THE STRUGGLE FOR GERMANY AND THE ORIGINS OF THE COLD WAR Melvyn P. Leffler SIXTH ALOIS MERTES MEMORIAL LECTURE 1996

German Historical Institute Washington, D.C. Occasional Paper No. 16

The lecture is named in honor of one of the most prominent
members of the Christlich-Demokratische Union during the reconstruction of postwar Germany. It is made possible by a grant from the Stifterverband für die deutsche Wissenschaft.
Occasional Paper No. 16
Edited by
Detlef Junker, Petra Marquardt-Bigman, and Janine S. Micunek
Published by the
GERMAN HISTORICAL INSTITUTE 1607 New Hampshire Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20009
Tel. (202) 387-3355


 
The Struggle for Germany and the Origins of the Cold War
Melvyn P. Leffler


The first wave of post-Cold War historical writing is now upon us, and commentators are moving swiftly to explain its meaning. With the use of archival resources from the former Soviet Union as well as from eastern Europe, Germany, and China, we are be- ing told that the newest history of the Cold War confirms the oldest history. The oldest history, that is, the traditional view of the Cold War, maintained that it began because of the ideologi- cally motivated expansionism of the Soviet Union and the relative slowness of the United States to respond to the worldwide threat emanating from the Kremlin. Writing recently in one of the most influential scholarly journals in the United States, the political sci- entist Douglas Macdonald argues that “much of the newly avail- able evidence confirms many traditional analytical assumptions about bloc expansion, in particular that there was a system-wide Soviet bloc threat with a significant amount of unity, and that this bloc was both held together and driven to expand its sphere of influence by the shared totalist ideological tenets of Marxism- Leninism, largely as defined by Moscow.”1
Although Macdonald's focus is on Asia and the Third World, he believes that his conclusions are applicable to Europe as well.
 1 Douglas J. Macdonald, “Communist Bloc Expansion in the Early Cold War. Challenging Realism, Refuting Revisionism,” International Security 20 (Winter 1995/96): 152-88.
8 Melvin P. Leffler
Here again, recent scholarship seems to offer support for such thinking. In a series of articles and an influential monograph, the historian R. C. Raack asserts that “the Bolshevik program was driven by often unspecific Marxist-Leninist ideological precepts having global application.” By 1924, Raack continues, “Stalin had written and adapted for a postwar world his own compendium of Lenin's radical interventionist politics to achieve international Marxism. . . . This is confirmed by long-concealed documents that reveal the extent of Stalin's international plans: first, a Red military thrust to the west of Europe, that to be followed by a vast expansion of the Soviet system carried out by the Red Army. His moves along the western front in 1939 and 1940 were there- fore only the first of an intended series.” The long-concealed evi- dence to which Raack assigns so much importance includes the secret protocols of the 1939 Nazi-Soviet pact and the diary en- tries of German Communist leader Wilhelm Pieck. The former demonstrate Stalin's intent to annex land and control eastern Europe; the latter his desire to use the German Communist Party to take over all of Germany.2
These interpretations resonate deeply in the triumphal atmos- phere surrounding the end of the Cold War and the disintegra- tion of communist regimes in Russia, East Germany, and eastern Europe. The simplicities of the early Cold War years have a great appeal, perhaps a greater appeal than ever because we now do know how loathsome those regimes really were. Hence, we are attracted to simple interpretations: Stalin's regime was barbaric; he was a Bolshevik totalitarian ideologue; he sought to expand his power and the communist system wherever he could; he was thwarted only by the belated action of the United States.
 2 R. C. Raack, Stalin’s Drive to the West, 1938-1945: The Origins of the Cold War (Stanford, Calif., 1995), especially 14-15 (for the quotation).
The Struggle for Germany 9
The history of the early Cold War, however, is far more com- plex than these interpretations suggest. Although it might be re- assuring to think that the new evidence underscores older veri- ties, this is not the case. The difficulty and diversity of historical interpretation are readily apparent when one looks at three addi- tional books that have recently appeared that deal with Germany and the origins of the Cold War.
Cambridge University Press has just published Carolyn Eisen- berg's book, Drawing the Line: The American Decision to Divide Ger- many. The volume is undoubtedly the most comprehensive and systematic assessment of U.S. policy toward postwar Germany. “Just when some thought we were approaching a consensus on the reasons why Europe and the United States sunk into nearly a half-century of Cold War,” writes Walter LaFeber in a blurb on the back of the book, “Carolyn Eisenberg forces us to rethink what we thought we knew.” American officials, she argues, opted for partition because that was the easiest way for them to carry out their desire to expedite western Europe's economic rehabilita- tion, promote the expansion of free trade, and make the world safe for free enterprise and a private market economy. American national security, she claims, “required global measures that could facilitate profit making.” And however successful U.S. policy was in accomplishing those goals, the triumphs need to be weighed against the setbacks: Germany was divided; eastern Germany and eastern Europe were abandoned to the Russians; Europe was militarized; and an arms race was spawned. Eisenberg suggests that these consequences might have been avoided, because she claims that the Kremlin was not eager to split Germany and was willing to compromise on many issues so long as its claims for reparations were satisfied.3
 3 Carolyn Eisenberg, Drawing the Line: The American Decision to Divide Ger- many, 1944-1949 (New York, 1996).
10 Melvin P. Leffler
Eisenberg’s book is a striking departure from Macdonald's as- sessment of the new literature. He, of course, would refute the significance of her findings by saying that she has not looked sys- tematically at Soviet motivations and policies. But in a new book that looks squarely at Soviet strategies in Europe, Caroline Ken- nedy-Pipe emphasizes that “the dominant concern of the Soviet leadership was the security and survival of the new Soviet state.” She says that the Kremlin's major preoccupation was to control the revival of German power. Stalin, she insists, was eager to gar- ner U.S. cooperation in the pursuit of this goal. Ideology, she claims, had little bearing on the direction of postwar Soviet for- eign policy.4
Although Kennedy-Pipe has done considerable research in printed collections of Russian documents as well as in traditional British and American sources, she has not consulted the newly opened archival materials in Russia and Germany. But, fortu- nately, we now have a monumental book that is based on exten- sive research in these archival collections. I am referring, of course, to Norman Naimark's volume, The Russians in Germany. He concludes: “The Soviets did not occupy Germany with spe- cific long-range goals in mind.” Economic imperatives and geo- political goals, he shows, often exerted decisive influence on So- viet actions in Germany. “Stalin,” Naimark says, “was a cruel and omnipotent dictator, to be sure, but one who spoke rarely in this period, and in deliberately opaque terms, providing ambiguous policy directives that could be interpreted in a variety of ways.” Soviet policy was carried out in the secretariat of the Central Committee and in the Main Political Administration of the army. But communication among disparate ministries and bureaucracies was poor. Overall, “the Soviet administration had many more checks and balances and had much more difficulty
4 Caroline Kennedy-Pipe, Stalin’s Cold War: Soviet Strategies in Europe, 1943- 1956 (Manchester, 1995), 192.
 The Struggle for Germany 11
carrying out unified decision making than did [the Americans].”5 Naimark’s analysis is not definitive. Although researched ex- tensively in the party and police archives of East Germany and in the documents of the Soviet foreign ministry, the Central Com- mittee of the Communist Party, and the Soviet Military Admini- stration, Naimark acknowledges that a comprehensive under- standing of how Soviet policy was made and for what purposes will not be had until there is access to military records and the presidential archives. But for the time being, Naimark’s book is not likely to be surpassed. Meanwhile, he offers little support for views like Macdonald's that suggest purposeful, ideological, re- lentlessly expansionist behavior on the part of the Kremlin. In fact, Naimark demonstrates quite persuasively that Soviet leaders never reconciled divergent strategies for dealing with Germany: “the logical alternative long-term goals of Soviet policy—the so- vietization of the eastern zone, the creation of a unified Germany run by the Socialist Unity Party [SED], or the establishment of a demilitarized, ‘neutral’ Germany in the center of Europe—
remained unreconciled during the period of occupation.”6
But neither does Naimark lend support to the conclusions drawn by Eisenberg. He does not emphasize Soviet reactions to U.S. initiatives. “Soviet officers,” Naimark writes, “bolshevized the zone not because there was a plan to do so, [and not because of their reactions to American behavior], but because that was the only way they knew how to organize society. They drew their models from the New Economic Plan, the First Five-Year Plan, and collectivization. The campaigns against ‘enemies of the
 5 Norman M. Naimark, The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949 (Cambridge, Mass./London, 1995), quotations on pp. 465, 24-25, 352.
6 Ibid., 466.
12 Melvin P. Leffler
people’ and the purges of the 1930s shaped their mentality.” And Naimark goes on to conclude that, although the Kremlin showed a great deal of interest in compromise with the West, “for good reason, neither the Western Allies nor the West German political leadership was ready to take a chance on Soviet goodwill.”7
In short, the new literature on Soviet policy does not lead to any firm conclusions about Soviet motivations. But the ambigui- ties surrounding Soviet behavior in Germany suggest that it is worthwhile to take another look at American policies and to re- consider them in light of what we now do know about Stalin's foreign policy. In the struggle for Germany, did the United States start the Cold War? And if it did, as Eisenberg suggests, does it necessarily follow that American policies were misguided?
In June 1945 Assistant Secretary of State Dean G. Acheson appeared before the Senate Committee on Banking and Currency. He was there to speak in behalf of the Bretton Woods agree- ments. In his carefully prepared testimony and in his usual delib- erate manner, Acheson painted an alarming, one might even say apocalyptic, picture of the plight of Europe. “There is a situation in the world, very clearly illustrated in Europe, and also true in the Far East, which threatens the very foundations, the whole fabric of world organization which we have known in our lifetime and which our fathers and grandfathers knew.” Liberated Europe, Acheson declared, was in shambles. “You find that the railway systems have ceased to operate; that power systems have ceased to operate; the financial systems are destroyed. Ownership of property is in terrific confusion. Management of property is
 7 Ibid., 467, 466.
The Struggle for Germany 13
in confusion. Systems of law have to be changed.” Nothing so ominous had existed, Acheson said, since the seventh century when the Moslems had split the world in two. Unless vigorous steps were taken to bring about collective action and collective security in the economic, political, and monetary fields, Europe might turn in upon itself. Acheson feared this prospect of autarky; he feared the prospect of revolution; he feared the stra- tegic ramifications. Hitler, too, Acheson warned, had organized a system in Europe which turned Europe inward on itself, “and with perfectly amazing skill made that system work and work so effectively that the Germans were able to fight all the rest of the world and support reasonably well the people of Europe.”8
Acheson, like most of his contemporaries inside and outside the government, recognized that Germany's power rested on its control over Europe's resources and its own ability to harness those resources for its war machine. With Germany finally de- feated after years of strenuous effort, the lesson learned was that no adversary must again be allowed to gain such domination over Europe's resources and industrial infrastructure. This truism was stated boldly in the first comprehensive strategy statement of the National Security Council after it was formed in 1947: “Soviet domination of the potential power of Eurasia,” it stated, “whether achieved by armed aggression or by political and sub- versive means, would be strategically and politically unacceptable to the United States.”9
This strategic concept, in fact, undergirded every aspect of postwar American policy from the time World War II ended. In a Brookings Institution study of March 1945, several of the
 8 U.S. Senate, Committee on Banking and Currency, Bretton Woods Agree- ments, 79th Cong., 1st sess., 1945, 19-22, 48-49.
9 NSC 20/4, in Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States (hereafter cited as FRUS), 1948, vol. 1 (Washington, 1975), 667.
14 Melvin P. Leffler
nation's foremost experts on international relations, including Frederick S. Dunn, Edward M. Earle, William T. R. Fox, Grayson L. Kirk, David N. Rowe, Harold Sprout, and Arnold Wolfers, stressed that the era of free security for America had ended. Hereafter, the United States must prevent any one power or coa- lition of powers from gaining control of Eurasia. The United States, they warned, could not withstand attack by a power that had first subdued the whole of Europe. “In all the world,” they wrote, “only Soviet Russia and the ex-enemy powers are capable of forming nuclei around which an anti-American coalition could form to threaten the security of the United States.” Most danger- ous of all was the possibility that Germany, or an alliance be- tween Germany and another power, or a power that had subdued Germany might again attain European hegemony and endanger American security.10 This study was considered so prescient that, after reading it, senior military officials classified it and circulated it as an official Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) document.11
Like Acheson, the academic experts who wrote “A Security Policy for Postwar America” were not advocating the adoption of anti-Soviet policies. In fact, like Acheson, they explicitly hoped for Soviet-American amity. “Soviet Russia,” they emphasized, “is a power whose good intentions must be assumed until there is incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. . . .” But with equal emphasis they stated that Soviet “intentions are sufficiently un- clear so that the United States must in no case place sole reliance for security on Soviet good intentions. Prudence dictated that the Western powers must not “permit the indefinite westward movement of the borders of the Soviet Union whether it
 10 Frederick S. Dunn et al., “A Security Policy for Postwar America,” March 8, 1945, Naval Historical Center, Washington, D.C. (hereafter NHC), Strategic Plans Division (SPD), series 14, box 194, A1-2.
11 Fred Kaplan, The Wizards of Armageddon (New York, 1983), 22.
The Struggle for Germany 15
occurs by formal annexation, political coup, or progressive subversion.”12
Here, of course, was the central dilemma: how to thwart the advance of Soviet influence in central and western Europe with- out disrupting the wartime coalition. Notwithstanding American consternation over Soviet actions in eastern Europe, policymak- ers did not initially rule out the possibility of cooperation and ac- commodation. President Harry S. Truman and his advisors de- plored the establishment of a Soviet sphere of influence in east- ern Europe yet did rather little to resist it, because they acknowl- edged the Kremlin's security imperatives in the region and be- cause they recognized their own lack of leverage.13 What was truly alarming was that Soviet predominance in eastern Europe was occurring at the same time as economic chaos, social turmoil, and political upheaval were spreading in southern and western Europe. The Kremlin was not necessarily responsible for these latter developments, but American officials were certain that the Soviet government could capitalize on this unrest even if it did not instigate it. As the European war ended in May 1945, no stra- tegic or foreign policy consideration, except the defeat of Japan, was considered more important than dealing
 12 Dunn et al., “Security Policy for Postwar America.”
13 Eduard Mark, “American Policy toward Eastern Europe and the Ori- gins of the Cold War, 1941-46: An Alternative Interpretation,” Journal of American History 68 (September 1981), 313-36; Geir Lundestaad, The Ameri- can Non-Policy toward Eastern Europe (Oslo, 1975); Lynn E. Davis, The Cold War Begins: Soviet American Conflict over Eastern Europe (Princeton, 1974); Mi- chael M. Boll, Cold War in the Balkans: American Foreign Policy and the Emergence of Communist Bulgaria, 1943-1947 (Lexington, Ken., 1984); Robert L Messer, The End of an Alliance: James F. Brynes, Roosevelt, Truman and the Origins of the Cold War (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1982); Deborah W. Larson, Origins of Contain- ment: A Psychological Explanation (Princeton, 1985); Fraser J. Harbutt, The Iron Curtain: Churchill, America, and the Origins of the Cold War (New York, 1986).
16 Melvin P. Leffler
with the potential for revolution in European areas not under So- viet occupation.14
Even before the closing months of the war, American officials fretted about the emerging vacuums of power and the impending shortages of food and fuel. But the full gravity of the crisis only became apparent to top American officials after Yalta. In March 1945 Samuel Rosenman, Franklin D. Roosevelt's trusted White House counsel, submitted a report describing the deplorable food situation in northwestern Europe. A few weeks later, Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy observed conditions in Ger- many, returned to Washington, and confessed that circumstances were far more horrible than anyone could have expected. McCloy “gave me a powerful picture of the tough situation that exists in Germany,” Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson noted in his diary on April 19. It “is worse than anything probably that ever hap- pened in the world. I had anticipated the chaos, but the details of it were appalling.”15
During the next few weeks, Stimson and McCloy conferred with the president. After seeing Truman on April 26, McCloy left behind a memorandum outlining the immense destruction in Germany. “There is a complete economic, social, and political collapse going on in Central Europe, the extent of which is un- paralleled in history unless one goes back to the collapse of
 14 In addition to the sources cited in footnotes below, see the memoran- dum of priorities agreed upon by Truman and his closest aides on the eve of the Potsdam Conference in Lisle A. Rose, Dubious Victory: The United States and the End of World War II (Kent, Ohio, 1973), 276-77.
15 Samuel Rosenman to Franklin D. Roosevelt, March 14, 1945, James F. Brynes Papers, Clemson University, File 73 (1); diary entry, April 19, 1945, Henry L. Stimson Papers, Yale University; for an illuminating survey that cogently captures the problems engendered by the war and its ensuing dislo- cation, see Thomas G. Paterson, On Every Front: The Making of the Cold War (New York, 1979), 1-32.
The Struggle for Germany 17
the Roman Empire and even that may not have been as great an economic upheaval. . . . Food is the great need—food for the displaced persons, food for liberated Europe and food for the Germans.” France and Belgium must be supplied with aid. “Without some reestablishment of their economic life they too can very well be torn apart by the collapse now in effect over Middle Europe.” Stimson hammered on the same themes.16 On May 22, the president himself addressed a letter to the heads of war agencies emphasizing the grave situation in liberated Europe. “To a great extent the future permanent peace of Europe de- pends upon the restoration of the economy of these liberated countries. . . . A chaotic and hungry Europe is not a fertile ground in which stable, democratic and friendly governments can be reared.”17
From the perspective of American military and civilian offi- cials, Communist parties, under the control or susceptible to the influence of the Kremlin, would capitalize on this unrest. On June 24, 1945, for example, Rear Admiral Ellery W Stone, the American commissioner in Italy, reported that “Italy is at the parting of the ways. . . . [H]er financial position is precarious; her economy has been totally disrupted. . . . Like other European countries devastated by the war, the ground in Italy is fertile for the rapid growth of the seeds of an anarchical movement fos- tered by Moscow to bring Italy within the sphere of Russian in- fluence. Already there are signs that if present conditions long continue, communism will triumph—possibly by force.” Joseph Grew, the under secretary of state, held this conviction as
16 Memorandum for the President, by John McCloy, April 26, 1945, Harry S. Truman Papers, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Missouri, President's Secretary's File (hereafter PSF), box 178; Stimson Diary, May 4- 16, 1945.
17 Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman, 1945 (hereafter cited as PPHST, 1945) (Washington, 1961), 61.
 18 Melvin P. Leffler
strongly as anyone in the government, and during May and June 1945, he was briefing the president on a daily basis. Referring to Italy, he told Truman that “anarchy may result from the present economic distress and political unrest . . . .” But Italy was simply a microcosm of the larger problem in central and western Europe. On June 27, Grew gave the president a long report on the international communist movement. He urged Truman to read it carefully prior to the forthcoming Potsdam Conference. “Europe today,” the report concluded, “constitutes a breeding ground for spontaneous class hatred to be channeled by a skillful agitator.”18
Far more significant than this report, however, was the one written in early June by Dr. C. J. Potter and Lord Hyndley on the coal situation in northwestern Europe. According to their esti- mates, coal production in Belgium, France, and Holland was less than fifty percent of normal; in Scandinavia, production was neg- ligible; in the western parts of Germany, it had risen from three to five percent of normal. They concluded that “unless immedi- ate and drastic steps are taken, there will occur in northwest Europe and the Mediterranean next winter a coal famine of such severity as to destroy all semblance of law and order, and thus de- lay any chance of reasonable stability.” State Department officials, including Grew, Assistant Secretary of State Will Clayton, and the incoming secretary of state, James E Byrnes, fully shared this view and endorsed the report. On June 24, 1945, Truman wrote British Prime Minister Winston Churchill:
18 Ellery W. Stone to H. R. Stark, June 24, 1945, NE=HC, Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Double Zero Files, 1942-1947, folder 23; Joseph C. Grew to Truman, June 18, 27, 1945, Department of State, FRUS Diplomatic Papers: Conference of Berlin (The Potsdam Conference), 1945, 2 vols. (Washington, 1960) (hereafter cited as FRUS, Potsdam), 1:686, 267-80; also see Joseph C. Grew, Turbulent Era: A Diplomatic Record of Forty Years, 1904-1945, 2 vols. (Boston, 1952), 2:1445-50.
 The Struggle for Germany 19
“From all the reports which reach me I believe that without im- mediate concentration on the production of German coal we will have turmoil and unrest in the very areas of Western Europe on which the whole stability of the continent depends.”19
Truman's letter reveals the emphasis American officials imme- diately assigned to Germany as a source of coal for the stabiliza- tion and reconstruction of all of western Europe. Notwithstand- ing JCS 1067, which authorized American officials to be con- cerned with the German economy only insofar as was necessary to prevent disease and unrest, from the very onset of the occupa- tion U.S. policymakers placed a high priority on restoring the productive capabilities of German coal mines, not for the sake of Germany, but for the benefit of the rest of western Europe. In- deed Stimson and McCloy chose General Lucius Clay as military governor because of his experience with resources, allocation, in- dustrial management, and production. In Germany, Clay immedi- ately turned his attention to reviving coal production. Within weeks, he came to realize that any increment in coal production depended upon solving transportation problems, alleviating food shortages, and establishing currency stability. Even before the Potsdam Conference, Clay wrote McCloy that “the successful large-scale mining of coal means some restoration of the German economy, and some industrial activity to support coal mining.”20
 19 For the Potter/Hyndley Report, see FRUS, Potsdam, 1:614-21, espe- cially 620; Grew to Stimson, June 8, 1945, ibid., 524-25; Will Clayton to Ed- win Pauley, July 3, 1945, ibid., 623; Truman to Winston Churchill, June 24, 1945, ibid., 612.
20 For Clay's views, see Jean Edward Smith (ed.), The Papers of General Lu- cius Clay: Germany 1945-1949, 2 vols. (Bloomington, Ind., 1974), 1:38-48. The quotation is on p. 44. For the selection of Clay, see ibid., xxxii-xxxiv; Memo- randum for the President, by McCloy, April 26, 1945, Truman Papers, PSF, box 178; John Backer, Winds of History: The German Years of Lucius DuBignon Clay (New York, 1983), vii-viii.
20 Melvin P. Leffler
In brief, what immediately became apparent was that substan- tial amounts of food, clothing, and even machinery would have to be imported into Germany in order to resuscitate coal produc- tion and facilitate its distribution to western Europe. These im- ports would be costly. Grew and Clayton pleaded with Stimson and McCloy to purchase the necessary food, cranes, and coal mining machinery. War Department officials acknowledged the great urgency of the matter but believed that they had no authori- zation to spend money except to avert disease and unrest. On the eve of Truman's departure for Potsdam, top policy makers gath- ered to resolve this dilemma. They concluded that the sums nec- essary to pay for these imports should be a first charge on all German exports from current German production and from stocks on hand. Secretary of State Byrnes explained these conclu- sions and their implications to Truman as the two men voyaged across the ocean to meet Churchill and Stalin at Potsdam.21
The American preoccupation with German coal production had profound implications for Soviet-American relations. Not only would the amount of reparations have to be scaled down from the figure of $10 billion tentatively agreed upon at Yalta, but in addition, the Kremlin would have to defer reparations until the coal industry was revived and until the imports necessary for the coal industry's rehabilitation were paid for with
 21 Grew to Stimson, June 8, 1945, FRUS, Potsdam, 1:524-25; Stimson to Grew, July 4, 1945, ibid., 628-30; Clayton to McCloy, June 18, 1945, ibid., 478; Stimson to Byrnes, July 4, 1945, ibid., 482; Byrnes to Truman, July 5, 1945, ibid., 491-92; Robert Ferrell, Off-the-Record: The Private Papers of Harry S. Truman (New York, 1980), 48-49; Rose, Dubious Victory, 276-77. The need for food in the western zones of Germany also impelled American officials to place a high priority on maintaining the economic unity of Germany so that grain and raw materials could flow from the Soviet zone to the western zones. See, for example, Grew to Truman, June 18, 1945, FRUS, Potsdam, 1:178-79.
