‘

By SAM RUSSELL

Why German issue

deadlocked Geneva

GENEVA
Wey did the Big Four foreign
ministers here reach dead-
lock on the question of Ger-
many?

The difficulties did not arise
at all from the question of free
elections, as the Western min-
isters and the press throughout
the Western countries maintain.

Soviet Foreign: Minister V7
M. Molotov made it plain that
the Soviet Union does not ob-
ject to free elections for a re-
unified Germany.

The assertions that either he
or the Soviet Union oppose such
elections or want to “Commun-
ize all Germany” are absolute
nonsense. They are a deliberate
attempt to deceive the peoples
of the Western countries who
are puzzled and worried about
the whole German question.

The Soviet position on Ger-
many is simply that, while it
agrees to free elections, it says
this is not the only, or even the
most important question ‘to be
considered in reunifying Ger-
many. j ,

The Soviet Union pdints out
that free elections did not pre-
vent the rise to power of. Hit-
ler.

Therefore, it says, in addition
to, and more important’ than,
free elections there must be
agreement on a European secur-
ity system to prevent any more
Hitler wars. :

The members of this security
system would act together in
case of a future war in Europe
to stop aggression as soon as
it started.

But they would do more.

They would meet to consider
what common action they would
take as soon as any one of them
considered it was threatened
with war.

If this system had been oper-
ating before the war, it would
have meant that, for example,
Austria or Czechoslovakia could
have summoned a meeting of the
security pact members as soon
as Hitler began to threaten
them. And the members would
have met already pledged to
common action to save peace.

The Soviet Union puts this
plan forward and insists that
something like it must be agreed
not simply for its own benefit,
but for all European peoples,
including the Germans them-
selves.

That is why, fér example,
such a plan is broadly support-
ed by the West German Social
Democratic party, largest single
party in West Germany.

That party realises that the
Soviet plan is for the benefit
of the German workers, who
suffered so terribly under Hit-
ler and the long war.

This is the most important
Soviet argument. :

5° 5° xt

The second point that Molo-
tov raised is that in a country
which has been divided so long
—ten years—with its two parts
developing different economic
systems, unity cannot be re-est-
ablished in a moment.

It needs to be brought about
step by step by joint action of
both German governments.

This “step by step” approach
has really much in common
with the “step by step” approach
in the past urged by British
Prime Minister Sir Anthony
Eden and others.

Why then should there be
any objections to it and to the
common sense Soviet position
about the need for agreement
on a system of European secur-
ity?

To find the reason, we must

go back to the Berlin confer-
ence two years ago.

At that ¢ime U.S. Secretary
of State John Foster Dulles,
and Britain’s Foreign Office ex-
perts were cock-a-hoop about
their policy of “negotiating from
strength.” :

“Let’s rearm Germany,” they
told the world. “Let’s create a
new German army under the
old Hitler generals and the Rus-

“sions will come to heel, while at
the same time the German De-
mocratic -Republic in Eastern
Germany will just vanish over-
night.” ,

So they went ahead, and
after the collapse of their first

‘ern Germany.

@® The majority of the people
ot West Germany ‘do not
want war, which has left
them only a legacy of shat-
tered cities. Nowhere is this
feeling stronger than among
the youth whose _ slogan
“Ohne uns” (“You can count
us out”), shown at right, has-
figured prominently in many
campaigns.

plan they drew up the Paris
agreements bringing Western
Germany into the Atlantic Pact
without, of course, ever consult-
ing the people of Western Ger-
many, Britain or France.

Xt be o3

Now the Western Powers
are demanding that any reuni-
fied Germany must be a rearm-
ed Germany inside the Atlantic
Pact from which the Soviet
Union is excluded because it
is,a pact directed against the
Soviet Union.

The Western Powers knew
in advance that such a proposal
would be unacceptable, for it
would mean that Western troops
and West German troops under
Hitler’s generals would advance
from. the line at present divid-
ing Germany right to the pre-
sent German-Polish frontiers,
hundreds of miles to the east.

The warnings that such a pro-
posal would be unacceptable
came not only from the Soviet
Union but also from the power-
ful West German Social Demo-
cratic party. ,

No ‘heed was taken of these
warnings. Why? Because the
Western Powers were determin-
ed that if they could not get
the whole of Germany inté the
Atlantic Pact then they would
at least keep their grip on West-

British Foreign Secretary
Harold Macmillan made much
play here with the argument

that unless Germany is reuni-

fied quickly and on Western |
terms there will be a danger of |

increased nationalism in Ger-
many.

