SOURCES ABOUT THE COLD WAR
On the following pages are sources, both primary and secondary (contemporary and more recent) written about a
series of events which you have studied as part of your work on the Cold War. A really important part of your essay
write up is about how well you are using sources – in this you must use sources that show both sides of an argument
to help support the debate which you are discussing in your essay. The best answers will use these sources as
EVIDENCE about how people feel now and how others felt at the time.
So do not use these just to copy out parts of what people have said but rather extract RELEVANT parts of the sources
AND explain why this was said. The only way to do this with success is to discuss, as part of your essay, how
trustworthy and reliable the source is. For example, if it is written by an American journalist during the Cold War, it
is likely to have a positive American spin on it, whilst a Russian speech given by Stalin may be biased as it is trying to
win people over. This DOES NOT MEAN that biased sources have no use. You just need to explain that whilst this is
the evidence – it may or may not tell you the truth, though it does show why people might lie.
Make it clear in your writing WHY you think the source was produced and therefore WHY it is HELPFUL to you when
explaining about different relations.
These are not the only sources you should use. Have a look on www.cartoons.ac.uk to find some alternative picture
based sources, when using these you will find quoting from them more difficult, but you can still describe them in
your essay.
THE YALTA CONFERENCE
William Leahy, chief of staff to the commander in chief of the United States, wrote about Yalta in his
autobiography, I Was There (1950)
Stalin then brought up the question of reparations in kind and in manpower, but said he was not ready to discuss the
manpower question. The latter, of course, referred to forced labour. Since the Russians were using many thousands
of prisoners in what was reported to be virtual slave camps, they had little to gain by discussing the matter. Stalin
then had Deputy Foreign Commissar Maisky elaborate on the Russian view of the reparations question.
The proposal in brief was: Reparations in kind should include factories, plants, communication equipment,
investments abroad, etc., and should be made over a period of ten years, at the end of which time all reparations
would have been paid. The total value of the reparations in kind asked by the Soviet was 10 billion dollars, to be
spread over the ten-year period.
The German heavy industries should be cut down and 80 per cent. removed in a period of two years after the
surrender.
Allied control should be established over German industry, and all German industry that could be used in the
production of war material should be under international control for a long period.
Churchill objected to the 10 billion-dollar figure, and he and Roosevelt agreed that a reparations committee should
be appointed to study the issue. Roosevelt made it clear that the United States would not make the financial
mistakes that followed World War I. He added that America would not want any manpower, any factories, or any
machinery. It might want to seize German property in the United States, which at that time was estimated not to
exceed 200 million dollars. Reparations presented a very complicated problem, and the appointment of a special
commission seemed to be the only possible way to arrive at any kind of recommendation that could be accepted.
James F. Byrnes, as Secretary of State, attended the Yalta Conference on 4th February, 1945.
In the fall of 1944 the Soviet Union and the Provisional Government of France had entered into a treaty of
friendship. It was immediately obvious at Yalta, however, that the treaty and the friendly words exchanged over it by
the diplomats had not changed in any degree Marshal Stalin's opinion on the contribution of France to the war. He
thought France should play little part in the control of Germany, and stated that Yugoslavia and Poland were more
entitled to consideration than France.
When Roosevelt and Churchill proposed that France be allotted a zone of occupation, Stalin agreed. But it was clear
he agreed only because the French zone was to be taken out of the territory allotted to the United States and the
United Kingdom. And he especially opposed giving France a representative on the Allied Control Council for
Germany. He undoubtedly concurred in the opinion expressed to the President by Mr. Molotov that this should be
done "only as a kindness to France and not because she is entitled to it."
"I am in favor of France being given a zone," Stalin declared, "but I cannot forget that in this war France opened the
gates to the enemy." He maintained it would create difficulties to give France a zone of
occupation and a representative on the Allied Control Council and refuse the same treatment to others who had
fought more than France. He said France would soon demand that de Gaulle attend the Big
Three's Conferences.
Churchill argued strongly in favor of France's being represented on the Council. He said the British public would not
understand if questions affecting France and the French zone were settled without her participation in the
discussion. It did not follow, as Stalin had suggested, that France would' demand de Gaulle's participation in the
conferences of the Big Three, he added. And, in his best humor, Mr. Churchill said the conference was "a very
exclusive club, the entrance fee being at least five million soldiers or the equivalent."
Conversation between Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at Yalta.
Winston Churchill: "The peace of the world depends upon the lasting friendship of the three great powers, but His
Majesty's Government feel we should be putting ourselves in a false position if we put ourselves in the position of
trying to rule the world when our desire is to serve the world and preserve it from a renewal of the frightful horrors
which have fallen upon the mass of its inhabitants. We should make a broad submission to the opinion of the world
within the limits stated. We should have the right to state our case against any case stated by the Chinese, for
instance, in the case of Hongkong. There is no question that we could not be required to give back Hong Kong to the
Chinese if we did not feel that was the right thing to do. On the other hand, I feel it would be wrong if China did not
have an opportunity to state its case fully. In the same way, if Egypt raises a question against the British affecting the
Suez Canal, as has been suggested, I would submit to all the procedure outlined in this statement. colleagues on the
Security Council."
Joseph Stalin: "I would like to have this document to study because it is difficult on hearing it read to come to any
conclusion. I think that the Dumbarton Oaks decisions have, as an objective, not only to secure to every nation the
right to express its opinion, but if any nation should raise a question about some important matter, it raises the
question in order to get a decision in the matter. I am sure none of those present would dispute the right of every
member of the Assembly to express his opinion. "Mr. Churchill thinks that China, if it raised the question of Hong
Kong, would be content only with expressing opinion here. He may be mistaken. China will demand a decision in the
matter and so would Egypt. Egypt will not have much pleasure in expressing an opinion that the Suez Canal should
be returned to Egypt, but would demand a decision on the matter. Therefore, the matter is much more serious than
merely expressing an opinion. Also, I would like to ask Mr. Churchill to name the power which may intend to
dominate the world. I am sure Great Britain does not want to dominate the world. So one is removed from
suspicion. I am sure the United States does not wish to do so, so another is excluded from the powers having
intentions to dominate the world."
Winston Churchill: "May I answer?"
Joseph Stalin: "In a minute. When will the great powers accept the provisions that would absolve them from the
charge that they intend to dominate the world ? I will study the document. At this
time it is not very clear to me. I think it is a more serious question than the right of a power to express its intentions
or the desire of some power to dominate the world."
Winston Churchill: "I know that under the leaders of the three powers as represented here we may feel safe. But
these leaders may not live forever. In ten years' time we may disappear. A new generation will come which did not
experience the horrors of war and may probably forget what we have gone through. We would like to secure the
peace for at least fifty years. We have now to build up such a status, such a plan, that we can put as many obstacles
as possible to the coming generation quarreling among themselves."
Anthony Eden wrote about Yalta in his autobiography, Memoirs: The Reckoning (1965)
Roosevelt was, above all else, a consummate politician. Few men could see more clearly their immediate objective,
or show greater artistry in obtaining it. As a price of these gifts, his long-range vision was not quite so sure. The
President shared a widespread American suspicion of the British Empire as it had once been and, despite his
knowledge of world affairs, he was always anxious to make it plain to Stalin that the United States was not 'ganging
up' with Britain against Russia. The outcome of this was some confusion in Anglo-American relations which profited
the Soviets.
Roosevelt did not confine his dislike of colonialism to the British Empire alone, for it was a principle with him, not the
less cherished for its possible advantages. He hoped that former colonial territories, once free of their masters,
would become politically and economically dependent upon the United States, and had no fear that other powers
might fill that role.
Winston Churchill's strength lay in his vigorous sense of purpose and his courage, which carried him undismayed
over obstacles daunting to lesser men. He was also generous and impulsive, but this could be a handicap at the
conference table. Churchill liked to talk, he did not like to listen, and he found it difficult to wait for, and seldom let
pass, his turn to speak. The spoils in the diplomatic game do not necessarily go to the man most eager to debate.
Marshal Stalin as a negotiator was the toughest proposition of all. Indeed, after something like thirty years'
experience of international conferences of one kind and another, if I had to pick a team for going into a conference
room, Stalin would be my first choice. Of course the man was ruthless and of course he knew his purpose. He never
wasted a word. He never stormed, he was seldom even irritated. Hooded, calm, never raising his voice, he avoided
the repeated negatives of Molotov which were so exasperating to listen to. By more subtle methods he got what he
wanted without having seemed so obdurate.
There was a confidence, even an intimacy, between Stalin and Molotov such as I have never seen between any other
two Soviet leaders, as if Stalin knew that he had a valuable henchman and Molotov was confident because he was so
regarded. Stalin might tease Molotov occasionally, but he was careful to uphold his authority. Only once did I hear
Stalin speak disparagingly of his judgment and that was not before witnesses.
THE NUCLEAR ARMS RACE
General Dwight Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander, told President Harry S. Truman that he was opposed
to the dropping of the atom bomb on Japan.
I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping
the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking
world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save
American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a
minimum loss of "face".
Henry Stimson, Secretary of War, letter to President Harry S. Truman (11th September, 1945)
The chief lesson I have learned in a long life is that the only way you can make a man trustworthy is to trust him; and
the surest way to make him untrustworthy is to distrust him. If the atomic bomb were merely another, though more
devastating, military weapon to be assimilated into our pattern of international relations, it would be one thing. We
would then follow the old custom of secrecy and nationalistic military superiority relying on international caution to
prescribe the future use of the weapon as we did with gas. But I think the bomb instead constitutes merely a first
step in a new control by man over the forces of nature too revolutionary and dangerous to fit into old concepts. My
idea of an approach to the Soviets would be a direct proposal after discussion with the British that we would be
prepared in effect to enter an agreement with the Russians, the general purpose of which would be to control and
limit the use of the atomic bomb as an instrument of war.
Henry Wallace, letter to Harry S. Truman (24th September, 1945).
You have asked for the comment, in writing, of each cabinet officer on the proposal submitted by Secretary Stimson
for the free and continuous exchange of scientific information (not industrial blueprints and engineering "knowhow") concerning atomic energy between all of the United Nations. I agreed with Henry Stimson.
At the present time, with the publication of the Smyth report and other published information, there are no
substantial scientific secrets that would serve as obstacles to the production of atomic bombs by other nations. Of
this I am assured by the most competent scientists who know the facts. We have not only already made public much
of the scientific information about the atomic bomb, but above all with the authorization of the War Department we
have indicated the road others must travel in order to reach the results we have obtained.
With respect to future scientific developments I am confident that both the United States and the world will gain by
the free interchange of scientific information. In fact, there is danger that in attempting to maintain secrecy about
these scientific developments we will, in the long run, as a prominent scientist recently put it, be indulging "in the
erroneous hope of being safe behind a scientific Maginot Line."
The nature of science and the present state of knowledge in other countries are such that there is no possible way of
preventing other nations from repeating what we have done or surpassing it within five or six years. If the United
States, England, and Canada act the part of the dog in the manger on this matter, the other nations will come to hate
and fear all Anglo-Saxons without our having gained anything thereby. The world will be divided into two camps with
the non- Anglo-Saxon world eventually superior in population, resources, and scientific knowledge.
We have no reason to fear loss of our present leadership through the free interchange of scientific information. On
the other hand, we have every reason to avoid a shortsighted and unsound attitude which will invoke the hostility of
the rest of the world.
In my opinion, the quicker we share our scientific knowledge the greater will be the chance that we can achieve
genuine and durable world cooperation. Such action would be interpreted as a generous gesture on our part and lay
the foundation for sound international agreements that would assure the control and development of atomic energy
for peaceful use rather than destruction.
James Franck was against dropping the atom bomb on Japan. He sent his views to President Harry S. Truman on
11th June, 1945.
The military advantages and the saving of American lives achieved by the sudden use of atomic bombs against Japan
may be outweighed by the ensuing loss of confidence and by a wave of horror and repulsion sweeping over the rest
of the world and perhaps even dividing public opinion at home.
From this point of view, a demonstration of the new weapon might best be made, before the yes of representatives
of all the United Nations, on the desert or a barren island. The best possible atmosphere for the achievement of an
international agreement could be achieved if America could say to the world, "You see what sort of a weapon we
had but did not use. We are ready to renounce its use in the future if other nations join us-in this renunciation and
agree to the establishment of an efficient international control.
Freda Kirchwey, The Nation (18th August, 1945)
The bomb that hurried Russia into Far Eastern war a week ahead of schedule and drove Japan to surrender has
accomplished the specific job for which it was created. From the point of view of military strategy, $2,000,000,000
(the cost of the bomb and the cost of nine days of war) was never better spent. The suffering, the wholesale
slaughter it entailed, have been outweighed by its spectacular success; Allied leaders can rightly claim that the loss
of life on both sides would have been many times greater if the atomic bomb had not been used and Japan had gone
on fighting. There is no answer to this argument. The danger is that it will encourage those in power to assume that,
once accepted as valid, the argument can be applied equally well in the future. If that assumption should be
permitted, the chance of saving civilization - perhaps the world itself - from destruction is a remote one.
