Chapter Seventeen
One of the chief functions of the wreckers in London, Washington and Berlin was to ensure that each meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers called to discuss the German problem should be a failure; and that the cause of the failure should always be attributed to the Russians. It was not always easy, but on the whole they succeeded. Certainly public opinion in the West was deceived into thinking that the Russians were solely to blame for the succession of failures at Paris, London, New York and Moscow.
In part the wrecking was deliberately planned in Washington and London, but to a great extent it was prepared beforehand by the British and American representatives in Berlin. They sent defeatist reports of proceedings in the Control Council and four-power committees; distorted accounts of developments in the Soviet Zone that helped to build up a picture in the White House and at Whitehall completely contrary to the facts. And from this picture, policy was often decided. When conferences outside Germany seemed to be proceeding favorably for agreement, the wreckers staged some incidents in Berlin which would ruin chances for agreement once again.
At the time of the Moscow Conference in March, 1947, when much was being said for public consumption by Messrs. Bevin and Marshall of the need for economic and political unity of Germany, plans for a separate West German state were already being discussed in Berlin. I published a story on February 6, 1947, that Britain and America were considering setting up a separate West German state, with headquarters at Frankfurt. I gave substantial details as to the type of state which eventually emerged. The story was a sensation. It was the first time the term West German State had been mentioned; the first time Frankfurt named as an alternative German capital to Berlin. It was a disclosure of the complete hypocrisy of British and American statesmen, then preparing to leave for the vital Moscow Conference called specifically to discuss German unity.
The British immediately denied the story, the Americans contented themselves with a half denial. An extremely angry Mr. Christian Steel sent for me, told me my story was outrageous, "playing into the hands of the Russians" and denied that there was the "slightest shadow of an intention to set up a separate West German State." The story was "irresponsible" and did not contain a "vestige" of truth. I had to remind Mr. Steel that this was not the first occasion on which I had found him "uninformed" about important matters which came within his province. As I had confirmation of the story from Mr. Steele's own department before I sent it, I was on fairly safe grounds and could afford to be emphatic.
It was natural that Western embarrassment should be acute. With the most important conference yet to be held on German unity due to open in a few weeks, Britain and America had been caught out making a deal to split Germany, behind the backs of the Russians. Later this was to become a commonplace but it was fairly new for them to be caught out in 1947.
I had been informed by a high official that the plan had been drafted "so as to lose no time once the Moscow Conference fails.” Not “if the conference fails” mark you. I have a copy of a despatch I sent on February 17, 1947, in which I wrote as follows: “My own view, reinforced with statements from many of the actual administrators in the British Element of the Control Commission, is that we want to avoid unity at Moscow, but also want to avoid at all costs the responsibility for a breakdown..." "Can you really get excited about a failure at Moscow?" one of Mr. Steel's assistants asked me at the time. I remarked that the general effect on world opinion would be bad and that German morale would go down. "That's all very well," he said, "but we stand to take an economic loss if economic unity is achieved."
At the Moscow Conference, the wreckers very nearly lost out. The general line of the proposals put forth by the Russians was very similar to that put up by the British. Both wanted a centralised Germany as opposed to the French and American preference for federation. The Russians dropped their earlier objections to raising the previously agreed level of German steel production and suggested a figure "between ten and twelve million tons," which was the figure the British had in mind. Marshall, of all people, opposed this, as reported earlier in the book, on "security" grounds. The Americans have been fighting for a figure of 20 million tons ever since.
The Russians proposed German-wide, free and secret elections to a Central Government with free participation for all political parties. Mr. Bevin opposed letting the Germans decide any matter which affected "British security" and spoke about the "suppression" of political parties, i.e., the Social Democrats in the Soviet Zone.
