The Evening Star TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1944. OCCUPATION OF GERMANY.

Evening Star, Issue 25344, 28 November 1944, Page 4

The Evening Star TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 1944. OCCUPATION OF GERMANY.

j It is officially confirmed that a threePower agreement for controlling Germany during military occupation has been signed and referred to Washington, London, and Moscow for acceptance. Their approval is expected, because all of its proposals have been previously discussed by them. Germany, it is expected, will be divided into three parts under military forces of the three Powers, of which each will be responsible for its zone. Oyer all there will be a Supremo Allied Council, and room will be found for other Allied nations, like the French, to control special areas like, the .Ruhr. This is what was forecast unofficially after the Quebec Conference in September. It is not stated how long such an occupation is expected to last, but if the lessons of the last war are remembered by the Allies it will not be of short duration. Mr Albert Gleiser, formerly advertising manager" for the ' Christian Science Monitor ' for Continental Europe, had some interesting views to express upon that point at the end of September, after four years that he had spent in German internment camps. Mr Gleiser was convinced that there is onlv one practical way of dealing ■with a" beaten Germany—the imposition of " unconditional surrender " and a " tough " Allied occupation for at least twenty years. His ideas of military control were expressed in almost precisely the same terms as those now put forward. Ho went on to say that " democracy should be installed whenever possible, beginning with municipal affairs." No doubt he would agree entirely with General Eisenhower's dictum that the Allies should come as conquerors, but hot as oppressors, but he was convinced that their control would be useless unless it was a firm rule. No anti-democratic political intriguing should be tolerated. Advisory committees, comprising town burgomasters, should keep in touch with governors and discuss their needs, but no person who had been a member of the Nazi Party should be eligible for office of any kind. After twenty years, the treatment of the Reich for the next twenty years should depend on the degree of progress and evolution the German people should have made. The Supreme Council should decide how to carry on the government of the country, and .occupying regiments should" be changed every year. That will seem hard to many British hearts. It is easy to imagine how, when a few years have passed, they will be pitying the poor Germans, whoso complaints of ill-treatment will rend the skies. The control will cost money, and there will be impatience of its expense. But the principles .in which a whole generation of Germans have been nurtured are not going to be transformed within three or four years; no disadvantages which the plan may entail for either British or Germans can be as bad as another war; _ and there is no reason why the individual German who can direct his thoughts to other things than mass homicide should not.,..liye a better life under Allied occupation than he did under Nazi rule. When t Germans. after the last war, with one voice denounced the " cruel peace " that was imposed on them, some British folk were the first to endorse and abet those denunciations. The answer to their was given when all the conditions of 'the dreadful peace did not prevent Germany, in the short space of twenty-five years, from becoming so strong again that the combined strength of the British Empire, America, and Russia has all been required to end, not to prevent, another mad onslaught by her upon her neighbours, of which millions of lives have been the cost. That must not be allowed to happen again.