PARADE THROUGH BERLIN

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26125, 30 May 1950, Page 5

PARADE THROUGH BERLIN

Demonstration By Communists

MARCH BY PEOPLE’S POLICE (N.Z. Press Association-Copyright) BERLIN, May 28. Although steel-heimeted Allied troops stood by in the bomb ruins in case of trouble during the “peace march” in Berlin of Communist youths, when the Western commanders went aloft in helicopters 1 o inspect the “front,’ they saw little more than a giant Whitsun pageant of colour. The only explosion was a leaflet bomb, which burst over the heads of the Communist-led demonstrators in Unter Den Linden. In spite of months of advance propaganda. the parade failed as a crowd‘attraction. East zone police, who are described by the West as belonging to a secret army, sent 10.000 jack-booted troops through the Lustgarten in perfect military precision. They carried no rifles or sidearms, but marched as 12 battalions with field kit. As they marched past, several spectators were heard to mutter: "I thought we had finished with this.” Two more “people’s police” crossed into the West sectors asking for political asylum, bringing the total in the last four days to 23. Most of the Eastern Soviet satellite States were represented in the parade, which was attended also by 5000 West German Communist youths, according to their banners. On the Eastern side of the Potsdamerplatz. Communist police laid out fire hoses at noon, but no anti-Com-munist demonstrators collected on the Allied side. Allied security headquarters reported that West Berlin was quiet and had no demonstration of any kind. The Mayor (Professor Ernst Reuter), broadcasting over the American sector radio, urged West Berliners to extend a friendly welcome to members of the Free Communist Youth Organisation who came over singly. “They are hungry little creatures, freezing ana badly clad, who deserve our sympathy and help.” he said. The correspondent of the Associated Press commenting on the march of tlv East German police staled: “Five years after the collapse of Hitler’s Rei"h, a new German Army marched down Unter den Linden to-day. Its Communist creators called it the ‘People's Ponce Force’ and the blue-black unimen had their weapons off. “But nobody who saw marching men had any doubt that they were soldiers —tanned, fit-looking soldiers, who marched with Prussian precision and appeared to have difficulty restraining tne goosestep.

“Five days’ ago the United States, aritain and France sent forma] notes to Moscow protesting at these so-called por.ee as an illegal military organisation. and demanding their dissolution. Observers who had seen Hitler's .egions march down the same triumphal avenue remarked on the similarity between the new Communist fo r ce and Hitler’s black-uniformed elite S.S.”