-IMMEDIATE DANGERS.
(a) France will have no oil industry. In its place we shall continue to enjoy a cartel of ten so-called " refiners," simple brokers who will buy oil already refined, mazut and lubricating oils from the Anglo-Dutch trust, and will sell to French consumers at a profit, all the greater in that they enjoy an absolute monopoly, protected by a high customs tariff.
(b) The engineering industry will lose, for this reason, an unprecedented chance of development. Indeed, all the conduits, pumps, pipe lines, and reservoirs—even for use in our colonies—will be bought and installed by the British trust, which will naturally place its orders in Britain.
(c) All our industries using petroleum or mazut—and they will be more and more numerous, railways, ships, factories with the Diesel engines—will pay dearer for their fuel. Hence, our manufacturers, already suffering through the high price of coal, will be at the same disadvantage as regards liquid fuel. It is impossible for us to compete, not only with Britain, but with Germany. Our chances of development offered by the Treaty of Versailles will be greatly diminished.
So much for the economic consequences of the Agreement of 24th April.
But it may have graver effects upon our foreign policy, and even on our safety.
Its principal object is to close to the United States oil resources necessary to their development. It is the com pletion of a kind of industrial " ring." But we may well believe that the Americans will not submit to this treatment without vigorous resistance. The tone of Franklin K. Lane's recent speech shows it plainly enough. Now they hold, as regards ourselves, powerful means of exerting pressure.
First, coal. In a statement to the Chamber, M. Millerand declared that in addition to deliveries from Britain, he counted on 400,000 tons a month of American coal. The Pennsylvanians may refuse us this, the more readily because at this very moment the workshops of New England are short of fuel.
Then, commercial credits. Our importers, unable to procure enough dollars to pay for all their purchases from the United States, see the greater number of their bills discounted by the American banks. If the banks refuse
to continue, our supplies of corn, meat, sugar, and boots will be seriously compromised.
Next, there are the credits for reconstruction. To balance our budget and restore our devastated territories, it is absolutely and urgently necessary to capitalise the annual payments of the German indemnity. And this operation has no chance of succeeding except by means of an international loan, of which the American people will contribute the greater portion. This latter hope is now almost certain to be disappointed.
Finally, there are the State loans. During and since the War the American Treasury has lent us about 13,000 million gold francs (more than 30,000 millions at the present rate of exchange). For three-quarters of this sum no date of repayment has been fixed. Were the Washington Government to exact the immediate repayment of one fourth only, it would be enough to send the value of our franc down to the level of the German mark, even of the Austrian crown, in every exchange in the world.
These are facts which we must look steadily in the face. Up to now our diplomats have chiefly appealed to senti ment. Invoking with tearful voice our million and a half of dead, and our devastated country, they have done little more than hold out to the Americans the beggar's cap, beseeching them to drop into it an alms of a few thouands million francs. But though they beg with importunity, they refuse the little that is asked of them in return. We do too much honour to the spirit of abnegation of our friends, and of this they have made it plain that they are aware.
Unfortunately, their business men, though they can be generous on occasion, are neither saints nor imbeciles. They are not disposed to deprive their industries of much needed capital in order to lend to a nation which refuses them access to the few useful resources it possesses, and which it gives generously to their competitors.