THE POTSDAM CONFERENCE
Official statement issued after the Potsdam Conference (2nd August, 1945)
In order to eliminate Germany's war potential the production of arms, ammunition and implements of war as well as
all types of aircraft and sea-going ships shall be prohibited and prevented. Production of metals, chemicals,
machinery and other items that are directly necessary to a war economy shall be rigidly controlled and restricted to
Germany's approved post-war peacetime needs to meet the objectives stated in Paragraph 15. Productive capacity
not needed for permitted production shall be removed in accordance with the reparations plan recommended by
the Allied Commission on Reparations and approved by the Governments concerned or if not removed shall be
destroyed.
At the earliest practicable date the German economy shall be decentralized for the purpose of eliminating the
present excessive concentration of economic power as exemplified in particular by cartels, syndicates, trusts and
other monopolistic arrangements.
In organizing the German economy primary emphasis shall be given to the development of agriculture and peaceful
domestic industries.
During the period of occupation Germany shall be treated as a single economic unit.
Walter Monckton, Britain's Solicitor-General, wrote about the Potsdam meeting on 3rd August, 1945.
He (Truman) would come prepared on each subject with a short, firm declaratory statement of US policy, and when
he had said his little piece he did little in subsequent discussion except reaffirm it. Winston was good but patchy. He
was perhaps too ready to indulge in long dissertations which were evidently not to President Truman's taste.
Stalin, on the other hand, spoke quietly, shortly, in little staccato sentences which Pavlov, his young interpreter,
translated immediately into forceful English. In the discussions Stalin was often humorous, never offensive; direct
and uncompromising. His hair was greyer than I expected, and was thinning. His eyes looked to me humorous, and
often showed as mere slits, but he had a trick of looking up when he was thinking or speaking, to the ceiling to the
right, and much of the time he would be pulling at a Russian cigarette.
Konrad Adenauer, Memoirs 1945-53 (12th July, 1952)
The Gradual Growth of Administration in the British Zone. The decision of the Potsdam Conference to treat Germany
as a single economic unit proved impossible to carry out. The victorious powers had made an agreement that
required unanimity by the Control Council for every decision. (The Allied Control Council was the four-power body
set up to decide questions concerning Germany as a whole.) But the four powers were never agreed on their
programme for Germany and the Soviet Union in particular pursued its own policy. At first even the three Western
powers disagreed over policy towards Germany.
The four occupation zones were drifting further and further apart economically and the economic chaos grew from
the spring of 1945 onwards. Germany's economic structure required an exchange of agricultural products from the
East, and to a lesser extent the South of the country, with the industrial production of the Ruhr and of other
industrial regions. This exchange was stopped by the division of the country into four zones. The zonal commanders
acted on the directives of their respective governments and each pursued his own policy in his own zone. This could
only further hinder an economy already largely paralysed by the ravages of war.
THE TRUMAN DOCTRINE
Henry Wallace, speech in New York City (12th September, 1946)
I plead for an America vigorously dedicated to peace - just as I plead for opportunities for the next generation
throughout the world to enjoy the abundance which now, more than ever before, is the birthright of men.
To achieve lasting peace, we must study in detail just how the Russian character was formed - by invasions of
Tarters, Mongols, Germans, Poles, Swedes, and French; by the intervention of the British, French and Americans in
Russian affairs from 1919 to 1921. Add to all this the tremendous emotional power with Marxism and Leninism gives
to the Russian leaders - and then we can realize that we are reckoning with a force which cannot be handled
successfully by a "Get tough with Russia" policy. "Getting tough" never bought anything real and lasting - whether
for schoolyard bullies or businessmen or world powers. The tougher we get, the tougher the Russians will get.
We must not let our Russian policy be guided or influenced by those inside or outside the United States who want
war with Russia.
President Truman, speech to Congress (12th March, 1947)
At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life. The
choice is often not a free one. One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free
institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and
religion, and freedom from political oppression.
The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror
and oppression, a controlled press and radio, fixed elections, and the suppression of personal freedom. I believe that
it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed
minorities or by outside pressures.
Andrei Vyshinsky, Soviet Union spokesman at the United Nations, speech (18th September, 1947)
The so-called Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan are particularly glaring examples of the manner in which the
principles of the United Nations are violated, of the way in which the organization is ignored. This is clearly proved
by the measures taken by the United States Government with regard to Greece and Turkey which ignore and bypass
the United States as well as the measures proposed under the so-called Marshall Plan in Europe.
This policy conflicts sharply with the principles expressed by the General Assembly in its resolution of 11th
December, 1946, which declares that relief supplies to other countries "should at no time be used as a political
weapon". It is becoming more and more evident to everyone that the implementation of the Marshall Plan will mean
placing European countries under the economic and political control of the United States.
The so-called Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan are particularly glaring examples of the way in which the
principles of the United Nations are violated, of the way in which the Organisation is ignored. As is now clear, the
Marshall Plan constitutes in essence merely a variant of the Truman Doctrine adapted to the conditions of postwar
Europe. In bringing forward this plan, the United States Government apparently counted on the cooperation of the
Governments of the United Kingdom and France to confront the European countries in need of relief with the
necessity of renouncing their inalienable right to dispose of their economic resources and to plan their national
economy in their own way. The United States also counted on making all these countries directly dependent on the
interests of American monopolies, which are striving to avert the approaching depression by an accelerated export
of commodities and capital to Europe.
It is becoming more and more evident to everyone that the implementation of the Marshall Plan will mean placing
European countries under the economic and political control of the United States and direct interference by the
latter in the internal affairs of those countries. Moreover, this plan is an attempt to split Europe into two camps and,
with the help of the United Kingdom and France, to complete the formation of a bloc of several European countries
hostile to the interests of the democratic countries of Eastern Europe and most particularly to the interests of the
Soviet Union. An important feature of this Plan is the attempt to confront the - countries of Eastern Europe with a
bloc of Western European States including Western Germany. The intention is to make use of Western Germany and
German heavy industry (the Ruhr) as one of the most important economic bases for American expansion in Europe,
in disregard of the national interests of the countries which suffered from German aggression.
Izvestia, newspaper published in the Soviet Union (13th March, 1947)
Commenting on Truman's message to Congress, the New York Times proclaims the advent of the "age of American
responsibility". Yet what is this responsibility but a smokescreen for expansion? The cry of saving Greece and Turkey
from the expansion of the so-called "totalitarian states" is not new. Hitler used to refer to the Bolsheviks when he
wanted to open the road for his own conquests. Now they want to take Greece and Turkey under their control, they
raise a din about "totalitarian states".
John Foster Dulles, speech (29th March, 1954)
The free nations want peace. However, peace is not had merely by wanting it. Peace has to be worked for and
planned for. Sometimes it is necessary to take risks to win peace just as it necessary in war to take risks to win
victory. The chances for peace are usually bettered by letting a potential aggressor know in advance where his
aggression could lead him.
George Kennan, Foreign Affairs Journal (July, 1957)
It is clear that the main element of any United States policy towards the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term,
patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies. It is clear that the United states cannot
expect in the foreseeable future to enjoy political intimacy with the Soviet regime. It must continue to regard the
Soviet Union as a rival, not a partner, in the political arena.
John Gates, The Story of an American Communist (1959)
Communists shared power with other parties. The Communists called these states "peoples' democracies" to
distinguish them from the Soviet-model "dictatorship of the proletariat" and many Communist parties actually
changed their name. Today when much attention is focused on the question of independent paths to socialism, as
advocated by Tito in Yugoslavia and Gomulka in Poland, it is often overlooked that such ideas were officially
condoned by Moscow between 1944 and 1947.
One year after Churchill's speech at Fulton, however, the lines became sharply drawn. The Truman Doctrine was
launched for Greece and Turkey and to "contain Communism" everywhere; the Communists were ousted from the
national unity governments of France and Italy (which they did not strongly resist, evidently preferring to go into
opposition). In reply, the Communist Parties of the Soviet Union and of eight countries in Eastern and Western
Europe set up the Communist Information Bureau, popularly called the Cominform. Coalition governments in
Eastern Europe were broken up and the Communists proceeded to take over full power and establish "dictatorships
of the proletariat." Against this background, American Communist Party policy became still more narrow and selfdefeating. In opposing the cold war, we placed the entire blame on the Truman policy and we would not concede
that any share in responsibility for the tensions could be attributed to the policies of Moscow and the Cominform. It
is my opinion-which I know many readers will not share-that powerful, reactionary forces here at home were mainly
respon¬sible for the cold war; they did not conceal their opposition to peaceful coexistence and their active hostility
to socialism. What I could not bring myself to see in those days was the considerable responsibility on the part of
Moscow as a result of wrong policies of Stalin (and if I ever saw it, I considered it my bounden duty not to say so).
As policy hardened in the international communist movement, the Foster group increased the pressure to make
everyone toe the mark. The Daily Worker which reflected the coalition policies to which the Dennis group still tried
to cling, was the target of attacks from Foster, Thompson and Davis.
MARSHALL AID
President Truman, speech to Congress (12th March, 1947)
The seeds of totalitarian regimes are nurtured by misery and want. They spread and grow in the evil soil of poverty
and strife. They reach their full potential when the hope of a people for a better life has died. We must keep that
hope alive. If we falter in our leadership, we may endanger the peace of the world - and we shall surely endanger the
welfare of our own nation.
At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life. The
choice is often not a free one. One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free
institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and
religion, and freedom from political oppression.
The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror
and oppression, a controlled press and radio, fixed elections, and the suppression of personal freedom. I believe that
it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed
minorities or by outside pressures.
George Marshall, Secretary of State, speech at Harvard University (5th June, 1947)
It is logical that the United States should do whatever it is able to do to assist in the return of normal economic
health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace. Our policy is directed not
against any country or doctrine but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos. Its purpose should be the
revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which
free institutions can exist.
Andrei Vyshinsky, Soviet Union spokesman at the United Nations, speech (18th September, 1947)
The so-called Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan are particularly glaring examples of the manner in which the
principles of the United Nations are violated, of the way in which the organization is ignored. This is clearly proved
by the measures taken by the United States Government with regard to Greece and Turkey which ignore and bypass
the United States as well as the measures proposed under the so-called Marshall Plan in Europe.
This policy conflicts sharply with the principles expressed by the General Assembly in its resolution of 11th
December, 1946, which declares that relief supplies to other countries "should at no time be used as a political
weapon". It is becoming more and more evident to everyone that the implementation of the Marshall Plan will mean
placing European countries under the economic and political control of the United States.
The so-called Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan are particularly glaring examples of the way in which the
principles of the United Nations are violated, of the way in which the Organisation is ignored. As is now clear, the
Marshall Plan constitutes in essence merely a variant of the Truman Doctrine adapted to the conditions of postwar
Europe. In bringing forward this plan, the United States Government apparently counted on the cooperation of the
Governments of the United Kingdom and France to confront the European countries in need of relief with the
necessity of renouncing their inalienable right to dispose of their economic resources and to plan their national
economy in their own way. The United States also counted on making all these countries directly dependent on the
interests of American monopolies, which are striving to avert the approaching depression by an accelerated export
of commodities and capital to Europe.
It is becoming more and more evident to everyone that the implementation of the Marshall Plan will mean placing
European countries under the economic and political control of the United States and direct interference by the
latter in the internal affairs of those countries. Moreover, this plan is an attempt to split Europe into two camps and,
with the help of the United Kingdom and France, to complete the formation of a bloc of several European countries
hostile to the interests of the democratic countries of Eastern Europe and most particularly to the interests of the
Soviet Union. An important feature of this Plan is the attempt to confront the - countries of Eastern Europe with a
bloc of Western European States including Western Germany. The intention is to make use of Western Germany and
German heavy industry (the Ruhr) as one of the most important economic bases for American expansion in Europe,
in disregard of the national interests of the countries which suffered from German aggression.
Konrad Adenauer, speech in Berne (23rd March, 1949)
It is impossible to understand the present condition of Germany without a brief survey of what happened after 1945.
