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25, and December 8,2 the Government of the United States expressed the earnest belief that an Austrian Treaty should be concluded at the earliest meeting of the Foreign Ministers.

The Government of Austria may be assured that there has been no change in the intention of the Government of the United States to seek and take every opportunity of restoring to Austria its well deserved political and economic independence by agreement among the occupying powers on the terms of an Austrian Treaty. The meeting of the Foreign Ministers at Berlin will be such an opportunity and the Government of Austria may be confident that its aspirations will there be given every support by the Government of the United States.

G. DISCUSSION OF THE PROBLEMS OF GERMANY, AUSTRIA, AND EUROPEAN SECURITY AT THE BERLIN MEETING OF FOREIGN MINISTERS, JANUARY 25–FEBRUARY 18, 1954

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97. NOTE FROM THE AMERICAN AMBASSADOR AT MOSCOW TO THE SOVIET MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS, DECEMBER 8, 1953 5

The United States Government is glad to learn from the Soviet Government's note of November 26 that it is now prepared to take part in a meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the United Kingdom, United States, France and the Soviet Union. It is its hope that this meeting will lead towards the reunification of Germany in freedom and to the conclusion of an Austrian State Treaty.

The United States Government is confident that real progress towards the settlement of the German and Austrian questions, which are especially urgent, will contribute to the solution of other major international problems, including that of European security. In this connection, the United States Government reaffirms that the voluntary association of the free countries of the Atlantic alliance and the actions of certain European states for developing their prosperity and ensuring their joint security are exclusively defensive and a collective contribution to peace.

The Soviet Government has stated its desire to discuss the possibility of a five-power conference. The forthcoming meeting of the four

1 Supra, docs. 91, 93, 94, and 95.

2 Infra, doc. 97.

Charles E. Bohlen.

Vyacheslav M. Molotov.

Department of State Bulletin, Dec. 21, 1953, pp. 852-853. The British and French Ambassadors delivered similar notes to the Soviet Foreign Ministry. Ibid., pp. 853–854.

Foreign Ministers will enable any participating government to state its views on this question.

The United States Government, having consulted with the German Federal Government and the German authorities in Berlin, proposes that the meeting of the four Foreign Ministers should begin on January 4, 1954, in the building which was used by the Allied Control Council in Berlin.

98. STATEMENT BY THE SECRETARY OF STATE,

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JANUARY 30, 1954 (Excerpt) 1

This second item of our agenda deals with the German question and also the problem of insuring European security. History compels us to treat these two matters together.

From this very city where we are, still largely in ruins, have been launched two world wars. Two of our four countries, France and the Soviet Union, have suffered land invasion both in World War I and World War II. The United Kingdom was invaded by air. All four of us have twice had to marshal to the full our human and material resources in order to withstand and finally to throw back the tides of German aggression.

Surely we have a vital interest to do all that is in our power to make sure that such aggressions should never occur again. Indeed, that concern is shared by the German people themselves who have suffered cruelly from militarism and tyranny from some of their own people.

The sacrifices which have been made during these two World Wars have now placed in our hands a large measure of power to influence the future, for better or for worse, and to determine whether the coming years will preface a durable peace or another disastrous war.

Nine years have now elapsed since the German Armistice 2 and peace is still unmade. In many ways, that delay is a reproach to us. But there is another side to the matter. The immediate aftermath of a bitter and exhausting war usually finds that reason is submerged by sentiments of hatred and revenge. The instinctive reaction at that time is to turn to repression as a means to future safety. But the lapse of time restores reason to its proper place and now, 9 years having passed, we should be able to invoke wisdom and statesmanship to be our guides.

The problem that we face here has two major aspects. First, there is the task of uniting Germany; and secondly, there is the task of insuring that united Germany shall be a peaceful Germany. I shall first speak of the problem of German unification.

The partition of Germany creates a basic source of instability, and there is little merit in our talking about peace if at the same time we are perpetuating conditions which endanger the peace.

1 Foreign Ministers Meeting: Berlin Discussions, January 25-February 18, 1954 (Department of State publication 5399; 1954), pp. 64-67.

2 Act of surrender, May 8, 1945; A Decade of American Foreign Policy, pp. 505

I am firmly convinced that a free and united Germany is essential to stable peace in Europe and that it is in the interest of all four nations which are represented here around this table.

How did it come to pass that there is this disunity, this disunity of Germany which is, as I say, a danger to peace? We here are not free from responsibility in that respect, because it is the disagreement of our four nations which has created the present division of Germany. It is the disagreement of our four nations which perpetuates the present division of Germany, and it is only we who can end this division of Germany.

As I pointed out in some earlier remarks that I made, that fact-the fact that we four have a unique responsibility in Germany-should make this German problem a central theme of our work here. It can be the test as to whether or not we are really qualified to work together for peace.

There exists this partition of Germany which is a threat to the peace. It is in our power to end it. All that is needed to end it is that we should have the will to end it. If we do not have that will, then I say we may be peace-loving nations, but we are not peace-seeking nations. Mr. Eden yesterday submitted a precise and a detailed plan to achieve the unification and freedom of Germany by an orderly series of actions that would start with free elections. It seems to us that this British proposal is clear, is reasonable, and is well designed to achieve at the earliest practical moment a full German settlement, including a German peace treaty.

I have no doubt that our discussions here around the table, as we debate this intricate matter, may suggest the desirability of some modifications in detail of the plan which Mr. Eden has submitted and perhaps some clarifications. Certainly, I think we must all have an open mind on that, and I certainly have an open mind. But I do say that in general I endorse the proposal that has been submitted on behalf of the United Kingdom and associate myself with it.

