and specialized heavy machinery.

Six Plus What? While the U.S. cooperated enthusiastically, Britain hesitated. But with last week's British move to join, the Common Market faces perhaps its greatest opportunity. Negotiations