The unconditional surrender of the German armed forces in May 1945 was interpreted by the Allies to mean a
complete transfer of governmental authority into their hands. This interpretation was wrong from the point of view
of international law. By it the Allies in practice assumed a task which it was impossible for them to fulfil. I consider it
to have been a grave mistake. They would have been unable to solve this task with the best will in the world. There
was bound to be failure and this failure badly affected the prestige of the Allies in Germany. It would have been
wiser if the Allies had, after a short intermediate state due to the confusion left by the war, let the Germans order
their affairs and had confined themselves to supervision. Their attempt to govern this large disorganized country
from outside, often guided by extraneous political and economic criteria of their own, was bound to fail. It brought
about a rapid economic, physical, and psychological disintegration of the Germans which might have been avoided.
It also seems that intentions such as had once been manifested in the Morgenthau Plan played their part. This
continued until the Marshall Plan brought the turning point. The Marshall Plan will remain for all time a glorious
page in the history of the United States of America. But the change was very slow and the economic, physical, moral,
and political decline of Germany which had begun with the unconditional surrender took great efforts to reverse.
George Kennan, Foreign Affairs Journal (July, 1957)
It is clear that the main element of any United States policy towards the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term,
patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies. It is clear that the United states cannot
expect in the foreseeable future to enjoy political intimacy with the Soviet regime. It must continue to regard the
Soviet Union as a rival, not a partner, in the political arena.
Felix Greene, The Enemy (1965)
Marshall Plan aid, essentially intended to keep the post-war economies of the West Europe countries within the
capitalist world, was also intended to dominate their economy. Every transaction was arranged to provide not only
immediate profits for specific US banks, finance corporations, investment trusts and industries, but to make the
European nations dependent on the United States.
NATO
The North Atlantic Treaty (4th April, 1949)
The Parties to this Treaty reaffirm their faith in the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and
their desire to live in peace with all peoples and all governments. They are determined to safeguard the freedom,
common heritage and civilisation of their peoples, founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the
rule of law.
They seek to promote stability and well-being in the North Atlantic area.
They are resolved to unite their efforts for collective defence and for the preservation of peace and security.
They therefore agree to this North Atlantic Treaty:
Article 1: The Parties undertake, as set forth in the Charter of the United Nations, to settle any international dispute
in which they may be involved by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security and justice
are not endangered, and to refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner
inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations.
Article 2: The Parties will contribute towards the further development of peaceful and friendly international relations
by strengthening their free institutions, by bringing about a better understanding of the principles upon which these
institutions are founded, and by promoting conditions of stability and well-being. They will seek to eliminate conflict
in their international economic policies and will encourage economic collaboration between any or all of them.
Article 3: In order more effectively to achieve the objectives of this Treaty, the Parties, separately and jointly, by
means of continuous and effective self-help and mutual aid, will maintain and develop their individual and collective
capacity to resist armed attack.
Article 4: The Parties will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any one of them, the territorial integrity,
political independence or security of any of the Parties is threatened.
Article 5: The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be
considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of
them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the
United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the
other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the
security of the North Atlantic area. Any such armed attack and all measures taken as a result thereof shall
immediately be reported to the Security Council. Such measures shall be terminated when the Security Council has
taken the measures necessary to restore and maintain international peace and security.
Article 6: For the purpose of Article 5 an armed attack on one or more of the Parties is deemed to include an armed
attack on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America ... on the occupation forces of any Party in
Europe, on the islands under the jurisdiction of any Party in the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer or
on the vessels or aircraft in this area of any of the Parties.
Willy Brandt, A Peace Policy for Europe (1968)
The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is first and foremost an effective defence alliance. It prevents potential
opponents from being tempted to exert political pressure on any one of the allies through military force. But
constant effort is required to maintain this defensive strength in the face of constantly advancing technical
development. We realise that the commitment in Europe is a great burden on the United States.... I am afraid that
the time for any significant lightening of the United States' burden has not yet come.
NATO and a policy of détente are not mutually exclusive. On the contrary, the existence of NATO - that is, its political
weight and its readiness to defend our territory against all attacks - has shown that a policy of tensions and crises is
of no avail. The weakening of NATO would reduce the possibility of a détente and lessen its effectiveness. The
military deterrent has ensured the peace of Europe.... Military security and détente do not contradict, but
supplement each other. Without the firm support of the alliance we cannot carry on any policy of détente. Similarly
the political objective of the alliance will not be realised without an East-West détente.
DOMINO THEORY
Konrad Adenauer, Memoirs 1945-53 (12th July, 1952)
I had become more and more firmly convinced that Stalin had always intended to get hold of West Germany with as
little destruction as possible. His policy of the first post-war years had not brought the result he wished, but I was
convinced that the Soviet Union had not given it up. If Stalin were to succeed in gaining control in the Federal
Republic without too much destruction, he would then be able to exercise a decisive influence on France and Italy,
countries whose political order was not very firm and where there were strong communist parties. Soviet dominance
in the Federal Republic, France, and Italy would make Soviet Russia into the strongest economic, military, and
political power on earth. It would mean the victory of communism in the world, including the United States. My
policy has always been informed by the conviction that this is the goal of Soviet Russia.
If Russia should succeed in including Western Germany in the Soviet system, it would mean such an access of
economic and war potential that Russia would gain a preponderance over the United States. Russia would certainly
respect the American atomic striking force until she herself possessed enough atom bombs. In January 1949 the
Soviets had for the first time succeeded in exploding an atom bomb. Soviet Russia would probably refrain from an
attack until a balance had been reached in atomic production. Then, however, it might happen that neither Russia
nor the United States would use that weapon, as was the case with poison gas which both sides in the last war
possessed in equal measure so that both sides were careful not to use it. Once an atomic balance had been reached,
land armies and air forces might become the decisive factors.
Vice-president Richard Nixon, speech, (December, 1953)
If Indochina falls, Thailand is put in an almost impossible position. The same is true of Malaya with its rubber and tin.
The same is true of Indonesia. If this whole part of South East Asia goes under Communist domination or Communist
influence, Japan, who trades and must trade with this area in order to exist must inevitably be oriented towards the
Communist regime.
H. W. Baldwin, New York Times Magazine, (February 21,1965)
Vietnam is a nasty place to fight. But there are no neat and tidy battlefields in the struggle for freedom; there is no
'good' place to die. And it is far better to fight in Vietnam - on China's doorstep - than fight some years hence in
Hawaii, on our own frontiers.
Professor George Kahin, speech (15th May, 1965)
Those who still are impressed by the simplistic domino theory must realize that non-communist governments of
Southeast Asia will not automatically collapse if the Communists should come to control all of Vietnam. So long as
Southeast Asian governments are in harmony with their nations' nationalism, so long as they are wise enough to
meet the most pressing economic and social demands of their people, they are not likely to succumb to
Communism.
Theodore Draper, Abuse of Power (1967)
The Latin American dominoes did not fall after Castro's victory (in Cuba) because the world is far more complex and
unpredictable than the theory gives it credit for being. Castro's growing force immediately set in motion
counterforces throughout Latin America, not sponsored by the United States alone, which was most ineffective, but
in the domestic policies of each Latin American country... The Cuban experience does not prove that the Latin
American dominoes could not have fallen; it merely proves that Castro's victory by itself was not enough for them to
fall.
President John F. Kennedy, interview (1963)
I believe there is no country in the world . . . where economic colonisation, humiliation and exploitation were worse
than in Cuba, partly as a consequence of U.S. policy during the Batista regime. I believe that, without being aware of
it, we conceived and created the Castro movement, starting from scratch. I also believe that this accumulation of
errors has put all Latin America in danger. The whole purpose of the 'Alliance for Progress' (an economic aid
programme for Latin America) is to reverse this fatal policy.
COMINTERN
Walter Krivitsky, I Was Stalin's Agent (1939)
For many years, while revolutionary prospects there seemed promising, the Comintern poured the greater part of its
money into Germany and Central Europe. But when it became more decisively an appendage of the Soviet
Government, and revolutionary objectives were side-tracked in favour of Stalinizing public opinion and capturing key
positions in the democratic governments, Moscow's budgets for France, Great Britain and the United States were
enormously increased.
John Gates, The Story of an American Communist (1959)
The Cominform described the world as divided into two sharply drawn camps, the camp of imperialism and war
headed by the United States, and the camp of socialism and peace, headed by the Soviet Union; all trends of
neutralism toward these two camps were roundly condemned. The concept of independent roads to socialism which
had flourished briefly was now denounced; the similarity of the new Communist countries and the Soviet Union was
emphasized now, and all Communist countries were called on to follow the Soviet pattern in every aspect of life with
disastrous consequences to their economies and liberties.
Whoever resisted these new policies was now ruthlessly purged. The Yugoslav Communists, standing up against all
pressures, were expelled from the Cominform in July 1948 and excommunicated from world communism, and Tito's
government denounced as pro-capitalist, even fascist. This in turn set the stage for vast new purges. Since Tito was
the worst of all possible enemies, anyone associated with him or with his ideas of an independent, national
development of socialism was considered an imperialist spy deserving to be eliminated. In frame-up trials (which I
did not then view as frame-ups and fully endorsed), Slansky, Rajk, Kostov and others were executed, while Gomulka,
Kadar and many more were removed in disgrace and thrown into prison.
THE BERLIN AIRLIFT
Willy Brandt interviewed by Terence Prittle (1974)
It would not be fair to be over-critical, particularly when such a fine rescue operation for Berlin was mounted by the
Western Powers. Maybe there were delays.... I would prefer to stress the positive aspects of the Blockade. First, it
was a heroic episode in which the Allied pilots and the Berliners played the main roles. Then it brought about a
feeling of real co-operation between the Berliners and the Allies. Those were grey, grim days; but our people showed
their steadfastness, their courage, their dry humour and their basic decency.
THE KOREAN WAR
Marguerite Higgins, New York Tribune (18th September, 1950)
Heavily laden U.S. Marines, is one of the most technically difficult amphibious landings in history, stormed at sunset
today over a ten-foot sea wall in the heart of the port of Inchon and within an hour had taken three commanding
hills in the city.
I was in the fifth wave that hit "Red Beach," which in reality was a rough, vertical pile of stones over which the first
assault troops had to scramble with the aid of improvised landing ladders topped with steel hooks.
Despite a deadly and steady pounding from naval guns and airplanes, enough North Koreans remained alive close to
the beach to harass us with small-arms and mortar fire. They even hurled hand grenades down at us as we crouched
in trenches, which unfortunately ran behind the sea wall in the inland side.
It was far from the "virtually unopposed" landing for which the troops had hoped after hearing of the quick capture
of Wolmi Island in the morning by an earlier Marine assault. Wolmi is inside Inchon harbor and just off "Red Beach."
At H-hour minus seventy, confident, joking Marines started climbing down from the transport ship on cargo nest and
dropping into small assault boats. Our wave commander. Lieutenant R. J. Schening, a veteran of five amphibious
assaults, including Guadalcanal, hailed me with the comment, "This has a good chance of being a pushover."
Because of tricky tides, our transport had to stand down the channel and it was more than nine miles to the
rendezvous point where our assault waves formed up.
The channel reverberated with the ear-splitting boom of warship guns and rockets. Blue and orange flames spurted
from the "Red Beach" area and a huge oil tank, on fire, sent great black rings of smoke over the shore. Then the fire
from the big guns lifted and the planes that had been circling overhead swooped low to rake their fire deep into the
sea wall.
The first wave of our assault troops was speeding toward the shore by now. It would be H-hour (5:30 P.M.) in two
minutes. Suddenly, bright-orange tracer bullets spun out from the hill in our direction.
"My God! There are still some left," Lieutenant Schening said. "Everybody get down. Here we go!"
It was H-hour plus fifteen minutes as we sped the last two thousand yards to the beach. About halfway there the
bright tracers started cutting across the top of our little boat. "Look at their faces now," said John Davies of the
Newark News. I turned and saw that the men around me had expressions contorted with anxiety.
We struck the sea wall hard at a place where it had crumbled into a canyon. The bullets were whining persistently,
spattering the water around us. We clambered over the high steel sides of the boat, dropping into the water and,
taking shelter beside the boat as long as we could, snaked on our stomachs up into a rock-strewn dip in the sea wall.
In the sky there was good news. A bright, white star shell from the high ground to our left and an amber cluster told
us that the first wave had taken their initial objective, Observatory Hill. But whatever the luck of the first four waves,
we were relentlessly pinned down by rifle and automatic-weapon fire coming down on us from another rise on the
right.
There were some thirty Marines and two correspondents crouched in the gouged-out sea wall. Then another assault
boat swept up, disgorging about thirty more Marines. This went on for two more waves until our hole was filled and
Marines lying on their stomachs were strung out all across the top of the sea wall.
Relman Morin, Associated Press (25th September, 1950)
Long after the last shot is fired fired, the weeds of hatred will be flourishing in Korea, nourished by blood and bitter
memories.
This is the heritage of the short weeks during which most of South Korea was learning Communism.
