Word: luxembourg
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...Luxembourg, Luxembourg, where is that on this map?" huffed France's famed statesman Aristide Briand at a diplomatic conference many years ago. "My dear Briand," suggested a young Luxembourger named Joseph Bech, "if you will just lift up your little finger from the map you will find it." Today as huge, shaggy and leonine as Briand was himself, Joseph Bech, 66, is the durable dean of European statesmen. He has been a member of Luxembourg's government since 1921, her Foreign Minister since 1926, her minister for Foreign Commerce, National Defense and Wine Culture almost as long. Last...
During his years as Luxembourg's perennial spokesman abroad, Joseph Bech has been a familiar, white-maned figure in the councils of the world's great nations. It was not flattering to Europe's great powers, another diplomat once said, "that the most intelligent of her foreign ministers is the representative from Luxembourg." Bech himself, a practical conservative who deplores "plans drawn in the clouds," explains his success with a line from Tacitus, who once described a successful politician as a man neither above nor below the affairs he dealt with, but simply equal to them. "Political...
Working in close harmony through the years, Bech and Dupong raised Luxembourg's affairs to a high degree of stability. Their nation has had no strikes since 1919. Her unemployment seldom soars above a paltry 20 (in a population of 300,000). As Minister of Wine Culture, the job he likes the best, Connoisseur Bech himself has worked a revolution in Luxembourg's vineyards, whose products were once considered the poorest in Europe...
...allay the fears of France (pop. 42 million) that a reunited Germany (pop. 65 million) might one day dominate the European Assembly elections, a ceiling was fixed above which no nation's delegation might rise. Luxembourg (pop. 300,000) was pacified by a clause guaranteeing representation for states whose populations are too small to elect even one member to the supranational chamber...
...Steel. Once, prices were fixed in each of five areas-France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands and Belgium-Luxembourg. Currency barriers and price controls restricted exports. With the lifting of controls, steel prices found a steady level. They recently dropped slightly, and with a pre-election price cut in Germany averaging 5%, are going lower. Customers are holding out for cheaper prices, but Monnet wants to keep them high enough to finance modernization and expansion...