Neighbor, How Art Thee?

From the broad river Plate, that waters the land of the gaucho, to the sleepy borders of the Rio Grande, 120,000,000 Latin Americans last week came smack up against a fact. The fact was comforting to some, disquieting to others; but to all it was as huge and undeniable as Popocatepetl: that the U. S., either as Good Neighbor or as Colossus of the North, was definitely on the move.

In Washington Cordell Hull, with Congress' formal approval, informed the Governments of Germany, Italy, France, Great Britain and The Netherlands that the U. S. would neither recognize nor acquiesce in the transfer of any territory in the Western Hemisphere from one non-American power to another. Did this mean that U. S. Marines would occupy St. Pierre, Miquelon, French Guiana, Devil's Island? The Chicago Daily News, whose publisher, Colonel Frank Knox, was appointed Secretary of the Navy two days later, proposed "One Way to Deal with French Possessions in the Caribbean." The proposal: take them over forthwith, set up a "trustee" government in which "three or five" American republics will be given representation.

But Latin America well knew that the stirring giant's plans were directed not at keeping French convicts locked up on Devil's Island but on keeping totalitarian war machines, military and economic--especially economic--locked out of the Western Hemisphere. If Latin America had ever doubted that the U. S. was serious in its plan to set up a giant economic union to control All-American exports (TIME, June 24), that doubt disappeared last week. Before leaving for Hyde Park, the President ordered full speed ahead on the All-American economic cartel, the biggest, most urgent "must" on the Administration's schedule. In Washington, the plan was put at the top of the agenda for a Pan-American Conference at Havana, scheduled for June 26. The State Department, acting at "total speed," thither invited the representatives of the 20 Latin American nations. All 20 with total speed promptly accepted (though Chile, Mexico, Paraguay, Uruguay, Peru and Argentina demurred at U. S. haste, asked a postponement until after mid-July).

What the plan would be in perfected detail, the Good Neighbor was still willing to leave to the conference table. But even its outlines raised plenty of questions, north and south of the Rio Grande. Two different views had emerged last week. The Department of Commerce envisaged a U. S.-subsidized-and-managed pool of all export commodities, under central control.

Latin Americans were inclined to favor separate pools for each commodity, with representation in each pool only for countries exporting that commodity.

Nervous Colombians asked whether the similarity of U. S. and Latin American products would not make the dumping operation unworkable. Nervous Western farmers received Franklin Roosevelt's assurance that there would be no dumping in the U. S.; nervous Canadians, his word that they would not be excluded. Others asked, What about Argentina's plan: To organize South American economy for South Americans, in preparation for the post-war boom which many Buenos Aires businessmen expected? Would Latin American surpluses inevitably lead to the establishment of national quotas, which would lead to Latin American AAAs? Would the U. S., by withholding America's pooled commodities from belligerents, turn the plan into a Pan-American embargo ?

These how-nows could not yet be answered. But in Washington's urgent mood, they were beside the point. In Washington's view, the pressing need now was to make Pan-American unity, long a postponable might-be, an impregnable here & now.

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