The Struggle for Germany 21
German exports. State Department officials hoped Soviet leaders would understand the exigencies that prompted these decisions.22 But with or without Soviet cooperation, Truman directed Gen- eral Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of American forces in Europe, to make the production and export of 25 million tons of coal from western Germany by April 1946 the number one prior- ity of occupation policy (except for protecting the health and safety of American troops).23 Without desiring a rift in relations, American policymakers expected Soviet officials to agree that coal for western Europe's reconstruction should take priority over reparations for Soviet Russia's own rehabilitation.
The importance of the Ruhr for western Europe's stabilization and rehabilitation also impelled U.S. officials to reassess earlier proposals that contemplated the Ruhr's separation from the rest of Germany, its internationalization, and its placement under the control of foreign governments, including Soviet Russia. Separa- tion, internationalization, and/or emasculation of the industrial infrastructure of the Ruhr had been deemed imperative in order to circumscribe Germany's future war-making capabilities. But on the eve of Potsdam, the State Department and the JCS submitted briefing papers arguing against any schemes for separation and internationalization. “Under present circumstances an extension of Soviet power and influence into the heart of Western Europe through the device of trusteeship would manifestly be open to grave doubt.”24 A
22 Grew to Pauley, July 2, 1945, FRUS, Potsdam, 1:520; Byrnes to Pauley, July 3, 1945, ibid., 623; Clayton to Thomas C. Blaisdell, July 4, 1945, ibid., 627-28; Department of State to British Embassy, July 11, 1945, ibid., 637; Staff Committee Paper, June 22, 1945, ibid., 187-88.
23 Truman to Josef Stalin, July 27, 1945, ibid., 2:1028; Directive to Dwight D. Eisenhower, July 26, 1945, ibid., 1028-30.
24 Briefing Book Paper, Department of State, “Germany: The Disposition of the Ruhr,” June 27, 1945, ibid., 1:587-88; Memorandum, by Joint Strate- gic Survey Committee, [ND], ibid., 595-96; Memorandum, by Joint Civil Af- fairs Committee, [ND], ibid., 609-10; Grew to Truman, June 30, 1945, ibid., 204-5.
 22 Melvin P. Leffler
few officials, like State Department Counselor Ben Cohen, still argued for internationalization. But their influence was on the wane, as symbolized by the resignation of Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau. Stimson and McCloy's view was ascendant. In a ten-page memorandum to the president on July 16, they co- gently stated the challenge: how to render Germany harmless as a potential aggressor and at the same time enable it to play its part in the necessary rehabilitation of Europe. The aging secretary of war warned that severance of the Ruhr from the rest of Germany would provoke irredentism and “cause the most violent political reactions.” Furthermore, there would be a tendency to drive [the rest of] Germany toward the east in her economic affiliations and outlook,” and that would jeopardize the interests of both the United States and western Europe.25
During the talks at Potsdam, Secretary of State Byrnes laid down the American position. Reparations should come primarily from each power's zone of occupation; imports must be a first charge on exports; the Ruhr would not be internationalized. The United States wanted to limit occupation costs, contain the spread of Soviet influence in Germany, and use the resources of the Ruhr and the Rhineland to spur economic rehabilitation else- where in western Europe. Although Truman and Byrnes were re- treating from elements of the Yalta agreements, they felt they were justified because they were convinced that the Soviets were reneging on their promises to hold free elections in eastern Europe, extracting sufficient reparations from their own zone in
 25 Stimson to Truman, July 16, 1945, Dwight D. Eisenhower Papers, Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas, File 1652, box 103; Stim- son Diary, July 15, 1945; for Ben Cohen's view, see entry, July 16, 1945, Walter Brown Log, Byrnes Papers; for exasperation with Henry Morgen- thau, see Stimson Diary, June 25 and July 4, 1945.
The Struggle for Germany 23
eastern Germany, and achieving their goal of ceding German ter- ritory east of the Oder-Neisse to Poland.26
Soviet leaders were disappointed by the American stand at Potsdam. Stalin and his foreign minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, protested that the Americans were retreating from earlier pledges with regard to the payment of reparations and the internationali- zation of the Ruhr. Stalin said that he had been promised a role in the supervision of the Ruhr. Molotov stressed that Russia desper- ately needed the metallurgical, chemical, and machinery factories that were located there.2727 Among themselves, the Russians ex- pressed bitter recriminations, thinking that the successful testing of the atomic bomb, to which Truman had alluded, was encour- aging the Americans to negotiate from strength and renege on former commitments. Andrei Gromyko recalled Stalin saying, “The USSR is being cheated. . . . The British and Americans were not behaving as real allies. They want to force us to accept their plans on questions affecting Europe and the world. Well, that's not going to happen!”28
In fact, Truman and his aides had not abandoned their desire for Soviet-American cooperation. Truman liked dealing with Sta- lin; Stimson and McCloy wanted to avoid a rift; Clay sought to get along with his Russian counterparts.29 But with
26 Diary and journal entries, July 28, 29, 1945, Joseph Davies Papers, Li- brary of Congress, box 19; Brown Log, July 27, 1945; W. Averell Harriman and Elie Abel, Special Envoy to Churchill and Stalin (New York, 1975), 484-87; Ferrell, Off-the-Record, 58; Robert Ferrell (ed.), Dear Bess: The Letters from Harry to Bess Truman, 1910-1959 (New York, 1983), 520-23.
27 Ninth Meeting of Foreign Ministers, July 27, 1945, FRUS, Potsdam, 2:429-31; Truman-Molotov Meeting, July 29, 1945, ibid., 473-75; Davies Diary, July 30-31, 1945, Davies Papers, box 19.
28 Andrei Gromyko, Memoirs (New York, 1989), 109-10.
29 For Truman's favorable comments about Stalin, see Ferrell, Dear Bess, 522; Ferrell, Off-the-Record, 57; diary entry, August 7, 1945, Eben A. Ayers Papers, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Missouri, box 16; for McCloy's desire to avoid a rift, see his Memorandum to the President, April 26, 1945, Truman Papers, PSF, box 178; for Stimson's desire to use the atomic bomb either as a club or a carrot to reach agreement, see Stimson Diary, April-September 1945; for Clay's hopes of working cooperatively with the Russians, see Smith, Clay Papers, 1:37-38, 62-63, 113, 150.
 24 Melvin P. Leffler
Germany defeated, Europe in turmoil, and the atomic bomb available for use, priorities were shifting. Heretofore, the preser- vation of Soviet-American amity had been the essential prerequi- site to insure American security by defeating the Axis. Now, with the war in Europe over and the defeat of Japan imminent, new concerns assumed primacy. The most likely future threat to the nation's security was the Kremlin's potential capacity to gain pre- ponderance in western Europe through the success of Commu- nist parties or by maneuvering to gain control of all of Germany. If Communist parties were subservient to Moscow, as most American diplomats and intelligence analysts believed, and if they came to power, they might offer strategic bases or sign bilateral trade accords with Moscow akin to those the Kremlin already was imposing on Romania, Poland, and Hungary. The nation's security, therefore, demanded that the resources of western Ger- many be safeguarded and utilized to thwart the forces of revolu- tion and to rehabilitate the western European economy. Likewise, Soviet influence in the Ruhr could not be tolerated lest the Krem- lin use that influence to orient parts of the German economy to- ward the East. As long as the Kremlin accepted these priorities, as long as Moscow acted with restraint in western Europe, as long as it did not seem to be maneuvering to harness German re- sources to Soviet power, accommodation was still possible. But forestalling possible Soviet preponderance in western Europe, whether of a direct or indirect
The Struggle for Germany 25
nature, was now the most vital security imperative of the United States; cooperation was desired but on American terms.30
American officials had reason to be wary, but not because Sta- lin had a strategy for seizing all of Germany or communizing it. After examining the newest archival evidence, Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov conclude in their new book that, “notwithstanding his reputation as a ruthless tyrant, [Stalin] was not prepared to take a course of unbridled unilateral expansion- ism after World War II. He wanted to avoid confrontation with the West. He was even ready to see cooperation with the Western powers as a preferable way of building his influence and solving contentious international issues.”31 Although Stalin was a cautious expansionist, he neither foresaw the contours of the future Cold War nor discounted the possibility of withdrawing Soviet troops from Germany. On the one hand, he worried about the rebirth of autonomous German power and its absorption by the West; on the other hand, he feared that a dismem-
 30 Joint Planning Staff (JPS) 744/3, Strategic Concept and Plan for the Employment of United States Armed Forces, September 14, 1945, National Archives (hereafter DNA), Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), Re- cord Group 218 (hereafter RG 218), CCS 381 (5-13-45), sect. 1; JCS 1545, Report by the Joint Strategic Survey Committee (JSSC), “Military Position of the United States in the Light of Russian Policy,” October 8, 1945, DNA, RG 218, CCS 092, USSR (3-27-45), sect. 1; Joint Intelligence Staff (JIS) 80/20, “Soviet Postwar Foreign Policy—General,” [January 1946], ibid., sect. 4; “Possible Resurrection of Communist International . . . ,” by Ray- mond E. Murphy, June 2, 1945, FRUS, Potsdam, 1:269-80; “The Capabilities and Intentions of the Soviet Union as Affected by American Policy,” by Charles Bohlen and Geroid T. Robinson, [December 1945], Diplomatic His- tory 1 (Fall 1977): 390-96; “The Soviet Union in 1945—An Economic Re- view,” by Thomas P. Whitney, December 24, 1945, FRUS, 1945, vol. 5 (Washington, 1967), 933-36.
31 Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin's Cold War: from Stalin to Khrushchev (Cambridge, Mass., 1996), 276.
26 Melvin P. Leffler
bered, divided Germany might be a militaristic, vengeful Ger- many. Stalin wavered. His best-case scenario was probably a de- militarized, united Germany amenable to Soviet interests. But he had no clear vision of how this goal might be achieved. To the extent that the United States and Great Britain might cooperate with him in controlling German power and extracting German reparations, Stalin appeared inclined to work with them. But co- operation had to be on his own terms, much as the United States sought cooperation on its own terms.32
Stalin's aspirations are partly discernible in his conversations with German Communist leaders who occasionally trekked to Moscow to ascertain the Kremlin's objectives and strategy. In June 1945 Stalin told Walter Ulbricht, Anton Ackermann, Gustav Sobottka, and Wilhelm Pieck that he opposed the division of Germany. The German Communist Party (KPD), he insisted, should be dedicated to maintaining unity. Stalin wanted an anti- fascist democratic revolution. He did not want the Communists to frighten potential supporters and allies. Their aim was to com- plete the bourgeois-democratic revolution. There was to be no class warfare; only the land of Junkers and war criminals was to be expropriated.33
The Soviets quickly permitted political activity in their zone, well ahead of what the British, Americans, and French planned to do. By allowing the KPD to mobilize support, yet controlling and monitoring the other parties, the Russians hoped that their min- ions would become the major political presence in the East. But their aims were by no means circumscribed to their own zone. In late 1945 and early 1946, the Kremlin forced the merger of the KPD and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) within the Soviet zone and formed the Socialist Unity Party
32 Ibid., 45-51, 74-76, 276-77, 282; Naimark, The Russians in Germany, 331; Kennedy-Pipe, Stalin's Cold War, 3, 88, 93-101, 109-10.
33 Naimark, The Russians in Germany, 257-58, 141-56.
 The Struggle for Germany 27
(SED). Soviet officials clearly hoped that a merged party might seem more moderate and compete more effectively in the west- ern zones, where the sectarian rhetoric of the KPD was a distinct liability to winning widespread support.34
But the Kremlin had no coherent strategy for winning the struggle for Germany. Its own goals were deeply conflicted. Stalin might have sought to conceive a political strategy for garnering support throughout Germany, but the behavior of his armies, his secret police, and his dismantling teams insured that his minions could not even win the allegiance of most East Germans. In- spired by hardship and revenge, Russian armies ransacked and brutalized their zone of occupation and alienated its inhabitants. Soviet soldiers engaged in the widespread rape of German women, and their officers sequestered German property. Various Soviet ministries deployed their own dismantling teams and forced German workers to disassemble their factories and crate the machinery for transshipment to Soviet Russia. The NKVD took over the uranium mines and conscripted German labor to work in knee-deep radioactive slime. None of this was coordi- nated in any way, and much of it went on against the wishes of the Soviet Military Administration.
