Nation: Clash on the Hill

With the President coaching from the sidelines, the U.S. Senate last week clashed head-on with the House by voting, 44 to 38, to modify a house-approved ban on $37 million of surplus-food shipments promised to the United Arab Republic. The Senate version, which now goes back to the House, would permit such shipments if the President finds them "in the national interest."

The House had voted the cutoff after U.A.R. President Gamal Abdel Nasser served notice that he intends to continue shipment of arms to Congolese rebels and averred that if the U.S. did not like his brand of foreign policy it could "go jump in the lake." For his part, Johnson told newsmen last week that if the U.S. is to protect its "vital interests, in this part of the world, where tensions are very high, then the President must have freedom of action to act in the best interest of all the people of this land."

Many a Congressman still failed to see just how such food shipments to the U.A.R. might help protect U.S. interests. The fact is that some 85% of Egyptian payments to the U.S. for surplus food is returned to Cairo in easy, long-term loans, thereby freeing other Egyptian funds to help support troublemaking forces in the Congo, as well as in Algeria and Yemen.