Page:Turkey, the great powers, and the Bagdad Railway.djvu/359

 European Powers as an attempt at political domination. America is the only power considered strong enough to provide the Orient with the capital and expert knowledge for its industrial development, without aiming at more than a legitimate profit. The Oriental feels that he needs coöperation with the West; but he is anxious to restrict that coöperation to the economic field. And he considers the United States the only power which would replace Europe's political ambitions by a sound, matter-of-fact, and sincere economic policy."[39]

During the Great War the economic situation of the United States underwent certain fundamental changes which seem to forecast increasing American interest in imperialism. Before the War, America was practically self-sufficient in raw materials; its export trade was composed very largely of foodstuffs and raw materials which found a ready market in the great industrial nations of Europe; financially, it was a debtor, not a creditor, nation. The enormous industrial expansion of the United States during the Great War, however, has changed these conditions. Raw materials have become an increasingly greater proportion of the nation's import trade, and American business men are becoming concerned about foreign control of certain essential commodities such as rubber, nitrates, chrome, and petroleum. American export trade has experienced an unparalleled period of expansion, and American manufactured articles are competing in world markets which formerly were the exclusive preserves of European nations. Furthermore, the export of American capital has almost kept pace with the export of American goods, so that by 1920 the United States had taken its place alongside Great Britain and France as one of the great creditor nations of the world. As time goes on American business will be reaching out over the world for a fair share of the earth's resources