At the same time, the cession of German land to Poland and the retention of German prisoners of war tarnished the appeal of the SED, because its leaders were closely associated with the ruthless practices of the occupation armies and with Soviet rulers in the Kremlin. Stalin, therefore, might have aspired for a united Germany amenable to his interests but had no real means of achieving this goal. He could not reconcile his desperate need for German resources and his determination to crush German mili-
 34 Ibid., 271-308; Barbara Marshall, The Origins of Post-War German Politics (London, 1988), 73-93.
28 Melvin P. Leffler
tarism with his dreams of effectuating a unified Germany in the hands of the SED.35
After Potsdam, U.S. officials sought to gain Soviet support for their efforts to establish a unified economic administration of Germany despite its division into four parts. Economic unity would facilitate the movement of foodstuffs from eastern Ger- many to the Ruhr, where they could be used to feed the miners, boost production, reduce imports, save dollars, and alleviate the financial burden on American taxpayers. While the Soviets claimed that reparation payments should take priority over any improvement in the German standard of living and plans for an interzonal trade agreement, they did not dispute the desirability of a unified economic administration. Instead they sat back and watched the French bear the onus of obstructing progress toward this goal.
The French still demanded the separation and internationaliza- tion of the Ruhr for security and economic reasons. They contin- ued to extract all the coal and transport equipment they could from their own zone and to demand ever larger amounts from the Ruhr as well. French actions infuriated Clay. He blamed the French for stymieing four-power cooperation and for retarding German economic recovery. He urged the State Department to pressure the French to cooperate. But the men at Foggy Bottom ignored Clays wishes because they feared that overt pressure would play into the hands of the French Communists. In May 1946, Clay suspended all reparation payments until the French and Russians agreed to joint economic administration.36
35 Naimark, The Russians in Germany.
36 Eisenberg, Drawing the Line, 200-12; John Gimbel, “On the Implemen- tation of the Potsdam Agreement: An Essay on U.S. Postwar German Pol- icy,” Political Science Quarterly 87 (June 1972):242-69; John Gimbel, The Origins of the Marshall Plan (Stanford, Calif., 1976); Smith, Clay Papers, 1:112-15, 156- 57, 167-68; for fears of the French Communists, see, for example, Jefferson Caffery to Secretary of State, February 9, 1946, March 1, 2, 1946, April 4, 1946, FRUS, 1946, vol. 5 (Washington, 1969), 413, 509-15, 421-22. In the spring of 1946, Clayton pressed the National Advisory Council for a large export-import loan to France in order to bolster the French economy, save Europe from collapse, and strengthen support for the non-Communist Left. See, for example, ibid., 441-46; for the political context of the loan to France, also see Memorandum, by H. Freeman Matthews, May 1, 1946,
 The Struggle for Germany 29
At the time of Clay’s action, State Department officials were deadlocked on whether or not to seek a four-power agreement on Germany. Although George Kennan's analysis of Soviet be- havior was now widely accepted, and although new tensions had flared over Iran, Acheson, Clayton, and some economic experts still wanted to work out an agreement with the Kremlin and hoped that an accord would allow the West to vie for all of Ger- many. By offering a package deal that might bring desperately needed foodstuffs and raw materials to western Europe from the Soviet zone in Germany and from eastern Europe, they desired to make one last attempt to test the Kremlin's loyalty to the eco- nomic unification principles of Potsdam.37 Top-ranking profes- sional foreign service officers such as H. Freeman Matthews, the director of the Office of European Affairs, and ex-
 FRUS, 1946, vol. 2 (Washington, 1970), 205-6.
37 Acheson was also horrified by the food shortages in western Europe.
See Acheson to Truman, April 30, 1946, DNA, RG 107, Records of the Of- fice of the Assistant Secretary of War, Howard C. Petersen Papers, General Subject File, box 1; for efforts to break the impasse and reach a deal, see Acheson and John H. Hilldring to Secretary of State, May 9, 1946, FRUS, 1946. 5:549-54; Walt Rostow, The Division of Europe After World War II (Aus- tin, Tex., 1981), 3-9, 51-62, 94-133; for Cabinet discussions of the desperate food situation in Europe, see Notes on Cabinet Meetings, by Matthew J. Connelly, January 25, 1946, February 1, 1946, March 29, 1946, Matthew J. Connelly Papers, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Missouri, box 1.
30 Melvin P. Leffler
perts on Soviet Russia, like Kennan, opposed such initiatives. They cautioned that the tradeoffs necessary to gain access to and leverage in the East might backfire. They believed that central economic agencies might permit the Soviets to maneuver more openly in the West and capitalize politically on the worsening economic situation. Rather than struggle for all of Germany and thereby risk losing everything, they urged that the United States move immediately to integrate western Germany into western Europe.38
This sentiment was especially felt at the highest levels of the War Department. Secretary of War Robert Patterson and Assis- tant Secretary Howard C. Petersen blamed the French, not the Soviets, for the impasse over economic unification and for the uncertainty over the Ruhr's future status. But notwithstanding who was responsible, Patterson, Petersen, and all the top generals in the army believed the situation was fraught with political- military peril. The “national security” of the United States, they wrote Byrnes on June 10, 1946, required the effective utilization of the economic resources of the Ruhr and the Rhineland in be- half of the stabilization of western Europe. The Ruhr could not be separated from the rest of Germany, lest it cause an irredentist movement, and its capabilities had to be redeveloped. Recogniz- ing, however, that the region's rejuvenated industrial complex might constitute a great threat in the hands of any potential en- emy, whether Germany or Russia, they called for the develop- ment of machinery to insure its demilitarization even while its re- sources were reactivated.39
38 Kennan to Secretary of State, March 6, 1946, FRUS, 1946, 5:519-20; Walter Bedell Smith to Secretary of State, April 2, 1946, ibid., 535-36; Memorandum, by Kennan, May 10, 1946, ibid., 556; Rostow, Division of Europe, 38-50, 62-69.
39 Robert P. Patterson to Byrnes, June 11, 1946, FRUS, 1946, 2:486-88; Patterson to Truman, June 11, 1946, Truman Papers, PSF, box 157; Note for the Files, by Dean Rusk, June 11, 1946, DNA, RG 107, Petersen Papers, Classified File, 091 Germany. The French were not quite as intransigent as they seemed. They, too, were thinking of ways to subject the Ruhr to inter- national control without sacrificing their own unique interests. John Gilling- ham, “From Morgenthau Plan to Schuman Plan,” in American Policy and the Reconstruction of West Germany, 1945-1955, ed. Jeffry M. Diefendorf, Axel Frohn, and Hermann-Josef Rupieper (New York, 1993), 129.
 The Struggle for Germany 31
Within the War Department, a young colonel named Charles H. Bonesteel was advocating the formation of an international corporation to control the production and distribution of the re- sources of the Ruhr. In a number of prescient memos that gained the attention of top officials in the State Department as well as the War Department, Bonesteel acknowledged that a revived Ruhr might some day be turned against the United States by ei- ther a regenerated Germany or an expanded Russia; hence the need to experiment with some form of international control while risking the Ruhr's resuscitation. Not to take this risk would mean the perpetuation of the prevailing chaos and the ultimate “communist engulfment of western Europe at which time the Ruhr might be deliberately rebuilt against us by an unscrupulous Communist super-state.”40
By June 1946, most senior officials in the State and War Departments were convinced of the need to join zones with the British in order to increase production in the Ruhr and thwart Soviet inroads. Whatever reluctance there was to move in this di- rection, lest it cause an open rift with the Russians, disappeared in mid-July when Molotov arose at the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers, assailed American policies in
 40 Charles H. Bonesteel, “Ultimate Disposition of the Ruhr and Rhine- land,” April 29, 1946, DNA, RG 107, Petersen Papers, Classified File, 091 Germany; Bonesteel, “Some General Security Implications of the German Settlement,” [ND], DNA, RG 107, Records of the Office of the Secretary of War, Robert P. Patterson Papers, box 1, Safe File.
32 Melvin P. Leffler
Germany, and championed German unification (less Silesia) and four-power control of Ruhr industries.41 Molotov also called for an increase in Germany's permissible level of industrial produc- tion. Because much of the capital equipment the Russians were removing from Germany was sitting and rotting along railway lines, the Soviets clearly were in the midst of refashioning their own thinking about reparations. Rather than seizing property, they would have the Germans produce the goods they needed. Not only might this strategy allow the Russians to get the prod- ucts they desired, but it would permit the Germans to retain some of their factories in the eastern zone (albeit often under So- viet control), develop their economy, and find gainful employ- ment. Russian economic needs might theoretically be reconciled with a strategy for ameliorating the reputation of the Soviet Un- ion inside Germany and for enhancing the political appeal of the SED.42
Secretary of State Byrnes responded immediately to the Soviet challenge by announcing American willingness to merge its zone with any other cooperating partner, meaning the British. Officials in London already had decided on the need to move jointly with the Americans to develop the resources of their zones and to re- duce occupation costs. To Foreign Minister Bevin as well as to Byrnes, Molotov's speech seemed like an unmistakable sign that the Kremlin was moving to use a nationalistic appeal to gain sup- port in the British, American, and French zones. Requests to al- low the newly formed SED to compete in the western zones served only to accentuate these apprehensions. The Kremlin, it seemed, might be maneuvering for all of
 41 United States Delegation Record, July 9, 10, 1946, FRUS, 1946, 5:842- 47, 869-72, 886-90.
42 Naimark, Russians in Germany, 186-97; Eisenberg, Drawing the Line, 233- 38.
The Struggle for Germany 33
Germany while ransacking its own zone and circumscribing open political competition within it.43
American and British officials feared that the hardship and deprivation within their areas of control might redound to the benefit of the Kremlin's minions should they be allowed to com- pete on equal terms and under the guise of a joint partnership with the more moderate Social Democrats. Clay, for example, worried that the lower echelons of the SPD in the western zones might escape the control of Kurt Schumacher and opt to link up with the SED. The American military governor declared that par- ties could merge only at the state level, because he knew Schu- macher could control developments at this level. Clay also re- fused to permit any meetings to occur in the American zone un- der the name “SED,” especially as long as the Russians refused to permit open political competition in the East. Through minute regulation of the KPD, Clay sought to restrict the growth of German communism and thwart any ability the Soviets might have to gain control of all Germany through the appeal of the SED.44
Like the British, Clay was terribly distraught about the level of production in the western zones, the deplorable conditions, and the extent of German demoralization. Although he still believed that a deal could be struck with the Russians, his major focus was on grappling with the administrative problems in his own sector and on ameliorating the woeful economic conditions. He pre- pared to introduce a set of financial reforms that would curb in- flation and spur production. Knowing, however, that they were likely to exacerbate conditions in the short run, he wanted
 43 Ann Deighton, The Impossible Peace: Britain, the Division of Germany, and the Origins of the Cold War (Oxford, 1990), 81-134; Marshall, Origins of Post-War German Politics, 80-86; Eisenberg, Drawing the Line, 239-40.
44 Marshall, Origins of Post-War German Politics, 80-93.
34 Melvin P. Leffler
to offer hope to the German people that if they endured the immediate hardships, they would eventually have the opportunity for political self-government, economic advancement, and inter- national respectability. If they cooperated with the American pro- gram, he wanted them to know, they would not be abandoned to the Communists or the Soviets. To enhance America’s credibility and reputation, they needed to be told unequivocally that the United States opposed all schemes to sever the Ruhr and the Rhineland and to dismember Germany.45
Clay invited Secretary of State Byrnes to come to Germany and deliver a major address to the Germans. On September 6, 1946, at the opera house in Stuttgart, Byrnes boldly reaffirmed America’s intent to remain in Germany. Without formally disas- sociating the United States with the Potsdam agreements, he sought to buoy German spirits by declaring that they should have the opportunity to expand exports, become economically self- sustaining, and enjoy an average European standard of living.46 Although Clay had not forsaken the goal of German unity, the Stuttgart speech confirmed that the United States was again as- signing primacy to priming the West German economy in the in- terests of western European rehabilitation. The ongoing negotia- tions to merge the British and American zones meant, as Charles Maier has written, that “henceforth the Americans envisaged a Western economic and geopolitical entity as their pre-eminent concern.”47
45 Smith, Clay Papers, 1:336-43; 247-48; 251-60; O. P. Echols to Patterson, August 24, 1946, DNA, RG 107, Patterson Papers, Safe File, box 4; Backer, Winds of History, 114-33.