As a great deal has been spoken and written about this subject, it is perhaps not out of place here to outline the position of the Social Democrats in the Soviet Zone. When the Soviet Army entered Germany, they licensed four political parties. The Communists and Social Democrats represented the workers, the Christian Democrats the middle class with a clerical tinge, and the Liberal Democrats, the champions of free enterprise. The dozens of political parties formed in the Western Zone, also crystallised into these main groupings. In the early days the Social Democrats in Berlin, proposed a merger with the Communists. The Communists at the time opposed a fusion party, but proposed both parties should retain their identities but work out a common political programme. The Social Democrat leader who made the original proposal, Frank Dahrendorf later changed his mind and went by British plane to the West to join with Schumacher and the right wing Social Democrats. The Communists later agreed to the fusion proposals and after resolutions supporting fusion had been carried by joint meetings of the Social Democrat and Communist executives all over the zone, and at both headquarters in Berlin, fusion was carried through. An overwhelming majority of the Central Executive of the Social Democrats, headed by Otto Grotewohl, voted for fusion and the creation of the new Socialist Unity Party (S.E.D.).
The two parties had about equal membership. From the top of the organisation with Wilhelm Pieck, the veteran Communist leader, and Grotewohl, as joint secretaries, right down to the smallest units, office at every stage was shared jointly by Communists and Social Democrats. This was the "suppression" of the Social Democrats in the Soviet Zone.
Mr. Bevin and British officials in Germany, not to mention the West German Social Democrats, have made much capital out of this "suppression." Permission for S.E.D. leaders to tour the British Zone during the elections in 1948, was withheld by the British on the grounds that the S.P.D. was "suppressed" in the Soviet Zone and West German Social Democrat leaders, Schumacher, etc., were not allowed to tour the Soviet Zone. "Until such rights are granted West S.P.D. leaders," said the British, "the S.E.D. and its leaders will have no facilities in the British Zone." The Americans took a similar line.
The Russians immediately published a communique to the effect that no West German Social Democrats had ever asked to visit the Soviet Zone, nor had the Social Democrats ever asked to form a separate party in the Soviet Zone. The inference of the communique was that Schumacher, Neumann and Co. were as free as all other West German politicians to tour the Soviet Zone.
Many West German politicians and trade union officials did go to the Soviet Zone – and made speeches when they got there. The Social Democrat leaders, the Schumachers, Neumanns and Reuters, never took up the Soviet invitation to ask for a pass to the Soviet Zone. They never took up the Soviet offer to form a branch of the West German Social Democrat party there. Schumacher's line and that of Mr. Bevin continued unchanged about the "suppression" of political rights in the Soviet Zone.
It was the question of reparations, however, that was made the main stumbling block at the Moscow Conference. The Western powers had pretended ever since 1946 that the Russian claims to 10 billion dollars' worth of reparations from Germany were "fantastic and outrageous," that no such figures had even been discussed. Bevin and U.S. Secretary of State Byrnes denied flatly at the Paris Conference in July, 1946, that such a figure had even been mentioned. For months the press had been fed stories about Russia wrecking the Potsdam agreement by taking reparations from current production. At Moscow, the sufferings of British and American taxpayers were balanced off against the blood of seven millions of Soviet citizens and soldiers killed, of 1,710 Soviet towns and 70,000 villages destroyed, 6,000,000 buildings wiped out, and 25,000,000 people made homeless; of over 70,000,000 head of livestock destroyed or driven off to Germany; of direct losses of 128 billion dollars.
As Mr. Molotov expressed it:"The difference in this respect between the Soviet Union and the United States of America, for instance, is generally known... the United States of America, which fortunately was not subjected to enemy occupation... enriched itself during the war. Published data testify to the fact that the profits of big property owners in the U.S.A. reached unprecedented proportions during the war years. Under these circumstances the representative of the American Government may, perhaps object to the payment of reparations to the Soviet Union."
Molotov exposed the hypocrisy of the British and American delegates in refusing to even discuss the figure of ten billion dollars' worth of reparations by disclosing the contents of the hitherto unpublished protocol to the Yalta Conference.
