number 1 - Centre d'études et de recherches européennes Robert ...

American Monnetism and the European Coal-Steel Community in the Fifties 29
army had brought on, he warned "(...) a crisis of almost terrifying proportions." 25
Even Monnet was, at least for the moment, nonplussed. Although confiding to
Bruce on 31 August that he would resign from the High Authority in consequence
of the EDC rejection, he changed his mind two days later because the scheme was
not "dead but only wounded" and could be "bandaged up for the next campaign." 26
The rejection of the EDC treaty had astonishingly few consequences. Within
two months Britain, France, and the United States had agreed to adopt the NATO
alternative to German rearmament. 27 Yet never again could European integration
be equated with Monnet's version of supranationalism. In November Monnet resigned
without prior warning as President of the High Authority, then rescinded the offer
and finally had to be forced out of office in June 1955. The official explanation
given for his abrupt decision to step down was disappointment at the failure of the
EDC. He may also have been influenced by the less spectacular, and only slightly
less ambiguous, failure of the Coal and Steel Community.
The American Loan
The CSC tended to be overlooked in the drama that unfolded around the EDC. This
result may not have been unintended. In Luxembourg things were a mess. At the
root of the problem was Monnet's refusal to cede any authority to, or share influence
with, others. In retaliation the producers therefore quite simply sabotaged his
work. The much touted openings of the common markets for coal and steel in
Spring 1953 had negligible effect. Everywhere output of the combustible continued
to be regulated by quasi-official national cartels. Faced with the prospect of competition,
the steel industry tightened informal alliances and even openly formed a new
International Steel Cartel to regulate exports. Although the High Authority issued
flurry of regulations governing price, marketing, investment, and so on, their only
real function was to conceal its impotence in masses of verbiage. 28
The only really important issue in the relationship between Washington and the
CSC was money: How much would be given in aid and for which purposes? A
decision to provide it, based simply on the notion that "some degree of financial
power will be essential to the Schuman Plan", 29 antedated the actual existence of
the organization, something that caused at least one official, Miriam Camp, to warn
on 18 July 1952 that "No case has yet been made out, either by the MSA (Mutual
Security Administration) or by the Schuman Plan countries, as to why dollar assis-
25. T. HOOPES, p. 246.
26. K.E. BRUCE Diaries, 2 September 1954.
27. J. GILLINGHAM, "David K.E.Bruce," pp. 8-49.
28. J. GILLINGHAM, Coal, Steel, and the Rebirth of Europe, pp. 332-348.
29. a. FRUS 1952-1954/VI "Memorandum of the Acting Director of the European Regional Staff,
Mutual Security Agency (Hulley) to the Assistant Director for Europe, Mutual Security Director
(Cleveland)", 21 July 1952; ibid "The Assistant Director for Supply of the Mutual Security Agency
(Fitz Gerald) to the Office of United States Special Representative in Europe," 2 August 1952.