Be Prepared

The preparations for meeting the Russians at Berlin began last week as such things usually do--by an inability even to agree on where in Berlin to meet. Both parties on the scene circled warily. So, in their separate home capitals, did the foreign ministers themselves. It had been nearly five years since Western foreign ministers sat down with Molotov. What was in store?

A growing nervousness was detectable in the Western chancelleries. Molotov could probably not be held to a discussion only of Germany and Austria. He might convincingly talk of total atomic disarmament--and a ban on atomic weapons, without any other kind of disarmament, would, as SHAPE Commander Alfred M. Gruenther acknowledged this week, be to Russia's advantage. Molotov might suggest a truce in Indo-China, and thereupon demand that Red China be invited to Berlin. Whatever the details, the Communists made no secret of their main ambition at Berlin: to defeat the West's plan for a European Army. The method would be to rouse France's ancient fears of German arms. Said John Foster Dulles this week in Manhattan: "Distrust between France and Germany is inflammable, and already Soviet agents are looking to it as a means for international arson."

The British asked for an advance huddle in Berlin of Dulles, Eden and Bidault a couple of days before the formal talks with Molotov begin.

Despite the last-minute nervousness, the West knows what it wants at Berlin. A cogent State Department memorandum to U.S. diplomatic missions in Europe put the objectives roughly as follows: P: To reach agreement on a free, unified Germany, and thus open the way to a general European settlement. P: Failing that, to establish that U.S. proposals represent the only means of reestablishing a free, united Germany. P: To show that Western proposals on Germany form part of a program which takes into account security requirements of all Europe, and the Soviet Union too. P: To throw light on Soviet intentions. If the Soviet Union takes a negative position, to make clear that the Soviet Union alone is responsible for the continued division of Germany and of Europe. CJ To keep open the prospect of negotiation with Russia at a later date. P: To conclude a treaty to insure political and economic independence of Austria. P: In the event of Soviet obstruction, to make clear that the Soviet Union alone is responsible for failure to agree on an Austrian treaty.

"There remain sections of public opinion, particularly in Western Europe," says the memo, "which still continue to picture the U.S. as reluctant to engage in genuine negotiations with the Soviet Union for fear that any relaxation of tension which might result would work to the detriment of the U.S. policy of strengthening European defense ... It is essential that it be made clear that we are not going into this conference in order merely to satisfy public desire for a conference, nor merely to demonstrate the intransigence of the Soviet Union."

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