840.48 Refugees/10–1047
Memorandum by the Director of the Office of European Affairs (Hickerson) to the Secretary of State
problem
The Danish Government has requested that 15,000 German refugees in Denmark be received in the US Zone of Germany in addition to 12,000 previously accepted. The request, presented in a Danish Embassy note of July 28, 1947,1 is worded in a manner implying that our Zone will not be asked to take more than the total of both contingents, namely 27,000 refugees.
background
At the close of hostilities nearly 200,000 German refugees, mostly aged people, women, and children, remained in Denmark. The Danes claim to have spent the equivalent of $80 million to support and guard these Germans, and regard them as an intolerable burden.
The British and Soviet representatives on the Allied Control Council in Berlin have never agreed with OMGUS that a decision of the ACC of November 20, 19452 should be construed as obligating the Soviet and British Zones to absorb the great bulk of the German refugees in Denmark.
Despite a promise which Stalin made to the Danish Foreign Minister in June 1946 to admit half of the refugees into the Soviet Zone providing the other three zones would accept the other half, the ACC was unable, because of the Soviet member’s refusal to discuss the problem, to work out distribution of the refugees to the various zones.
At loss for a solution, the Danes then appealed to each of the three western zones to accept a contingent of 12,000, and to the Soviet Zone to take 36,000. Actually, the British Zone took 18,000, the French Zone 15,000, and the US Zone 12,000, making 45,000 to the three western zones as against 36.000 to the Soviet Zone. A second contingent of 15,000 has recently been transferred to the French Zone. The British have under consideration a Danish request that their zone take an additional 15,000, and have on their own initiative begun to receive from Denmark German refugees who have relatives in the British Zone to provide shelter. The Danes expect that if the US Zone accepts 15,000 as requested, the USSR will then raise its zone’s acceptances to a total matching that of the three western zones. This would have the effect of removing all of the German refugees still in Denmark.
[Page 680]A prompt solution of Denmark’s German refugee problem is of vital interest to the United States because of the current consultations regarding the defense of Greenland. If we are not willing to give what the Danes regard as reasonable assistance toward the solution of one of their most serious problems, they are not likely to consider objectively our need for long-term defense rights in Greenland.
action taken
Under Secretary Lovett addressed a letter3 on September 12 to General Draper, Under Secretary of War, urging compliance with the Danish request and stating that although we can not count on any direct benefits from acceptance of the 15,000 refugees we may be sure that failure to take favorable action will react against us in the Greenland consultations. General Draper departed for Korea before making a decision and has just returned. In the meantime we have learned that General Noce of Civil Affairs4 is opposed to the Danish request while General Norstad of Plans and Operations is in favor of accepting the 15,000 refugees.
recommendation
That in any conversation with Mr. Rasmussen he be told that Denmark’s request that the US Zone accept 15,000 German refugees in Denmark is receiving careful consideration.
- Not printed.↩
- For a report on the November 20, 1945 meeting of the Allied Control Council for Germany, see Foreign Relations, 1945, vol. iii, p. 852; and for the text of the plan approved at that meeting see ibid., vol. ii, pp. 1316–1317.↩
- Not printed.↩
- Maj. Gen. Daniel Noce, Chief, Civil Affairs Division, War Department General Staff.↩