Desolate & Desperate

As the West resolutely girded for any Communist-made showdown on Berlin, East German Puppet Boss Walter Ulbricht showed signs of nervousness. He ordered the 100,000 men of East Germany's "People's Army" alerted to "maximum combat readiness" and gave them their first assignment: to use "all means" to try to stop the debilitating (and embarrassing) flow of refugees through Berlin to the West--an average of 1,000 per day last week. The Communists began to evict East Berliners who work in West Berlin from their homes, mounted a show trial of five East Germans charged with helping refugees escape (penalty: three years' imprisonment).

Ulbricht also summoned some 1,500 party functionaries for a pep talk. "After all," he said, "when housewives come into the stores and can't find milk or butter, they begin to criticize. You must understand that we have to pay for all our imports with expensive products. Therefore we can't import any more food than is absolutely necessary." Ulbricht also had a few words for the commissars about East Germany's restive farmers. "You must do a better job of explaining questions of international politics," urged Ulbricht, "so that all the farmers understand that the powers of peace and socialism will win."

Burning Shoes. Ulbricht unwittingly was underscoring what every East German knows--and every refugee's escape mutely testifies to: that life is grim in East Germany and getting grimmer all the time. In its headlong efforts to emphasize heavy industry (East Germany is now the sixth largest industrial nation in the world), the regime has given short shrift to consumer goods. Buyers have to wait at least a year for delivery of refrigerators, up to two years for washing machines. Even the outrageously priced Wartburg car (selling in East Germany for $3,750, in West Germany for $1,250) has a waiting list six-months-to-a-year long. The bulk of new apartment houses built have no bathtubs in them.

Even when the goods are available, they are usually so shoddily made as to be almost useless. Two enormous hangars in the Johannestal airport are crammed with $75 million worth of textile products that nobody at home or abroad will buy. (After Ghana and Guinea turned them down, the East Germans tried to fob them off on Communist Hungary--which indignantly returned the whole lot.) The state-owned shoe industry was recently forced to burn 25,000 pairs of sandals that were unmarketable.

The visitor to East Germany is invariably struck by the overcrowded restaurants. "What else can I do with my money?" explained one diner. "It isn't safe to save it, since you never know when they are going to change the currency or ask all of those with money in banks to buy worthless state bonds. We can't get decent furniture or clothes. So the best idea is to eat well and forget about it."

Dresden Today. Most of the West's knowledge of life in East Germany today is gleaned from refugees, or guided tours of East Berlin, the regime's carefully rebuilt showcase. But last week TIME Correspondent William Rademaekers was allowed a rare U.S. look at Dresden, East Germany's third largest city, set deep in the southern Saxony hills of East Germany on the Czechoslovakian border. Cabled Rademaekers:

Emerging from the Dresden railroad station, the visitor is confronted by a half-mile panorama of weeds and rubble, a skyline of twisted girders and the rusting frames of church spires. As a transportation nexus, Dresden was the most heavily damaged city in Germany in World War II. The center of the city, the historic Altstadt, was all but leveled by Allied bombers. The Communists have made little effort to rebuild it after 15 years.

Most of Dresden's 492,000 people live in the relatively unbombed suburbs or in cheap, monotonous rows of Communist prefab houses. Most of the men wear cardigan jackets and cuffless cotton pants, since East German suits are both shoddy and expensive. In contrast, the women are relatively well dressed. They make their own clothes, closely follow West Berlin's latest fashions.

A Souvenir. To Dresdeners, Americans are people from another planet. The mother of a young boy asked if she could have an empty U.S. cigarette pack "as a remembrance." Surprisingly, most were fearlessly outspoken about their dislike of Communist Boss Walter Ulbricht's regime. "Why did you come here?" asked a salesgirl wonderingly. "Why does anyone come here?" Quipped a bitter bartender: "Have a socialist drink: crush one potato in a glass, drink it fast and try to think of vodka." "Shall I describe how it is to live here?" sneered a girl government clerk. "It stinks."

There was no evidence of a critical food shortage in Dresden, but prices were high, and distribution problems were evident everywhere. One store would have an oversupply of bread, another none. Eggs were practically nonexistent, butter rationed and scarce. "We have a joke here," said a farmer. "Do you know the difference between an atom bomb and a collective farm? None. Both completely lay waste to the earth."

Block Commandos. The economy of Dresden, as of all of East Germany, has been hard hit by the refugee flow west. A precision mechanic said that eight of 30 workers in his factory section had left in the last three years. The Dresden Communist paper carries a daily appeal to women to join work brigades to alleviate the manpower shortage.

In the drastic new efforts to curb the refugee exodus from Dresden, the authorities have set up "block commandos," made up of civilian party members, who make nightly neighborhood checks, knocking on every door. When nobody answers, they alert the railroad police to watch for the resident. Banks are now required to report the name of anyone who draws a suspiciously large amount of cash from his account. As a result, would-be refugees now leave on weekends to thwart the commandos (since many Dresdeners take vacation weekends in the summer anyway), never draw more than $50 in cash to take with them.

When I boarded the train in Dresden for my return to Berlin, some 20 jack-booted railway police were busy checking everybody's passports and papers. Passports were checked six times between Dresden and Berlin.

When the train reached the Soviet sector check point of Schoenfeld in Berlin, East German police swarmed everywhere in and alongside the train. They pulled six teen-agers and an elderly woman off the train, herded them toward a group of 20 disconsolate East Germans presumably jerked off earlier trains. One girl with short blonde hair and a green raincoat dropped her bag and began to cry as she was taken off. As the train pulled away toward West Berlin, I watched a policeman pick up her bag, lead her sobbing into a green barracks office while a Soviet soldier watched impassively.

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