Matthews Files

The Secretary of State to the President

Memorandum for the President

Referring to your memorandum of September 15 from Quebec1 on the postwar treatment of Germany which received the agreement of the Prime Minister and yourself, it occurs to me that several steps should be considered in connection with the adoption of the policy which will be carried out in Germany after its surrender or collapse.

It would seem highly advisable to have the firm agreement of the Governments of Great Britain and the Soviet Union to the policy to be adopted as we have thus far acted on the basis that every action followed with respect to Germany, particularly in the post-hostilities period, would be on an agreed tripartite basis. It has been our understanding that the Soviet Government has also acted on this general assumption, and of course the European Advisory Commission, established by the Moscow Conference, was set up for the purpose of working out the problems of the treatment of Germany. We must realize that the adoption of any other basis of procedure would enormously increase the difficulties and responsibilities not only of our soldiers in the immediate military occupational period but also of our officials in the control period following.

Our information up to the present has been to the effect that the British Government no doubt has ideas of its own with respect to the application of economic controls to Germany, and we have not yet had any indication that the British Government would be in favor of complete eradication of German industrial productive capacity in the Ruhr and Saar. We have no idea as yet what the Soviet Government has in mind. Would it not be well at this time for the State Department to sound out the British and Russian views on the treatment of German industry either through the European Advisory Commission or otherwise?

  1. See ante, p. 134, footnote 4.