CONGRESS: Quotes and Arguments

CONGRESS Quote and Arguments

Franklin Roosevelt last week told Congress that the term “peace bloc” was wide enough to cover both the advocates and opponents of repeal of the embargo on arms to belligerents. His opponents for the most part also indicated that they would not question the motives of their adversaries in the embargo fight. Both attitudes were ingenuous, for the obvious fact was that the emotions of both sides, in Congress and out, were muddled.

For 20 years, with the memories of the futility of World War I still fresh, U. S. citizens have urged one another to a progressively mounting hatred of war. For five years they have encouraged one an other in a growing distaste for the brutalities of Fascism. Today, the two emotions exist side by side in the hearts of most Americans. But Americans do not belong all in one camp, for in some one emotion is stronger, in some the other.

Many an advocate of embargo repeal declares that he wants it in order to keep the U. S. out of war, whereas obviously he has quite another reason : he does not think it will bring war, and he wants to strike a blow at Fascism. Similarly many an opponent of repeal hastens to add that he is against Fascism and all its works whereas he has patently adopted a know-nothing, believe-nothing attitude toward the perils of Fascism, feeling that to do so may save him from the perils of war. With emotion thus muddled, Congressional argument grew equally so.

“The heart of the question which Congress is now going to debate is whether the repeal or the retention of the embargo on arms is the more likely to lead the United States into the war. It is evident that it is impossible for the advocates of either policy to prove their case conclusively. . . . The best that Congress can hope to do now is to adopt that policy which, on a cool estimate of the probabilities as we know them today, seems the least likely to have consequences which will put us in a difficult and dangerous position later on.” So wrote Pundit Walter Lippmann last week. Having done so, he proceeded to review the arguments on both sides of the question.* Herewith is an outline (after Lippmann) of the arguments pro & con, a sort of debater’s handbook:

Repeal of the arms embargo is more likely to keep the U. S. out of war because:

1) The shorter the war, the less likely is the U. S. to become involved. But the war will be prolonged if the Allies cannot get arms from the U. S. They will have to stand on the defensive until they can build new arsenals and airplane factories. Rebuttal: If the Allies realize that they cannot get arms from the U. S., they may be more inclined to make peace quickly, or they may be soon conquered by the Germans.

2) Continuing the arms embargo might make the Allies lose the war, deprive the U. S. of the nations which are now its buffer states against Fascism, leave the U. S. facing the Nazi-Soviet bloc across the Atlantic, force the U. S. to fight the next war caused by Fascist aggression. Rebuttal: The Atlantic is a broad ocean and the next war is not here yet.

Retention of the arms embargo is more likely to keep the U. S. out of war because:

1) Repeal of the arms embargo now would make the Germans very angry and possibly lead them to take reprisals against the U. S. (against U. S. shipping, for example), thereby drawing the U. S. into war. Rebuttal: The Nazis have been and always will be angry with the U. S. whenever it suits them. They are just as likely to take reprisals against the U. S. in spite of the arms embargo, for from a military standpoint, it is just as important to them to shut off the Allies from food and the materials from which arms are made as from arms themselves.

2) If the U. S. sells arms to the Allies, the whole U. S. economy will become dependent on war trade—business will depend on it for profits, labor for jobs, possibly even lenders for the security of their loans—and eventually the U. S. will have to go to war to save its customers. Rebuttal: Embargo or no embargo, the U. S. is going to have a huge war trade, for the Allies will need war materials. In the last war only 10% to 25% of the Allied purchases in the U. S. were arms. If the Allies cannot get arms, they will take more material for making arms. And they will buy such materials because (without borrowing in the U. S.) Great Britain and France have some $3,720,000,050 in gold, plus some $3,000,000,000 in U. S. securities etc. with which to pay their bills.

*Lippmann’s personal conclusion: repeal is better.