Only weeks ago in the region around Seoul and Inchon, people were being killed, dispossessed of land and homes,
left to starve, or driven away from all they held dear - because they were not Communists and refused to act like
Communists.
Today, in that same region, the same things are still happening - because some Koreans are Communists and
propose to remain so.
Hidden in the hills a mile off the road to Seoul, there is a village of twenty-four mud-stone huts with thatched roofs.
The
people raise rice and corn. Once they had a few cattle. There were no rich here and, by Koreans standards, no poor
either.
Even before the North Korean military invasion last June, nine of the men in the village were Communists. The
headman didn't know why. He simply said they belonged to a Red organization, and frequently went to meetings
in Inchon at night. They talked of the division of land and goods.
"It made trouble," the headman told an American intelligence officer through an interpreter. She says the lectures
talked about life in Russia, how things are done there, and how good everything is. She says it was convincing, and
people believed what they heard. "But she is not a Communist. She went because she was hungry."
As a result, the headman said, some of the other villages banded together and beat the Communists. "There was
always trouble and fighting," said the headman, "and we talked of driving the Reds away."
Then the North Korean army swept southward over this little village. The nine Communists suddenly appeared in
uniforms. They killed some of their neighbors and caused others to be put in jail at Inchon. The headman himself fled
to safety in the south. One of the villagers went with him.
"He did not want to go," said the headman. "He was to be married. The girl stayed here. She is 18 and a grown
woman, but she did not know what to do."
Back in the village the nine Communists began putting theory into practice. First they confiscated all land. Then they
summoned landless tenant farmers from nearby villages and told them the land would be given to them if they
became Communists.
Keyes Beech, Chicago Daily News (11th December, 1950)
"Remember," drawled Colonel Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller, "whatever you write, that this was no retreat. All that
happened was we found more Chinese behind us than in front of us. So we about-faced and attacked."
I said "so long" to Puller after three snowbound days with the 1st Marine Division, 4,000 feet above sea level in the
sub-zero weather of Changjin Reservoir. I climbed aboard a waiting C-47 at Koto Airstrip and looked around.
Sixteen shivering Marine casualties - noses and eyes dripping from cold - huddled in their bucket seats. They were
the
last of more than 2,500 Marine casualties to be evacuated by the U.S. Air Force under conditions considered flatly
impossible. Whatever this campaign was - retreat, withdrawal, or defeat - one thing can be said with certainty. Not
in the Marine Corps' long and bloody history has there been anything like it. And if you'll pardon a personal
recollection, not at Tarawa or Iwo Jima, where casualties were much greater, did I see men suffer as much.
The wonder isn't that they fought their way out against overwhelming odds but that they were able to survive the
cold and fight at all. So far as the Marines themselves are concerned, they ask that two things be recorded:
1. They didn't break. They came out of Changjin Reservoir as an organized unit with most of their equipment.
2. They brought out all their wounded. They brought out many of their dead. And most of those they didn't bring out
they buried.
It was not always easy to separate dead from wounded among the frozen figures that lay strapped to radiators of
jeeps and trucks. I know because I watched them come in from Yudam to Hagaru, 18 miles of icy hell, five days ago.
That same day I stood in the darkened corner of a wind-whipped tent and listened to a Marine officer brief his men
for the march to Koto the following day. I have known him for a long time but in the semidarkness, with my face
half-covered by my parka, he didn't recognize me. When he did the meeting broke up. When we were alone, he
cried. After that he was all right.
I hope he won't mind my reporting he cried, because he's a very large Marine and a very tough guy.
He cried because he had to have some sort of emotional release; because all his men were heroes and wonderful
people; because the next day he was going to have to submit them to another phase in the trial by blood and ice.
Besides, he wasn't the only one who cried.
In the Marines' twelve-day, forty-mile trek from Yudam to the "bottom of the hill," strange and terrible things
happened.
Thousands of Chinese troops - the Marines identified at least six divisions totaling 60,000 men - boiled from every
canyon and rained fire from every ridge. Sometimes they came close enough to throw grenades into trucks, jeeps,
and
ambulances.
Marguerite Higgins, War in Korea (1951)
I met the Eighth Army commander. Lieutenant General Walton H. Walker, for the first time when I returned to the
front in mid-July after MacArthur had lifted the ban on women correspondents in Korea. General Walker was a
short, stubby man of bulldog expression and defiant stance. I wondered if he were trying to imitate the late General
George Patton, under whom he served in World War II as a corps commander.
General Walker was very correct and absolutely frank with me. He said he still felt that the front was no place for a
woman, but that orders were orders and that from now on I could be assured of absolutely equal treatment.
"If something had happened to you, an American woman," the general explained, "I would have gotten a terrible
press. The American public might never have forgiven me. So please be careful and don't get yourself killed or
captured."
General Walker kept his promise of equal treatment, and from then on, so far as the United States Army was
concerned, I went about my job with no more hindrance than the men.
Adlai Stevenson, speech, Louiseville (27th September, 1952)
Last Monday General Eisenhower spoke in Cincinnati about Korea. He said that this was a "solemn subject" and that
he was going to state the truth as he knew it, "the truth - plain and unvarnished."
If only his speech had measured up to this introduction! And since he has tried, not once but several times, to make
a vote-getting issue out of our ordeal in Korea, I shall speak on this subject and address myself to the record.
We are fighting in Korea, the General declares, because the American Government grossly underestimated the
Soviet threat; because the Government allowed America to become weak; because American weakness compelled
us to withdraw our forces from Korea; because we abandoned China to the communists; and, finally, because we
announced to all the world that we had written off most of the. Far East.
That's what he says - now let's look at the record.
First, the General accuses the Government of having underestimated the Soviet threat. But what about the General
himself? At the end of the war he was a professional soldier of great influence and prestige, to whom the American
people listened with respect. What did he have to say about the Soviet threat? In the years after the war, the
General himself saw "no reason" - as he later wrote - why the Russian system of government and Western
democracy "could not live side by side in the world." In November, 1945, he even told the House Military Affairs
Committee: "Nothing guides Russian policy so much as a desire for friendship with the United States."
I have no wish to blow any trumpets here. But in March, 1946, I said: "We must forsake any hope that the Soviet
Union is going to lie still and lick her awful wounds. She's not. Peace treaties that reflect her legitimate demands,
friendly governments on her frontiers and an effective United Nations Organization should be sufficient security. But
evidently they are not and she intends to advance her aims, many of them objectives of the Czars, to the utmost."
Douglas MacArthur wrote about the arrival of General Matthew Ridgway in his autobiography, Reminiscences
(1964)
On December 23rd, General Walker was killed in a freak jeep accident. It was a great personal loss to me. It had been
"Johnny" Walker who had held the line, with courage and brilliant generalship, at the very bottom of Korea, until we
could save him by slicing behind the enemy's lines at Inchon. It had been Walker who, even in the darkest hours, had
always radiated cheerful confidence and rugged determination.
It was a difficult time to change field commanders, but I acquired one of the best in General Matthew Ridgway. An
experienced leader with aggressive and fighting qualities, he took command of the Eighth Army at its position near
the 38th parallel. After inspecting his new command, he felt he could repulse any enemy attempt to dislodge it. On
New Year's Day, however, the Reds launched a general offensive in tremendous force, making penetrations of up to
12 miles. It forced the Eighth Army into further withdrawal. By January 4th, the enemy had recaptured Seoul, and by
January 7th, the Eighth Army had retired to new positions roughly 70 miles south of the 38th parallel.
Marguerite Higgins, War in Korea (1951)
Despite large-scale reinforcements, our troops were still falling back fast. Our lines made a large semicircle around
the city of Taegu. The main pressure at that time was from the northwest down the Taejon-Taegu road. But a new
menace was developing with frightening rapidity way to the southwest. For the Reds, making a huge arc around our
outnumbered troops, were sending spearheads to the south coast of Korea hundreds of miles to our rear. They
hoped to strike along the coast at Pusan, the vital port through which most of our supplies funneled.
It was at this time that General Walker issued his famous "stand or die" order. The 1st Cavalry 25th Division were
freshly arrived. Like 24th Division before them, the new outfits had to learn for themselves how to cope with this
Indian-style warfare for which they were so unprepared. Their soldiers were not yet battle-toughened. Taking into
account the overwhelming odds, some front-line generals worried about the performance of their men and told us
so privately.
In an article in Newsday on 28th July, 1993, Murray Kempton suggests that General Matthew Ridgway helped to
control the actions of Douglas MacArthur in Korea.
In his autobiography, Ridgway recalls a 1950 meeting where the Joint Chiefs of Staff wondered what they could do to
restrain General Douglas MacArthur from his head-over-heels plunge toward the Chinese border and disaster in
Korea. The chiefs could already look at the map and recognize that MacArthur had arrayed his troops as for a
parade, divided their columns and left between them the mountain where enemies could assemble in peace and
await the securest chance for war. The chiefs had passed the hours helplessly struggling between their awe of a
commander who had been riding with the Cavalry when they were in rompers and their awareness of his terminal
folly.
Ridgway was then only deputy Chief of Staff and forbidden to speak up in the company of his superiors. Crisis
compelled him to break the laws of silence at last. "We owe it to ourselves," he said, to call MacArthur to halt; and it
must be done now because even tomorrow could be too late. The chiefs sustained the shock of this breach of Old
Army custom and continued to sit inert until what they knew might happen did and all too soon.
After the meeting, Air Force Chief of Staff Hoyt Vandenberg congratulated him for his courage. His answer was not
thanks for the compliment but renewed urgings that MacArthur be curbed. "Oh, what's the use," Vandenberg
replied. "He won't listen." And, thereafter of course, it would be for Ridgway to restore the ruin of the Korean
campaign.
Marguerite Higgins, War in Korea (1951)
A reconnaissance officer came to the improvised command post and reported that the soldiers landing on the coast
were not a new enemy force to overwhelm us, but South Korean allies.
On the hill, soldiers were silencing some of the enemy fire. It was now seven forty-five. It did not seem possible that
so much could have happened since the enemy had struck three quarters of an hour before.
As the intensity of fire slackened slightly, soldiers started bringing in the wounded from the hills, carrying them on
their backs. I walked over to the aid station. The mortars had been set up right next to the medic's end of the
schoolhouse. The guns provided a nerve-racking accompaniment for the doctors and first-aid men as they ministered
to the wounded. Bullets were still striking this end of the building, and both doctors and wounded had to keep low
to avoid being hit. Because of the sudden rush of casualties, all hands were frantically busy.
One medic was running short of plasma but did not dare leave his patients long enough to try to round up some
more. I offered to administer the remaining plasma and passed about an hour there, helping out as best I could.
My most vivid memory of the hour is Captain Logan Weston limping into the station with a wound in his leg. He was
patched up and promptly turned around and headed for the hills again. Half an hour later he was back with bullets in
his shoulder and chest. Sitting on the floor smoking a cigarette, the captain calmly remarked, "I guess I'd better get a
shot of morphine now. These last two are beginning to hurt."
Tom Hopkinson, the editor of Picture Post lost his job after publishing a story on the Korean War. He wrote about
the controversy in his book Of This Our Time (1982)
During their time in Korea Hardy and Cameron made three picture stories, the most dramatic of these being the
record of General MacArthur's landing at Inchon, the port of Seoul. Seoul was not only the capital of Korea but the
key centre of
communications for the invading armies - North Koreans backed by Chinese - now operating far down to the south
after
driving the South Koreans and their allies into what Cameron called "the toehold enclave of Pusan". The Inchon
landing effectively cut the legs from under the attackers, dramatically reversing the whole military situation. This
was the second most powerful seaborne invasion ever launched - only that against Normandy five years earlier
having been bigger - and our two men were the only British photo-journalists present.
The Inchon landing was not the only story our two men had sent back, and one of the others posed a problem. Text
and photographs showed vividly how the South Koreans, with at least the connivance of their American allies, were
treating their political prisoners, suspected opponents of the tyrant Synghman Rhee. Rhee himself would in due
course be ditched as the insupportable head of an intolerable regime by the American protectors who had kept him
in power for so long; but that was still ten years on into the future, and in the meantime Rhee and his henchmen
were our gallant allies and the upholders of our Christian democratic way of life. By the 1980s we have all seen
treatment of prisoners more openly murderous than that revealed in Hardy's pictures, and Cameron's accompanying
article would today be accounted mild. But in the climate of that time, with British and Australian troops involved in
the fighting, any criticism of South Koreans was certain to be regarded as criticism of 'our' side. Such criticism,
moreover, being anti-Western, must inevitably be 'pro-Eastern', and hence - with only a small distortion of language
- 'Communist propaganda', a crime of which I was already being accused by my employer.
