Conference files, lot 59 D 95, CF 100
No. 360
Communiqué Issued by President
Truman and
Prime Minister Churchill
In their communiqué of January 9, 1952,1 the President and the Prime Minister announced that they had considered how the [Page 858] United States and the United Kingdom could best help each other in the supply of scarce materials and that discussions were continuing.
These discussions have now been completed. Agreements have been reached which, taken together within a framework of mutual assistance, will make it possible for the two countries to carry out more effectively their common task of contributing to the strength and security of the free world. The United States will help the United Kingdom to meet its most serious shortage, steel, and the United Kingdom will help alleviate one of the United States most serious shortages, aluminum, and will also assist the United States in getting supplies of tin.
The United Kingdom requirements of steel for 1952 were reviewed in detail. On the basis of these requirements, and after allowing for supplies of foreign ore to be diverted to the United Kingdom by arrangement between the United Kingdom and the United States steel industry, the United States undertook to make available to the United Kingdom for purchase during 1952 steel (including scrap and pig iron now earmarked for the United States from overseas sources) to a total figure of 1,000,000 long tons. This includes the steel allocated for the first quarter in the previously announced arrangement. About 80 per cent of the amount supplied will be steel, mostly in the form of ingots. This represents less than one per cent of the total United States production. It has been agreed that the United States may vary the proportions between the steel products and the steel making materials to be supplied.
This will be of the greatest assistance to the United Kingdom in meeting its defense and essential civilian needs, and will help the United Kingdom industry to take care of some of the essential needs of other friendly countries for structural steel and plate steel, thereby relieving the pressure on overburdened United States facilities.
In the absence of a change in the present supply situation, it is not anticipated that any of the steel to be furnished to the United Kingdom will be supplied in structural or plate or in shapes that are in serious short supply in the United States. Most of the steel will be supplied in the last half of 1952 when a portion of the United States steel expansion program will have been completed. Deliveries to the United Kingdom will be confined to those items in reasonably free supply.
[Page 859]The steel shipments to Britain will be so arranged as to time and types that no cut will be required in steel allocations already made to United States industry for the first and second quarters of 1952.
United States requirements for aluminum and tin were also reviewed. On the basis of these requirements, the United Kindgom agreed to make available to the United States a total of 55,100,000 pounds of aluminum. This represents an increase, to be spread evenly over the last three quarters of 1952, of 33,060,000 pounds of aluminum over the arrangements made recently with the United States by the United Kingdom. This quantity is equivalent to about 10 per cent of the total United Kingdom annual supply. The United States has agreed that it will replace this aluminum by the middle of 1953. It is expected that much of the United States aluminum expansion program will be in operation by that time.
The United Kingdom has agreed to make available to the United States 20,000 long tons of tin during 1952 at $1.18 per pound, F.O.B. Singapore. Both Governments agreed that it would be desirable if more normal arrangements for the conduct of the tin trade could be established as soon as possible.
These arrangements will enable the United States to more nearly meet its essential tin plate requirements and improve its aluminum allocations to defense and civilian industries.
It was noted that both countries would continue to use their best efforts to expand and accelerate their programs for increasing production of scare materials, both at home and overseas.
The two Governments also reviewed and expressed satisfaction with the progress which has been made through the International Materials Conference toward effecting equitable distribution of key raw materials.
These arrangements should make a valuable contribution to the defense programs of the two countries, and increase their ability to meet the acute shortage in the free world of steel, tin plate, and other strategic materials.