military power of the United States but also from the efforts of the United States and the United Nations to lead toward a genuine solution of the security problem.
Concerning the controversial veto power, I believe that the efforts to eliminate it or to make it ineffective have their primary cause less in specific intentions of the United States than in the manner in which the veto privilege has been abused.
Let me come now to your suggestion that the policy of the United States seeks to obtain economic domination and exploitation of other nations. It is a precarious undertaking to say anything reliable about aims and intentions. Let us rather examine the objective factors involved. The United States is fortunate in producing all the important industrial products and foods in her own country, in sufficient quantities. The country also possesses almost all important raw materials. Because of her tenacious belief in “free enterprise” she cannot succeed in keeping the purchasing power of the people in balance with the productive capacity of the country. For these very same reasons there is a constant danger that unemployment will reach threatening dimensions.
Because of these circumstances the United States is compelled to emphasize her export trade. Without it, she could not permanently keep her total productive machinery fully utilized. These conditions would not be harmful if the exports were balanced by imports of about the same value. Exploitation of foreign nations would then consist in the fact that the labor value of imports would considerably exceed that of exports. However, every effort is being made to avoid this, since almost every import would make a part of the productive machinery idle.
This is why foreign countries are not able to pay for the export commodities of the United States, payment which, in the long run, would indeed be possible only through imports by the latter. This explains why a large portion of all the gold has come to the United States. On the whole, this gold cannot be utilized except for the purchase of foreign commodities, which because of the reasons already stated, is not practicable. There it lies, this gold, carefully protected against theft, a monument to governmental wisdom and to economic science! The reasons which I have just indicated make it difficult for me to take the alleged exploitation of the world by the United States very seriously.
However, the situation just described has a serious political facet. The United States, for the reasons indicated, is compelled to ship part of its production to foreign countries. These exports are financed through loans which the United States is granting foreign countries. It is, indeed, difficult to imagine how these loans will ever be repaid. For all practical purposes, therefore, these loans must be considered gifts which may be used as weapons in the arena of power politics. In view of the existing conditions and in view of the general characteristics of human beings, this, I frankly admit, represents a real danger. Is it not true, however, that we have stumbled into a state of international affairs which tends to make every invention of our minds and every material good into a weapon and, consequently, into a danger for mankind?
This question brings us to the most important matter, in comparison to which everything else appears insignificant indeed. We all know that power politics, sooner or later, necessarily leads to war, and that war, under present circumstances, would mean a mass destruction of human beings and material goods, the dimensions of which are much, much greater than anything that has ever before happened in history.
Is it really unavoidable that, because of our passions and our inherited customs, we should be condemned to annihilate each other so thoroughly that nothing would be left over which would deserve to be conserved? Is it not true that all the controversies and differences of opinion which we have touched
Concerning the controversial veto power, I believe that the efforts to eliminate it or to make it ineffective have their primary cause less in specific intentions of the United States than in the manner in which the veto privilege has been abused.
Let me come now to your suggestion that the policy of the United States seeks to obtain economic domination and exploitation of other nations. It is a precarious undertaking to say anything reliable about aims and intentions. Let us rather examine the objective factors involved. The United States is fortunate in producing all the important industrial products and foods in her own country, in sufficient quantities. The country also possesses almost all important raw materials. Because of her tenacious belief in “free enterprise” she cannot succeed in keeping the purchasing power of the people in balance with the productive capacity of the country. For these very same reasons there is a constant danger that unemployment will reach threatening dimensions.
Because of these circumstances the United States is compelled to emphasize her export trade. Without it, she could not permanently keep her total productive machinery fully utilized. These conditions would not be harmful if the exports were balanced by imports of about the same value. Exploitation of foreign nations would then consist in the fact that the labor value of imports would considerably exceed that of exports. However, every effort is being made to avoid this, since almost every import would make a part of the productive machinery idle.
This is why foreign countries are not able to pay for the export commodities of the United States, payment which, in the long run, would indeed be possible only through imports by the latter. This explains why a large portion of all the gold has come to the United States. On the whole, this gold cannot be utilized except for the purchase of foreign commodities, which because of the reasons already stated, is not practicable. There it lies, this gold, carefully protected against theft, a monument to governmental wisdom and to economic science! The reasons which I have just indicated make it difficult for me to take the alleged exploitation of the world by the United States very seriously.
However, the situation just described has a serious political facet. The United States, for the reasons indicated, is compelled to ship part of its production to foreign countries. These exports are financed through loans which the United States is granting foreign countries. It is, indeed, difficult to imagine how these loans will ever be repaid. For all practical purposes, therefore, these loans must be considered gifts which may be used as weapons in the arena of power politics. In view of the existing conditions and in view of the general characteristics of human beings, this, I frankly admit, represents a real danger. Is it not true, however, that we have stumbled into a state of international affairs which tends to make every invention of our minds and every material good into a weapon and, consequently, into a danger for mankind?
This question brings us to the most important matter, in comparison to which everything else appears insignificant indeed. We all know that power politics, sooner or later, necessarily leads to war, and that war, under present circumstances, would mean a mass destruction of human beings and material goods, the dimensions of which are much, much greater than anything that has ever before happened in history.
Is it really unavoidable that, because of our passions and our inherited customs, we should be condemned to annihilate each other so thoroughly that nothing would be left over which would deserve to be conserved? Is it not true that all the controversies and differences of opinion which we have touched
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