“RUSSIA WINNING COLD WAR”

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25796, 6 May 1949, Page 7

“RUSSIA WINNING COLD WAR”

Former U.S. Official’s Opinion STATEMENT MADE TO SENATE (N.Z. Press Association —Copyright) (Rec. 8 p.m.) WASHINGTON, May 4. On balance, Russia was winning the cold war, said Mr Will Clayton, a former Under-Secretary of State testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the North Atlantic Pact. He said that Russia’s principal aims in the cold war were to frighten democratic governments into excessive expenditures for defence and to scare private capital and initiative so that they would not operate freely. “.Russia is a past master at this type of warfare,” he said. “It wages war on all fronts simultaneously and at relatively small cost fb itself. The cost to the democracies, on the other band, is enormous.” Mr Clayton said that the-Soviet effort to undermine the democracies appeared to be succeeding. The only solution was io use the North ‘Atlantic Pact as a basis for a federal union of democracies which would muster such strength that Russia would not dare attack it.

The West had won the battle of Berlin because that was a problem in transport, in which the West excelled. But the West had not won the battle of Greece. It had practically lost the battle of China, and had yet to fight the battle of the Middle East. “And we have not yet won the battle of West Europe. The cold war is still raging there.” Mr Clayton added that the European Recovery Programme was doing well indeed, but the job of setting Europe on its feet must be borne eventually by private enterprise, which was afraid to operate in Europe because it

lacked confidence in European currencies. Even with the Economic Cooperation Administration, Europe would not be in balance with the rest of the world by 1952, nor in all probability by 1962, unless the democracies radically altered their present course. Mr Clayton said that the North Atlantic Treaty was a necessary step, but the cold war would go on with perhaps greater vigour than before. However, if a federal union was formed it would take the offensive in the cold war in every country in Europe. “And we would win that war.” There could be no peace in the world, said Mr Clayton, until Russia returned to its pre-war boundaries. The problem of world peace was that of getting Russia back to its own ground without a shooting war and without a long cold war. Mr Dulles’s Views Mr John Foster Dulles, a United States delegate to the United Nations and a Republican Party expert on foreign affairs, said that the North Atlantic Pact was necessary to prevent a temporary alliance between Russia and Germany, which could readily dominate the European Continent. The Atlantic Pact would superimpose upon the Brussels Pact another Western unity that was bigger and stronger, so that it did not have to fear the inclusion of Germany. Mr Dulles outlined Lis views on the pact as follows: (1) It was needed to eliminate doubt that the Atlantic community would act quickly and unitedly for common defence. (2) It would make possible substantial economies in ths European Recovery Programme and the United States military budget. (3) It would make possible a solution of the German problem. (4) It would not be operated primarily as a military instrument. (5) It and the Rio Pact should not be understood as tacit offers to divide the world with Soviet Communism. (6) It should not inaugurate a system of group consultation, which would destroy the value of the United Nations as a world discussion centre. (7) War would be highly probable If the United States did not adhere tc the pact. SENTENCED TO DEATH FORMER GESTAPO CHIEF LONDON, May 4. Friedrich Wilhelm Theilengerdes, formerly Gestapo chief of Oldenburg, was to-day sentenced to death by a British Control Commission court which found him guilty of a crime against humanity, reports Reuter’s correspondent in Oldenburg. Theilengerdes shot and killed a Russian civilian in Oldenburg in August, 1944.