Occupation Feeding

Report Outline
Obligations of Victor to Vanquished
Occupation Feeding in Bizonal Germany
Occupation Feeding in the Far East
Effects on Economy of United States
Special Focus

Obligations of Victor to Vanquished

Hague Convention and Rules of Land Warfare

Congress will shortly be asked by President Truman to appropriate an additional sum of about $1 billion for “government and relief in the occupied areas”—primarily Germany and Japan—during the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1949. If granted in full, the new appropriation will be about one-fifth less than the $1.3 billion voted for these purposes in the current fiscal year.

The Appropriations committees of Congress are expected to inquire more closely into the need for and purposes of this year's appropriation than at any time in the past. The large expenditures required for support of the peoples of Germany and Japan were opposed in last year's congressional debates as “reparations from the victor to the vanquished,” and there has been similar opposition in Great Britain to the smaller amounts made available by that country. On the one hand, Congress will be tempted to cut down on American food for former enemies. On the other hand, it will be pressed to preserve, and perhaps to expand, this convenient outlet for agricultural commodities which threaten to become surplus on the American market.

Obligations of Victor to Vanquished

The obligation to provide minimum supplies for the peoples of the occupied areas—in the amounts needed to prevent starvation, disease and unrest—derives from the Hague Convention of 1907, and the Laws and Customs of Land Warfare, Article 43 of which reads as follows: