AUSTRIA iS RUSSIA’S HEADACHE

Wanganui Chronicle, 23 December 1950, Page 2

AUSTRIA iS RUSSIA’S HEADACHE

(By HUBERT HARRISON, Reuters Correspondent in Vienna).

Do the Russians want to split Austria into two parts as *hey have split Germany and Korea? speculation on this question is current here, as elsewhere in the world. A general survey of Austrian and foreign opinion here suggests that “Joe Stalin alone knows! ”

In Austria, the Russians are on the horns of a dilemma. If they remain here on present terms, they have to face a gradual but certain loss of prestige due to their impotence to carrj through in Austria pians to dominate the country which have succeeded in all other countries or par.s of countries which they have occupied since the war.

An attempt to split the country or to withdraw is fraught with dangers great enough to make it difficult for them to make up their minds what to do. A decision to stay in present conditions means that they can continue, as they have done in the past, to milk Eastern Austria and Vienna through their control of the former German assets which they claim as their property.

They can also continue to give support and encouragement to the Austrian Communist Party, which has completely failed to win the support of any large part of the people of Austria and which cannot even claim to control a large part of the working class in the Russian zone, let alone elsewhere.

In staying, too, they retain one point of contact with the western allies since Austria is the one place in the world where four-power machinery is still working and where the Russians can sit round a table at regular committee and council meetings with the western representatives and find out what they really think on current events. On the other hand, to stay involves a definite loss of prestige. At Allied Council meetings, their generals are no match in wit and repartee for the diplomatic brains of the western allies’ new civilian High Commissioners. They have been made to look foolish many times of late. At one recent, somewhat stormy meeting, the Russian High Commissioner even lost his temper and complained petulan.ly: “I will not be persecuted in this manner.”

Further, despite their constant support, the Austrian Communist party is steadily losing ground. During the recent Communist inspired attempt at a general strike, for the first time since the war ended the population of a Russian-occupied territory actually took a stand against the Russians’ desire and defeated a Russian-inspired plan. Since the strike failed, the Aus-1 trian. Government has also taken a firm stand and protested four times to the Russians and to the Allied Council against, Russian interference in Austrian juridical and police affairs.

The Russians have been forced more and more surely to realise that the Austrian people in their overwhelming majority, are against Communism — and Sovietism. They are trying at present t 0 strengthen their position by pressure on the police and administration in their own zone and by attempts to influence the workers of other zones to strike, but these attempts have so far failed completely—with consequent loss of prestige for the Russians.

If they should decide to split Austria as they did Germany,they will

also face grave disadvantages. It is true that they would thus be able completely to control lower Austria and the Burgenland (including the Austrian oil-fields) and to blockade Vienna at will, but. a great part of the oil and industry of this area is already completely under their control and Berlin has shown how ineffective the of a city can be if the western Allies are prepared to oppose its effects. Further, if eastern Austria and Vienna were cut off from the west, Russia would have to accept responsibility for the supply of food and raw materials for the population and industry of this area. There are now largely supplemented from Marshall Plan supplies which would cease if the country were split. This new burden would fall upon Russia at a time when she is having trouble in all the neighbouring lands— Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Rumania—to supply food and raw materials, stocks of which have been exhausted owing to drought and the defects of the new economic system. Western allied observers here believe that this would be a bad moment for Russia to take over responsibility for feeding and providing work for three million Austrians. The other possbility would be for Russia to sign an Austrian Treaty. This would give the Russians certain advantages such as receipt of 150,000,000 dollars, and the withdrawal of the western allies from Austria, but it would also have many disadvantages. It would mean the withdrawal of their 40,000 to 50,000 troops from Austria where they have been living free of charge on occupation costs for years. It would weaken their influence on the whole country, and especially on Vienna and eastern Austria, their present zone of occupation. It would undoubtedly mean a withdrawal to the east, a retreat, and at this present moment, with the defeat of expansionist aims in Korea and the general weakening of Russian prestige in Europe, it is hardly to be expected that they will take this line. A competent British observer sums up the present situation thus: “The Russians just do not know what to do in Austria. There is n 0 evidence whatever that they are determined to split the country or use eastern Austria as a jumping off ground for an attack on western parts of the country. During the recent Communist putsch it was obvious that the Russians did not press their advantage anything like so hard as they could have done. There is evidence, too, that they regard the control agreement for the time being as sacrosanct. It would be a complete reversal of policy if they did decide to divide Austria as they have done Germany, but if they did decide t 0 do it, they certainly have the possibility and the strength,” he added. “The decision will not be made here but in Moscow, and Moscow’s decisions are incalculable.” The new American civilian High Commissioner, Mr. Walter J. Donnelly, stated recently that n his opinion the Russians want to keep fourpower machinery working in Austria, although they are trying at the same time to strengthen their position here by pressure on police and administration as far as they dare without risking the destruction of the present machinery or the partition of the country. He felt, too, that the Russians definitely do not want «a treaty with Austria at present.