Iv . Attempted Partial Integration and Free Trade: Approaching the Council of Europe, Ecsc Arrangement, and Efta Membership 1953–60
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235 IV . ATTEMPTED PARTIAL INTEGRATION AND FREE TRADE: APPROACHING THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE, ECSC ARRANGEMENT, AND EFTA MEMBERSHIP 1953–60 1 . GENERAL INTRODUCTION: THE TREATIES OF ROME AS THE “BASIC LAW” OF THE EU, AND EFTA AS THE TRUNCATED EEC-SISTER In one of his latest publications, Alan S. Milward called the most successful pro- ject of the integration of post-war Europe – “the one that gives it genuine power and leverage in the world, which its commercial power and attraction binds to the European Union (EU) most of the European states which are not members of it”. He named the Rome Treaties its “founding charter”.1 On March 25, 1957, six States (Belgium, the Federal Republic of Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands), members of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) that had been created five years before, signed the Treaties of Rome establishing the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Atomic Community (EURATOM) at the Capitol in the city on the Tib- er.2 Looking at the ruins of the Forum Romanum, one of the fathers of the treaties, 1 Alan S. MILWARD, Politics and Economics in the History of the European Union, London – New York 2005, 1; see also IDEM, The Reconstruction of Western Europe 1945–51, London 1984, 421–461; IDEM, The European Rescue of the Nation State, Berkeley – Los Angeles 1992; Michael GEHLER, In Past and Present Research Debates: Alan S. MILWARD, the Ori- gins, Effects, and Significance of the Treaties of Rome, in: Zeitgeschichte 41 (2014), 1, 39–61; concerning this chapter see the documents 24 to 40 in the appendix “Documents”. 2 For research literature: Ingo WALTER, The European Common Market. Growth and Patterns of Trade and Production, New York 1967; Enrico SERRA (Dir.), Il Rilancio dell’Europa e i trattati di Roma/La Relance Européenne et les Traités de Rome/The Relaunching of Europe and the Treaties of Rome, Actes du colloque de Rome 25–28 mars 1987 (Groupe de liaison des historiens auprès des communautés/European Community Liaison Committee of Histori- ans 3), Bruxelles – Milano – Paris – Baden-Baden 1989; Ludolf HERBST – Werner BÜHRER – Hanno SOWADE (Hrsg.), Vom Marshallplan zur EWG. Die Eingliederung der Bundesre- publik Deutschland in die westliche Welt (Quellen und Darstellungen zur Zeitgeschichte 30), München 1990; Franz KNIPPING, Rom, 25. März 1957. Die Einigung Europas, München 2004, 9–13; Eric BUSSIÈRE – Michel DUMOULIN – Sylvain SCHIRMANN – Hartmut KAELBLE – Luisa PASSERINI – Marie-Françoise LÉVY – Marie-Noëlle SICARD – Robert FRANK – Gérard BOSSUAT – Anne DEIGHTON – Josefina CUESTA – Antonio VARSORI 236 IV. Attempted Partial Integration and Free Trade the Belgian Paul-Henri Spaak, said to his chef de cabinet Baron Robert Rothschild before signing the treaty, that a new empire had been established without a single shot being fired.3 Konrad Adenauer4 characterized the treaties eventually as the most important event in post-war history.5 1955–1956: The Belgian socialist Paul-Henri Spaak is regarded as one of the founding fathers of the community of six states – Wilfried LOTH – Marie-Thérèse BITSCH – Antoine MARÈS – Johnny LAURSEN – An- toine FLEURY, L’expérience européenne: 50 ans de construction de l’Europe 1957–2007/Ex- periencing Europe. 50 years of European construction, Communauté européenne 2006 (CD Rom); Maria Grazia MELCHIONNI – Roberto DUCCI, La genèse des traités de Rome Paris 2007; Michael GEHLER (Hrsg.) (unter Mitarbeit von Andreas PUDLAT), Vom gemeinsamen Markt zur europäischen Unionsbildung. 50 Jahre Römische Verträge 1957–2007. From Com- mon Market to European Union Building. 50 years of the Rome Treaties 1957–2007, Wien – Köln – Weimar 2009; IDEM, Europa. Ideen – Institutionen – Vereinigung – Zusammenhalt, Reinbek/Hamburg (expanded new edition) 2018, 242–264, 270–280; Wilfried LOTH, 60 Years ago: The Foundation of EEC and EAEC as Crisis Management, in: Journal of European Inte- gration History 23 (2017), 1, 9–28. 3 In 1954 ROTHSCHILD was appointed chef de cabinet of Paul-Henri SPAAK at the Belgian foreign ministry. Together with SPAAK and Jean Charles SNOY ET D’OPPUERS he wor- ked on the Treaties of Rome. Shortly before the treaty was signed, Rothschild was standing beside Spaak gazing over the Forum Romanum in Rome, when SPAAK said: “I think that we have re-established the Roman Empire without a single shot being fired”, https://ec.euro- pa.eu/commission/white-paper-future-europe-reflections-and-scenarios-eu27–2025_en, also https://isgp-studies.com/organisations/introduction/Robert_Rothschild_bio.htmThe Treaty of Rome, the European Union and Robert Rothschild, Posted on September 17, 2014, https:// wideawakegentile.wordpress.com/2014/09/17/the-treaty-of-rome-the-european-union-and- robert- rothschild/ (called up on August 25, 2015). 4 Hanns Jürgen KÜSTERS, Die Gründung der europäischen Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft, Ba- den-Baden 1983, 79–88, related to Adenauer: 39–42, 225–227, 319–325, 422–424; IDEM, The origins of the EEC Treaty, in: SERRA (Dir.), Il Rilancio dell’Europa, 211–238. 