The Price of Pride

The Price of Pride In Washington last week the Inter-American Defense Board, created by vote of the Conference of Foreign Ministers at Rio, got down to brass tacks, began to arrange convoys for those Latin American countries whose rupture of diplomatic relations with the Axis powers had led to submarine reprisals on their shipping. As 55-day voyages from U.S. ports to Bombay and Suez cut Allied tonnage on Latin

American routes by more than half, the U.S.'s southern semi-allies grew clamorous with the realization that solidarity means sacrifice.

But, by a curious coincidence, the crisis caused in their economies was nothing compared to the crisis in Argentina-which at the Rio Conference had most stubbornly held out for full neutrality. Aloof Argentina, though she politely sent observers to the I.-A.D.B., declined all truck with convoys; they would compromise her neutrality. But the strain was telling.

When the Argentine Finance Ministry last week announced the March export figures, they were jarring. Last year's 555,000 tons was bad enough; this year's 387,000 tons was nightmarish. For weeks no ship under Anglo-U.S. control has left New York for Argentina.

Nor was shipping shortage the whole story. U.S. exporters revealed an invisible anti-Argentine embargo exercised indirectly through denial of export licenses. Isolation began to feel pretty lonely.

Meantime Argentina's surpluses piled up implacably: e.g., 80,000,000 bushels of flaxseed compared to last year's already catastrophic 50,000,000. In Buenos Aires, to conserve fuel, neon signs were doused, cinemas closed earlier, corn helped stoke locomotive and power-plant boilers. Autos & trucks were rationed; rationing was announced for tin plate, rubber, iron & steel, wood pulp, industrial chemicals. Newspapers' size was reduced. Tin-plate shortage caused a boom in glass and wood containers.

Argentina was paying a high price for her pride. But she named whip-smart, young C. (for Ceferino) Alonso Irigoyen chairman of a new Interdepartmental Committee on Economic Policy to tackle the crisis, pulled in her belt, disregarded hints.

Strong hint went winging back from the U.S. last week with the Army Purchasing Commission under Brigadier General Eduardo T. Lapez. Like the naval twin under Rear Admiral Saba H. Sueyro which preceded it by a fortnight, it had been invited to Washington last December to discuss the details of arms promised by the U.S. Like its twin, it returned emptyhanded.

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