John Hightower, Associated Press (26th March, 1951)
The dispute that rages between General Douglas MacArthur and the Truman administration over how to win the
Korean war has reached fever heat again. The administration may shortly ask the general to clear with broad foreign
policy issues.
This may or may not prove acceptable to MacArthur, but State Department officials as well as some others with
great influence at the White House privately say something must be done to prevent a repetition of last week's
exchange of shocks and harsh words between Tokyo and Washington.
President Truman circulated last December a firm, government-wide directive declaring that any statement on
foreign policy by any official or employee of the government in a speech, article or other public utterance, should be
cleared with the State Department. Informants said today that order was called to MacArthur's attention at that
time.
Friday night, Washington time, MacArthur left Tokyo for the Thirty-eighth Parallel area of Korea to order United
Nations forces to cross into North Korea as tactical requirements made necessary. Before leaving Tokyo he issued a
statement to the press.
In this statement he made a bid for peace talks with his opposite number on the Communist side, said the Chinese
Reds were licked and incapable of waging modem war and warned that if the United Nations launched attacks on
Chinese bases and coastal area the Red nation would probably suffer military collapse.
This statement, a check showed, caught the State Department completely unawares. It apparently also caught
President Truman without advance notice. After several hours of parleying, including a talk between Secretary of
State Acheson and Mr. Truman, a rather meaningless statement was issued, designed to say on Saturday that
Washington had nothing to do with what MacArthur had declared Friday night.
The statements said MacArthur had authority to conduct military operations but that political issues which "he has
stated are beyond his responsibilities are being dealt with in the U.N. and by the governments having troops in
Korea."
The key MacArthur clause which set off the alarm here was that the United Nations could probably succeed in
forcing a military collapse of Red China by a limited coastal attack and base-bombing war. A Tokyo dispatch
yesterday suggested MacArthur probably was trying to divert the Chinese Reds' attention from Korea to the danger
of a coastal attack.
Whatever his objective, any statement he makes - even mingled in with "ifs" - about extending the war in the Far
East always sends huge shudders among the Canadian, French, British and other friendly governments. When the
Europeans come in to the State Department wanting to know "what does MacArthur propose to do," Acheson and
his aides get upset about the problems of holding together the political side of the coalition of which MacArthur is
military commander.
PRESIDENT JOHN F KENNEDY
In his autobiography Nikita Khrushchev describes his first meeting with John F. Kennedy after he had beaten
Richard Nixon to became president of the United States.
I was impressed with Kennedy. I remember liking his face, which was sometimes stern but which often broke into a
good-natured smile. As for Nixon... he was an unprincipled puppet, which is the most dangerous kind. I was very glad
Kennedy won the election... I joked with him that we had cast the deciding ballot in his election to the Presidency
over that son-of-a-bitch Richard Nixon. When he asked me what I meant, I explained that by waiting to release the
U-2 pilot Gary Powers until after the American election, we kept Nixon from being able to claim that he could deal
with the Russians; our ploy made a difference of at least half a million votes, which gave Kennedy the edge he
needed.
James Reston, a journalist on the New York Times newspaper, travelled to Vienna with President Kennedy when
he met Khrushchev for the first time He commented on this meeting three years later in an article for his
newspaper.
Khrushchev had studied the events of the Bay of Pigs; he would have understood if Kennedy had left Castro alone or
destroyed him but when Kennedy was rash enough to strike at Cuba but not bold enough to finish the job,
Khrushchev decided he was dealing with an inexperienced young leader who could be intimidated and blackmailed.
Theodore Sorensen was a friend and speechwriter for John F. Kennedy. He was with Kennedy in Vienna and later
wrote about the meeting between these two men.
Neither Kennedy nor Khrushchev emerged victorious or defeated cheerful or shaken. Each had probed the other for
weakness and found none. Khrushchev had not been swayed by Kennedy's reason and charm. Kennedy had not
been panicked by Khrushchev's tough talk.
Elie Abel's book, The Missiles of October: The Story of the Cuban Missile Crisis, was published In 1966. In the book
Abel comments on John Kennedy's meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna.
There is reason to believe that Khrushchev took Kennedy's measure at their Vienna meeting in June 1961, and
decided this was a young man who would shrink from hard decisions... There is no evidence to support the belief
that Khrushchev ever questioned America's power. He questioned only the President's readiness to use it. As he
once told Robert Frost, he came to believe that Americans are "too liberal to fight.'
Jack Anderson, speech at the University of Utah (22nd September, 1999)
John F. Kennedy called the best brains he could assemble. He gathered them from as far away as Moscow. Every
embassador that served in Moscow that was still alive was present. The brightest people that understood the Soviet
Union were present. They met every day for three weeks. They became so cozy that President Kennedy began calling
them his crisis club. His crisis club. And they warned. They said, "Mr. President, don't back Khrushchev in to a corner.
He is an impulsive man. He is an impulsive man. You remember when he took a shoe off at the United Nations and
banged on a desk. He might very well push a button that will send missiles toward the United States. Don't back him
in to a corner. Give him room to maneuver." That was their advice.
John F. Kennedy did not take it. He decided, he went before the crisis club after about three weeks and he said,
"Gentlemen, I have decided on a boycott. We are going to have to stop any more missiles from going in to Cuba, and
we are going to call upon the Soviet Union to withdraw the missiles that they have already planted there." One in
the crisis club said, "Mr. President, what you are describing is an act of war. Are you prepared to wage war with the
Soviet Union?" The president said, "We'll make it as easy as we can on the Soviets. We'll offer to take our missiles
back from Turkey and Greece. They are worn, useless missiles that we were going to take back anyway, but on the
world's stage, it may give them, save them some loss of faith. So we will offer to take back our missiles from Turkey
and Greece, but we will insist that they remove their missiles from Cuba, and if they don't, we will have to stop
them."
One of the members of this group said, "Mr. President, what if they don't stop? What if the Soviets turn you down,
and continue sending missiles to Cuba, and you order them to stop, and what if they don't stop?" The president said,
"We will follow the procedures of the sea. We will fire a warning shot across the bow, and if they don't stop then, we
will attack." One of the members said, "Mr. President, what if the situation were reversed? What if the Soviets tried
to stop our ships on the high seas and maybe even fired a warning shot. What would you do?" Jack Kennedy thought
that over a bit. "Well," he said, "it would depend on the circumstances, of course, but most likely I would have to
take military action." And this man said, "And what makes you think the Soviets won't do the same?" Now there
were a lot of Monday morning statesman afterward that said they knew that the Soviets would back down. I am
here to report to you, because I had sources in that meeting, in those meetings. They told me exactly what was said.
President Kennedy said, "I don' t know what the Soviets will do."
Walter Trohan wrote about the Cuban Missile Crisis in the New York Tribune in November 1962.
For the first time in twenty years Americans can carry their head high because the president of the United States had
stood up to the premier of Russia and made him back down.
Mario Lazo, a Cuban lawyer was a supporter of the Batista regime that was overthrown by Castro. After the Cuban
revolution he fled to the United States. In 1968 he wrote a book called Dagger in the Heart: American Failures in
Cubas.
The accounts of the crisis did not make clear that it was a power confrontation, that the power of the USA was
incomparably superior to that of the USSR, and that the leaders of both nations knew this to be a fact. The United
States, it is worth repeating, could have erased every important Soviet military installation and population centre in
two or three hours while the strike capability of the USSR was negligible. Although Kennedy held the trump cards, he
granted the Communist Empire a privileged sanctuary in the Caribbean by means of the "no invasion" pledge.
George Brown, In My Way (1970)
Jack Kennedy was one of the two Presidents of the United States whom it has been my privilege to know well. I came
to love and admire him in the sense that I did Gaitskell. He was generous, very warm-hearted and a great
humanitarian. As I came to know him better, I got to feel less and less that he was a doer. A thinker, a man of
imagination, a man of inspiration, a man of feeling - yes. But even though I be in a minority, here again I think he was
not what I regard as a great doer. I know that in writing this I shall be reminded of Cuba, where Kennedy seemed to
act with the utmost decisiveness. Yet I have a nagging feeling that Cuba was in a way a decision made for him. But he
charmed Khrushchev as he charmed me and as he charmed everybody else. All I can say here is that there has been
no politician, Gaitskell apart, in whose presence I have felt more fascinated, charmed and excited about the
possibilities of power.
Robert S. McNamara interviewed on CNN in June 1996.
The domino theory... was the primary factor motivating the actions of both the Kennedy and the Johnson
administrations, without any qualification. It was put forward by President Eisenhower in 1954, very succinctly: If the
West loses control of Vietnam, the security of the West will be in danger. "The dominoes will fall," in Eisenhower's
words. In a meeting between President Kennedy and President Eisenhower, on January 19, 1961 - the day before
President Kennedy's inauguration - the only foreign policy issue fully discussed dealt with Southeast Asia. And there's
even today some question as to exactly what Eisenhower said, but it's very clear that a minimum he said... that if
necessary, to prevent the loss of Laos, and by implication Vietnam, Eisenhower would be prepared for the U.S. to act
unilaterally - to intervene militarily.
And I think that this was fully accepted by President Kennedy and by those of us associated with him. And it was fully
accepted by President Johnson when he succeeded as President. The loss of Vietnam would trigger the loss of
Southeast Asia, and conceivably even the loss of India, and would strengthen the Chinese and the Soviet position
across the world, weakening the security of Western Europe and weakening the security of North America. This was
the way we viewed it; I'm not arguing (we viewed it) correctly - don't misunderstand me - but that is the way we
viewed it. ...
There were three groups of individuals among his advisers. One group believed that the situation (in South Vietnam)
was moving so well that we could make a statement that we'd begin withdrawals and complete them by the end of
1965. Another group believed that the situation wasn't moving that well, but that our mission was solely training and
logistics; we'd been there long enough to complete the training, if the South Vietnamese were capable of absorbing
it, and if we hadn't proven successful, it's because we were incapable of accomplishing that mission and therefore
we were justified in beginning withdrawal. The third group believed we hadn't reached the point where we were
justified in withdrawing, and we shouldn't withdraw.
Kennedy listened to the debate, and finally sided with those who believed that either we had succeeded, or were
succeeding, and therefore could begin our withdrawal; or alternatively we hadn't succeeded, but that ... we'd been
there long enough to test our ability to succeed, and if we weren't succeeding we should begin the withdrawal
because it was impossible to accomplish that mission. In any event, he made the decision (to begin withdrawing
advisers) that day, and he did announce it. It was highly contested...
Kennedy hadn't said before he died whether, faced with the loss of Vietnam, he would (completely) withdraw; but I
believe today that had he faced that choice, he would have withdrawn rather than substitute US combat troops for
Vietnamese forces to save South Vietnam. I think he would have concluded that US combat troops could not save
Vietnam if Vietnam troops couldn't save it. That was the statement he in effect made publicly before his death, but
at that time he hadn't had to choose between losing Vietnam, on the one hand, or putting in US combat troops on
the other. Had he faced the decision, I think he would have accepted the loss of Vietnam and refused to put in US
combat troops.
Kenneth O'Donnell, Memories of John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1983)
Kennedy had told (Kenneth O'Donnell) in the spring of 1963 that he could not pull out of Vietnam until he was
reelected, "So we had better make damned sure I am reelected." ... At a White House reception on Christmas eve, a
month after he succeeded to the presidency, Lyndon Johnson told the Joint Chiefs: "Just get me elected, and then
you can have your war."
I. F. Stone, a journalist, wrote an article on Kennedy after he was assassinated in 1963.
What if the Russians had refused to back down and remove their missiles from Cuba? What if they had called our
bluff and war had begun, and escalated? How would the historians of mankind, if a fragment survived, have
regarded the events of October?... Since this is the kind of bluff that can easily be played once too often, and that his
successors may feel urged to imitate, it would be well to think it over carefully before canonizing Kennedy as an
apostle of peace.
Douglas Horne, JFK Forum (23rd July, 2004)
In spite of having lead a rather reckless personal life of apparent sexual excess - something I do not care about
personally one way or the other - JFK's popularity continues to grow. I think this is for substantial, not insubstantial,
reasons.
