Paris Embassy Files: File—Germany: Telegram
The United States Military Governor for Germany (Clay) to the Department of the Army
CC–5804. Personal from Clay action to Dept of Army, personal for Under Secretary Draper, info personal for Ambassador Douglas, London, Ambassador Smith, Moscow, and Ambassador Caffery, Paris. Herewith my comments on today’s meeting. I will limit them to major points of difference as it will be some time before the official and agreed summary of today’s meeting is ready.1 We met today from 1700 hours to 2130 hours. As this will probably happen frequently, I will probably continue to send personal comment prior to receipt of prepared summary as waiting for the latter would either keep us up most of the night or else delay my comment. While I do not object to the former, I am afraid that these meetings will last for some time and of course we do have our other business to continue concurrently.
At today’s meeting the Finance Committee reported on its work since the last previous meeting. It was able to agree three items completely and three items with reservations having to do with the methods arid procedures of exchange. These will be sent you separately in exact wording.2 However, the first point of difference was in the way the law would be promulgated to withdraw B-marks and substitute E-marks. The Soviets insisted that the agreement of the Commanders in Chief would suffice whereas it was our contention that a joint proclamation would be necessary. It was apparent that the Soviet desire was to effect the withdrawal by agreement thus letting the Soviet law as promulgated by the Soviet Military Administration become in fact [Page 1110] the law for all of Berlin. The legal validity of the Soviet proposal is doubtful as all previous agreements have been issued either as proclamations of the Four Commanders in Chief or as proclamations by each of the Zone Commanders. Robertson suggested that the agreement be promulgated as the basis for the law. I reserved my position to get a legal opinion as many future legal transactions and claims will have to be resolved under the law. I also reserved for possible bargaining position. If in fact the promulgation of the agreement is considered legally valid, it is of course not a major point. This paragraph further provides that the exchange would be under instructions of the German Bank of Emission. I reserved my acceptance of this unless it was amended to require the approval of the instructions by the Financial Commission or unless the agreement of [on] the functions of the Financial Commission clearly established its right in this respect. This question arose in connection with another of the partially agreed paragraphs in which it was provided that the exchange would be through the established credit institutions. Here the Soviet version states that these credit institutions would operate under the control of the German Emission Bank. The British and French joined me in insisting that there be added to this paragraph “under the supervision of the Finance Commission”. Of course, this was not accepted by the Soviets nor was a French amendment which placed the control of the credit institutions under the Financial Commission acting under the regulations of the Emission Bank. The French amendment was not accepted by either Robertson or myself. The remaining issue was over the disposition of the B-marks which the Soviets insisted should be destroyed. As we still have the desire to permit B-marks to move to the West Zone to protect their holders, we resisted the Soviet proposal and stated that these B-marks were our property and had value to us if we desired to use them for currency in the Western Zones. While I did not consider this as major point, it is one I would not like to concede except to secure final agreement. This completed our action on the work of the Finance Committee today. They were placed back at work to report to us on Sunday, thus allowing them more time to discuss the very complicated details still ahead. They will also produce a clean copy of today’s agreements with the disagreed portions in usual brackets.
