Food for Freedom

The case for Aid to the Small Democracies becomes clearer and more powerful every day. Salient and unanswerable arguments are gaining more and more prominence, restating and implementing Hoover's idea of "stiffening the morale" of the conquered peoples. Keeping these people from starvation is, they say, a better weapon against totalitarianism than the weapons of force. The failure to do so would, it is claimed, drive the small people into the arms of the Nazis because they will hate Britain and America. This may be putting it too strongly, it is true. There is plenty of evidence of chafing under tyranny, of hope for liberation and triumph for democracy. There is idealism left in the conquered people no matter how much they tighten their belts. But there are also the "realists" who say that it's better to play ball with Hitler than starve. The pro-shipment line of argument is given point by Darlan's threat of convoy; a concern for his people and a ticklish situation forced him into this action.

The reasons against the food shipments are hazy, to say the least. British spokesmen answered Darlan by saying that they were willing to try out a plan of relief but that no plan had been proposed. Mr. Hoover's committee stands ready and waiting in America. It is claimed that Britain's effort will be impaired by leakage of food to the Nazis. But the fact is that the Hoover proposal makes allowance for this, and guarantees a cessation of shipments if it occurs; the plan is air tight. Another argument is that it is "not America's business" to question Britain's blockade. That also seems rather odd in view of the actual facts: we feel so strongly that it is our business that we have organized the nation on a war-time basis to ship materials of death for use against the Axis; cannot we make it our business to ship the materials of life to the democracies? To say that it is not our business implies among other things that we have no interest in the direction or the outcome of the war.

Vague and irrational objections should not stand in the way of a humanity which is combined with realists statesmanship. Too many Poles and Finns and Dutch and French are coming to realize that their allegiance to democracy doesn't relieve hunger and suffering; that gulls and crows, disease and empty stomachs, don't make a good basis for hope and endurance till final victory. American has the power, the right, and the duty to assert her role as helper of the helpless.