It is now apparent, with the release of many classified documents, the writing of many memoirs, and the release of
many secret office recordings, that JFK was a real skeptic about the use of military force in combat, and that
although he believed in a very strong military readiness posture for the United States, and took his Cold War
responsibilities extremely seriously, he repeatedly used military force, or rather was prepared to use it, only as a last
resort, if all other options had been exhausted. For example:
(1) He refused to bail out the failed CIA Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba with U.S. troops, as the JCS desired him to do;
(2) He ultimately refused to either bomb or invade Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He made all preparations to
do so, and made sure the USSR saw these preparations, and used this impending readiness as a powerful diplomatic
tool to leverage Kruschev, but his daily strategy during this crisis was to continue to prepare for military action, while
daily stalling the hawks who demanded the use of military force. In doing so he probably prevented a nuclear war,
for we now know that the Russian rocket forces in Cuba had permission to use tactical nuclear weapons (launched
by FROG missiles) against any US invasion forces, WITHOUT the advance permission of Moscow. As Robert
McNamara said in 1992, if thousands of US sailors and Marines and Army troops had been "fried" invading Cuba, it
would have demanded a retaliatory response by JFK and the nuclear war with the USSR would then have probably
been unstoppable, escalating day-by-day into a true Armageddon. Ted Sorenson, who knew JFK's political instincts
better than anyone else, has said that even though the Cuban invasion was "imminent" at the time Kruschev
capitulated and agreed to remove the missiles, he was confident JFK would have found ways and means to stall the
hawks in the USG and delay, or forestall, an invasion on a day-by-day basis, even though it was theoretically
approved for Tuesday (I think), 2 days after Kruschev capitulated.
(3) JFK clearly was intent on withdrawing form Vietnam in 1965; he was disgusted with the entire military and
political situation in Vietnam, was angry that we had become enmeshed and entrapped there with so many advisors,
and was determined to right this error after his re-election.
(4) JFK took the Cold War seriously, but in the right way, and over the right issues. Berlin was important (because it
did involve serious issues of not appeasing a superpower bully, whose appetite might then only be whetted for
more); Vietnam (which was increasingly apparent to be a local civil war and not truly a vital superpower issue) was
not. JFK wanted to defeat communism, but NOT on the battlefield...he wanted to defeat them in the Space Race, the
ultimate superpower propaganda contest in which national greatness and the validity of two competing systems
were going to be measured by technological prowess and economic strength, not by a destructive war. JFK wanted
to promote the positive values of the West and the USA through volunteer service...through the Peace Corps.
(5) JFK wanted above all else to avoid an accidental, unintentional World War in the Nuclear Age. His own WW II
experiences (in which he learned to be very skeptical about military leadership and so-called expertise), his study of
Barbara Tuchman's book "The Guns of August" about WW I, and the fresh memory of the Korea stalemate in Asia all
made him very cautious about the use of military force. He wanted to go to war only if we HAD TO...not because the
hawks in the USG wanted to. And if we "had to" go to war, he wanted to ensure it was over a vital interest like Soviet
aggression in Europe, not over a sideshow in Southeast Asia where US interest were not directly threatened.
(6) This man chose a life of public service, when he could, instead, have rolled up in a ball of self-pity and lived a
selfish life of luxury all alone, feeling sorry for himself because of his serious illness (addison's disease) and his back
pain (which was constant and unremitting). Yet all those who knew him well said he never uttered a word of selfpity, and had a genuine optimism about the future of man, about the positive role [and great responsibility] of the
United States in the 20th century, and genuinely believed in the credo of public service that he so openly promoted.
(7) JFK became very courageous on civil rights in 1963, after a couple of years of dithering in 1961 and 1962. He
could not duck the issue any longer, and strongly and firmly came down in favor of equal opportunity in education
and proposed a very bold civil rights bill which LBJ got passed in his memory as part of the JFK legacy after his
assassination.
(8) JFK's Peace Speech at the American University in June 1963 was a truly remarkable document, just as the Test
Ban Treaty in September of 1963 was a noteworthy accomplishment. The Test Ban Treaty was his proudest
achievement, and the Peace Speech (which rejected a military PAX AMERICANA and asked Americans to re-evaluate
their altitudes about the Soviet Union) challenged both Americans and the Soviets to end the Cold War...a full
generation before it finally happened.
In conclusion, regardless of whether people have advanced degrees or not, or think about politics frequently or
infrequently, they have a pretty good sense of these things today in America; following the disaster of LBJ's War in
Vietnam, and the current disillusionment over America's Iraq adventure, JFK's sober caution in foreign affairs looks
pretty good to most Americans. (His one big screw-up was the Bay of Pigs; he openly acknowledged this, and he
learned valuable lessons from it about being cautious about the so-called expertise of others, and about the limits of
military power.) So does his intelligent, well-informed and reasoned (but not jingoistic) patriotism, his
encouragement of public service, his insatiable curiosity, his support of the arts in America, and his optimism. So
does his correct and courageous (if a bit belated) stand on civil rights in America.
America was on the right road in 1963 when he died. After his death, with the exception of the Apollo Moon Landing
program and other space initiatives which he began, everything else went downhill fast in the 1960s. Americans
know, and appreciate these facts. It is the mainstream historians who get it wrong when they say JFK was not a great
President; the man in the street knows better. If he had lived to serve a full 8 years, I think the mainstream historians
would treat him more kindly because they would have more concrete, completed accomplishments to write about.
(Mainstream historians recognize concrete accomplishments rather than potential, and possibilities, and could-havebeens.) JFK was great because he had the country going in the right direction, avoided a nuclear war (and
appeasement) through his caution and firm resolve during the missile crisis, promoted public service and the arts,
and was responsible for the robust space program which may be the principal accomplishment for which the the
post-WW II USA is remembered 500 years from now (as JFK himself predicted).
PRESIDENT NIKITA KHRUSHCHEV
Nikita Khrushchev claimed that it was some time after Stalin's death before he realized the extent of his crimes.
I still mourned Stalin as an extraordinary powerful leader. I knew that his power had been exerted arbitrarily and not
always in the proper direction, but in the main Stalin's strength, I believed, had still been applied to the
reinforcement of Socialism and to the consolidation of the gains of the October Revolution. Stalin may have used
methods which were, from my standpoint, improper or even barbaric, but I hadn't yet begun to challenge the very
basis of Stalin's claim to a special honour in history. However, questions were beginning to arise for which I had no
ready answer. Like others, I was beginning to doubt whether all the arrests and convictions had been justified from
the standpoint of judicial norms. But then Stalin had been Stalin. Even in death he commanded almost unassailable
authority, and it still hadn't occurred to me that he had been capable of abusing his power.
Nikita Khrushchev, speech, 20th Party Congress (February, 1956)
Stalin acted not through persuasion, explanation and patient co-operation with people, but by imposing his concepts
and demanding absolute submission to his opinion. Whoever opposed this concept or tried to prove his viewpoint,
and the correctness of his position, was doomed to removal from the leading collective and to subsequent moral and
physical annihilation. This was especially true during the period following the 17th Party Congress, when many
prominent Party leaders and rank-and-file Party workers, honest and dedicated to the cause of communism, fell
victim to Stalin's despotism.
Stalin originated the concept "enemy of the people". This term automatically rendered it unnecessary that the
ideological errors of a man or men engaged in a controversy be proven; this term made possible the usage of the
most cruel repression, violating all norms of revolutionary legality, against anyone who in any way disagreed with
Stalin, against those who were only suspected of hostile intent, against those who had bad reputations.
Richard Nixon met Nikita Khrushchev in Moscow, in 1959. In his memoirs Nixon described the impression that
Khrushchev made on him.
Khrushchev's rough manners, bad grammar, and heavy drinking caused many Western journalists and diplomats to
underestimate him. But despite his rough edges, he had a keen mind and a ruthless grasp of power politics. Bluntly
ignoring Western invitations for disarmament and détente, Khrushchev openly continued to stockpile weapons...
many believed that he would have no qualms about using them to unleash a nuclear war.
In his autobiography Nikita Khrushchev describes his first meeting with John F. Kennedy after he had beaten
Richard Nixon to became president of the United States.
I was impressed with Kennedy. I remember liking his face, which was sometimes stern but which often broke into a
good-natured smile. As for Nixon... he was an unprincipled puppet, which is the most dangerous kind. I was very glad
Kennedy won the election... I joked with him that we had cast the deciding ballot in his election to the Presidency
over that son-of-a-bitch Richard Nixon. When he asked me what I meant, I explained that by waiting to release the
U-2 pilot Gary Powers until after the American election, we kept Nixon from being able to claim that he could deal
with the Russians; our ploy made a difference of at least half a million votes, which gave Kennedy the edge he
needed.
James Reston, a journalist on the New York Times newspaper, travelled to Vienna with President John F. Kennedy
when he met Khrushchev for the first time He commented on this meeting three years later in an article for his
newspaper.
Khrushchev had studied the events of the Bay of Pigs; he would have understood if Kennedy had left Castro alone or
destroyed him but when Kennedy was rash enough to strike at Cuba but not bold enough to finish the job,
Khrushchev decided he was dealing with an inexperienced young leader who could be intimidated and blackmailed.
Theodore Sorensen was a friend and speechwriter for John F. Kennedy. He was with Kennedy in Vienna and later
wrote about the meeting between these two men.
Neither Kennedy nor Khrushchev emerged victorious or defeated cheerful or shaken. Each had probed the other for
weakness and found none. Khrushchev had not been swayed by Kennedy's reason and charm. Kennedy had not
been panicked by Khrushchev's tough talk
Elie Abel's book, The Missiles of October: The Story of the Cuban Missile Crisis, was published In 1966. In the book
Abel comments on John Kennedy's meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna.
There is reason to believe that Khrushchev took Kennedy's measure at their Vienna meeting in June 1961, and
decided this was a young man who would shrink from hard decisions... There is no evidence to support the belief
that Khrushchev ever questioned America's power. He questioned only the President's readiness to use it. As he
once told Robert Frost, he came to believe that Americans are "too liberal to fight.'
Mikhail Gorbachev, Memoirs (1995)
Khrushchev's secret speech at the XXth Party Congress caused a political and psychological shock throughout the
country. At the Party krai committee I had the opportunity to read the Central Committee information bulletin,
which was practically a verbatim report of Khrushchev's words. I fully supported Khrushchev's courageous step. I did
not conceal my views and defended them publicly. But I noticed that the reaction of the apparatus to the report was
mixed; some people even seemed confused.
I am convinced that history will never forget Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalin's personality cult. It is, of course,
true that his secret report to the XXth Party Congress contained scant analysis and was excessively subjective. To
attribute the complex problem of totalitarianism simply to external factors and the evil character of a dictator was a
simple and hard-hitting tactic - but it did not reveal the profound roots of this tragedy. Khrushchev's personal
political aims were also transparent: by being the first to denounce the personality cult, he shrewdly isolated his
closest rivals and antagonists, Molotov, Malenkov, Kaganovich and Voroshilov - who, together with Khrushchev, had
been Stalin's closest associates.
True enough. But in terms of history and 'wider polities' the actual consequences of Khrushchev's political actions
were crucial. The criticism of Stalin, who personified the regime, served not only to disclose the gravity of the
situation in our society and the perverted character of the political struggle that was taking place within it - it also
revealed a lack of basic legitimacy. The criticism morally discredited totalitarianism, arousing hopes for a reform of
the system and serving as a strong impetus to new processes in the sphere of politics and economics as well as in the
spiritual life of our country. Khrushchev and his supporters must be given full credit for this. Khrushchev must be
given credit too for the rehabilitation of thousands of people, and the restoration of the good name of hundreds of
thousands of innocent citizens who perished in Stalimst prisons and camps.
Khrushchev had no intention of analysing systematically the roots of totalitarianism. He was probably not even
capable of doing so. And for this very reason the criticism of the personality cult, though rhetorically harsh, was in
essence incomplete and confined from the start to well-defined limits. The process of true democratization was
nipped in the bud.
Khrushchev's foreign policy was characterized by the same inconsistencies. His active presence in the international
political arena, his proposal of peaceful co-existence and his initial attempts at normalizing relations with the leading
countries of the capitalist world; the newly defined relations with India, Egypt and other Third World states; and
finally, his attempt to democratize ties with socialist allies - including his decision to mend matters with Yugoslavia all this was well received both in our country and in the rest of the world and, undoubtedly, helped to improve the
international situation.
But at the same time there was the brutal crushing of the Hungarian uprising in 1956; the adventurism that
culminated in the Cuba crisis of 1962, when the world was on the brink of a nuclear disaster; and the quarrel with
China, which resulted in a protracted period of antagonism and enmity.
All domestic and foreign policy decisions made at that time undoubtedly reflected not only Khrushchev's personal
understanding of the problems and his moods, but also the different political forces that he had to consider. The
pressure of Party and government structures was especially strong, forcing him to manoeuvre and to present this or
that measure in a form acceptable to such influential groups.
Alexander Dubcek, Hope Dies Last (1992)
My Russian friends learned about Khrushchev's secret speech about two weeks after it happened. A representative
of the Central Committee came to the school and read excerpts at their Party meeting. No text circulated. It was a
strictly confidential intra-Party announcement, and we foreign students were told nothing, then or later. I, however,
learned very quickly about the speech and about many additional details which confirmed rumors that had been
circulating for months. Still, it was the official truth that had the greatest impact.
