REPORT BY THE CHIEF OF STAFF, SUPREME

HEADQUARTERS ALLIED POWERS, EUROPE

[Editor's note: This executive hearing was published in 1953 with certain excisions. The chief of these, as marked in the committee's transcript copy, are reprinted below. Page references are to the printed hearing. In order to locate the excised passage exactly in the text, the last line or short phrase preceding the point of excision in the 1953 print is reprinted here.]

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 1, 1953

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS, Washington, D.C.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:15 a.m., in the Foreign Relations Committee room, U.S. Capitol, Senator Alexander Wiley (chairman), presiding.

Present: Senators Wiley, Smith of New Jersey, Hickenlooper, Ferguson, Knowland, Fulbright, Sparkman, Humphrey, and Mansfield. Also present: Col. George P. Welch, Chief of Public Information Division, U.S. Army; Dr. Wilcox, Dr. Kalijarvi, Mr. Marcy, Mr. Holt, Mr. Cohn, and Mr. O'Day of the committee staff.

[3]

General GRUENTHER. *** The result is that they now have between 65 and 70 satellite divisions.

Our intelligence people estimate that about half of those are up to Soviet standards. The other half can still be considered as substandard, but the Soviets are developing their strength in that field. What we really have then is 175 Soviet divisions, roughly 65 to 70 satellite divisions, about half of the latter being effective divisions.

The most effective ones are in Bulgaria. The Soviets after the war spent most of their attention in building up the Yugoslav forces and the Bulgarian forces, and then when Tito broke away, they gave greatest attention and priority to Bulgaria.

[4]

General GRUENTHER.

**However, he had an opportunity there. Now every case is different, but if war should come, the more pressure that is put on these people, the quicker they are going to break, because in this whole area the Soviets are basically not popular. Take for example a country such as Czechoslovakia, which had a much higher standard of living than the Soviets can possibly bring them. There is no doubt that the Soviet regime is a heavy yoke on the

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necks of the Czechs, and they would rid themselves of the Soviets if ever they had a chance, but anyone thinking along those lines now is likely to lose his head, as you recognize.

[5]

General GRUENTHER. * * They have just passed one for 18 months. At that time if you were going to do any betting, because of the Danish record of neutrality, you would have bet, 3, 4, and 5 to 1, you would have given large odds that as of April 1953, they wouldn't have more than doubled their conscription period.

[5]

General GRUENTHER. *** with warning that was no more than a matter of minutes.

I don't want to say that they couldn't do that now. If the Soviets follow a pattern, for example, right in this area, they will come and have maneuvers starting in the spring, starting next month.

Senator FERGUSON. You mean the Red Army having maneuvers? General GRUENTHER. Yes, sir. They concentrate a force in here. If they gave it the order to push through, it would naturally catch us, not unawares because our people are very alert here, but still at a considerable disadvantage. If we had had 3 or 4 days warning, we could concentrate a force in the particular area threatened. In other words, the Soviets could place a group in there on maneuver, and at 5 o'clock at night issue the order to go on through, and thereby achieve very definite local surprise.

Our belief is that, because of the rest of our forces in here, this would not be a very sound move on the part of the Soviets. That doesn't mean they won't do it, however, because their way of reasoning may very well be quite different from ours.

Just to give you an illustration of how things like this happen, 1 year ago when they were maneuvering in here, some of our people out here at night who were listening in on the radio suddenly heard an order being given in Russian that the following morning at 5 o'clock that Russian force would attack, and attack the particular unit of our man listening on the radio. Well, that naturally gave our people very much of a nervous period that night. They didn't know whether it was a bluff, a maneuver, or a real attack. Actually it wasn't a real attack, and whether it was a bluff required by the maneuver, we don't know. The attack did not materialize, but it could have materialized.

[5]

*

General GRUENTHER. *** but of course those reinforcements are here and they could bring them in.

Senator FERGUSON. How long would it take them to go from where they are now to the border?

General GRUENTHER. Well, they are stationed right along in here. Senator FERGUSON. No, I mean the Red Army.

General GRUENTHER. It would take a matter of days, Senator, and if our intelligence was good enough, we would get word of that.

