Seeking Unity--Slowly

They were all there, those aging statesmen who years ago committed their dreams to the ideal of European unity. Jean Monnet, 80, "the father of the Common Market," last week convened a session of his nonofficial Action Committee for a United States of Europe in Brussels. Former Common Market President Walter Hallstein was there, along with veteran French Politicians Antoine Pinay and Maurice Faure and dozens of other ranking European statesmen. Together, they constitute a sort of European shadow government. They had come to Brussels in an attempt to spur Common Market bureaucrats and the respective ministers of the Six (Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands and West Germany) to start immediate negotiations to admit Britain to the economic community.

Even as Monnet and his supporters issued ringing calls for unity during their session in the Charlemagne Building, over at the new Common Market headquarters began the first ministerial meetings since the dethronement of Charles de Gaulle. Would the old obstacles of yesteryear suddenly melt away? Hardly. The six agriculture ministers started what seemed likely to turn into a marathon discussion of the Common Market's costly farm-support issue. They got bogged down in disputes about a unified support price for butter and beef.

The finance and economics ministers of the Six did somewhat better. After considering proposals from the Common Market's Executive Commission for joint economic planning and budgetary discipline to deal with overheated European economies, the ministers agreed --in principle--to set up a unified monetary mechanism. The details would have to be worked out later. Nevertheless, France's Finance Minister Valery Giscard d'Estaing and West Germany's Economics Minister Karl Schiller called the agreement an important step. Giscard added, perhaps too optimistically, that it was "the first time we have monetary solidarity among the Six."

This week it will be the foreign ministers' turn to meet in Brussels. The overriding issue will be the question of British entry into the Common Market. The rest of the Six concur with Monnet's proposal for immediate preparations. But French President Georges Pompidou first wants to hold a summit of the Six, perhaps in October, before sitting down with Britain. The French view is likely to prevail.

So far, the main threat to Britain's application seems to be the British themselves. While Monnet was speaking at a press conference in Brussels about the desirability of European political federation, former British Prime Minister Sir Alec Douglas-Home glanced up from a crossword puzzle and told newsmen that "we British are a practical people. We want to confront a situation first before we think about setting up an institution to handle it." During the same session, British Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart said that plans for a European Parliament were "premature." Such statements made many Europeans wonder whether the British are willing to sacrifice some of their own sovereignty for a united Europe. Dutch Foreign Minister Joseph Luns, a strong supporter of Britain's entry, last week warned that if they wanted only to participate in a loose economic union, "then the British will not become members."

Progress in the North. Meanwhile, in Copenhagen, the Scandinavians were making substantial progress toward creating their own economic alliance. After two weeks of final and frenetic discussions, representatives of Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland emerged with a detailed blueprint for a Nordic Economic Community, dubbed Nordek. The draft agreement must still be ratified by the respective Scandinavian parliaments, and there were still difficult compromises to be worked out --notably on dairy products, meat and fisheries. Even so, the consensus was that surprisingly good progress had been made. Targeted by its drafters to go into operation Jan. 1, 1971, Nordek would unify the Scandinavian economies if the road to Brussels should still be blocked. Or, if membership negotiations were under way, it could serve as their joint bargaining agent with the Common Market for a better deal.

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