To tell the truth, I was not quite ready to hear much of what they were saying, and I was shocked when they stated
bluntly that Stalin had been a murderer. There were many more shocks waiting to be sure, but this one was too
sudden and too momentous - the man had for so many years portrayed himself as the embodiment of everything I
wanted to believe in. Now I could no longer separate Stalin from the bad side of things, could no longer assume he
did not know. Now it seemed he was the very cause of all the woe.
A major source of these revelations were the prisoners who were then starting to return from the camps of the
Gulag. Their stories quickly spread. It was more and more obvious that all of them were innocent, which meant that
the other millions, those who could not return, those whose graves were scattered across the country, had also been
innocent. This included the best-known victims of the great purges of the 1930S, a time I remembered so vividly It
was a terrifying thing to learn.
Apparently most other foreign students, including those from Czechoslovakia, were insulated from this ferment until
well after the Twentieth Congress. I have to admit that I hesitated to tell them what I was hearing from my Russian
friends. Since my very young years, I have been inclined to think things through before making a move or a
judgment, and this was no exception. It took me time to digest this flood of depressing news and to separate men
from ideas and the good from the bad.
Among my Russian friends, Khrushchev was the hero of the day. The story circulated that he had dared to make the
speech before the delegates against the will of the majority of the leadership, who had been involved in the mass
repressions. In 1957 they conspired against Khrushchev and tried to overthrow him, but he was smarter and won the
struggle against Molotov Kaganovich, and the rest.
Herbert Morrison, An Autobiography (1960)
When Khrushchev came with Bulganin on 25 April, 1956, to that by now famous dinner with the Parliamentary
Labour Party, he appeared at first to be a quite new type of Russian leader - jolly, ready to laugh and be friendly, and
on the surface perfectly genuine. I suspected that it was a post-Stalin policy of the Kremlin to choose extrovert,
human personalities for positions of power and public office so long as they had brains and Communist convictions
as well.
At the dinner Khrushchev went through the motions of not wishing to make a formal speech, wanting to leave the
limelight to Bulganin, who was of course Chairman of the Soviet Council of Ministers and Prime Minister. Bulganin
spoke conventionally and courteously, friendly greetings to Britain and all that.
Mr. K. did speak, as I knew he would. He started his speech pleasantly enough with harmless, friendly material, but
the longer he spoke the more he boasted. It was the usual sort of thing. The Soviet Union had won the war. Britain
had done little. The men who most obviously showed their annoyance at this were George Brown and Aneurin
Bevan. Soon they were making protests which Khrushchev could not pretend he had not heard.
This annoyed Khrushchev very much and he lost his temper. He made it very plain that he disliked being
contradicted and that he was not accustomed to it. He was cross also when Gaitskell raised the question of the
Communist imprisonments of Social Democrats.
Next day, on the eve of their departure, I attempted to cheer Khrushchev up but his anger had not subsided and he
took the opportunity to denounce the entire British Labour Party.
Khrushchev is undoubtedly a clever man; either a dangerous one or a man who will be valuable to the cause of
peace. It is impossible to know yet whether he is playing a part or being genuine.
THE BERLIN WALL
Otto Frei, The People of East Berlin, Atlantic Monthly (December, 1963)
Up to August 13, 1961 the East Berliners were half-free. They had of course, to work during the day in state-owned
enterprises in an unfree society and were subject to an arbitrary legal system. But in the evening at the close of
work, they came over to West Berlin to meet relatives and acquaintances, go to the movies or the theatre, stroll up
the Kurfiirstendamm, read Western newspapers. About eight million theater and movie tickets were sold each year
in West Berlin to East Berliners. About 60,000 people from the East came daily to West Berlin to work in factories
and workshops.... For 13 years people could move fairly freely in both parts of the city and meet whenever they
wished. Some 200,000 Germans from East Berlin and the Soviet Zone visited West Berlin every day. Berlin, despite
political division, was still a special area.
Mikhail Gorbachev, Memoirs (1995)
In the autumn of 1989, precipitate developments in the 'socialist part' of Europe radically changed the situation - the
Communists lost power in the first free elections in Poland and Hungary, Erich Honecker was forced to step down,
and the Berlin Wall collapsed virtually overnight.
It goes without saying that the events in Hungary and Czechoslovakia and later in Romania and Bulgaria caused us
great concern. However, not once did we contemplate the possibility of going back on the fundamental principles of
the new political thinking - freedom of choice and non-interference in other countries' domestic affairs.
In our conversations, Kohl had repeatedly said that Honecker did not understand or accept Soviet perestroika and
was set on implementing his own dogmatic, hard line. I had the impression that Kohl was trying to win me as an ally
in case he decided himself to influence developments in East Germany. Be that as it may, I made it quite clear that
we would not dictate to the East German leaders how they should run their affairs at home.
Obviously, we were not blind; we had our own views on Honecker's policies and were worried about the
developments in the German Democratic Republic. We did not sit idly by - but I reject any insinuation that our
contact with the East German leadership at this critical moment amounted to pressure or blackmail.
I had met Honecker on some seven or eight occasions since 1985 and had formed quite a consistent view of him as a
person and as a politician. My cautious attempts to convince him not to delay the necessary reforms to the country
and the Party had led to no practical results whatever. It was as if I had been speaking to a brick wall. We last met in
October 1989.1 had gone to participate in the ceremonies planned for the fortieth anniversary of the German
Democratic Republic. Honecker had pressed me to come. Despite some hesitation on my part, I agreed to attend.
JOSEPH STALIN
Alexander Vasilevsky, Memoirs (1974)
Stalin was unjustifiably self-confident, headstrong, unwilling to listen to others; he overestimated his own knowledge
and ability to guide the conduct of the war directly. He relied very little on the General Staff and made no adequate
use of the skills and experience of its personnel. Often for no reason at all, he would make hasty changes in the top
military leadership. Stalin quite rightly insisted that the military must abandon outdated strategic concepts, but he
was unfortunately rather slow to do this himself. He tended to favour head-on confrontations.
John Gates, The Story of an American Communist (1959)
In March, 1953, Stalin died. I had enormous regard and admiration for him, and his death left a void in my scheme of
things. But developments after his death forced me to question whether my absolute faith in Stalin had been
justified. Immediately following his death, the Soviet government launched a peace offensive that resulted a few
months later in the settlement of the Korean war. Soviet foreign policy had a new quality now, different from when
Stalin had been alive. Had he been at all responsible for the Korean war? Had he been an obstacle to its settlement?
The strange phrase, "cult of the individual," began to appear in the Soviet press. What did it mean? Who was the
anonymous "individual"? To me it was obvious that the reference was to Stalin; I said so to Dennis, but he could not
see it that way.
Just before Stalin died, a group of Jewish doctors had been imprisoned, charged with being part of an international
"Zionist conspiracy" to poison the Soviet leaders. It was fantastic; still I accepted it as gospel truth, so firm was my
faith. This had a sardonic counterpart at Atlanta when Dennis fell ill with gall bladder trouble and the prison doctors
recommended an operation. His condition was becoming critical, but Dennis feared an operation by doctors who
were probably not sympathetic with his politics. I advised him to go through with it and remarked sarcastically that
in America surgeons were not influenced by politics in performing operations, but that if he were in the Soviet Union
he might have good reason to fear, as I said, the doctors' plot demonstrated.
Dennis was shocked at rhy cynicism; but he went through with the operation, which turned out very successfully. As
later events made clear to me, I had slandered the Jewish doctors and so had the Soviet leaders. After Stalin died the
case was revealed to be a frame-up. When the doctors had first been arrested, Earl Browder had charged not only
that they were being framed, but that the arrests had anti-Semitic connotations. This I had firmly refused to believe.
Now I was forced to reverse myself. It was not easy.
THE BAY OF PIGS INVASION
In 1953, Fidel Castro complained about Cuba's economic relationship with the United States.
With the exception of a few food, lumber and textile industries, Cuba continues to be a producer of raw materials.
We export sugar to import candy, we export hides to import shoes, we export iron to import ploughs.
After Nikita Khrushchev of the Soviet Union met Fidel Castro in New York in 1960 he told a colleague what he
thought of him.
Castro is like a young horse that hasn't been broken. He needs some training, but he's very spirited - so we will have
to be careful.
In his book The Perfect Failure, Trumbull Higgins argues that Kennedy had a strong dislike of Fidel Castro and had
been discussing his removal even before he became president.
As early as October 1960 Kennedy had discussed with his conservative friend Senator George Smathers of Florida the
likely reaction of the American public to an attempt to assassinate Castro. Alternatively, Kennedy and Smathers had
considered provoking a Cuban assault upon the base at Guantanamo to provide an excuse for a U.S. invasion of the
island.
Terence Cannon was born in the United States but in the 1960s lived and worked in Cuba. In his book,
Revolutionary Cuba, Cannon discusses the air-raid on Cuba on 14th April, 1961.
Nine CIA planes had taken off that morning from Puerto Cabezas (Nicaragua): eight for Cuba and one directly to
Miami... each plane bore an imitation of the Cuban Air Force insignia. The single pilot bound for Miami was to arrive
there just after the others had bombed Cuba... An enterprising reporter got close enough to his plane to notice that
dust and grease covered the bomb-bay doors and that the muzzles of the guns were taped shut. The plane had
obviously not participated in any attack.
Peter Bourne worked as an assistant to President Jimmy Carter. After meeting Fidel Castro in 1979 he decided to
write a book about him. In the book he dealt with the Bay of Pigs incident.
One plane that took off from Nicaragua with the others did not engage in the raid, but flew to Miami with an engine
deliberately feathered by pistol shots. When it landed, the pilot claimed that he was a member of Fidel's air force
who had defected after bombing his own airfield... Knowledgeable journalists noticed that his B-26 had a metal nose
cone while those in the Cuban air force were made of Plexiglass.
After the bombing raid on 14th April 1961, Fidel Castro made a speech to the Cuban people.
The imperialists plan the crime, organize the crime, furnish the criminals with weapons for the crime, pay the
criminals, and then those criminals come here and murder the sons of seven honest workers. Why are they doing
this? They can't forgive our being right under their very noses, seeing how we have made a revolution, a socialist
revolution. Comrades, workers and peasants, this is a socialist and democratic revolution of the poor, by the poor
and for the poor, we are ready to give our lives.
In 1961 the Cuban government published details of some of the 1,197 prisoners Involved in the Bay of Pigs
invasion.
Occupations: 100 plantation owners; 67 landlords of apartment houses; 35 factory owners; 112 businessmen; 179
lived off unearned income; and 194 ex-soldiers of Batista.
Total property owned in Cuba: 923,000 acres of land; 9,666 houses and apartment buildings; 70 factories; 12 night
clubs; 10 sugar mills; 24 large property owners; 5 mines and 3 banks.
On February 4,1962 Fidel Castro made a speech in Havana where he considered the motivations behind the Bay of
Pigs invasion.
What is hidden behind the Yankee's hatred of the Cuban Revolution... a small country of only seven million people,
economically underdeveloped, without financial or military means to threaten the security or economy of any other
country? What explains it is fear. Not fear of the Cuban Revolution but fear of the Latin American Revolution.
After the Bay of Pigs, Philip Bonsol, the United States Ambassador in Cuba, wrote about the failed attempt to
overthrow Fidel Castro .
The Bay of Pigs was a serious setback for the United States... It consolidated Castro's regime and was a determining
factor in giving it the long life it has enjoyed... It became clear to all concerned in Washington, in Havana and in
Moscow that for the time being the Castro regime could be overthrown only through an overt application of
American power.
E.Howard Hunt, interviewed for the television programme, Backyard (21st February, 1999)
When I came back (from Cuba), I wrote a top secret report, and I had five recommendations, one of which was the
one that's always been thrown at me, is that during... or... slightly antecedent to an invasion, Castro would have to
be neutralized - and we all know what that meant, although I didn't want to say so in a memorandum with my name
on it. Another one was that a landing had to be made at such a point in Cuba, presumably by airborne troops, that
would quarter the nation, and that was the Trinidad project; cut the communications east to west, and there would
be confusion. None of that took place. Once, when I came back from Coconut Grove and said, "What about... is
anybody going after Castro? Are you going to get rid of him?", "It's in good hands," was the answer I got, which was
a great bureaucratic answer. But the long and the short of it was that no attempt that I ever heard of was made
against Castro's life specifically. President Idigros Fuentes of Guatemala was good enough to give our Cuban exiles
two training areas in his country, one in the mountains, and then at (Retardo Lejo) we had an unused airstrip that he
gave over to us, which we put into first-class condition for our fighter aircraft and our supply aircraft, and we trained
Cuban paratroopers there. And the brigade never numbered more than about 1,500, which was 10 times more than
Castillo Armas commanded.