46 For Byrnes's speech at Stuttgart, see Department of State Bulletin 15 (Sep- tember 15, 1946): 496-501; for Brynes's motives, including Clay's problems with the Germans, see Byrnes to John Snyder, September 9, 1946, Byrnes Papers, File 446 (1).
47 Backer, Winds of History, 133-36; Charles S. Maier, “The Making of ‘Pax Americana’: Formative Moments of United States Ascendancy,” in The Quest for Stability: Problems of West European Security, 1918-1957, ed. R. Ahmann, A. M. Birke, and M. Howard (London, 1993), 400.
 The Struggle for Germany 35
For the short term, the formation of Bizonia called for yet larger amounts of dollars to spur the German economy. The Truman administration faced this burden just as the American people voted Republican majorities into the Senate and House of Representatives. Republicans had campaigned vigorously for re- duced expenditures, lower taxes, stable prices, and a balanced budget. Truman’s advisers realized that the goals of the occupa- tion as well as overall European stabilization would be imperiled if Congress cut funds for Germany. Secretary of War Patterson, therefore, welcomed the opportunity to send Herbert Hoover, the former Republican president, on a mission to Germany. After observing conditions, Patterson expected that Hoover would lobby Republican legislators in behalf of additional aid.48 In early March 1947, Hoover returned with a set of recommendations that immediately gained wide popular support. He warned against proposals to sever the Ruhr and called for the rehabilitation of the German economy. Certain industries, he said, should be taken off the prohibited list, and German reparation obligations needed to be subordinated to the larger
 48 For the interrelationships between Republican control of Congress, budget cutting, and foreign policy, see, for example, Testimony, by George C. Marshall, February 14, 1947, U.S. Senate, Executive Sessions ofthe Senate For- eign Relations Committee, 80th Cong., 1st and 2nd sess., 1976, 1:15; for Truman's worries about this matter, see D. C. Ramsey to Chester Nimitz, December 2, 1946, NHC, CNO, Double Zero Files, folder 31; for James Forrestal's concerns, see James Forrestal to Michael Forrestal, January 19, 1947, James Forrestal Papers, Seely G. Mudd Library, Princeton University, box 73; for the relationships between the War Department and Hoover, see the materials in DNA, RG 107, Patterson Papers, Safe File, box 4; John Gimbel, The American Occupation of Germany: Politics and the Military, 1945-1949 (Stanford, Calif., 1968), 127.
36 Melvin P. Leffler
goals of western European stabilization and American tax reduc- tion.49
Yet many champions of German economic rehabilitation found Hoover's report and even Byrnes's Stuttgart address deeply troubling. They worried about the rebirth of autonomous Ger- man power. Ferdinand Eberstadt, wartime director of the Muni- tions Board, intimate advisor to Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal, and close friend of Robert Lovett, soon to become un- der secretary of state, expressed profound reservations. “If the production of the Ruhr,” he wrote Forrestal, “is to be controlled by Germany, Germany will dictate the conditions, and the extent of the recovery of the Western European countries and also to a considerable extent the Russian recovery.” Eberstadt advocated international control of the Ruhr and complete demilitarization of its industries.50 When John Foster Dulles joined the U.S. dele- gation to the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers, the Re- publican foreign policy spokesman echoed Eberstadt's concerns. “German economic potential,” Dulles wrote George C. Marshall, the newly appointed American secretary of state, “at least as rep- resented by the Ruhr and the Rhineland, should be fully devel- oped and integrated into western Europe, and this should be done in a form which would not risk giving economic mastery to the Germans.”51 The challenge,
49 For Hoover's report, see Gimbel, Marshall Plan, 182-84; for Hoover's testimony, see U.S. Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, Historical Se- ries, Foreign Relief Aid: 1947 (Washington, 1979), 30-43; for the public re- sponse, see Daily Summaries of the Press, March 3-5, 1947, DNA, Records of the Department of State, RG 59, Records of the Office of Public Opin- ion Studies, 1943-1974, box 3.
50 Ferdinand Eberstadt to Forrestal, September 9, 16, 1946, November 2, 1946, Ferdinand Eberstadt Papers, Princeton University, box 28; see also Forrestal to Eberstadt, September 13, 1946, ibid.
51 Memorandum, by Dulles, February 26, 1947, John Foster Dulles Pa- pers, Princeton University, box 31.
 The Struggle for Germany 37
White House aide John Steelman told the president, was to re- construct western Europe without reviving a German “colos- sus.”52
These men not only distrusted German intentions but espe- cially feared the implications of a Soviet-German alliance. “The natural resources and productive facilities of the Ruhr and its ad- jacent industrial districts,” Eberstadt reminded Forrestal, “are the heart not only of the German war potential, but of the war po- tential of Western Europe.”53 Should the Russians get possession of the Ruhr, even indirectly, it would have enormous conse- quences. The German people, Dulles maintained, could not be trusted. Once they began to recover their vitality, they “will al- most certainly be dominated by a spirit of revenge and ambition to recover a great power status.” They would be tempted to align themselves “with the dynamic element of the disrupted war coali- tion.” The Russians were already taking over East German indus- try and reorienting it to serve the Soviet economy. Should they negotiate a deal to secure reparations from current production in the western zones of Germany, Dulles feared, they would gain leverage in those sectors and integrate them into the Soviet econ- omy. Should this tendency extend into western Europe, Dulles warned Marshall, “western civilization and personal freedom, as we had known it, would be impossible.”54
These considerations were much on Secretary of State Mar- shall's mind in March 1947. Since he had taken office in January, cold and snow had battered western Europe, the British
 52 John Steelman to Truman, ND [late April 1947], DNA, RG 335, Re- cords of the Secretary of the Army, 091 Germany, box 74.
53 Eberstadt to Forrestal, September 16, 1947, Eberstadt Papers, box 28.
54 Memorandum, by Dulles, February 26, 1947, Dulles Papers, box 31; Memorandum, by Dulles, March 7, 1947, ibid., box 32.
38 Melvin P. Leffler
had announced their intent to withdraw from Greece and Turkey, and Truman had accepted new responsibilities in the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. As Marshall prepared to lead the U.S. delegation to the Council of Foreign Ministers meeting in Moscow, State Department experts briefed him thoroughly on German problems. The principal U.S. goal, they insisted, was “a Germany . . . integrated into Europe.”55 The former army chief- of-staff and overseer of the nation's wartime strategy needed few lessons on the economic and military significance of the Ruhr. Nor did the man he had just appointed to direct the newly cre- ated office of the Policy Planning Staff. As he was about to take this job, George Kennan told a group of air force officers that a prospective merger of German and Soviet power constituted the greatest threat to American security. “We insist that either a cen- tral German authority be established along lines that will make it impossible for the Soviet Union to dominate Germany and tap its resources, or that we retain complete control over the western zones of Germany.”56
Yet when Marshall arrived in Moscow and summoned General Clay for advice, the U.S. military governor told him that the Sovi- ets were negotiating from weakness. Whereas Dulles, Bonesteel, and Walter Bedell Smith, the U.S. ambassador to Moscow, hesi- tated to take risks lest they lose all of Germany, Clay wanted to contest for eastern Germany and project U.S. influence into east- ern Europe. Shrewd bargaining, Clay believed, was the key to success. From his extensive dealings with Soviet officials in the Allied Control Council, Clay knew how desper-
 55 Memorandum of Conversation, by Edwin A. Lightner, January 24, 1947, FRUS, 1947, vol. 2 (Washington, 1972), 199-200; “Policy Paper Pre- pared in the Department of State,” [January 1947], ibid., 220-23.
56 For Kennan's views, see his Answers to Questions at Air War College, April 10, 1947, George F. Kennan Papers, Princeton University, box 17.
The Struggle for Germany 39
eately the Russians wanted reparations from current production. He told Marshall to consider Soviet requests so long as the Kremlin would agree to augment the level of German industrial production, provide the raw materials without cost for their pro- duction, and defer their actual collection until Germany njoyed an export-import balance.57
Clay’s assessment of the Soviet position was correct. The Sovi- ets wanted reparations from the western zones and a hand in the Ruhr. Stalin did not want to split Germany, cede the coal, steel, and metallurgy to the West, and risk the development of a re- strengthened, perhaps even remilitarized German state acting ei- ther independently, or, worse yet, as part of a hostile Western al- liance. At the end of January 1947, he summoned the SED chiefs to Moscow, told them to pursue a policy of moderation, and reit- erated his desire for a united Germany. Stalin even told Ulbricht that in exchange for the legalization of the SED in the western zones, he was willing to think about permitting the SPD to act independently in the East.58 At the Moscow Conference itself, Molotov stressed the need for reparations from current produc- tion, talked about restoring the Weimar Constitution for all of Germany, and indicated a willingness to compromise on all mat- ters if the Soviet request for reparations could be satisfied.59 Not- withstanding its actions elsewhere in eastern Europe and even in its own zone, Naimark writes, “the Soviet Union had different intents and purposes than it did in Poland, Romania, or even Czechoslovakia and Hungary. In Germany, the Soviets were in- terested in maintaining maximum flexibility to accommodate to a four-power agreement on the unification, demilitarization, and neutralization of the country. The Soviets
57 Smith, Clay Papers, 283, 330-32; Backer, Winds of History, 171-77.
58 Naimark, Russians in Germany, 298-302; Zubok/Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, 47-48.
59 Eisenberg, Drawing the Line, 289-308.
 40 Melvin P. Leffler
were too desperate for a share of West German coal and mineral resources and too worried about the integration of West German industrial power into an American-dominated Western condo- minium to give up easily on hopes for a neutral Germany.”60
But with the exception of Clay, the U.S. delegation to the Moscow Conference had little interest in testing the Kremlin's commitment to a neutral and united Germany. Marshall submit- ted proposals for a comprehensive agreement and focused atten- tion on augmenting the German level of industry. Knowing this idea would arouse French and Soviet strategic apprehensions, he reemphasized Byrnes's proposal for a four-power treaty guaran- teeing Germany's demilitarization. Yet Marshall would not budge on the item that mattered most to the Russians. Listening to the advice of Dulles and heeding new instructions from the presi- dent, Marshall made no effort to satisfy the Kremlin's desire for reparations from current production. He would not make any concessions that might enable the Soviets to interfere with indus- trial recovery in the western zones and with reconstruction initia- tives in the rest of western Europe.61 After a long talk with Stalin in the Kremlin, Marshall grew frightened by the Soviet leader's equanimity in the face of widespread European distress. The sec- retary of state was convinced that the Kremlin intended to capi- talize on the unravelling of western Europe's socio-economic fabric and political order.62
60 Naimark, Russians in Germany, 351.
61 For developments at the Moscow Conference, see FRUS, 1947, 2:234- 390; Eisenberg, Drawing the Line, 277-317; for Marshall's great concern with the strategic implications of a revitalized Germany, see Memorandum of Conversation between Marshall and Vincent Auriol, March 6, 1947, FRUS, 1947,2:192-95; Minutes of Meeting with Georges Bidault, March 13, 1947, ibid., 247-49.
62 For Marshall's talk with Stalin and the conclusions he drew, see FRUS, 1947, 2:337-44; Radio Broadcast, by Marshall, April 28, 1947, Department of State Bulletin 16 (March 11, 1947): 919-24; Walter Millis (ed.), The Forrestal Diaries (New York, 1951), 266-68; George F. Kennan, Memoirs (1925-1950) (New York, 1967), 342-47.