We then received the report of the Transport Committee. This committee had achieved almost nothing. It had attempted [to deal with] the present condition of the rails; the obtaining of additional paths to permit increased supplies being brought into Berlin; and the freedom of traffic on military trains. The Soviet representative was unwilling to discuss any of these subjects in any detail unless the questions of restrictions on air traffic were also discussed. General Koenig [Page 1111] pointed out that the Soviet attitude indicated a desire to impose additional restrictions whereas the instructions in the Moscow directive were very clear that all we had to discuss was the removal of restrictions. At this point Sokolovsky took almost an hour to present the Soviet viewpoint. He argued that the restrictions in question were only those applied since 18th June and would not include the earlier restrictions applied in March. He insisted on the Soviet right to require identification and presumably inspection, and enlarged it to say that traffic on military trains should be restricted to military persons and that civilians, families, and others should travel on whatever other and general service might be arranged. He also brought up the question of payment for such travel. He admitted that these restrictions had been imposed in March because of the London Conference and on 18th June because of currency reform, but claimed that since our directive concerned only the latter insofar as Berlin was concerned it was manifest that the transport restrictions could only have been those applied as a result of currency reform which would be removed when the Soviet Currency was accepted in Berlin. You will remember that Molotov suggested the same date of 18 June but that later Stalin had said if restrictions had been imposed prior to this date these restrictions would also be removed. Sokolovsky then stated that our agreements provided only for airlift for Military persons and cargo and that they could not accept commercial or civil airlift. This is, of course, an old contention that the permission given to civil airlines to fly into Berlin was contrary to our quadripartite agreement. He suggested that what he was proposing formed a reasonable basis for discussion by the transport committee and that it be instructed to proceed with detailed discussions on this basis. General Koenig reiterated the French position that we were not to discuss additional restrictions but only the removal of restrictions, however, he was ready for the transport committee to make another try. General Robertson referred to the Soviet letter imposing the restrictions in March3 to refute the statement by Sokolovsky that the Soviets had always restricted the movement of other than Military personnel or military trains. He stated that progress of the transport committee would be an evidence of sincerity of the Soviet desire to reach agreement and for that reason he was prepared to have the transport committee make another try. At this point I stated that I was certain that my government had understood in Moscow that the removal of restrictions on transport meant the return to the conditions which existed before March and that it had [Page 1112] not authorized me to discuss removal of restrictions except in this overall sense. I further stated that we could not accept Marshal Sokolovsky’s interpretation of past agreements in a way in which he desired them to be interpreted and that we would not agree that there had ever been any restrictions on air lift, hence this would not appear to be a proper subject of discussion under the Moscow directive. I reminded him that I had said that I was prepared to discuss safeguards with respect to the movement of currency and goods to and from Berlin by air but not the restriction of air traffic; that as I felt that Marshal Sokolovsky’s proposal both with respect to passenger traffic and air lift were entirely outside the scope of the directive sent to us by our Governments, it seemed hopeless to me to refer these matters under this misunderstanding to a committee; and that as much as I regretted to cause any delay I desire definitely to study Sokolovsky’s proposal before committing myself to a further course of action. It was then 21:30 hours and we agreed to adjourn the meeting to meet at 15:00 hours tomorrow to resume the transportation discussion and to hear the report of the Trade committee which in fact is still arguing about the agenda which it will discuss.
[Here follows a brief account of the discussion between Clay, Robertson, and Koenig, adjournment of the meeting with Sokolovsky, and Clay’s reiteration of his determination to stand firm.]
The going is tough and it is too early to predict the outcome.
I do not propose even to let this transportation issue cause a break, as I feel that it is now necessary to explore every detail with a view to determining how many we can agree and how many remain unagreed, as the extent of the latter I am sure is of utmost importance to the decisions which you will have to make in Washington. However, at the present rate here would seem little likelihood that we could be anywhere nearly through with the discussion of details by the established date of 7th September.4
- The agreed report of this meeting was sent in telegram 2227, September 4, from Berlin, not printed (740.00119 Control (Germany)/9–448).↩
- Materials on the reports of the Transport and Finance Committees were also sent in telegram 2227.↩
- The reference here is to General Dratvin’s letter March 31, the text of which was transmitted in telegram 749, April 1, from Berlin, not printed. (740.00119 Control (Germany)/4–148) Further documentation on this letter is in telegram 748, April 1, from Berlin, p. 886.↩
- In telecon TT–1139, September 4, not printed, Clay was authorized, at his discretion, to refuse to allow the Transport Committee to consider the lifting of transport restrictions except on an overall basis, and any question of air restrictions, except those necessary to safeguard the currency. Clay was also authorized to withhold his approval of any other issue as long as Sokolovsky maintained his position on transport. (862.515/1–148)↩