5 Original quotation: „vielleicht wichtigste Ereignis der Nachkriegszeit“, Benjamin STAHL, Grundstein für Europa. 25. März 1957: Römische Verträge unterzeichnet, in: Das Parla- ment, 2012, Nr. 11–12, https://www.das-parlament.de/2012/11_12/Kehrseite/38159523/317790 (25.8.2018); Hanns Jürgen KÜSTERS, Adenauers Europapolitik in der Gründungsphase der Europäischen Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft, in: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 31 (1983), 4, 646–673. 1. General Introduction: The Treaties of Rome and EFTA 237 What was the historical background of this political event? The failure of the European Defense Community (EDC) in 1954 happened when the French Nation- al Assembly had withdrawn the EDC, the European army project supported by the US, from its agenda.6 This was the first intracommunity crisis. It once again had to do with the controversial issue of how a maximum of security towards Ger- many could be achieved. France no longer viewed itself as being in the position of solely and independently covering the German potential under the American protective screen.7 After the end of the EDC, the ECSC foreign ministers meeting at a conference in Messina resolved on June 2, 1955 to go a step further “towards the construction of Europe”. The step should “first of all be taken in the economic field”. In addi- tion, it charged a committee chaired by the Belgian socialist Paul-Henri Spaak with the task of drawing up a detailed report “on the feasibility of both, a general economic union and a nuclear energy union”.8 France and the FRG were the lead- ing players. While Paris wanted to see the atomic energy community pushed, West Germany stood behind the concept of the economic free market which, of course, was not without its disputes domestically.9 In the end, the Spaak Committee was successful in linking both plans with eachother and realizing them. On May 19, 1956, the ECSC foreign ministers con- ference in Venice approved the “Spaak Report” with the resolution to begin inter- state negotiations. These negotiations by the ECSC states led to the founding of the European Economic Community (EEC)10 and the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM).11 They were aimed at horizontal integration which was then expressed in the Treaties of Rome, which entered into force on January 1, 1958. Though, it was thanks to the well-coordinated and purposeful leadership 6 Edward FURSDON, The European Defence Community, a History, London 1980; Ronald W. PRUESSEN, Cold War Threats and America’s Commitment to the European Defense Commu- nity: One Corner of a Triangle, in: JEIH Vol. 2 (1996), 1, 51–69. 7 Dieter KRÜGER, Sicherheit durch Integration? Die wirtschaftliche und politische Zusammen- arbeit Westeuropas 1947 bis 1957–58 (Entstehung und Probleme des Atlantischen Bündnisses bis 1956, published by the Militärgeschichtliche Forschungsamt 6), München 2003. 8 Curt GASTEYGER, Europa zwischen Spaltung und Einigung 1945 bis 1993 (Schriftenreihe 321), Bonn 1994, here 147, 154–155 (Messina Conference Communiqué); see document 28 in appendix “Documents”. 9 Wilfried LOTH, Deutsche und französische Interessen auf dem Weg zu EWG und EURATOM, in: Andreas WILKENS (Hrsg.), Die deutsch-französischen Wirtschaftsbeziehungen 1945– 1960 (Beihefte der Francia 42), Sigmaringen 1997, 171–187. 10 Hanns Jürgen KÜSTERS, Die Gründung der Europäischen Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft, Baden-Baden 1982; see also in particular, the contributions to Enrico SERRA (Ed.), Il ri- lancio dell’Europa e i trattati di Roma, Baden-Baden 1989; see document 30 in appendix “Documents”. 11 Peter R. WEILEMANN, Die Anfänge der Europäischen Atomgemeinschaft: zur Grün- dungsgeschichte von Euratom 1955–1957, Baden-Baden 1983; see document 30 in appendix “Documents”. 238 IV. Attempted Partial Integration and Free Trade of Spaak,12 who, within the framework of the Committee named after him, acted as an honest broker and showed the way from Messina to Venice in 1956,13 and with Pierre Uri and other collaborators led the integration policy out of its crisis and paralysis in 1954. The “Common Market”, with the successful Spaak Committee (1955–56) that preceded it, was also a reflex to the French colonial power crisis and the addition- al associated crisis between the old and new world powers; that is, it was also a result of the failed French policy of recolonization that had begun with Indochina (1947–54), continued through the Suez debacle (1956), and finally concluded with the Algerian War (1958–61). The Suez Crisis gave full expression to the dissent in colonial policy between the old classic colonial powers (France and Great Britain) and the new imperial superpowers (the USSR and the USA). The results were consequences in Europe policy and integration policy.14 The USSR sharply criticized the Rome Treaties as an agent of “dollar imperi- alism” and “cartel capitalism”. In the first decade of Western European integra- tion (1947–1957), Moscow had felt threatened by European unification and sought to hinder it by various means.