No Camels, No Gnats

The Paris Foreign Ministers' Conference was wheezing to an end. It would probably put some sort of limited agreement on the record; but barring last-minute Russian surprises, the agreement would be limited to just a smidgen more than nothing.

Small Blessing. This week the ministers still have a chance of settling the question of trade and transport between Berlin and West Germany. That issue had not been on the Foreign Ministers' agenda at all; the Big Four's economic experts in Berlin were to settle it. But the experts' talks were stalled, because the Russians, who had lifted the blockade, refused to promise in black & white that it would stay lifted. At present, transport between Western Germany and Berlin is still technically subject to Russian control and, in the words of the U.S. transport chief, "dependent on Soviet whims." Actually, there was little or no transport because of the Berlin rail strike (see below).

In Paris, Secretary of State Acheson proposed that the Berlin commanders be instructed to end their talks within five days. After a day's hesitation Vishinsky accepted the proposal. Said Acheson: "A very pleasant note on which to end [today's] meeting. I hope it will bring us all pleasant dreams."

Said Vishinsky: "A small blessing . . ."

This week, the Berlin commanders sent separate, inconclusive reports to the ministers in Paris; the impression was that the commanders were waiting for the rail strike to be settled. Meanwhile, one night this week, after the regular council session was over, the ministers withdrew to Robert Schuman's private office at the Palais Rose; there, Vishinsky began to talk brass tacks about Berlin. The West was willing to offer the Russians trade from West Germany for their occupation zone, which, many observers believe, is what the Russians really want. In exchange, the West demanded hard & fast guarantees of its right to free access to Berlin.

At the public sessions, Vishinsky launched his long-expected propaganda piece de resistance. He suggested that the four powers prepare drafts of a peace treaty for Germany to be submitted to another Foreign Ministers' conference three months hence. One year after the conclusion of a German treaty, all occupation troops should be withdrawn from Germany.

By this move, Vishinsky forced Acheson & friends to talk against the one thing most Germans want--withdrawal of foreign troops. All three Western ministers replied that, as long as they did not know what kind of Germany there would emerge from a possible peace conference, it was not safe to leave Germany to its own devices. Said Acheson: "Mr. Vishinsky's proposal is as full of propaganda as a dog is of fleas. In fact, I say it is all fleas and no dog . . ."

James & Vladimir. For 25 minutes, in three languages, the ministers kept the tired flea gag hopping about the conference table. Vishinsky produced what he described as a quotation from the Bible: "You should not try to catch fleas, lest a camel slip through your fingers." Ernest Bevin grumbled that he had never read that in the Bible--at least not in the King James version. Vishinsky said he was quoting the St. Vladimir version.* Unofficial translators figured that Vishinsky must have meant Matthew 23:24 (identical in the King James version and in the approved Russian Orthodox Bible): "Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel."

Nobody at the Paris conference had swallowed any camels, or any gnats either. If the conference ended--as seemed likely --with the same tight-lipped absence of concessions, the East-West conflict would now revert from the conference table to the fields and factories, the minds and hearts of Europe; there, the West was slowly winning over communism.

* Vladimir (circa 956-1015), Grand Duke of Kiev and All Russia, also known as the "Beautiful Sun," was a man of varied accomplishments. He sacked cities at the drop of an insult, kept 800 concubines (300 at Vyshgorod, 300 at Belgorod and 200 at Berestova), and--vaguely dissatisfied with his earthly attainments and the old Slav deities--sent out emissaries in search of a good religion. He declined Islam, because it forbade "the wine which was dear to the Russians," Judaism, whose disciples were scattered over the earth, and Roman Catholicism, whose ceremonies were not splendid enough. He finally chose the Byzantine Church and had all the Kievans baptized by immersion in the Dnieper. One of the things Vladimir did not do, however, was to translate the Bible for the Russians. St. Methodius (826-885) did that.

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