NO REAL AGREEMENT AT MOSCOW

Grey River Argus, 31 August 1948, Page 5

NO REAL AGREEMENT AT MOSCOW

Uncertain Prospects (Rec. 10.45). LONDON, August-30. The prospect of any genuine agreement between the Western Powers and Soviet Government on the. Berlin blockade is still extremely uncertain. The situation, after thirty days of negotiations, still is not far from a deadlock, says the Daily Telegraphy diplomatic correspondent. There are reports that the delay in announcing any results is due to a failure to agree on the wording of a communique. Those reports are not accurate. The Four Powers have scarcely discussed a communique. The- correspondent added: The real hold-up lies in the drafting of Four Powei’ instructions to the . military governors in Germany about proposed new talks on Berlin’s currency. It seems that the Western Powers are viewing the Russian proposals with suspicion. That this should be the situation, after such long discussions, raises the doubt as to whether anything at all has been accomplished in Moscow. BERLIN NW IS A GLORIFIED CABBAGE-PATCH . ' Fighting The Blockade (Rec. 9.30). LONDON, August 30. “Berlin to-day is a glorified bage-patch, with every available foot of land yielding vegetables”, says the Times correspondent at Berlin. “The Tiergarten, Hindenburg Park, and plots around the statues, the monuments and the memorials are being cultivated under British, American, and French supervision. In addition to this there are four hundred thousand private vegetable allotments. “Officials estimate seven thousand five hundred tons of fresh vegetables have been marketed in the western sector of Berlin since the Russian blockade began. The Military Government ensures that the Western sector hospitals have priority for vegetables,* particularly potatoes,, which are very scarce. Meanwhile, dvhydrated potatoes must suffice for the other Western Berliners. It is difficult to imagine what would be Berlin’s plight if the Western sector’s Military Governments had not reeducated the Berliners in local food production”.

INTER-ZONAL TRADE BLOCKED The president of the Soviet Zone Economic Commission, Heinrich Rau, sharply criticised the “Western attempt to split Germany”. He said he wished to see economic and political unity of Germany, as “the difficulties which inter-zonal trade will encounter after the lifting of the transport ban will keep growing”. LEIPSIZ FAIR ' The first to leave Berlin since the beginning of the Russian blockade on June 23, two American cars carrying American citizens to the Leipsiz Fair, passed through a military police on the RussoAmerican zone boundary to-day. The fair, which* is Communist sponsored, was opened to-day with, exhibits greatly reduced by the Soviet blockade of Berlin. There were not any trains running from Western Germany to carry exhibitors and buyers, who, if they wanted to get to the fair, had to go to the Russian zone border and get transport from there. Professor Zeigner, Lord Mayor of Leipzig, opening the fair, disclosed that 800 exhibitors from the Western zones of Gerbany, and 200 from Berlin’s Western sectors were taking part in the fair, “despite all the difficulties”. Russians in Berlin A Western Estimate (By Reece Smith, New Zealand Kemsley Empire Journalist). . BERLIN, July 26. Russians, all down the line, from Molotov to junior officers in Berlin, are so convinced of the rightness of their country’s beliefs as to leave no room whatsoever for discussion. The final realisation of the Russian idea is so inevitable, to their minds, that it. is wilful obstruction to propose measures, such' as Marshall Aid. which may delay world revolution. No such gesture coule, by any stretch of Muscovite imagination, be sincere or altruistic. Irritated by the persistance of the West, they are not even prepared now to kick this thesis round, as a debating point. These circumstances made no easier the task of British and American officers in Berlin whose task it was til the Kommandatura brtoke up to .work with Russian opposite numbers in administering the city. British officers who faced them across the table in months of tedious debate concede the Russians may be genuine but their methods hardly lea to speedy decisions and smart administration.

