Wirarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, APRIL 23, 1940. ISOLATION POLICY AND POLITICS.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 April 1940, Page 4

Wirarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, APRIL 23, 1940. ISOLATION POLICY AND POLITICS.

r [''JTOUGH he is called upon at limes io rebut the accusal ions of his political opponents that he is leading the United States into war, President Roosevelt, is,in fact in a strong position in dealing with these opponents, and particnlailj with those of them who take up an extreme islationist standpoint. In a broadcast from Warm Springs, reported briefly yesterday, Mr Roosevelt at once denied and derided the charges of his opponents and attacked the isolationists, with obvious refeience, it is said, to Mr Thomas Dewey, one of the most stronglysupported Republican aspirants lor the Presidential nomination. I do not subscribe (Mr Roosevelt said as he is reported) to the preachment of the Republican aspirant who, in effect, says that the United States should do nothing to create a more secure order for world peace when the time comes. At a casual view, il may appear that in repudiating any desire to lead or thrust the United States into war and at the same time attacking the isolationists (whose supreme concern it is that the United States should not be involved in the war) Mr Roosevelt is taking up an inconsistent and unstable attitude, lie will have no great difficulty, however, in showing that it is in fact bis isolationist opponents, or at all events those of them who carry their ideas on the subject of isolation to an extreme, who are open to that reproach. Practically all informed observers, irrespective of their political sympathies, are agreed that an. overwhelming proportion of the people of the United Stales desire to keep out of the war if they can. It has been stated that America will not intervene unless she thinks that the Allies otherwise would lie beaten. Leaving aside the question whether this means that the American people are content to have their liberties safeguarded by the efforts and sacrifices of other democracies, the declared American standpoint is understandable and in any ease no doubt must be accepted. Like any other policy, however, that of the American isolationists must be shaped and developed on practical lines if il is to serve its intended purpose—the purpose of keeping the United States out of the war. There are fanatical and extreme American isolationists who would refuse any form of assistance to the Allies and would endeavour Io hold the balance quite evenly between them, and the totalitarian aggressors to whom they are opposed. Mr Thomas Dewey, who is perhaps the favourite Republican aspirant for the Presidential nomination, has of late made some concessions to this section of opinion, notably in intimating that, he would oppose any modification of the Johnson Act —the measure which forbids any extension of American credit to nations which have defaulted, as the Allied nations have, in. war debt payments to the United States. A. shrewd American commentator, Air Raymond Gram Swing, has ventured the opinion that Mr Dewey may in this way have undermined his prospects of securing the Republican Presidential nomination. It is quite possible that Mr Swing' may be right. At all events, a policy of extending as little consideration and help as possible to the Allies obviously in itself is calculated to defeat the aim and purpose of the American isolationists. Nothing can bo more certain than that if the Allies were in danger of being defeated, the United States would be impelled from a standpoint of mere self-preservation to enter the war. The logical course for the American isolationist therefore is to support any assistance their country can give Io the Allies, short of herself becoming a belligerent. For the time being, those considerations raise no acute issue. The Allies have mobilised financial and credit resources which enable them to pay for the war and other materials they are obtaining from the United States. Whether the Allies will be able Io continue their war trade with the United Slates on these lines until victory has been won depends simply on the duration of the war and the demands it is destined Io impose. It cannot be taken for granted that the Allies will he able to the end of Iho conflict to pay “cash on the nail’’ for all that. I hey need and obtain from the United States. In a recent article in the “Christian Science 'Monitor," Mr J. Roscoe Drummond, wrote on this subject:— Frankly, the time is visible when French and British cash reserves will be under severe strain and the United States will be faced with the inescapable question of whether it will extend credit to the Allies. As the war progresses, the Allies may ask for greater financial and industrial help from the United States. Not merely because of the toll of German sinkings, but because American and other neutral shipping has voluntarily withdrawn from the war zone, Great Britain is already buying and chartering vessels on a large scale, and will be looking to the United States for ships as well as munitions and might be expected to need credit within eighteen months. The Allies do not expect the war to be over soon or easily. Apart entirely from the interests of the Allies, these questions evidently need eonsidera I ion as they hear on purely American interests. Particularly if needs Io he considered that in weakening the Allies and endangering their victory by withholding financial and industrial help, the so-called isolationists would be pursuing- a course calculated, not io keep their country out of the war, but rather to make its participation in the war inevitable.