No Promiscuity

When wartime export controls expire in June, the U.S. will again be bound to grant licenses for arms export to any foreign government--Monaco or Russia--that wants to buy U.S. weapons. To end such promiscuous purchasing, President Truman last week asked Congress for a major amendment to the Neutrality Act.

The proposed change would empower the Secretary of State to screen arms buyers and distinguish between "aggressor and aggrieved, peacemaker and troublemaker." He could refuse licenses which were not "in accord with the foreign policy or the security interests of the United States." The embargo would apply not only to arms and munitions, but to anything intended "directly or indirectly" for foreign military forces.

Said the President: "If war should ever again become imminent it would be intolerable to find ourselves in our present position of being bound by our own legislation to give aid and support to any power which might later attack us."

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