 The Struggle for Germany 41
While the foreign ministers talked for six weeks in Moscow, the European economy appeared to be disintegrating. Food riots erupted in the Ruhr; the French government said it was running out of grain, flour, and coal; and Italy was plagued with labor strife and political violence. Clay remonstrated that the triumph of communism in Germany was now a possibility; Robert Mur- phy, his State Department political advisor, reported that he had never seen German morale so low. In Geneva, Assistant Secre- tary of State Clayton apprised Washington that the French eco- nomic situation was “critical.” And from London came a tele- gram from Ambassador Lewis Douglas and Admiral Richard Conolly, the commander of U.S. naval forces in Europe and the Mediterranean, warning of an impending financial crunch with almost incalculable political, strategic, and economic ramifica- tions.63
In Washington, Acheson, Patterson, and Forrestal appointed an Ad Hoc Committee of the State-War-Navy Coordinating
 63 For developments in Germany, see, for example, Smith, Clay Papers, 1:328, 337-38; Donald R Heath to Secretary of State, April 3, 24, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 2:1144 46; 863-64; Murphy to Secretary of State, May 11, 1947, ibid., 867; for French problems, see French Embassy to Department of State, April 8, 1947, FRUS, 1947, vol. 3 (Washington, 1972), 696-97; Clayton to Acheson, April 23, 1947, ibid., 702; for news from Italy, see James C. Dunn to Secretary of State, March 13, 1947, April 1, 12, 1947, ibid., 876-80; for the reports from London, see Richard Conolly to Nimitz, February 24, 1947, NHC, CNO, Double Zero Files, folder 20; Lewis Douglas to Secre- tary of State, May 16, 20, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 3:14-15. In fact, overall Euro- pean economic conditions were not as grave as American officials believed. See Alan S. Milward, The Reconstruction of Western Europe, 1945-1951 (Berkeley, 1984), 1-55. But the financial crunch facing Britain, France, and Italy was real, as were the possibilities for social unrest and Communist political ad- vances in the latter two countries.
42 Melvin P. Leffler
Committee (SWNCC) to study additional foreign assistance. The elaborate reports of this committee and its sub-committees had a common theme: economic chaos and socio-political turmoil would enable Communists to win or seize power, thereby bring- ing the resources of additional countries within the Soviet orbit. To insure that this did not happen, the SWNCC recommended a comprehensive assistance program. Impoverished governments had to be able to secure the dollars necessary to purchase food, fuel, and other essential raw materials. “The United States,” the SWNCC concluded, “has need of friends in the world today and particularly needs to take care that other nations do not pass un- der the influence of any potentially hostile nation.”64
At the same time, the JCS concluded its own study of “United States Assistance from the Standpoint of National Security.” The JCS squarely placed overriding importance on the future of west- ern Europe. It was impossible to contemplate how the United States “could live safely if France and/or Great Britain were un- der Soviet domination either by reason of military conquest or for the reason that communists had taken over control of their government . . . .” A revived Germany, integrated into the West, the JCS stressed, was indispensable to the well-being and safety of France and Britain, either in wartime or in peacetime. The “complete resurgence of German industry, particularly coal min- ing, is essential for the economic recovery of France—whose security is inseparable from the
 64 Special Ad Hoc Committee of the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee (SWNCC), “Policies, Procedures, and Costs of Assistance by the United States to Foreign Countries,” April 21, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 3:204-19, especially 209, 217; also see the many related studies, April-July 1947, DNA, RG 165, sects. 1-A. 1-B, ABC 400.336 (March 20, 1947); Joseph M. Jones, The Fifteen Weeks (February 21-June 5, 1947) (New York, 1955), 199-206.
The Struggle for Germany 43
combined security of the United States, Canada, and Great Brit- ain.”65
The State Department concurred with the thrust of this analy- sis. On his way back to Washington, Marshall ordered Clay to overcome Anglo-American differences and to get the Bizone producing the coal and equipment needed throughout western Europe.66 Upon arriving in the nation's capital, Marshall eagerly waited to see the results of Kennan's work with the Policy Plan- ning Staff. Kennan defined the immediate threat to the nation's security in economic terms. The Kremlin was unlikely to engage in military aggression but could capitalize on economic chaos and social disorder. The most urgent need was to thwart the appeal of the Left by reviving the western European economy; the place to begin was in the coal mines and steel furnaces of the Ruhr and Rhineland. To accomplish this objective, the western zones of Germany, like the rest of Europe, required dollars to purchase food and raw materials.67
In the weeks that followed, Kennan's Policy Planning Staff, along with Assistant Secretary Clayton and Under Secretary of State Robert Lovett, fashioned the basic principles of the Mar- shall Plan. All European countries, even the Soviet Union,
65 JCS 1769/1, “United States Assistance to Other Countries from the Standpoint of National Security,” April 29, 1947, FRUS 1947, vol. 1 (Wash- ington, 1973), 736-50, especially 739-41.
66 Backer, Winds of History, 181-90.
67 Kennan, Memoirs, 342-58; FRUS 1947, 2:220-30; Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York, 1969), 308-10; Pol- icy Planning Staff (PPS) 2, “Increase of European Coal Production,” June 2, 1947, in The State Department Policy Planning Staff Papers, 1947-1949, ed. Anna Kasten Nelson. 3 vols. (New York, 1983) (hereafter cited as PPS Papers), 1:12-21; Minutes of Meetings of the PPS, May-June 1947, DNA, RG 59, Records of the PPS, box 32. Lovett, too, believed that coal was the top pri- ority. See Petersen to Clay, July 8, 1947, DNA, RG 107, Petersen Papers, Classified File, 091 Germany.
 44 Melvin P. Leffler
might receive assistance provided they accepted the basic ground rules: the economic and industrial rehabilitation of western Europe was the transcendent goal; integration, mutual aid, and self-help were essential ingredients. Eastern Europe constituted a source of raw materials for the West and had to forego its East- ern orientation. Communist parties in the West must accept ex- pulsion from coalition governments and refrain from violence. These ideas were translated into concrete policies during the summer and fall of 1947. Truman's role was minor in the making of the Marshall Plan. But Forrestal, Patterson, Peterson, and Kenneth Royall, the new secretary of the army, insisted that Brit- ain postpone socialization of the Ruhr coal mines, that France accept a new level of industry for Germany, and that Soviet de- mands for reparations continue to be subordinated to these larger goals.68
68 In addition to the citations in the preceding note, see the following: for the place of eastern Europe, Kennan, Memoirs, 353-60; “Summary of Discus- sion,” by Ward Allen, May 29, 1945, FRUS, 1947, 3:235; Memorandum of Conversation, by Petersen, ibid., 268-69; Kennan to Lovett, June 30, 1947, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 33; for the expulsion of the Communist parties from the coalition governments of Italy and France, see FRUS, 1947, 3:889- 914; Philip F. Dur, Jefferson Caffery of Louisiana: Ambassador of Revolutions (Lafayette, La., 1982), 42; for the level of industry in Germany, see FRUS, 1947, 2:977-1072; also the documents in DNA, RG 165, sect. 4-I, ABC 387 Germany (December 18, 1943); Petersen to Hilldring, July 15, 1947, DNA, RG 107, Petersen Papers, Decimal File, 091 Germany; Royall and Marshall to Clay and Murphy, July 26, 1947, ibid.; Lovett to Marshall, August 3, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 2:1015; for socialization of the German coal mines, see Meet- ings of Three Secretaries, May 7, 1947, June 19, 1947, and July 3, 1947, DNA, RG 107, Safe File, box 3; Petersen to Patterson, June 12, 1947, ibid., General Decimal File, box 8; Petersen to Clay, June 25, 1947, DNA, RG 107, Petersen Papers, Classified File, 091 Germany; Patterson to Marshall, June 13, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 2:1152; Memorandum, by Clayton, June 20, 1947, ibid., 929; for Truman's passive role, see Minutes of Cabinet Meetings, July-August 1947, Connelly Papers, box 1.
 The Struggle for Germany 45
The new evidence from Russian and eastern European ar- chives demonstrates that the Marshall Plan had an enormous im- pact on the Kremlin's perceptions and policies. Initially interested in exploring the U.S. overture, Stalin and Molotov quickly drew back. From intelligence reports in London, they correctly learned that the British and Americans regarded Germany as the key to reconstruction and would oppose reparations to the Soviet Un- ion. “Under the guise of formulating a plan for the reconstruc- tion of Europe,” Molotov remonstrated, “the initiators of the conference in fact desire to establish a Western bloc with the par- ticipation of Western Germany.”69 Worse yet, he and Stalin be- lieved that the Marshall offer was an attempt to penetrate the economies of eastern Europe, dilute the Soviet sphere, and reori- ent them westward. “The imperialists,” Molotov concluded, “were drawing us into their company but as subordinates. We would have been absolutely dependent on them without getting anything useful in return.”70
Believing that the Marshall Plan was an “attempt to form a Western Bloc and isolate the Soviet Union,” Stalin hurriedly es- tablished the Cominform, a new coordinating body for European Communist parties. In late September 1947 representatives of nine Communist parties convened in Poland for its first meeting. Andrei Zhadanov assailed the Marshall Plan and proclaimed the division of Europe into “two camps.” Although the new docu- ments suggest that the Kremlin opted for this language
 69 Scott D. Parrish, “The Turn Toward Confrontation: Soviet Reaction to the Marshall Plan, 1947,” Working Paper No. 9, Cold War International His- tory Project [of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars] (Washington, 1994), 28; Mikhail Narinsky, “The Soviet Union and the Mar- shall Plan,” ibid., 45.
70 Albert Resis, Molotov Remembers: Inside Kremlin Politics, Conversations with Felix Chuev (Chicago, 1993), 62; see also Parrish, “Turn Toward Confronta- tion,” 25.
46 Melvin P. Leffler
at the last moment, at the meeting Zhadanov insisted that there was no alternative to this conceptualization of world politics. “American ‘aid’,” he said, “almost automatically brings with it the alteration of the policies of the country to which the aid is given: into power come individuals and parties who are ready to put into place the internal and external program directed by Washing- ton.” Lambasting the French and Italian Communists for their previous efforts to cooperate with bourgeois parties, Zhadanov now encouraged them to launch an offensive against the Marshall Plan with protests, demonstrations, and riots.71
While the Kremlin railed against the Marshall Plan, the discus- sions among representatives of the western European countries remained contentious. U.S. policymakers grew exasperated as European officials seemed to disregard the principles of mutual aid and self-help and contemplated requests for aid far greater than the Americans envisioned.72 The protracted talks imperiled U.S. goals. The economic situation of Britain and France “is dete- riorating with terrifying rapidity,” Kennan noted on September 4.73 The “greatest potential danger to U.S. security,” emphasized the CIA, “lies . . . in the possibility of economic collapse of West- ern Europe and of the consequent accession to power of ele- ments subservient to the Kremlin.”74 To thwart leftist insurgents in Greece, Truman sent military advisors to that country.75 He
also
pondered recommendations to intervene
 Parrish, “Turn Toward Confrontation,” 30-40.
FRUS, 1947,3:364-77.
Memorandum, by Kennan, September 4, 1947, ibid., 397-405.
71 72 73 74
75 Howard Jones, “A New Kind of War”: America's Global Strategy and the Truman Doctrine in Greece (New York, 1989), 95-102; Lawrence S. Wittner, American Intervention in Greece, 1943-49 (New York, 1982), 233-38.
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), “Review of the World Situation,” September 26, 1947, Truman Papers, PSF, box 203.
The Struggle for Germany 47
militarily in Italy.76 But there was no quick fix to the coal situation in the Ruhr. When Anglo-American experts convened to study the matter, they concluded that progress depended on currency stabilization, the availability of foodstuffs and consumer goods, improved transport, and German management of the mines.77 Frightened by the economic paralysis in Germany and political turmoil elsewhere in Europe, Truman convened a special session of Congress and beseeched legislators to approve emergency re- lief pending passage of the Marshall Plan itself.78
While Congress deliberated, Marshall led a delegation to Lon- don for yet another meeting of the foreign ministers. The United States, Marshall told the cabinet before he left, would not be duped into placing “western Germany under arrangements which would leave that country defenseless against communist penetra- tion.”79 There could be no agreement unless the Kremlin aban- doned its desire for reparations from current production and ac- cepted Western control of the Ruhr. Rather than focus on com- promises that might lead to agreement, the U.S. delegation looked for the right moment to call for adjournment. Writing to his old friend, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ambassador Smith con- fided. “The difficulty under which we labor is that in spite of our announced position, we really do not want
 76 Minutes of the National Security Council, December 17, 1947, January 13, 1948, and February 12, 1948, DNA, RG 273; NSC 1/2, “Position of the United States with Respect to Italy,” February 10, 1948, FRUS, 1948, vol. 3 (Washington, 1974), 767-69.
