ECONOMICS: Cuckoo Clocks & Other Things

Last week fast-moving ECAdministrator Paul Hoffman made a fast trip to Europe to try to stop the dismantlement and removal—for reparations—of industrial plants in Western Germany. Eastbound, he rode on the presidential plane with Secretary of State Marshall. (“It was,” said Hoffman, “the highest-level hitchhike in history.”) Next day he conferred with sprightly Foreign Minister Schuman in Paris; the next, with tired, grumpy Foreign Minister Bevin in London; and a day and a half later, he was back in Washington, holding a press conference. He was natty in a dark blue suit but he needed a shave.

A year ago the U.S., Britain and France agreed that Western German industry should be restored to about the 1936 level. Under this plan 682 plant units from the Anglo-American zones and 233 from the French zone were earmarked for dismantling. Meanwhile, in the U.S. Congress a feeling began to grow that plant removal was a wasteful business, that it might hinder the Marshall Plan and add to the U.S. taxpayer’s burden. Hoffman wants to be able to tell Congress next year that waste has been minimized.

Hoffman found Bevin cool to a proposal to stop dismantling. The Briton argued 1) that it would violate treaties, thus weakening the West’s case against Russia, and 2) many of the plants would be more useful in other countries than they would be in Germany. The first point could be argued endlessly; the second is a question of fact, to be investigated plant by plant.

The French tended to agree with Bevin. In Paris a Foreign Office spokesman made a cogent observation: “We will have to rebuild many factories wrecked by the Germans and replace lots of machines stolen by the Germans. Are we to take them from Germany, where they serve no useful purpose now, or are we to get them from the U.S. under the Marshall Plan?”

Upshot of the Bevin-Hoffman talks was that preparations for dismantlement would continue, but that actual removals would cease until a U.S. committee of experts had examined the case of each plant with this question in mind: Will it contribute most to EGA if left here or if taken elsewhere? Mr. Hoffman mentioned the case of a plant making cuckoo clocks. “Personally, I’m in favor of letting the Germans make cuckoo clocks.”