The decision reached on reparations at Yalta was as follows:
"Protocol on the talks between the heads of the three governments at the Crimea Conference on the question of German reparations in kind.
"The heads of the three Governments agreed as follows:
"(1) Germany must pay for the losses caused by her to the Allied nations in the course of the war. Reparations are to be received, in the first instance, by those countries who have borne the main burden of the war, have suffered the heaviest losses and have organised victory over the enemy.
"(2) Reparations in kind are to be extracted from Germany in the three following forms:
"(a) Bulk removals within two years from the surrender of Germany or the cessation of organised resistance from the national wealth of Germany located on the territory of Germany herself as well as outside her territory (equipment, machine tools, ships, rolling stock, German investments abroad, shares of industrial, transport, navigation and other enterprises in Germany, etc.), these removals to be carried out chiefly for purposes of destroying the war potential of Germany;
"(b) Annual deliveries of goods from current production after the end of the war for a period to be fixed.
"(c) German labour.
"(3) For the working out on the above principles of a detailed plan for exaction of reparations from Germany an Allied Reparations Commission to be set up in Moscow consisting of the representatives of the U.S.S.R., the U.S.A., and the United Kingdom.
"( 4) With regard to the fixing of the total sum of reparations as well as the distribution of it among the countries which suffered from the German aggression, the Soviet and American Delegations agreed as follows:
" 'The Moscow Reparations Commission should take in its initial stages as a basis for discussion the suggestion of the Soviet Government that the total sum of reparations in accordance with the points (a) and (b) of paragraph 2 should be 20 billion dollars, and that 50 per cent. of it should go to the U.S.S.R.'
"The British Delegation was of the opinion that pending consideration of the reparations questions by the Moscow Reparations Commissions no figures should be mentioned.
"The above Soviet-American proposal has been passed to the Moscow Reparations Commission as one of the proposals to be considered by the Commission. Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt, J. Stalin."
The Western powers had practised a monstrous deceit in keeping the important fact of the Yalta Protocol a secret, and allowing press and politicians to rave about Soviet "unjustified, impertinent, baseless" claims for reparations. Soviet insistence on taking reparations from current production was constantly cited in the West as a Soviet breach of the Potsdam Agreement.
After Mr. Molotov disclosed the terms of the Yalta Protocol, the Western press were fed stories that Roosevelt had not disclosed the terms to his advisers and that Churchill had never really accepted them. In any case, it was claimed, the Yalta Agreement had been superseded by that signed in Potsdam. In fact, at Yalta there was a clear agreement between the Russians and Americans at least as to the type of reparations to be taken and the amount which should be used as a basis for settling a final figure on the amount Russia was to receive. Even Mr. Churchill's reservations were only in regard to the amount Germany was to pay and not on the fact that reparations were to be from current production and German labour.
The Yalta protocols were not superseded by the Potsdam Agreement; on the contrary. The preamble to the Potsdam Agreement states: "The purpose of this agreement is to carry out the Crimea Declaration on Germany" and the reparations agreement later signed in Berlin also referred clearly back to the Crimea, or Yalta decisions. The Crimea declaration gave the Soviet Union the right to take reparations from removals of plant, from current production and from German Labour. Only the total amount to be taken was disputed. Molotov made the reasonable proposal to stick to the figure of 10 billion dollars, spread over a period of 20 years and he made it clear he was prepared to discuss even the figures if the Allies were interested in serious discussions. But they were not. Reparations, they claimed, would cripple Germany, add intolerable burdens to the British and American taxpayers. Reparations had already brought the Soviet Zone of Germany to a state of ruin, they asserted.
The wreckers in Berlin did their bit by preparing reports that the Soviet Zone was in a state of collapse. (They proved that many times, but it always refused to collapse.) Machinery in mines and factories were being worked to a standstill; there were no replacements; managers with the necessary technical skills were locked up as war criminals or Nazis; dismantling had robbed the zone of most of its original value; land reform had brought about chaos in agricultural production; a complete collapse could only be staved off for a couple of weeks.