Chauncey Holt was interviewed by John Craig, Phillip Rogers and Gary Shaw for Newsweek magazine (19th
October, 1991)
We went to Cuba many times. At that point in time Carlos Prio was President of Cuba and Batista was in exile. It was
Lanksy who was instrumental in getting Prio to allow Batista back into the country. He came back into the country
and one day he just walked into the Presidential Palace apparently, and made Prio an offer he couldn't refuse...
Batista was always in Lansky's pocket. So we were back and forth there in regards to the casinos.
Later on, when Castro started kicking up a force, and of course after he had landed there in the Escambay
Mountains, Lansky, to hedge his bet, began offering assistance to Castro in the form of money and arms that were
flying in. So although he was a very close friend of Batista, he was still assisting Castro. Around that time flying arms
to Castro was no problem. The State Department didn't bother you at all. They just tolerated it.
THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet Union's foreign secretary, book Through Russian Eyes: President Kennedy's 1036 Days
was published in 1973. In the book Gromyko wrote about the background to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The United States over several years had established offensive military bases around the socialist countries and,
primarily, near the USSR borders... the placement of medium-range effective Soviet missiles in Cuba was undertaken
only after the United States ruling circles continually rejected proposals to remove American military bases, including
missile sites, on foreign territory.
In 1984 Fidel Castro was interviewed by the American journalist, Tad Szulc. The journalist asked Castro why he
was willing to allow Soviet missiles to be placed in Cuba.
It was necessary to make it clear to the United States that an invasion of Cuba would imply a war with the Soviet
Union. It was then that they proposed the missiles... We preferred the risks, whatever they were, of a great tension,
a great crisis, to the risks of the impotence of having to await a United States invasion of Cuba.
In his autobiography published in 1971, Nikita Khrushchev explained why the missiles were placed in Cuba.
The United States had already surrounded the Soviet Union with its own bomber bases and missiles. We knew that
American missiles were aimed against us in Turkey and Italy, to say nothing of West Germany. It was during my visit
to Bulgaria that I had the idea of installing missiles with nuclear warheads in Cuba without letting the United States
find out they were there until it was too late to do anything about them. Everyone agreed that America would not
leave Cuba alone unless we did something. We had an obligation to do everything in our power to protect Cuba's
existence as a Socialist country and as a working example to the other countries in Latin America... The Americans
had surrounded our country with military bases and threatened us with nuclear weapons and now they would learn
just what it feels like to have enemy missiles pointing at you; we'd be doing nothing more than giving them a little of
their own medicine.
Terence Cannon, Revolutionary Cuba (1981)
Convinced that Cuba faced an imminent attack by an overwhelmingly superior force, the revolutionary government
sent Che Guevara to Moscow to request nuclear missiles with which to defend their country The Soviet Union
agreed.
Theodore Sorensen was a close friend and a political adviser to President John F. Kennedy. In his biography of
Kennedy, Sorensen explains what the president and his advisers believed to be the reasons for the missiles being
placed in Cuba.
Convinced that Cuba faced an imminent attack by an overwhelmingly superior force, the revolutionary government
sent Che Guevara to Moscow to request nuclear missiles with which to defend their country The Soviet Union
agreed.
David Detzer is an American historian. His book The Brink: The Cuban Missile Crisis, was published in 1980.
One wonders, given Russian reluctance to move nuclear weapons from Soviet soil, if in fact they merely sent rockets
and non-nuclear warheads. If the Kremlin's purpose was essentially political (for example, Berlin), all they needed to
do was to give the appearance of nuclear capability. Moreover, sending atomic warheads to Cuba offered certain
disadvantages. Something might go wrong - such as a ship sinking or a misfire, or even the Cuban government
grabbing them. It seems at least possible that the Russians were bluffing.
James Daniel and John Hubbell are two historians who wrote a book about the Cuban Missile Crisis. In their book,
Strike in the West, they comment on why they believed the missiles were placed in Cuba.
The United States anticipated that by the mid-sixties they would have in the neighbourhood of 1,500 ballistic
missiles... The total number of Soviet missiles which could reach targets in the United States was about 125... But by
moving medium and intermediate-range missiles to Cuba, deep in the Western Hemisphere, Russia was rapidly
narrowing the gap... The presence of Russian missiles in Cuba had drastically altered the balance of world power.
On October 22,1962 President John F. Kennedy made a speech to the nation on radio and television about the
Soviet missiles in Cuba. Below is an edited version of the speech.
Good evening, my fellow citizens. This Government, as promised, has maintained the closest surveillance of the
Soviet military buildup on the island of Cuba. Within the past week, unmistakable evidence has established the fact
that a series of offensive missile sites is now in preparation on that imprisoned island. The purpose of these bases
can be none other than to provide a nuclear strike capability against the Western Hemisphere.
The characteristics of these new missile sites indicate two distinct types of installations. Several of them include
medium range ballistic missiles, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead for a distance of more than 1,000 nautical
miles. Each of these missiles, in short, is capable of striking Washington, D.C., the Panama Canal, Cape Canaveral,
Mexico City, or any other city in the south-eastern part of the United States, in Central America, or in the Caribbean
area.
To halt this offensive buildup, a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being
initiated. All ships of any kind bound for Cuba from whatever nation or port will, if found to contain cargoes of
offensive weapons, be turned back... We are not at this time, however, denying the necessities of life as the Soviets
attempted to do in their Berlin blockade of 1948.
Walter Trohan wrote about the Cuban Missile Crisis in the New York Tribune in November 1962.
For the first time in twenty years Americans can carry their head high because the president of the United States had
stood up to the premier of Russia and made him back down.
Mario Lazo, a Cuban lawyer was a supporter of the Batista regime that was overthrown by Castro. After the Cuban
revolution he fled to the United States. In 1968 he wrote a book called Dagger in the Heart: American Failures in
Cuba.
The accounts of the crisis did not make clear that it was a power confrontation, that the power of the USA was
incomparably superior to that of the USSR, and that the leaders of both nations knew this to be a fact. The United
States, it is worth repeating, could have erased every important Soviet military installation and population centre in
two or three hours while the strike capability of the USSR was negligible. Although Kennedy held the trump cards, he
granted the Communist Empire a privileged sanctuary in the Caribbean by means of the "no invasion" pledge.
I. F. Stone, a journalist, wrote an article on Kennedy after he was assassinated in 1963.
What if the Russians had refused to back down and remove their missiles from Cuba? What if they had called our
bluff and war had begun, and escalated? How would the historians of mankind, if a fragment survived, have
regarded the events of October?... Since this is the kind of bluff that can easily be played once too often, and that his
successors may feel urged to imitate, it would be well to think it over carefully before canonizing Kennedy as an
apostle of peace.
Ambassador Dobrynin's Cable to the Soviet Foreign Ministry (27th October 1962)
Late tonight R. Kennedy invited me to come see him. We talked alone. The Cuban crisis, R. Kennedy began, continues
to quickly worsen....
"And what about Turkey?" I asked R. Kennedy. "If that is the only obstacle to achieving the regulation I mentioned
earlier, then the president doesn't see any unsurmountable difficulties in resolving this issue," replied R. Kennedy.
"The greatest difficulty for the president is the public discussion of the issue of Turkey. Formally the deployment of
missile bases in Turkey was done by a special decision of the NATO Council. To announce now a unilateral decision
by the president of the USA to withdraw missile bases from Turkey - this would damage the entire structure of NATO
and the US position as the leader of NATO, where, as the Soviet government knows very well, there are many
arguments. In short, if such a decision were announced now it would seriously tear apart NATO." "However,
President Kennedy is ready to come to agree on that question with N.S. Khrushchev, too. I think that in order to
withdraw these bases from Turkey," R. Kennedy said, "we need 4-5 months. This is the minimal amount of time
necessary for the US government to do this, taking into account the procedures that exist within the NATO
framework. On the whole Turkey issue," R. Kennedy added, "if Premier NS Khrushchev agrees with what I've said, we
can continue to exchange opinions between him and the president, using him, R. Kennedy and the Soviet
ambassador. "However, the president can't say anything public in this regard about Turkey," R. Kennedy said again.
R. Kennedy then warned that his comments about Turkey are extremely confidential; besides him and his brother,
only 2-3 people know about it in Washington. "That's all that he asked me to pass on to NS Khrushchev," R. Kennedy
said in conclusion. "The president also asked NS Khrushchev to give him an answer (through the Soviet ambassador
and R. Kennedy) if possible within the next day.
Theodore Sorensen, interviewed in 1989.
Kennedy recognized that, for Chairman Khrushchev to withdraw the missiles from Cuba, it would be undoubtedly
helpful to him if he could say at the same time to his colleagues on the Presidium, "And we have been assured that
the missiles will be coming out of Turkey." And so, after the ExComm meeting (on the evening of 27 October 1962),
as I'm sure almost all of you know, a small group met in President Kennedy's office, and he instructed Robert
Kennedy - at the suggestion of Secretary of State Dean Rusk - to deliver the letter to Ambassador Dobrynin for
referral to Chairman Khrushchev, but to add orally what was not in the letter: that the missiles would come out of
Turkey. Ambassador Dobrynin felt that Robert Kennedy's book did not adequately express that the "deal" on the
Turkish missiles was part of the resolution of the crisis. And here I have a confession to make to my colleagues on the
American side, as well as to others who are present. I was the editor of Robert Kennedy's book. It was, in fact, a diary
of those thirteen days. And his diary was very explicit that this was part of the deal; but at that time it was still a
secret even on the American side, except for the six of us who had been present at that meeting. So I took it upon
myself to edit that out of his diaries, and that is why the Ambassador is somewhat justified in saying that the diaries
are not as explicit as his conversation.
EAST GERMANY (GDR)
Waltraut Krugler, quoted by Hubertus Knabe in his book 17th June 1953: A German Uprising (2003)
The street was full of people, saying 'come with us, do this with us'," she remembered. "At 2 o'clock in the
afternoon, the street was black with people. The police said: 'All of you go home, and we will fulfil your demands.'
But people shouted at the police and threw stones. Then the tanks came and people were killed.
An East German joke about Walter Ulbricht and Willy Brandt told during the 1970s.
'Have you a hobby, Herr Brandt?'
'Yes, I collect jokes that people tell about me,' says Brandt. 'And you?'
'Oh, I collect people who tell jokes about me,' says Ulbricht.
An East German joke about Walter Ulbricht told during the 1970s.
The Interior Minister telephones Walter Ulbricht.
'Thieves have broken into the Ministry this evening.'
'Have they stolen something?'
'Alas, yes. All the results of the next elections.'
An East German joke that circulated in the 1970s.
A West German Communist was travelling on a train through the GDR. He got into conversation with an old lady.
'Back home in West Germany,' he told her, 'shirts cost forty marks each.'
'Shirts?' said the old lady ruefully. 'We had those here once.'
'Butter is terribly expensive in the West. We are forced to eat margarine,' he continued.
'Yes,' said the old lady, 'we had margarine here once, too.'
'Now look here!' shouted the West German, by now thoroughly exasperated, 'You don't have to tell me these fairystories, you know! I'm a Communist!'
'A Communist?' sighed the old lady. 'Yes, we had those here once, too.'
Jeevan Vasagar, The Guardian (17th June, 2003)
A German historian has accused the British of "betraying" an anti-communist uprising in the early years of the
German Democratic Republic which was eventually put down by Soviet tanks. In a book published to coincide with
today's 50th anniversary of the uprising, Hubertus Knabe claims that the western powers, in particular Britain led by
Winston Churchill, declined to intervene because they feared a reunited Germany.
Churchill rebuked a British commander who protested about the execution of a west Berlin student caught in the
east and praised the Russians for their restraint.
Mr Knabe, author of 17th June 1953: A German Uprising, said: "The demonstrators were bitterly disappointed, after
the west's rhetoric about the liberation of Europe, and the encouragement of resistance, that when they went out
on the streets, they received no support"
The anniversary has been trailed for weeks by political debates, television documentaries and theatre productions.
In his book, the historian quotes Churchill expressing surprise that the British commander should have issued a
complaint to the Russians without consulting London.
The then prime minister asked whether the Soviet Union should have allowed "the eastern zone to collapse into
anarchy and revolt", according to a private message quoted by Mr Knabe, and went on: "I had the impression that
the unrest was handled with remarkable restraint."
The west feared reunification. The foreign secretary, Selwyn Lloyd, told Churchill in a memo on June 22 that the
allies felt "a divided Germany is safer at present. But none of us dare say so in public because of the impact on public
opinion in Germany". The first East Germans to go out on the streets in 1953 were construction workers on
Stalinallee, the Communist-era highway that slices through east Berlin.