Diplomats at Work

Beyond the President's speech, the U.S. last week made these major moves in worldwide diplomacy:

P: Decided, in line with the Administration's determination to aid Iron Curtain countries seeking economic independence from Moscow, to relax restrictions on exports to Poland, thus allow the Gomulka government to buy surplus U.S. farm products for dollars at prevailing world market prices.

P: Announced, in reply to an urgent appeal by United Nations' Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold, that the U.S. will lend the U.N. up to $5,000,000 to help meet the initial costs ($7,000,000 to $10,000,000) of Suez Canal clearance, with repayment "terms and arrangements" to be worked out later. Canada, Australia and six West European nations are expected to advance the rest. Still to come: agreement on a permanent plan to finance the total ($40 million) salvage job.

P: Cold-shouldered Israeli attempts to commit the U.S., in advance of Tel Aviv's full compliance with U.N. resolutions, to support her demands that in any Mideast settlement Israel be guaranteed free passage through the Suez, protection from further Egyptian commando raids, etc. The State Department, determined that Israel not be rewarded for her attack on Egypt, told the Israeli Foreign Ministry in effect: first things first, i.e., no U.S. commitments until Israel withdraws behind the 1949 armistice lines. On the other side of the ledger, the U.S. Treasury gave no sign of heeding fervent Egyptian requests that it release the $40 million in Egyptian assets frozen by Washington after Egypt seized the canal.

P: Revealed, in a terse statement by the U.S. embassy in Taipei, that the U.S. will build a $25 million air base for the Chinese Nationalist government in central Formosa--which the U.S. Air Force will be permitted to use at will. The new field, to be "the most modern" on the island, will be capable of handling B-36 and B-52 bombers, will thus fully transform Formosa into a major strategic bombing base.

P: Agreed, four weeks after Iceland dropped its demand that the U.S. withdraw its forces from the strategic Keflavik air base, to lend Iceland $4,000,000 to finance essential imports and continue its economic development programs.

P: Sliced into the huge stocks of Government-held farm surpluses by negotiating an agreement with Brazil under which 1) the U.S. will sell the Rio government $138,700,000 worth of the surplus, most of it ($111,000,000) in wheat; 2) Brazil will make payment in nondollar currency, i.e., cruzeiros; and 3) the U.S. in turn (under the terms of the 1954 Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act) will use the currency to finance economic and other development projects in Brazil.

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