Economic unity must be avoided was the inference. Otherwise the Soviets would just dump their zone-full of troubles into the laps of the Western Powers as an added burden for the poor taxpayers. I saw one of these reports, prepared for the Moscow conference, by a British economist who had never been into the Soviet Zone, but based his material on stories from dispossessed Junkers and industrialists, or displaced Nazi officials who had fled to the West. The truth was that the Soviet Zone was never near economic collapse – not even when General Clay assured a group of United Nations correspondents visiting Berlin at the end of 1948, that "the counter-blockade had brought Soviet Zone economy to a standstill."
Each conference, however, was preceded by a flood of such reports, designed to bolster up whatever particular line was to be taken.
In between the Moscow Conference and that held in London in November, 1947, Mr. Marshall produced his famous European Recovery Programme aimed amongst other things at giving Western German priority in reconstruction of her industry and restoring her to a dominant place in Europe again. Molotov accurately pointed out at the Paris discussions on Marshall Aid that to talk of including Germany in such a scheme before the question of setting up a central German government had been decided, would divide Europe and Germany into two camps.
With Marshall Plan dollars already in the air there was little chance of continuing eyen the small measure of agreement which had been reached in Moscow – on questions of land reform and demilitarisation. Indeed there was great jubilation in General Clay's headquarters a few days before the conference was due to start when it became known that the U.S. State Department had finally approved the plan for the West German State (the same one of which Mr. Steel knew nothing eight months previously but which was only a War Department project at the time). It was known in Berlin, late in November that Mr. Marshall intended to waste no time allowing the Russians to make "propaganda speeches" in London and that he would break the conference up as soon as it got into dangerous waters.
"Dangerous waters" would be when the Soviet delegation insisted on discussions to implement the general principles of economic and political unity of Germany, which had been accepted at the Moscow Conference. One proposal which went the rounds of Berlin a few days before the London conference, was that if the Russians pressed too hard their demands for German unity and an all-German government, one should make them pay in dollars a share of the bill for feeding Western Germany. "That ought to stop 'em," the official who told me ofthe proposal, said hopefully.
In London, Mr. Molotov demanded immediately that the Moscow decisions to establish a central government of Germany and to prepare a peace treaty with that government, be implemented. On the second day of the conference, Molotov proposed concretely "that the Council of Foreign Ministers examine in the first place the following basic questions connected with the preparation of the peace treaty with Germany: (a) formation of a central German democratic government; (b) peace conference for examination of the draft peace treaty with Germany; (c) principal directives for the drafting of the peace treaty."
These proposals if they had been discussed would have steered the conference into "dangerous waters" indeed. Mr. Marshall drew the reparations "red herring" across the trail and Mr. Bevin introduced a document which announced British abandonment of the Potsdam Agreement. M. Bidault with Marshall dollars already in his pockets, for the first time came out for complete support for every proposal made by the Anglo-American delegates.
Mr. Bevin's draft was entitled "Supplementary Principles to Govern the Treatment of Germany" and was presented as a document supplementing the Potsdam Agreement, whereas in fact it cut across the main provisions of Potsdam. Complete renunciation of the Potsdam Agreement was contained in the proposal that "where there is any inconsistency between the principles contained in the Potsdam Agreement and the principles contained in the present statement, the latter shall prevail." And the British, with French and American backing, insisted that this should be accepted as a basis for discussions.
It soon became obvious that the Western Powers were once again interested only in talking agreements and not reaching agreements. In the middle of the conference Marshall announced a complete stop on further reparations deliveries to the Soviet Union. Mr. Molotov tried consistently to keep the discussions on to the setting up of a government and the preparation of a peace treaty, but his efforts were side-tracked and sabotaged. The last thing the Western Powers were interested in was an all-German government, although neither Bevin nor Marshall had the courage to say so openly.
