Bureau of European Affairs, Foreign Service—Justification of positions by function

In addition, in the security function, 118 Marine Guard positions were allocated in 1950 and 124 are budg eted in 1951 and 1952.

NET INCREASE

Mr. ROONEY. Mr. Flood, will you please take over?

Mr. FLOOD. In the Foreign Service section there is an increase of $777,058, and there is a net increase of 25 positions.

Now, we are pleased to have with us this morning Mr. George W. Perkins, who is Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs. suppose, Mr. Perkins, you have an affirmative statement you would like to make?

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Mr. PERKINS. I did not bring any prepared statement.

Mr. FLOOD. Whether or not you have a prepared statement, I take it for granted that you would like to make a statement.

Mr. PERKINS. Well, that is at your pleasure. I understand the Secretary went very fully over the policies and the problems of the State Department. I would be glad to make a statement if it is desired. I think it would be interesting to you if I told you of my recent trip to Europe.

Mr. FLOOD. Of course, we will be glad to have you do that. There is no doubt that the Secretary gave us a very comprehensive and a very interesting trip around the circuit, but at the same time in view of your recent trip, I am sure that the committee would be glad to hear your impressions, since you are the top man in this section..

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GENERAL STATEMENT

Mr. PERKINS. The main objective of the trip was to attend two meetings of our Ambassadors. We started a year and a half ago having regional meetings of the Ambassadors which we have found extremely useful, to get them together and exchange ideas and talk problems over. I think the most interesting item came out of the meeting of the Ambassadors from behind the iron curtain.

Mr. FLOOD. We have a new member of the committee, Mr. Marshall, of Minnesota. Will you just give us a paragraph to tell us the jurisdiction of your shop, and what you mean by the Bureau of European Affairs?

Mr. PERKINS. The Bureau of European Affairs covers the European countries except Germany, including satellites and Russia. Outside of Europe we have the Commonwealth countries outside of Asia. We do not have India, Parkistan, and Ceylon, but we do have Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa.

Mr. FLOOD. By "the Commonwealth" you mean the British Commonwealth?

As far as the satellite armies themselves were concerned, they were building them up as fast as they could, but they were in particular trouble because they had eliminated most of their officer personnel as being not trustworthy from a Communist point of view, which left them without any reasonably well-trained officer personnel that they could rely on, and they had young boys with 3 months' training trying to act as regimental commanders and that sort of thing, and the armies were not well trained.

When I was in Belgrade later, I checked that with the Foreign Minister and Tito. There they said that Bulgaria was further along in its preparation, but was not yet ready for an attack on Yugoslavia or anybody else.

Now, I think that is worth noting. It does not mean in any sense that they are not getting ready for war, but it does, perhaps, mean that we have a little time to build up our own defenses on our own side. Mr. FLOOD. Off the record.

Mr. PERKINS. Yes, sir. We also have the North and South Poles in our jurisdiction.

Mr. FLOOD. From one extreme to the other; is that it?

Mr. PERKINS. Yes, from one extreme to the other. Does that cover what you want?

Mr. FLOOD. Yes.

MEETING BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN

Mr. PERKINS. As I say, I think the most interesting thing was the meeting of our representatives from behind the iron curtain.

Their unanimous feeling was that there was no indication of preparation for immediate war in the countries from which they came.

That does not mean that there were not preparations being made for war, but the steps for immediate hostilities were not being taken. In other words, for instance, they are not building air-raid shelters, and they are not particularly increasing their antiaircraft protection. That was true in all of the capitals where we have missions with the

exception of Budapest, where they were very busy building air-raid shelters.

(Discussion off the record.)

Mr. FLOOD. We take for granted that you will tell this subcommittee the most intimate of your revelatious; but, when you come to a point where you think you should do so, go off the record if you wish. Mr. PERKINS. Now, another interesting thing that came out of that meeting was the morale of our people in the countries back of the iron curtain. They did not seem to be worried about things very much. Life was not too pleasant for them, but they were in very good spirits and more than willing to carry on the job that they had there. There were no complaints, and no feeling of discouragement or anything of that kind, and I think that is a very interesting thing to note.

FOUR-POWER MEETING

One of the other things generally discussed with most of the Europeans I saw was the question of the policy to be adopted in connection with the four-power meeting, if there is a four-power meeting. Everyone agreed that our general thesis that a four-power meeting which did not get at the basic impasses between East and West was useless; that you cannot just talk about Germany and Austria or any other single problem, and that you had to get at the basic impasses existing between East and West and try to resolve those.

We stopped over in Vienna 2 or 3 days. I think it is interesting to note that we now have a civilian High Commissioner there. There was a military High Commissioner there until last fall. It is now under the direction of the State Department, and Ambassador Donnelly from Venezuela has been made High Commissioner. The situation obtaining in Austria is now comparable to that in Germany, and the thing is working very well. The cooperation between the High Commissioner and the commander of the United States Forces in Austria is first rate, and everything is going along very smoothly there.

The establishment of a civilian High Commissioner has been very successful there. It was a difficult transfer of authority, because all of those things are difficult particularly when you are operating in the midst of territory which is controlled by the Soviets, as Vienna is, surrounded by Soviet-dominated area.

