740.00119 Council/5–1349

The British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Bevin) to the Secretary of State 1

top secret

I very much appreciate your sending me a copy of the memorandum which you have written with regard to the forthcoming meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers.2 I am grateful to you for giving-me this information about the way in which your mind is moving, and I am very glad to find that I am in general agreement with the views which you express.3 I am sure you are right in suggesting that the test which we should apply in considering the German question is whether the unification of Germany can be achieved in conditions which help and do not retard the unification of a free Europe.

There is, however, one point which is causing me some concern, and that is the suggestion made in paragraph 5 of your memorandum about a possible regrouping of troops in Germany. I agree with you that this is a matter which deserves a most careful study among us but the statements in the press today on this question have come at a most unfortunate moment. These statements have the appearance of being authoritative and might be interpreted on the Continent as a change in the policy of the United States Government from the agreed decisions contained in the annex on security to the report of the Three Power Conference on Germany4 which took place in London last June. Parliament has just approved the Atlantic Pact, and we, in [Page 875] common with the other Western European countries, have just entered into serious and far-reaching commitments, and I am concerned lest speculation about the possibility of regrouping the occupation forces in Germany may have an unsettling effect upon public opinion in Europe at the present time.

You may like to know that we have consulted our Chiefs of Staff on this question of regrouping, and they see very serious military objections to it. They point out that to concentrate troops in overcrowded areas such as ports would be extremely bad for morale and training, quite apart from any political objection to bringing troops into these areas and compelling the Germans to make room for them. They also have drawn attention to the fact that the problem of suitable aerodromes must be faced and that if the Western Occupying Powers withdrew their troops to the frontier of [or] port areas we should be withdrawing 250–300 miles from Berlin, while the Russians remained in relative proximity. Finally the new German Government might risk being at the mercy of the peoples police, which is the only organised and armed gendarmerie force in Germany.

In consequence I feel obliged to draw your attention at once to the serious doubts which I feel about the possibility of advantageously regrouping our occupation forces at the present time in Germany. I am however looking forward with pleasure to discussing this and all the other matters raised in your memorandum with you and M. Schuman personally before the Council of Foreign Ministers opens.

I have sent a copy of this message to M. Schuman.

[ Bevin ]
  1. The source text was sent to Secretary Acheson as an enclosure to a personal note from Ambassador Franks, May 13, not printed (740.00119 Council/5–1349).
  2. Under reference here is “An Approach to the CFM” transmitted in telegram 1605, supra.
  3. In telegram 1942, May 12, from Paris, not printed, Caffery had reported that Schuman had read “An Approach to the CFM” and said: “It is very sound; in fact, it is very good.” (740.00119 Council/5–1249)
  4. The text of the Report of the London Conference on Germany, February 23–March 6 and April 20–June 7, 1948, is printed in Foreign Relations, 1948, volume ii, p. 75. The Report on Security, dated May 26, is also printed ibid., p. 291.