When things became too embarrassing, Marshall stuck to his lines and broke up the conference according to plan. He let it be known that this was the last meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers as far as America was concerned. With decisions already taken to go ahead with the West German State, Bevin and Marshall could notafford to run the risks of further conferences.
After the London conference, crises between the powers in Berlin came rapidly to a head as had been intended. The last difficulties were removed for the Western Powers for the final splitting up of Germany and the setting up of a West German state tied to American capitalism. Nevertheless, General Clay and Co., had some narrow escapes when it was difficult for them to persist in their tactics without being caught out publicly.
After the western unilateral currency reform and the resultant blockade of Berlin, the counter-blockade, the nonsense of the air-lift, General Clay was almost caught out when the matter was brought up at the United Nations.
The efforts of the Argentine delegate, Dr. Bramuglia, to sort out who was responsible for the breakdown in currency reform negotiations and under what conditions it could be established on a unified basis, began to make things .uncomfortable for the British and Americans. They began to wish they had never raised the matter in the United Nations. The small powers showed themselves not at all interested to get involved in a war over Berlin. The president and secretary of U.N.O., Dr. Evatt and Mr. Trygvie Lie, sent appeals to the four powers to compose their differences. They asked them to “redouble their efforts in a spirit of solidarity and mutual understanding to secure in the briefest possible time the final settlement of the war and the conclusion of all the peace settlements."
The appeal concluded by urging that the Berlin currency question be tackled immediately with the help of the Security Council.
Vishinsky replied three days later warmly approving the move and agreeing to an early conference of the foreign ministers to discuss the peace treaties with Japan, Austria and Germany, and also to discuss and settle the Berlin problem. Vishinsky agreed that settlement of the latter was of paramount importance in clearing the way for a more general agreement.
The British, Americans and French were caught on the wrong foot by the prompt Soviet reply, and began to wish they had never raised the Berlin question at the Security Council. Evatt and Trygvie Lie were strongly criticised in the Western press for having embarrassed the Western powers. A meeting was hurriedly arranged and the day following the Soviet reply, Britain, America and France produced almost identical statements coldly reiterating that the Soviet Union was to blame for all difficulties and they would agree to no discussions until the Russians lifted all traffic restrictions to Berlin. The language of ultimatums as they well know was not the language to use if one honestly sought agreement.
The Lie-Evatt appeal was the reflection of genuine nervousness among the small powers that America was pushing them into a war over Berlin. Their resistance prompted Dr. Bramuglia, as president of the Security Council, to persist in his efforts to find a peaceful solution. On November 18 he sent out a five-point questionnaire which bluntly asked each of the four powers what were their terms for a settlement.
Once again the Russians stole a march on the Western powers. Vishinsky handed in his replies on November 22, forcing the hands of his Western colleagues. They presented their answers the following day. The situation for Clay and those who wanted to preserve Berlin as a powder keg, became serious when the replies to the questionnaires were made known. There were virtually no points of disagreement. When the Western powers were forced into a corner, forced to bring the basis of their quarrels with the Russians out into the open instead of hiding them inside a closed Control Council meeting, it was seen that there was no real problem.
The following are the questions and the replies:
(1) What organisation would exercise 4-power control?
Both the Russians and the Western Powers' replies were in favour of a Financial Commission representing the four Military Governors.
(2) What would be the functions of the organisation?
The Russians replied the Commission should carry out the 4-Power directive agreed at Moscow on August 30, 1948.
The Western Powers said the Commission should control currency, credit and banking, supervise the activities within Berlin of the German Bank of Emission; regulate the Municipality's fiscal policy; and supervise the issue of import and export licences.
(3) Over what financial operations and in what areas should quadripartite control be exercised?