The Russians, they found, wound tirelessly through labrinthine argument with the earnestness . of an Oriental carpet seller. As with these tradesmen, the Western temperament just was not in the race. The British are by now prepared to give the Rusisans best at round table marathons, and it will be surprising if any Berlin settlement involves a return to the old methods. For a long time the Russians had great fun pulling smart moves on the side while keeping up a stream of deadpan double-talk round the conference table. Their success may have persuaded the Americans and British that it is a line worth adopting. One reason for the Russians’ spik.iness, in the opinion of some of their British opposite numbers, is a firm conviction of the West’s wrong headedness in all matters. It is no heln that this conviction runs almost as strongly from West to East. When such a powerful faith as that of the Russians comes to the top, close reasoned argument gets nowhere. Underlying every idea, too, is the suspicion that the other side is preparing for war. Neither protagonist mentions this openly. In Berlin the threat is not held to be immediate. But. throughout. Germany, those people, with Gentries of experience can see the approach of war in muci the same way as an old farmer c«n sense coming weather, there ’he feeling that a clash must come. Three months, a year, 10 years, but sometime. An atmosphere which markedly diminishes the “Old £>oys stuii round East-West conference tables. Among officers who dealt with them at all levels in Berlin, there are shades of opinion as to how much initiative and authority Russian negotiators are given. Early in the occupation, in 1945, they would consider counter arguments, and were to a small degree flexible. Within narrow limits, they bargained as Western negotiators are accustomed to. As the situation tightened, the same officers would arrive at a conference with a prepared statement,

leavened with the usual accusation that the Western Powers were colonising Germany, instead of restoring her. These statements, all bearing the same trade mark, were read straight, through, and were not open for discussion. British and Americans combed through them in vain for some sign of common ground, and in the process, became mildly weary of being told they were always wrong, and the Russians were always right. Over the caviar and vodka, afterwards, the Rusisans would be greatly surprised that these charges continued to rankle outside the conference room. Some bewildered onlookers, accustomed to the man to man basis of Western dealings, have suggested that everything would ■go more smoothly if the hard arguing took place off the' record so that, having expressed themselves freely and without any gallery play, the sides could return to the conference table with ta least some indication of the possibility of settlement. With champagne substituted for caviar, tihs is how European diplomacy has been getting along for some decades. Whether this in itself is any recommendation is questionable, but an even stronger objection is the RusThey may all sleep on the same stove at home, but they are mighty standoffish by the time they get to Berlin. At Western social and diplomatic occasion, when a Russian officer can be persuaded to attend, he never comes alone. In the long gone days when British tommies were having drinks with Russian soldiers, _ the Russians would not split up singly as Tommies might with G.l’s. Always it appears as if they are keeping a check on each other. There is, too, a tendency for officers who accept Western hospitality in Berlin not be seen again about the city. It is felt more likely that they have simply been posted to another unit, where the danger of contamination is less, than that they are busy bolstering salt production in Siberia. Nevertheless, it is faintly disturbing to a Westerner to fee! tnat nis having an innocuous party chat with a Russian is due cause for that Russian to be banished from the city. Hostesses, it will be appreciated, are rapidly running out of eligible Russians for their parties. Russian wives in Berlin have been ordered home. Not, it is assumed because of imminent war, but because the impact of Western ways and wealth may sow a seed of doubt. Russian Waacs remain, under the threat of discipline if they, /adopt the newcapitalistic skirt length. A further Berlin sore spot is the tendency for a Briton, or American to find himself in jail if he exercises his right to wander througn the Soviet sector of the capital. Germans can move .about without let or hindrance. but Western occupation members tend to wind up in the interrogation room. There has been no substantial let up of ill treatment, and release, upon Western protestations, has usually been a matter of hours but such episodes never build up a back slapping atmosphere. There are bound to be faults on both sides, but from the Western sector of Berlin it looks as though the Russians have tnrown our endeavours at friendship back in our face. Somehow; for all their vodka parties, they do not seem very good at making friends.