77 “Report on the Anglo-American Talks on Ruhr Coal Production,” by Williard Thorp and William Strang, September 10, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 2:960- 62; Memorandum, by Kenyon C. Bolton, September 22, 1947, ibid., 965-67.
78 For Truman's decision to call a special session of Congress, see ibid. 3:471-84.
79 For the quotation, see Daniel Yergin, Shattered Peace: The Origins of the Cold War and the National Security State (Boston, 1978), 330-31.
48 Melvin P. Leffler
nor intend to accept German unification on any terms that the Russians might agree to, even though they seemed to meet most of our requirements.“80
In fact, we now know that Stalin had not forsaken the possibil- ity of an agreement. In November 1947 the politburo of the CPSU (B) reaffirmed that the goal of the Soviet Union was to re- store a “united democratic Germany.”81 Powerful people in the Kremlin and in the Soviet Military Administration in the Russian zone, Norman Naimark writes, continued to oppose the division of Germany. They “were still looking for possible agreements with the Western powers that would avert or delay the
 80 Smith to Eisenhower, December 10, 1947, Eisenhower Papers, File 1652, box 101; for developments at the London Conference, see FRUS, 1947, 2:728-72; for Marshall's views on Germany, see his speech before the Chicago Council of Foreign Relations, November 18, 1947, Department of State Bulletin 17 (November 30, 1947):1028; Testimony, by Marshall, No- vember 10, 1947, U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Emergency Foreign Aid, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, especially p. 34; for key State Department background papers, see “Summary of State Depart- ment's Proposed Position Papers for London Meeting of CFM [Council of Foreign Ministers],” ND [November 1947], Truman Papers, PSF, box 163; Reparation, ND [November 1947], ibid.; “An Economic Program for Ger- many,” November 5, 1947, ibid.; for American officials' acknowledgment of their lack of interest in reaching accord with the Kremlin, see Henry By- roade to Albert C. Wedemeyer, December 22, 1947, DNA, RG 319, Re- cords of the Plans and Organizations Division (hereafter P&O), 092 TS; Harriman to Truman, August 12, 1947, DNA, RG 335, Records of the Sec- retary of the Army, box 74. Also see the Anglo-American talks preliminary to the London Conference, which reveal little effort to find a compromise basis to reach accord with the Soviets. FRUS, 1947, 2:688-92.
81 Mikhail Narinsky, “Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade, 1948,” p. 2, paper presented at a conference on “The Soviet Union, Germany, and the Cold War, 1945-1962: New Evidence from Eastern Archives” (Essen, 1994).
The Struggle for Germany 49
creation of a separate West German state. They still sought influ- ence among the West German population . . . .”82
It was precisely this prospective influence that U.S. officials dreaded. They feared that even Stalin's minimal terms might en- able the Kremlin to wedge its way into the western zones and thereby win the struggle for all of Germany. The most urgent danger facing the United States, Marshall believed, “would be a Germany controlled by the Soviet Union with German military potential utilized in alliance with the Soviet.”83
For Marshall, the London meeting provided a propitious opportunity to consult with Ernest Bevin and Georges Bidault, the British and French foreign ministers. In the presence of Clay and Brian Robertson, the British military governor of Germany, Marshall and Bevin outlined plans for currency reform, for German management of the coal mines, and for increased German self-government.84 The Germans, Marshall believed, would not remain neutral; they would turn East or West. The West German economy, therefore, had to be rehabilitated, and German loyalty had to be won for the West.85
In the weeks and months after London, the European crisis headed toward a climax. American and British officials sought to build strength. In their merged zone, Clay and Robertson insti- tuted a set of economic, financial, and administrative reforms that were prerequisite to financial stabilization and political self- government. Publicly, Bevin proposed a Western Union; pri- vately, he also solicited a military pact with the United States.
82 Naimark, Russians in Germany, 166, also see 306-9, 345.
83 Memorandum of Conversation, by Marshall, July 21, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 2:1003.
84 British Memoranda of Conversations, December 17, 18, 1947, ibid., 815-26.
85 Memorandum of Conversation, by Samuel Reber, November 18, 1947, ibid., 722.
 50 Melvin P. Leffler
Upon French initiative, it was also agreed to meet in London to explore avenues for incorporating the French sector into Bizo- nia.86 In Washington, American officials labored more strenuously than ever to secure congressional passage of the European Re- covery Plan (ERP).87
Soviet officials denounced Western initiatives and reacted bru- tally. In Bulgaria, opposition leaders were executed; in Poland, seventeen non-Communists were accused of supplying informa- tion to the underground and were tried as traitors; in Hungary, members of the Social Democratic and Smallholders parties were expelled from the government and were forced to flee for their lives.88 Stalin signed a series of bilateral defensive pacts with Hun- gary, Romania, and Bulgaria, made overtures for a defensive alli- ance with Finland, and was rumored to be seeking a mutual assis- tance treaty with Norway.89 More ominous yet, in Czechoslovakia, Stalin supported the Communist seizure of power and the ensu- ing suppression of democratic leaders.90
The American public was shocked by events in Czechoslova- kia, but U.S. policymakers were not surprised. Kennan and
 86 For the actions of Clay and Robertson, see Smith, Clay Papers, 2:536-37, 545-58; for Bevin's initiatives, see, for example, FRUS, 1948, 3:3ff ; for French overtures, which first led to a three-power meeting in London and then to the inclusion of representatives from the BENELUX nations, see ibid. 2:20-21 ff.
87 See U.S. Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, European Recovery Pro- gram, 80th Cong., 2nd sess., 1948.
88 Peter Calvocoressi, Survey of International Affairs, 1947-48 (London, 1952), 195-96, 187, 192-93.
89 For the treaties, see Margaret Carlyle (ed.), Documents on International Af- fairs, 1947-1948 (New York, 1952), 298-99; see also Kennedy-Pipe, Stalin's Cold War, 120-24.
90 For the Communist seizure of power in Czechoslovakia, see Thomas T. Hammond (ed.), The Anatomy of Communist Takeovers (New Haven, Conn., 1975), 398-432.
The Struggle for Germany 51
Charles Bohlen, the government's ablest Kremlinologists, had foreseen a Soviet crackdown. “Subject to a squeeze play,” Ken- nan had written, the Soviets were seeking to thwart the Marshall Plan, stymie Western initiatives in Germany, and bulwark a de- fensive position in eastern Europe.91 U.S. Army officials and intel- ligence analysts also anticipated that attempts to implement cur- rency reform in the western zones, establish a provisional gov- ernment, and boost industrial production might trigger Soviet countermoves, including the isolation of Berlin and the full in- corporation of East Germany into a Soviet orbit.92
But U.S. policymakers did not think the Kremlin would go to war. “The problem at present,” wrote John Hickerson in the im- mediate aftermath of the coup in Czechoslovakia, “is less one of defense against overt foreign aggression than against internal fifth-column aggression supported by the threat of external force.”93 Soviet leaders, in the view of American officials and in- telligence analysts, knew that they could not defeat the United States in a protracted conflict. Their economy was too weak; their transportation system too primitive; their petroleum industry too vulnerable to attack. Even if Soviet armies overran
 91 Kennan to Lovett, October 6, 1947, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 33; “Pre- liminary Analysis of Announcement of the Revival of the European Comin- tern,” by Bohlen, October 7, 1947, DNA, RG 59, Charles Bohlen Papers, box 6; PPS 13, “Resumé of the World Situation,” November 6, 1947, FRUS, 1947, 1:772-74; Memorandum for the President, by Hillenkoetter, Novem- ber 7, 1947, Truman Papers, PSF, box 249.
92 Byroade to Wedemeyer, December 22, 1947, DNA, RG 319, P&O, 092 TS; Wedemeyer to Secretary of the Army, January 2, 1948, DNA, RG 165, sect. 4-I, ABC 387 Germany (December 18, 1943); Memorandum for the President, by Hillenkoetter, December 22, 1947, Truman Papers, PSF, box 249; Bevin to Marshall, February 17, 1948, FRUS, 1948, vol. 2 (Washington, 1973), 68.
93 Memorandum, by Hickerson, March 3, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 3:40-41.
52 Melvin P. Leffler
western Europe, they had no way of attacking the United States. Stalin, they assumed, would therefore seek to avoid a military clash with the United States. The men who ruled the Kremlin were not regarded as bold adventurers, but as domestic tyrants who would not jeopardize their internal power for the sake of foreign conquest. They wanted to win the struggle for Ger- many—and for all of Europe—but not through military action.94
Without provoking the Soviets into a war that nobody wanted, officials in Washington pressed forward with their plans to coopt western Germany for the well being of western Europe. Pru- dence dictated some additional military spending. In a tough speech to Congress on March 17, Truman asked for more money for defense as well as for passage of Universal Military Training and Selective Service.95 But American policymakers continued to assign priority to the passage of the ERP and to implementing their plans for Germany. The State Department instructed Clay to stop laboring on an agreement for quadripartite currency re- form. Officials feared that the Kremlin would use a currency ac- cord either to frustrate German economic recovery or to compli- cate the already contentious talks with the French regarding tri- zonal merger, German management of the coal mines, and provi- sional self-government.96
 94 Kennan to Marshall, February 3, 1948, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 33; Kennan to Marshall, January 6, 1948, ibid.; CIA, “Review of the World Situation as it Relates to the Security of the United States,” February 12, 1948, Truman Papers, PSF, box 250; S. J. Chamberlin to Omar Bradley, March 14, 1948, DNA, RG 319, P&O; JIC of the U.S. embassy in Moscow, “Soviet Intentions,” April 1, 1948, DNA, RG 330, CD 2-2-2, box 54; CIA, “Possibility of Direct Soviet Military Action During 1948,” April 2, 1948, Truman Papers, PSF, box 255.
95 PPHST, 1948 (Washington, 1964), 182-86.
96 Memorandum, by Frank G. Wisner, March 10, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:879-80; Smith, Clay Papers, 2:561.
The Struggle for Germany 53
The Kremlin regarded Western actions with consternation. “The Western powers,” wrote A. Smirnov, the head of the 3rd European Department of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “are transforming Germany into their strong point and including it in the newly formed military-political bloc, spearheaded against the Soviet Union and the countries of new democracy.”97 Accord- ing to Zubok and Pleshakov, Stalin believed the United States was trying “to revive German-military industrial potential and to direct it, as in the 1930s, against the Soviet Union.”98 On March 9, Stalin summoned Marshal Vassily Sokolovsky, the commander- in-chief of Soviet occupation forces, and Vladimir Semyonov, his political advisor, to the Kremlin. They discussed measures to re- strict the movement of commerce and transport from the west- ern zones to Berlin. Stalin's aim was to get the Western powers to halt their attempts to merge the three western zones, form a West German government, and carry out currency reform. But should the Kremlin fail in this goal, Stalin thought he might force the Americans, British, and French to abandon Berlin. When Wil- helm Pieck suggested to Stalin on March 26, 1948, that the politi- cal prospects of the SED might be enhanced if the Allies were removed from Berlin, Stalin retorted: “Let's make a joint effort— perhaps we can kick them out.”99
At the end of March, Sokolovsky began issuing orders to strengthen controls around the borders of the Soviet zone of occupation. He sought to restrict Western traffic to the Greater Berlin area. He was flush with confidence. On April 17, the So- viet Military Administration in Germany reported to Moscow that “our control and restrictive measures have dealt a strong blow at the prestige of the Americans and British in Germany.
97 Narinsky, “Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade,” 6.
98 Zubok/Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin 's Cold War, 50.
99 Ibid., 52; Naimark, Russians in Germany, 6, 306; Narinsky, “Soviet Policy
and the Berlin Blockade,” 5-8.
