WESTERN EUROPE: A Case of Faltering

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A fog of doubt and faintheartedness settled across Western Europe. NATO was in trouble. Short of steel, coal and confidence, the U.S.'s Western allies were getting nervous about the mounting pressures of rearmament on their precarious economies. Britain, facing near-bankruptcy, reluctantly slowed down its rearmament program (see below). France, which seems to lack the moral purpose to save itself, could not make up its mind to ratify the Pleven (European army) plan, which the French themselves originated. The Benelux countries talked of pulling out of the European army: if Britain wouldn't join, if the French would neither fish nor cut bait, they wanted to return to the old system of nations individually contributing divisions to SHAPE.

All of a year's grand schemes and brave arguments were not suddenly collapsing; but they were faltering. And of them all, the most precarious was the European army. This ingenious and complicated scheme was designed to revive German arms without reviving German militarism: it would place German divisions beside French, Italian and Benelux divisions, in a multilingual army reporting to SHAPE. As things stand now, German divisions cannot be recruited until France—and the rest of Western Europe—ratifies the European army plan. Yet France balks at ratifying.

No one was saying much about it in public yet, but the U.S. is now considering alternatives. Officially the U.S. still opposes the re-establishment of the Wehrmacht. But if the French continue to stall, the U.S. may decide to drop the European army idea and negotiate directly with Bonn for a national German army, linked to NATO by treaty. A year ago such a move would have shocked Western Europe. Today it has some support in Britain, Belgium and The Netherlands : better an alliance of national armies than a multinational force which never gets started. The choice is up to France.