GERMANY TO-DAY

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 81, Issue 7252, 15 September 1950, Page 6

GERMANY TO-DAY

(PART II) (By J. P. Kennedy). BERLIN. Bound up inextricably with the problems of Germany, is the urgent question of the defence of Western Europe as a whole. Important as a healthy Western Germany is to the economy of Western Europe, she is even more essential from the point of view of defence at the present time. But though this has been clearly realised in the West it still remains a thorny problem and one that is not likely to be settled without some heartburnings, particularly amongst ■some of the former victims of Prussian ruthlessness. In Western Germany to-day, one understands with some force that action in this respect is necessary. It is necessary, not because the German people and Government are demanding it, but because a stiffening of Germany’s defences—which at the present moment are so weak that they might just as well be non-exist-ent-—is required to cement the confidence of the West in their abilities to stand up to the increasing pressure that Communist expansion is bringing to bear on them. It is essential, too, to boost the morals of the Germans in the face of the Russian threat, and to put an end to the equivocal attitude that some Germans are adopting towards Communism lest the worst happens and their country is engulfed. This attitude represents, in the absence of adequate defences, a form of insurance towards which, less scrupulous Germans, are tending. It is typified, for example, in the large-scale purchase of advertising space in Communist daily newspapers by big industrial undertakings. Despite the aversion which most Germans have towards the Soviet and the system it stands for, many highly placed British administration officials—and the High Commissioner (Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick) is one of them—have no illusions that some nbn-Communist Germans would trim their sails to the Russian breeze if it suited their ends, just as the Thyssens of the Weimar Republic aided the Nazi Party in procuring its replacement. Some senior British officers that 1 have talked with in Germany felt that the rearming of Germany should be a gradual process, carefully planned and controlled to avoid any awakening of German military sentiment in its old form. They envisaged the gradual, unobtrusive formation of small cadres that could be extended as time passed. There is much to be said for this view, especially when one recalls the original intentions of Allied policy. But the fenag here is that this would be a long-term development, whereas the time is short and the demand immediate. Allied military strength in Germany at the moment is deplorably low and the Germans and their fel-low-Europeans are keenly conscious of the fact and far from happy about it. The stand taken in Korea has heartened the Germans and they feel that much depends on whether that action has a sobering effect on the new Russian imperialism. It has heartened them, too, because the Germans, especially the Berliners, who are surrounded by Soviet territory, see a parallel to the two Koreas in East and West Gerjnany. But their optimism is sobered by the view that if the Russians launched an attack there would be nothing to stop them. Allied weaknesses in this respect were brought home to me in a tour of the British operations room in Berlin from which the movements of British troops in the city are controlled in times of trouble. The system they have may be very efficient, but it has at its disposal at the present time only a few battalions, and is therefore little moie than a showpiece. One finds a tendency amongst many Germans to think of rearmament as a German problem alone, forgetting just how deeply the interests of the other countries of Western Europe are involved. Any action that is taken in Geimany must be part of a general European defence plan, such perhaps as the formation of a general European army. There must be integration of Europe’s defences—integration between what is done in Germany annd what is done in France and the Low Countries, for example. The Schumann Plan represents French recognition of this in so far as it is an attempt by the French to link Germany and France under an international framework, a policy that is in striking contract to those of bitterness and separation of interests that have previously divided the two principal nations of Western Europe, Britain excepted. Neither have the French any desire to see a defenceless Germany with themselves cast for the main role as defenders of the West. A rearmed Geimany, under international supervision, many Frenchmen tell one, would be a strong buffer State between France anebthe East. And other observers will tell you that the rearming of Germany is more important than that of France, because the Germans would have to bear the first onslaught, and because of the stability and determination of the Germans as opposed to the more mercurial temperament of the French. One may not agree with all aspects of the arguments for German rearmament, but one is inevitably forced to the conclusion that the German vacuum must be ended. And whilst it can be ended to a certain extent by substantial increases in the troops stationed. there by the occupying Powers, it seems that full German co-operation must be purchased by German participation—at least to a limited extent. The marshalling of Germany’s industrial resources to the rearmaments drive is not so difficult, however. German coal and steel production can play an important role, and if that contribution is kept within the supplying of component parts for war machines, the development of any new war potential in Germany should be checked. Undoubtedly the creation of a German Army would give a fillip to German nationalism, something that the Allies once wished to avoid. But it has now become questionable as to whether or not it is not time that German nationalism should be encouraged to a point where it could at least become a minor bulwark against Com-

munism in that country and against any effort to attach the country to the Soviet orbit.

It should also be remembered that a German Army would strengthen the position of the German Federal Government in its lelations with the Allies. In some ways this is understandable, but there i.s the consideration that it might lessen the odium from which any German Government under the tutelage of the Allies must suffer. It might also have the effect of increasing its prestige even further above that of the Soviet puppet regime in East Geimany. But in all this the fact must not be lost sight of that if Western Germany is to be rearmed the arms must come from the common pool available to the Western Union countries. It mu.st necessarily slow up the rearmament of the rest of Western Europe because of this. An behind the whole question of rearmament is a further point that the British Commissioner (Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick) made in an interview; namely, that the advance of modern military research on weapons is such that they become rapidly outmoded and that there is thus a replacement problem even in peacetime which never assumed such proportions in the past. It ha.s been shown in Korea that weapons which were successful in the recent war are inadequate now; Sir Ivone believes that the same could easily happen as a sequel to the rearmaments drive and the outbreak of a third world war. And lastly, there is the question of the effect of all this on the peace treaty with Germany. That is a matter for all the Powers, including Russia. Just what effect .such a development of Western Germany would have when it comes to drafting the peace treaty—if ever—is impossible to foretell. But it would undoubtedly strengthen the hand that the German emissaries would hold at the peace conference. $ (To be continued).