There are one or two observations which I would make, particularly suggested by some remarks that have been made by Mr. Molotov. Mr. Molotov has, for example, suggested that the proposal of the United Kingdom would be in essence an attempt on the part of the four Occupying Powers to impose unification upon Germany rather than to let the Germans work out their own affairs. As I read Mr. Eden's project, it would be just the contrary.

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Under his proposal, the essential steps in the entire unification process, including their timing, are left up to the freely elected representatives of the German people. Who is it under this plan who will draft the new constitution? It will be the freely elected German national assembly. Who will set up a provisional all-German authority and later on the all-German government? The all-German national assembly. Who decides when powers shall be transferred from the existing regimes in Eastern and Western Germany to the all-German government, and what international rights and obligations 1 Foreign Ministers Meeting, pp. 223-225.

See Mr. Molotov's statement of Jan. 30, 1954; ibid., pp. 61-64.

it shall assume? Again, the national assembly and the all-German government.

As I read the plan, the entire emphasis seems to be on enabling freely elected German authorities to make the crucial decisions all along the road to a final German settlement.

That observation brings me to comment on another point upon which Mr. Molotov has commented, namely, this problem of free elections.

Any proper plan for German unification must provide adequate safeguards of election freedom. This, it seems, is covered by the proposal that we are considering. Conditions of genuine freedom must exist not only on election day itself, but for a reasonable period of time before the votes are cast, and also after the elections, in order to insure that there shall be no reprisals and that everyone may safely vote his convictions.

To take care of this latter point, the United Kingdom plan would maintain the supervisory machinery in operation until the all-German government assumes full control and is able to assure democratic freedoms throughout Germany in accordance with its constitution.

We can be sure that the 50 million inhabitants of Western Germany are willing and anxious to cooperate to insure such free elections. The same can be said for my Government and also, I believe, for the French and British Governments. The 18 million inhabitants of the Soviet Zone deserve the same kind of assurances, and I trust that my Soviet colleague will agree to the importance of providing those

assurances.

Mr. Molotov has made some observations about the pending proposal which seem to me to imply a lack of full understanding of that proposal, or possibly, I might suggest, the need of further clarification of the proposal. I will not attempt to go into those matters myself, because I am confident that Mr. Eden, who submitted the plan, will himself deal with these matters. But as I read the plan, it is not subject to the type of objections which Mr. Molotov has indicated, and I hope that, on the basis of further clarifications, he would find that the plan itself, at least in its broad outlines, is reasonable and one that we could proceed to adopt as providing a way of bringing an end to this dangerous condition of the continued partition of Germany.

99. STATEMENT BY THE SECRETARY OF STATE,
FEBRUARY 5, 19541

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Since our meeting yesterday, I have read the transcript of Mr. Molotov's remarks and have studied his proposal. I can still find no encouraging interpretation of what we heard yesterday afternoon. 1 Foreign Ministers Meeting: Berlin Discussions, January 25-February 18, 1954 (Department of State publication 5399; 1954), pp. 102–105.

2 Ibid., pp. 90-100.

3 Ibid., pp. 228–229.

The basic impression which strikes me is this: Mr. Molotov is afraid of genuinely free elections in the East Zone. He is afraid that the 18 million Germans in the East Zone, if given a chance to speak, would overwhelmingly reject the present imposed regime. Mr. Molotov has good reason to be afraid.

Consequently, the Soviet Foreign Minister has categorically rejected the proposals for genuinely free elections which have been put forward by the Western Powers. In its place he proposes his own blueprint. In the name of peace, he proposes a method for extending the solid Soviet bloc to the Rhine. In the name of what he calls democracy, he has set forth the classic Communist pattern for extinguishing democracy as that word has been understood for 2,000 years.

The cornerstone of the Soviet proposal is the so-called government of the German Democratic Republic. That government was put in office by Soviet power. It was confirmed in office by Soviet power. If it had not been for elements of 22 Soviet divisions, including tanks and armored cars, it would have been forcibly ejected from power by the workers who in their desperation rose up against it last June.

It is that regime which under the Soviet plan would negotiate on a basis of equality with the government of the German Federal Republic. However, the scales are to be still further weighted in favor of the Soviet puppet regime, because it is provided by the Soviet plan these initial negotiations shall also involve "wide par ticipation of democratic organizations."

In the Soviet dictionary the words "democratic organizations" have a clear, precise meaning. They mean those front organizations captive trade unions, youth organizations, women's organizations which promote the Communist purposes without openly presenting themselves to the people in their true guise.

It is under these auspices that there would be prepared the “allGerman electoral law," and the establishment of election conditions. We can visualize in advance the type of elections upon which the East German regime would insist, because we already know those conditions from its past. I have already told of the election conditions which were established in East Germany where the voters were com+ pelled by armed force and penalties to go to the polls and, when there, were compelled to put in the ballot box a list of names which had been previously prepared for them and which was made public only on election day.

Indeed, the Soviet plan expressly stipulates in Communist language that the election conditions would in fact be what they were in the Soviet Zone. The election must be so conducted as to assure its socalled "democratic" character. It must provide for the participation "of all democratic organizations." It must preclude "pressure upon voters by big monopolies," and it must exclude from voting privilege any organizations which by Soviet standards are of a Fascist or militaristic nature.

If we take the tragic pattern which has spread all over Eastern

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