863.20/6–1148
The Minister in Austria (Erhardt) to the Secretary of State
No. 274
Sir: I have the honor to refer to your telegram 408, May 41 and previous correspondence, and letter from Headquarters, USFA to Intelligence Division, General Staff, May 6, 1948, “Organization of Future Austrian Army”.2 On March 18 Chancellor Figl discussed with the U.S. Deputy Commissioner the problem of making plans for the formation of an Austrian army; he believed that the Soviet element would almost certainly refuse permission to the Austrian Government to begin such planning if the Allied Council were asked, and that even if permission should be granted the Soviets would then have an excuse for closely supervising and perhaps interfering with the work of the planning committee. It was therefore decided that the permission of the Allied Council would not be asked, but that an unofficial bipartite committee of the two major parties would begin work in secret. This committee was appointed, and has been discussing the future army for about two months; it consists of Minister of Interior Helmer and Julius Deutsch for the Socialists and State Secretary of Interior Graf and General Emil Liebitzki for the People’s Party.
Deutsch and Liebitzki are the most active military planners of their respective parties, and both have been considering this question [Page 1370] for over a year. Liebitzki was colonel in the pre-Anschluss Austrian Army, later a concentration camp inmate, and is at present working in the pensions office of the Finance Ministry. Deutsch was Secretary of War under the Social Democratic Government of 1919–1920, and later until 1933 commander of the Republican Defense Corps founded by the Socialists; he was a general in the Spanish Republican Army and during the late war worked on the Austrian desk of OWI.
Both major parties are now agreed on the necessity for an army, although large sections of both originally opposed it. The peasants believed that an army would draw too heavily on much needed farm labor, and the Diet of Vorarlberg voted in the summer of 1947 to express its opposition to an army; many Socialists feared that an army might again be used to suppress a worker’s movement, as was done in 1934. However recent events have convinced both groups that a trained army must be in existence before the occupation ends, to guard against possible internal communist uprisings as well as against border incidents. During the last month the Socialists have publicly come out in favor of the formation of an army, first in an article in the May issue of the official party organ Vertrauensmann, then in a resolution of May 26, prompted by a speech of Deutsch, which reaffirmed the old Socialist opposition to militarism but called for a democratic army “to defend the boundaries as well as to protect the republican-democratic constitution created by the free people of Austria”. Both the article and the resolution stressed the importance of assuring that the new army be closely connected with the people, and that the Socialist party cooperate in its creation to secure its democratic character.
In spite of this agreement on the fundamental question, the two parties still disagree on many details. The most important of these is the amount of political representation in the army. The Socialists are still afraid that an army can be made into an instrument of reaction, and want to be represented as a party in the leadership as well as in the rank and file. The People’s Party is opposed to the representation of political parties as such. Deutsch estimated a year ago that only about 100 suitable Socialist officers were available, and consequently Socialist plans have been largely directed towards making a census of possible officers and non-coms; it seems almost certain that most of the trained military personnel, particularly the officers, will be oriented towards the People’s Party. For this reason the Socialists are determined to secure representation in the military leadership, and would like to have one of their party, possibly Deutsch, as Minister of Defense. The People’s Party points out that under the Austrian constitution the army can only be called out by the President at the request of the Minister of Interior, both of whom are Socialists, and has advanced a counter proposal to the demand for political representation, [Page 1371] whereby a bipartisan parliamentary committee would have an equal voice with the defense minister and chief of staff in military planning and appropriations. This dispute has not yet been settled.
Further points of disagreement are the length of enlistment, the type and organization of the army, and the source of arms. Deutsch first proposed the use of German arms, which Liebitzki opposed on the grounds that leftover German material is in a bad state of repair and could not later be replaced. This disagreement is not serious, since both parties would be willing to accept U.S. arms. The Socialists propose a militia type army, modeled on the Swiss, with a six-month term of enlistment for all able-bodied men at the age of 21. The People’s Party agrees that the army should be conscripted from the whole population rather than that it be a regular volunteer army, but insists on a regular military organization into about eight divisions disposed at strategic defense points, and especially opposes the idea of short-term enlistments. Liebitzki regards 18 months as the ideal term, 15 as the minimum, with overlapping terms to insure that one class of recruits would not be discharged before another’s training had begun. He proposes 18 or 19 as the draft age, partly to prevent the soldiers from being able to vote and thus subject to political propaganda; the Socialists are particularly anxious to insure that the soldiers keep their right to vote.
One proposal on which both parties agree is that the U.S. element furnish arms now to begin training a cadre for the future army within the framework of the existing police and gendarmerie. Headquarters, USFA, is at present giving sympathetic consideration to this proposal. Aside from assistance in this respect, it is not contemplated that U.S. representatives in Austria should intervene in the settlement of the organizational problems described above, unless it should appear that the inter-party differences are so irreconcilable as to jeopardize further progress in these vital preparations. On the date this report was submitted the Austrian Communist Party adopted a resolution opposing the creation of an Austrian army; a summary of this resolution is being sent by telegram to the Department.
Respectfully yours,