The Russian reply was on the lines of the Western answer to question No. 2, but added that the Commission should ensure that the use of the Eastern mark in Berlin did not disrupt the economy of the Russian Zone and that it should ensure sufficient currency for the municipal budget and occupation costs.
The Western Powers referred to their reply to the second question.
(4) What should be the exact wording of the directive for the implementation of quadripartite control?
The Russians said that it should correspond to the directive agreed to in Moscow on August 30, 1948?
The Western Powers said that the four Military Governors should draw up the necessary legislation.
(5) How would control between Berlin and the Western zones of occupation, and foreign countries, including the issue of export and import licences be exercised?
The Russians proposed that control should be exercised by the Commission but that fuel, food and power should be excluded from the licensing system.
The Western Powers also agreed that fuel, food and power should be excluded from licensing and that other commerce should be licensed by the Berlin City Council subject to the approval of the Commission.
It seemed that agreement was very near. At Bramuglia's suggestion a Committee from six "neutral" countries was set up to iron out the remaining differences and report back no later than the end of January. The Western press began to report that agreement was very near. There was great unhappiness in General Clay's headquarters and in the Social Democrat camp in Berlin.
Clay, however, had several cards left to play. He, at first, against the advice of the British and French, insisted on going ahead with Berlin City Council elections, scheduled for December 5. The Russians did their best to have the elections postponed until the delicate negotiations on Berlin's future were finalised. They could only serve to stir up more ill feeling and complicate an already mixed up situation in Berlin. Clay, and by this time the British and French, were adamant. The elections must take place. The Socialist Unity Party had already announced it would not take part. Five days before the elections, a separate City Council was set up in the Soviet sector with Herr Ebert as Mayor. It was denounced as illegal by the Western powers, but Clay said that its establishment would not prejudice the issue of a single currency for the city.
By December 22, the 6-power Committee had worked out an agreement which provided for the simultaneous introduction of the Soviet Zone mark as the sole currency for Berlin and the lifting of all transport restrictions. The agreement embodied all the proposals submitted by the four powers in their reply to Dr. Bramuglia's questionnaire. The Committee asked for a decision on its report within 10 days. The Soviet delegate immediately accepted the plan as a basis for discussion and agreement. The Western Powers asked for more time.
By Monday, January 3, the western powers had agreed also and actually initialled an agreement. But Clay had one more time-bomb to explode.
On the Monday evening he sent for two correspondents, Mr. Stephen White, of the New York Herald-Tribune, and Charles Wheeler, of the Chicago Sun-Times. They had not asked for interviews but were invited to see Clay in his Berlin headquarters. He deliberately "floated" a story that there could be no agreement in Paris. Conditions in Berlin had "changed" since the Americans had agreed to the Committee's proposals. Clay said he had just despatched two of his experts to Paris to put this viewpoint forward.
The news burst like a bomb-shell in Paris next morning. British and French and even the American delegates learned of the changed American attitude only when they opened their morning copy of the Paris edition of the Herald-Tribune.
Clay's views were accepted. There was no agreement. An official statement released in London and Washington on March 16 reflects the undeniable fact that only the Americans stood out against agreement. The committee itself reported that whereas the Russians, British and French accepted the plan, the Americans rejected it in January as "not providing the basis for an equitable or workable solution to the Berlin currency and trade problem."
There were in fact no changed conditions in Berlin after the December 5 elections and the setting up of separate City Councils. The American proposals which they afterwards repudiated were made after the setting up of the rival Councils. It was the old familiar story of Clay making policy in Berlin when it seemed agreement was likely to be reached outside Germany. When the Americans went back on their agreement everything was thrown back into the melting pot again. It was a repetition of the story of currency reform for Germany as a whole, related in an earlier chapter. The Russians, as Clay had intended began to wonder whether the Western powers were sincere in anything they did or promised.
The obedient West German press started a venomous campaign against the Russians and those "who thought a deal could be made with the Reds." The Social Democrat press built up the case of "changed conditions." In fact, nothing had changed at all in Berlin since the original American proposals were made. But the air-lift had to continue and Berlin as a powder:-keg had to be preserved.