The Austrian people themselves, I think, are an exceptionally stout people. They are facing their difficulties with great determination and courage and are not being discouraged by any of the things which they are confronted with.

FOOD DISTRIBUTION IN YUGOSLAVIA

In Yugoslavia I talked with the people who are watching the distribution of the food which we have sent in there. They are quite satisfied with the way that was being handled. They thought the Yugoslavs were completely living up to their agreement and seeing that the distribution was equal and that adequate publicity was given to it, and so forth. They had no complaints as to the way that was being handled whatever.

ECONOMIC SITUATION IN YUGOSLAVIA

It became apparent, or it is becoming apparent-and I got more information on this in Belgrade-that the economic situation in Yugoslavia continues to be bad. The food situation, of course, you know, is bad. That has had its economic repercussions because normally Yugoslavia exports food. Of course, this year they have no food to export; and in fact they had to get assistance, which we gave. I think we all have to be thinking about what needs to be done in order to get Yugoslavia back on its feet.

The general feeling was that if Yugoslavia had been able to come into the Marshall plan at the time that it was inaugurated, and had entered into and gotten its share to the extent that the other European countries did, they would be pretty well out of their difficulty at the present time. It was also felt that there was nothing inherently wrong with the situation there in Yugoslavia which could not be corrected. In other words, it was perfectly possible for them to have an economy which was self-sustaining and which they could operate independently.

ALINEMENT WITH THE WEST

We talked quite a little bit about the attitude of Yugoslavia toward the world situation, and they explained quite fully, which they have also stated publicly, that they did not feel that they could aline themselves too definitely with the west; that they could not by any chance put themselves in the status of being satellites of the United States or any other western group.

There were four reasons given for that:

First, the internal repercussions in Yugoslavia would be bad if the Yugoslavs felt that they were alining themselves too definitely with the west.

(Discussion off the record.)

Mr. PERKINS. The second point was that they felt that their action of breaking away from Stalin had had beneficial effects on the satellites. and had given courage to those people, and that it was a good thing from the general point of view to have the Communist regimes in those countries upset and disturbed by the action which Tito had taken.

The third point they made was that if they alined themselves too closely with us they could be branded as being part of a plot for aggression. Quite a point was made of the fact that, if there was to be aggression from the Russian side, the Russians would make every effort to have it appear that they were being attacked. It was felt. that the Russian people per se are not very keen about fighting outside of their own territory; and, therefore, it was important from the Russian point of view to have it appear that they had been attacked so that they could propagandize their own people along those lines. Any close association with the west, particularly in the military field, would perhaps help to build up that line amongst the Russians.

The fourth point they mentioned was the effect which their action had had on the Communist Parties outside of the iron curtain, I think we can completely agree that the break which has taken place in the Italian Communist Party and elsewhere has been a healthy thing, and Tito leadership in that direction has been effective.

(Discussion off the record.)

Mr. FLOOD. Was Mr. Allen with you when you talked to Tito? Mr. PERKINS. Yes; he was.

Mr. FLOOD. How is he?

Mr. PERKINS. He is fine.

Mr. FLOOD. We have a very high regard for Mr. Allen.

Mr. PERKINS. Yes, sir; I think he is doing a very magnificent job. Mr. FLOOD. Where did you talk to Tito?

Mr. PERKINS. At his villa.

Mr. FLOOD. At his summer villa?

Mr. PERKINS. It was in Belgrade. I think he has a summer place in Bled.

Mr. FLOOD. What is his physical condition generally; do you think? Mr. PERKINS. He looked extremely well.

Mr. FLOOD. He is in fit shape?

Mr. PERKINS. Yes, very fit.

Mr. FLOOD. In what language was he talking?

Mr. PERKINS. He talked in Serbo-Croat. The interpreter told me that he had difficulty in interpreting for Tito. He was very good, and I had congratulated him afterward on what a good job he had done. Mr. FLOOD. You talked in the English tongue, you did not talk in French or any of the other diplomatic languages?

Mr. PERKINS. No. The interpreter said the difficulty in interpreting for Tito is that he actually understands English well enough not to misunderstand it.

Mr. FLOOD. Did you discuss at any time the situation existing in Yugoslavia as between the Roman Catholic Church and the Government of Yugoslavia?

Mr. PERKINS. No; I did not touch on that.

Mr. FLOOD. Did Tito mention it in any way?
Mr. PERKINS.No.

Mr. FLOOD. Was it mentioned by anybody during your stay in Yugoslavia?

Mr. PERKINS. No; it was not brought up.

Mr. FLOOD. Would it not occur to you that it would be an extremely interesting subject?

Mr. PERKINS. It is an extremely interesting subject, but Mr. George Allen was handling that, and I wanted to confine the conversation, which was relatively brief, to other subjects.

Mr. FLOOD. I am disappointed because if I had come back to this subcommittee from there I would have had some information on that rather volatile problem.

Mr. PERKINS. Well, I did talk with some other people about that problem. I am talking about official talks now. They confirmed what we said last fall. Anybody can go to church and everything is going along very quietly. That does not mean that everything is all right in the religious picture, but it confirmed what we said here last fall.

Mr. FLOOD. That is true of all churches?

Mr. PERKINS. Yes.

Mr. FLOOD. Regardless of sect or denomination they can practice their faith?