Leaks to the Reds

The plea of Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden for a relaxation of the Allied embargo against trade to Red China got a cool reception in Washington last week (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). Part of the reason was an angry blast by the Senate Investigations Subcommittee at the "shocking" flow of strategic goods already leaking out to Red nations, mainly Russia. The subcommittee voted unanimously for public hearings on the effect of an agreement two years ago to cut the Battle Act embargo list for Western Allies from 297 to 217 items and the international quantitative control list from 90 to 20 items. The net result, rumbled Subcommittee Chairman John McClellan, had been to release "war-useful items that under no circumstances should be handed over to the Soviets."

A prime example was aluminum. Though hard aluminum alloys are still barred, soft aluminum is not, and increasing amounts have been shipped to Communist nations. Soft aluminum can be easily reprocessed into aircraft-strength alloys. Another sore point was copper. Great Britain alone shipped more than 100,000 tons of copper to the Soviet bloc, almost 30% of Russia's annual production, and it was sold at a time when the U.S. itself was short of copper. Furthermore, most of it came from mines in Rhodesia that had been developed with U.S. loans. In addition, a whole group of strategic machine tools had been released. Communist buyers picked up models in Europe, sent them home to be copied, even bought several $350,000 horizontal boring and milling machines from Britain that can handle any job from engine parts to tank turrets.

Though few U.S. firms do business with the Reds (total U.S.-Soviet bloc trade in 1955: about $5,000,000), European nations have used the liberalized embargo list to boost exports 27% in the last twelve months, while increasing imports by only 7%.

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