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A visitor from North America to Great Britain and the continent can scarcely fail to sense a feeling of hostility. Much to his surprise he is regarded as coming from an area behind a gold curtain and to find that he is in a sort of no man’s land between iron and gold curtains. The source of this hostility is not easy to discover and appraise and varies from accounts of escapades of members of the North American armed forces to the sober complaint of business men as to their inability to surmount the tariff barriers of North America and particularly of the United States. In Great Britain the consumer is shown exhibitions of goods which are solely for export and realizes that he must continue to go without them because of a need for American dollars. Or he may receive parcels from Canada with products made in Great Britain, exported to Canada and returned to Great Britain. Hostility is evident in a wide range of manifestations notably in the trends toward socialism and in an incipient underground movement. A Canadian assumed to be an American finds attitudes perceptibly changing once it is understood that he is not an American. In a vague sense Canada probably appears to occupy a position in relation to the United States similar to that of Jugo-Slavia in relation to Russia except that no Tito has appeared in Canada, but a Canadian visitor will sense a change of attitude reflected in greater frankness and in many cases savage criticism of the United States—criticism such as is apt to emerge in cases of loans and gifts. One-way gifts are not a basis of friendship. The attitude is expressed in the remark “I cannot understand why he is so bitterly opposed to me. I have never done anything for him.”

The Department of Economic Affairs of the United Nations in “A survey of the Economic situation and Prospects of Europe” describes the problem in these words “The European import-surplus problem is essentially the same as the export-surplus problem of the United States, and the alternatives facing the United States are those facing Europe with the signs reversed; sooner or later the United States must either increase its imports or decrease its exports or do both. But the danger exists that if adequate remedial measures are not taken to work out a tenable balance, the economic structure of both Europe and the United States may become so adjusted to the disequilibrium as to create strong pressures tending to perpetuate it.” As suggested by The Economist there is a prospect of a “United States dollar shortage forever.”^[1] Nor does Europe gain much comfort from the United States. Professor J. H. Williams, a judicious observer, writes, “Deep-seated in the whole process has been the growing predominance of the United States: resting on the cumulative advantages of size and technological progress and expressing itself in the so-much discussed chronic dollar shortage. . . . We must think of the objective of the Marshall Plan in terms of reshaping the European economy and adjusting it to its changed world position, and of making the necessary adjustment in our own. We must also regard it as the beginning rather than the end of the adjustment process.”^[2]

Reductions in the American tariff might promise an outlet for European goods to thus alleviate the problem have been proposed on a limited scale but it is clear that discussion of the tariff in general will not be raised even to the high level of the argument advanced by Mr. Dooley. “The tariff! What difference does it make? Th’ foreigner pays th’ tax annyhow. He does! said Mr. Dooley, if he ain’t turned back at Castle Garden.” Nor is there much prospect of discussion of the tariff in the United States and Canada since European countries cannot expect to have much influence on this subject and again in the words of Mr. Dooley. “Them that the tariff looks after will look after the tariff.” The tariff becomes the chief instrument in American imperialism. “The mind that thinks in terms of the protectionist symbol is equally at home in the imperialist symbol.”^[3] It is as much a contradiction in terms “to speak of protective tariffs as instruments of free enterprise as to speak of militarism or imperialism as instruments of free enterprise.”^[4] Trade barriers and monopolies become deadly enemies of free enterprise capitalism.^[5]

The effects have been evident in the emergence of developments which reflect a profound determination to maintain the supremacy of European culture against the threats of Americanization and Communism. It is unnecessary to elaborate on the character of these threats since it is exceedingly difficult for an Anglo-Saxon trained in a common law tradition to understand the point of view of a European trained in the Roman law tradition. But it is clear that European countries feel more directly exposed to American influence and that the threat of “the cumulative advantage of size and technological progress” of the United States is in the impact of uniformity and standardization and its disastrous implications to the artistic culture of Europe and to western civilization.

It is hardly possible for Canadians to understand the attitude of hostility because of the overwhelming influence of American propaganda^[6] and even more difficult to strengthen the European point of view. Americans are the best propagandists because they are the best advertisers.^[7] Whatever hope of continued autonomy Canada may have in the future must depend on her success in withstanding American influence and assisting in the development of a third bloc^[8] designed to withstand the pressure of the United States and Russia but there is little evidence that Canada is capable of these herculean efforts and much that she will continue to be justly regarded as an instrument of the United States. The tariff has long since been forgotten in Canada and there is little prospect of its revival. We too have our mild imperialist ventures as shown in our acquisition of Newfoundland. “War is self-defence against reform.”^[9] Neither a nation, nor a commonwealth, nor a civilization can endure in which one half in slavery believes itself free because of a statement, the Bill of Rights,^[10] and attempts to enslave the other half which is free.

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.

Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.

A cover which is placed in the public domain was created for this ebook.

[The end of Between the Gold and Iron Curtains, by Harold Adams Innis]