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Spaak and his colleagues have even taken pains to play down the supranational features of the Common Market. But for all Spaak's understandable reluctance to indulge in grandiose talk of supra-nationalism, it is clear that the interlocking of economies that would come with the Common Market would make another Franco-German war highly unlikely, and in time would probably lead the Six to adopt a common budget and, hence, a considerable degree of political unity.
The Thickets. Negotiating an agreement acceptable to all hands required a plunge through an incredible thicket of quotas, subsidies, double pricing and doctored transport rates in every country. German industrialists, cockily confident of their ability to outcompete anyone in Europe, were enthusiastic at the opportunity to win an even bigger share of Western European markets, but unenthusiastic at the prospect of being obliged to give French-style benefits—including three-week vacations—to their hitherto unpampered employees. The labor benefits, in turn, have great appeal to German unions, thereby vitiating German Socialism's traditional opposition to European integration schemes.
The French demanded that the proposed Common Market investment fund contribute development capital to French colonies—something which the Germans felt would discredit the organization in the eyes of the Afro-Asian nations (this one is still not settled). The Italians wanted the investment fund to concentrate on underdeveloped areas of Europe, specifically the Mezzogiorno, or Italian South.
The Dutch were hopeful of finding new markets for their low-cost agricultural produce, but in all the countries protection of the farmer is so deeply ingrained that even after the Common Market is fully operating in 1970, national protection will still be allowed on 30 agricultural products.
Fears & Hopes. Looking in from across the Channel, the British were keenly aware that the Six offered the fastest-expanding major market in the world. (Since 1950, annual imports of the Six have increased from $11 billion to $19 billion.) The British were also aware that if they stayed out of the Common Market, the tariff wall thrown up by the Six (who now buy one-eighth of Britain's exports) might well exclude many British goods, and that, under these circumstances, commercial and eventually political domination of Western Europe would fall into the hands of Germany.
Even so, Britain's emotional and economic ties with the Commonwealth might well have kept Britain on the sidelines but for the coincidence that, just as the Common Market was being hammered into shape, two "good Europeans" took over the crucial jobs in Britain—Macmillan as Prime Minister and Peter Thorneycroft as his .Chancellor of the Exchequer. "Make no doubt of it, we are behind the Free Trade Area," said Thorneycroft.
Creation of the Free Trade Area, declared Peter Thorneycroft last week, "will make us a better ally." The U.S. State Department, though recognizing that some U.S. industry may at first suffer, is all for the two schemes—convinced that all Europe will eventually gain by them, and therefore the U.S. too will benefit.