The result of Bramuglia's efforts was that a committee was appointed to continue to try and reach a settlement at Geneva. Eventually, financial experts from the four powers in Berlin went to Geneva. The French delegate who took part told me the Soviet delegate Valetin produced proposals which were immediately accepted by the French and British delegates. The Americans continued to say "No, No, No," without giving reasons or counter-suggestions. These talks also broke down.
Another cynical example of the Berlin wreckers at work was during the meeting of the Foreign Ministers in Paris in June, 1949, to discuss terms for calling off all traffic restrictions between the zones and stopping the air-lift.
No sooner did the talks start than Clay's first lieutenant, General Howley, exploded a time-bomb which it was confidently hoped would wreck the talks before they got properly started. The Howley-sponsored and Howley-created, breakaway trade union, U.G.O. (Independent Trade Union), called all its railway workers out on strike, nullifying the Russian action in lifting the traffic restrictions as they had promised. No trains could get through to Berlin, because Howley's strikers had tied up all rail movement in the city. The ostensible reason for the strike – which strangely enough took place just at the time the Foreign Ministers were to meet – the railway workers decided they must be paid more of their wages in West marks and less in East marks.
As trains could not get through to Berlin, the Russians were accused of bad faith.
Howley, the U.S. Commandant of Berlin, must bear full responsibility for the strike. It could not possibly have taken place at a time like that, when the most delicate negotiations were in progress for a last attempt at four-power unity, unless the Americans had given at least their permission. U.G.O. was an invention of Howley, to split the Berlin trade union movement.
For the first time in Howley's history I am sure, he wholeheartedly backed a strike, applauded the strikers when they rejected the Soviet conditions to resume work; applauded the violence of gangs of Nazi toughs who attacked Soviet policemen trying to get trains running again. The U.G.O. strike was part of the pattern of staging provocative incidents in Germany to nullify any chances of agreement. No stones were to be left unturned – or unthrown in this case – to try and wreck this important conference which might well have decided the issue between war and peace. In the end Howley was forced to call off the strike and some sort of modus vivendi was found at Paris.
Clay and Howley are no longer in Berlin, but their work was done only too well, with British active or passive support. They have created an unworkable situation in Berlin, which is daily a provocation to the Russians. They have fostered movements and sentiments that are Nazi in everything but the name. In Western Germany they have encouraged German nationalism fed on demands to "regain" Eastern Germany, to grab back the lands east of the Oder-Neisse Line. They have encouraged militarism and chauvinism and congratulated the neo-Nazis for having sentiments just as "anti-Bolshevik" as those cultivated by Hitler and Goebbels. They have taken over the Nazi propaganda technique and employ many of the Goebbels' trained propagandists in their newspapers and radio stations.
They have encouraged Germans to deride not only the Russians but any attempts at allied unity. They split Germany on the pretence that otherwise Russia would have installed a "red regime" from the Oder to the Rhine. What they really feared was that Germans should have a free vote as to whether they wanted Junkers on their lands and Nazi barons in charge of their industries. They knew the Russians would have insisted on votes on such questions and immediate implementation of measures once voted.
They have created two Germanys and despite their attempts to present the Bonn government as "democratic" and the Republic as "undemocratic," there is no doubt which of the two governments most nearly represents the interests of the German worker and farmer. There is no doubt which one represents the social and economic democratic order without which the word democracy is a pretentious sham. There is no doubt which one represents a promise of peaceful development, of cultural progress and human tolerance.
The West German government has preserved everything that has made Germany hated and feared over the continent of Europe. Anti-Semitism is almost as blatant to-day as it was under the protection of Hitler. Nationalism, chauvinism, racialism is as rife as ever. It is a fine legacy that the British and American military administration have handed over to their civilian counterparts after four years' of occupation.
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