But would German national-
ism be appeased once. West Ger-

man Chancellor Konrad Aden-

auer’s army stood on the fron-
tier with Poland — a frontier
which neither he nor the West-
ern Powers have so far recog-
nized?

Everything that has happen-
ed in West Germany in the past
two years shows that the world
would then be confronted with
new territorial demands on the
familiar and fatal prewar Hitler
pattern. :

And? previous experience
shows that once the German
militarists were rearmed, all
the so-called restrictions would,
as Molotov ‘said, “be thrown
aside like useless old rags.”

mm es Feu .

The people of the Western
countries, all those who stand
for peace, must recognize “ the
truth of those words and to help

hich would
warns es,

win an agreement w
prevent. what Molotov
against happening.
Such agreement mus
as its cornerstone a SY§
European security. ee
With that a reunified German
could be brought into Borate
as the four Heads of ¢ free
ment put it, by means © for
elections carried out 11 Ce ibats
mity with the national inte”)
of the German people 42 arity:
interests of European se€€ uid
A reunited Germany Noo:
be free from any mpilitaryy ys"
Pending reunification, per
tem under which contrat” oy
tween East and West Getm™),
could start at once shout —
stablished. : : d
= Such a program is supp
by the West German Soci#
mocrats, and the soonet
labor movements of othet ctio®

tem ©

ern countries swing into soonel

together behind it, the ae
will it become reality and

ope and the world be #

ain. ‘
breathe freely ag hi Oe

AN American of nearly 70 is
to be wrenched from his
family, home and country be-
cause 20 years ago he went to
public meetings which advocat-
ed unemployment insurance.
This is the latest tragic im-
becility of the U.S. “Reds-
under - the - bed”
authorities. ;
And their victim this time,
old age pensioner Tom Dutton,
is not a Communist. He is
going to be deported to Britain
because two paid government
informers. said they remember-
ed seeing him at “Communist”
meetings during the depres-
sion.

wife Margaret — also 70 —
his children, grandchildren and
all save 40 pounds of personal
belongings in his Detroit home.
Racked with arthritis, he works
intermittently as a painter to
‘support his family “on his
meagre pension.

The immigration authorities
have cooked up the excuse
that Tom cannot prove he was
born in the U.S.—although he
has lived in Detroit for the last

immigration

Tom’ will have to leave his

~ At 70 U.S. wants to deport him |

49 years and remembers his*
parents saying. that he was
born in Philadelphia. °

As a young man, to get a
job on the Detroit United Rail-
ways, he said he was an Eng-
lishman because he had been
told that the company favored
British-born workers.

He was fired after five years
because the company said he
was a socialist — officials had
heard he advocated a munici-
pal transport system. He was
arrested in 1932 on the alle-
gation that he had entered
the country illegally, but he
was released. :

“One day,” says Tome {T
joined a crowd in front of the

city hall. They were property .

owners who had been denied
relief because they owned
homes. The group got us on
relief. ;

“I went to several meetings
of the group after that. - They
were all open meetings, attend-
ed by about 200 persons, at
which people spoke in favor
of unemployment insurance
and about some of the laws
they didn’t like.

‘where extreme hardship

‘I spoke for,.some of ne
things, too, but I never 2
longed to the Communist Pr
ty in my life. I’m an old 74%
whose life is nearly ove? ry
don’t know where I was b° an
but I’ve been an AmnenS
most all of my life. I've 8°)
up with this city and I'm
old to change now. e

As he told his story. eee:
erican newspapermen he

; we
down. “They’ve let me ee
old and now they, want to 5°

me away to die,” he told the :
“What do I know of En abe
What can I do there enittle
go on relief, ie afar Le se
while, and then die? ton
Tom applied for suspensit
of his deportation, whi¢ of
granted at the discretion
the attorney-general in © to

He
the family can be shown:
was refused a hearing. oes

Unless public OP naaee

sailing past the green, '
gris-covered Statue of 14

5
to end his days as an exile.

3 955 — PAGE
PACIFIC TRIBUNE — NOVEMBER 25, 1955 — eo

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