Now there is a big if in that, because since they control this zone very well, if they put on a very clever deception campaign, it is possible that the intelligence wouldn't filter back quickly enough. How

ever, that is the struggle that always exists between our task of getting intelligence and the enemy's task of preventing us from getting it, through counterintelligence operations. One of the major military objectives that we have is to be able to get that warning.

We aim to get to a position where we will receive that warning. General Ridgway's basic strategy, which was General Eisenhower's, is to have a shield sufficiently strong so we will not be a pushover in case of attack. Behind that shield we will be prepared to bring up reserve forces quickly to reinforce the combat area, using air power to break up these attacks, using air power in every possible way for retaliatory purposes.

[6]

General GRUENTHER. **The governments of all six of those countries are definitely for it.

The key is France. The project of the European Defense Community is a French project, a French plan, but the French people are taking a long look at it.

There is a very significant element in France that fears the creation of a Wehrmacht more than it fears a Russian invasion. They have had this most unsatisfactory experience with the Germans over a period of years, and they are taking another look at it.

You get a bad break in a thing like this. Take the thing that happened here a few months ago. Right about here is the small town called Oradour. In June of 1944, a German SS division came into Oradour in that little town of 632 people, and it killed 627 of them. Five people, men, women and children escaped. All the rest of them were dead, a terrific atrocity, no question about it.

They didn't try those fellows until January of this year. Now you can well imagine trying a group of Germans and Alsatians that they were, a spectacular trial lasting for some 6 or 8 weeks, and that has stirred up a terrific fear again of the Germans, because this thing gets aired all over again some 9 years after it happened.

So I say to you that while the French Government is unhesitatingly behind this European Defense Community, I would say that there is considerable uneasiness on the part of many Frenchmen on it. My own hunch-and it is a very, very wobbly hunch-is that the French will pass this. The other countries, of course, will not pass it unless France does. I think that France will find it in its own selfinterest to do so.

For one thing, if I were a Frenchman I would pass it if for no other reason, even if I had to take the rearmament that the Germans did and dump it out into the sea, because the Germans are going to be a very powerful force commercially, and if they are able to function without a rearmament load, there is going to be no stopping them in the commercial markets of the world.

[7]

General GRUENTHER. *** I think he has exercised outstanding leadership in Germany.

I don't want to say that there aren't many Germans who still have all the traits that were found objectionable in the years that

have gone by, because there are no doubt a great many of them. However, Chancellor Adenaur has, I think, seen this picture that there is no hope other than to have unification of Europe, and I think that his leadership has been a very significant influence in quelling and quieting that recalcitrant and destructive element in Germany.

I hope he lives for a long time. He is, after all, 77 years old. He is in very excellent health, but he isn't going to live forever, and the question as to who could take his place is by no means clear.

Summing up, though, I say that at this time the passage is uncertain. I think the French will pass it, but I wouldn't want to give odds on any timing for their passing it.

We, from the purely military standpoint, point out its military importance.

[7]

General GRUENTHER. ** *It is up to the governments to assess the advantages as against the disadvantages and make the proper decision.

Senator SMITH. Don't the French insist on our throwing in support so that the French strength will be preponderant over the Germans in the whole picture?

General GRUENTHER. Yes, that is a point that the French raise. They don't want the German strength to be preponderant.

Actually if I were a Frenchman, I wouldn't worry too much about that, because it is the strength of the coalition that really determines how the Germans are going to fit into it.

[11]

Senator FERGUSON. Do you think that Malenkov may have that in mind and is going to stop it or has that gone too far?

General GRUENTHER. Well, that is too much of a speculation for me. I certainly think that if I were a policy adviser to the Soviet Government, which is a very egotistical assumption, I would certainly advise that sort of a sacrifice in order to lull the West again.

[12]

General GRUENTHER. I think they are all sensitive, Senator. I would say probably the French more so because the French are living in a very sensitive atmosphere. They took a terrific defeat, and it bothers them, and psychologically they are uneasy. They have an unstable government. They have had sixteen changes of constitutions since 1789.

[22]

That is

General GRUENTHER. tremendous event from the standpoint of confirming this breaking-off from the Soviet orbit. I think that there is practically no chance that Tito will ever be