 54 Melvin P. Leffler
The German population believes that the Anglo-Americans have retreated before the Russians and that this testifies to the Rus- sians' strength.” Sokolovsky, moreover, did not think that the Americans could mount an effective airlift. “Clay’s attempts to create an airlift,” the Kremlin was informed, “have proved futile. The Americans have admitted that idea would be too expensive.” Thinking they could thwart American plans, on May 18 the So- viet government instructed its military administration in Germany to be prepared to introduce its own banknotes into Greater Ber- lin should the Western powers make the first move to circulate a new currency in their zones. The Kremlin's intent, writes Russian historian Mikhail Narinsky after assessing the newest evidence, was to “incorporate the whole of Berlin in the financial-economic system of the Soviet zones.”100
The Kremlin, however, misjudged the determination of U.S. officials. When Congress passed the Marshall Plan in late March 1948, and when the Italian Communists were defeated at the polls in April, U.S. policymakers breathed a sigh of relief. In their view, the tide had turned. But rather than relax the pressure, they felt emboldened. Marshall, Lovett, Kennan, and Bohlen wanted the Kremlin to know that although the United States hoped to avoid war, it would not tolerate any provocative counterthrusts.101 When Stalin and Molotov published the diplomatic correspon- dence and insinuated they would be prepared to negotiate, the Americans showed no interest.102 The
100 Narinsky, “Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade,” 9-11.
101 See especially Bohlen to Lovett, April 22, 1948, DNA, RG 59, Bohlen Papers, box 1; Kennan, “Draft Telegram,” May 10, 1948, ibid; FRUS, 1948, vol. 4 (Washington, 1974), 833-58.
102 For American disinclination to negotiate, even in view of Soviet ac- tions that were interpreted as conciliatory, see [untitled memorandum], by Bohlen, May 18, 1948, DNA, RG 59, Bohlen Papers, box 1; Memorandum for the President, by Hillenkoetter, May 20, 1948, Truman Papers, PSF, box 249; Marshall to Douglas, May 11, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 4:861-63; Marshall to Norman J. O. Makin, May 14, 1948, FRUS, 1948, vol. 5, pt. 2 (Washington, 1976), 987-88; Lovett to Douglas, May 19, 1948, ibid. 2:258; Marshall to Caffery, May 26, 1948, ibid., 284; see also J. Samuel Walker, “'No More Cold War': American Foreign Policy and the 1948 Soviet Peace Offensive,” Dip- lomatic History 5 (Winter 1981), 75-91.
 The Struggle for Germany 55
United States was determined to complete the agreements labori- ously negotiated in London with Britain and France that provided for trizonal merger, German self-government, and currency re- form. Any equivocation, the Americans feared, would disillusion Germans and turn them eastward.103
French officials demurred. They worried about the strategic and economic consequences of German revival. A West German state might seek to recover its own power or might ally with Rus- sia in order to achieve reunification. Germany alone or a Ger- many united with Russia constituted a long-term menace. But French officials were equally apprehensive about short-term dan- gers. Might acceptance of Anglo-American plans for Germany ignite a wave of domestic protest, fifth-column action, or a Communist coup? Might France then follow Czechoslovakia into the communist wasteland? Might Western initiatives provoke ei- ther a Soviet attack or trigger a sequence of moves that could culminate in war? The French did not think the Kremlin wanted war. But war might come because the recreation of the German government and the rehabilitation of the German economy were portentous acts, the consequences of which could not be pre- dicted.104
 103 For fears of disillusioning Germany and driving Germans eastward, see Smith, Clay Papers, 2:570-71; Douglas to Secretary of State, February 25, 26, 28, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:87, 93, 98-100.
104 French fears, both short-term and long-term, are nicely summarized in Memorandum of Conversation, by Caffery, June 26, 1948, DNA, RG 335, Records of the Secretary of the Army, Office of the Under Secretary (hereaf- ter SAOUS), Draper/Voorhees, box 12; Draper to Secretary of Defense, June 2, 1948, ibid., box 74. These same French fears were repeatedly ex- pressed during the London talks. See, for example, FRUS, 1948, 2:98-100, 110-11, 232-33, 266, 279-81, 317, 324-26, 331-35, 364-65.
56 Melvin P. Leffler
U.S. officials did not discount French fears. They grasped that the new Germany might maneuver between East and West, ally with the Kremlin, or seek domination. These eventualities had to be guarded against. To allay French anxieties, the Truman ad- ministration agreed that the United States should assume un- precedented commitments in Europe. In addition to support for a Military Security Board to guarantee Germany's disarmament and for an international authority to monitor the allocation of the resources of the Ruhr, U.S. officials promised to keep occupation troops in Germany indefinitely.105 Announcing that the United States would support a Western Union, President Truman authorized talks that would consummate a year later in the North Atlantic Treaty.106 He instructed General Clay to begin planning for a joint defense of the Rhine and approved the idea of a com- prehensive military aid program.107 The president and his advisors were not eager to
105 FRUS, 1948, 2:71-73, 98-105, 110-11, 122-23, 248, 297, 319.
106 For Truman's support of a Western Union, see his speech on March 17, 1948, PPHST, 1948, 182-86; for State Department actions, see FRUS, 1948, 3:58-136; for Under Secretary of State Lovett's efforts in behalf of the Vandenberg Resolution and the North Atlantic Treaty, see, for example, Memorandum, by Lovett, May 21, 1948, ibid. 2:270-72; Lovett to Douglas, May 24, 25, 1948, ibid., 275-77; Testimony, by Lovett, June 3, 1948, U.S. Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, Legislative Origins of American Foreign Policy: The Vandenberg Resolution and the North Atlantic Treaty (New York, 1979), 67-83.
107 For authorization to enter into strategic planning for a defense of the Rhine in case of emergency, see Marshall to Douglas, May 26, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:282; Smith, Clay Papers, 2:679; JCS 1868/11, “Guidance for United States Military Representative for London Military Talks on the Western Union of Nations,” July 3, 1948, DNA, RG 319, P&O, 092 TS, p. 84; for the military assistance program, see NSC 9/3, “The Position of the United States with Respect to Support for Western Union and other Related Free Countries,” June 28, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 3:140-41; NSC 14/1, “The Position of the United States with Respect to Providing Military Assistance to Na- tions of the Non-Soviet World,” July 1, 1948, ibid. 1:585-88; for the military assistance talks in London, see the extensive documentation in DNA, RG 218, Records of the JCS, William Leahy Papers, box 5. In September, the United States also reequipped three French divisions in Germany. See Memorandum, by JCS, September 13, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 3:648-49; Memo- randum, by Wedemeyer, October 10, 1948, ibid., 665; Memorandum, by Marshall, November 5, 1948, ibid., 675-76.
 The Struggle for Germany 57
assume these obligations and commitments. They realized, how- ever, that without them the French would never adhere to the London accords and go along with U.S. plans for rebuilding and coopting latent German power.
Although the French reluctantly signed the London agree- ments, their apprehensions that the Kremlin would not acquiesce to Western initiatives in Germany proved correct. When Marshal Sokolovsky was informed on June 18 that the Americans, British, and French intended to carry out their currency reform, he said that the new money would not be permitted to circulate in Greater Berlin, which “is a part of the Soviet zone.” On June 22, Sokolovsky declared his own monetary reform for the Soviet zone and for all of Berlin. The next day the Western powers an- nounced plans to circulate their currency in the western sectors of Berlin. In retaliation, Soviet occupation authorities blockaded Berlin. On July 3, Sokolovsky stated that the restrictions would continue until the West canceled its plans to establish a West German government.108
Overall, Stalin's policies continued to be conflicted, as illus- trated by new information demonstrating the immense amount of materiel that continued to flow from the eastern zone
 108 Narinsky, “Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade,” 11-14.
58 Melvin P. Leffler
into western Berlin notwithstanding the blockade.109 Stalin still could not decide whether he wanted principally to thwart West- ern plans for western Germany and thereby try to effectuate a unified and neutral Germany, or whether he wanted to expel the Americans, British, and French from Berlin and thereby solidify the division of Germany and communize the East. The blockade itself seemed to suggest that he was moving toward the latter op- tion, but he was still wavering. He and Molotov reiterated that the restrictions would be lifted if the Western powers repudiated the agreements they had reached at London regarding the forma- tion of West Germany and if they agreed to treat Germany as a unit. But at the same time, the Soviet Military Administration in- tensified its ideological campaign inside the eastern zone, acceler- ated its repression of social democratic voices within the SED, and proceeded with the sovietization of German culture. A Soviet diplomat later recalled that “for us it was of primary importance to . . . incorporate entire Berlin in the economic system of the Soviet zone” and totally dislodge the Western powers from Ber- lin. If this option was the Kremlin's overriding goal, it could not be pursued without forcing western Germany into a Western bloc, something Stalin desperately wanted to avoid. But to pre- vent it, he had to consider diluting Soviet control in the East, something he was equally unwilling to do lest he lose the struggle for Germany in the eastern as well as the western zones.110
American officials grasped the dual motives behind Soviet ac- tions. They believed the Kremlin was trying to pressure the West to reverse the London agreements and to include the Soviet gov- ernment in plans for the future of western Germany.
109 William Stivers, “The Incomplete Blockade: Soviet Zone Supply of West Berlin, 1948-49,” Diplomatic History (forthcoming).
110 Narinsky, “Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade,” 14-19, quotation on 17; Kennedy-Pipe, Stalin's Cold War, 120-38; Naimark, Russians in Ger- many, 308-17, 385-464.
 The Struggle for Germany 59
Should Stalin fail to achieve this goal, American officials thought he would seek to force the Western powers out of Berlin so that the Kremlin could proceed more easily to incorporate East Ger- many into the Soviet bloc. Neither of these options was accept- able to American officials. They would not repudiate the London agreements; nor would they depart from Berlin. Despite its negli- gible military importance, Berlin was deemed to be a symbol of overriding significance. Withdrawal from Berlin, American offi- cials insisted, would have a “bandwagon” effect on the rest of Germany, Italy, and France. Western Europeans would lose faith in American determination. They would define their self- preservation in terms of an accommodation with the East. One European country after another would drift into the Soviet orbit, thereby endangering vital U.S. security interests.111
The challenge for American officials was to demonstrate the proper mixture of imagination and courage to stay in Berlin, avoid hostilities, and proceed with the implementation of the London accords. Believing that the Soviets were bluffing and were afraid of U.S. air power, Clay wanted to send an armed con- voy from the western zones through eastern Germany to Berlin. Acting more prudently and seeking to avoid overt
 111 For excellent analyses of American decision making during the Berlin crisis, see Avi Shlaim, The United States and the Berlin Blockade, 1948-1949 (Berkeley, 1983); John Oneal, Foreign Policy Making in Times of Crisis (Colum- bus, Ohio, 1982), 216-90; for assessments of Soviet motives, see, for exam- ple, Memorandum for the President, by Hillenkoetter, June 24, 1948, Truman Papers, PSF, box 249; Bradley to Eisenhower, “National Military Establishment Views on Situation in Germany,” by P&O, June 30, 1948, DNA, RG 319, P&O, 092 TS; “Soviet Arms in Berlin Situation,” by Bohlen [ND], DNA, RG 59, Bohlen Papers, box 6; Bohlen to Marshall, Lovett, et al., August 4, 1948, ibid., box 4; CIA, “Review of the World Situation,” July 14, 1948, Truman Papers, PSF, box 204.
60 Melvin P. Leffler
provocation, Truman, Marshall, and Lovett opted for an airlift of supplies to beleaguered West Berlin. Stalin would have to decide whether he wanted to interfere with the airlift and risk war.112 Meanwhile, the airlift galvanized German sentiment in support of the West. Clay believed that German abhorrence of Soviet ac- tions provided the ideal context for the formation of a provi- sional West German government that would lock itself into a Western orientation. Not to act expeditiously would forsake a unique opportunity.113
It was uncertain how long this opportunity would last, because, notwithstanding the initial euphoria produced by the airlift's suc- cess, military officers believed that it was too costly to be contin- ued indefinitely and put at risk too great a proportion of the na- tion's air assets.114 In August, Lovett and Bohlen asked Kennan and the PPS to submit ideas on possible resolutions of the Berlin crisis and the German question. Kennan submitted a stunning proposal that established the lines of debate for most of the next year. Revising his earlier views, he now called for a comprehen- sive settlement that provided for the withdrawal of occupation forces from most of Germany, the establishment of a unified Germany, and the continuation of
 112 For U.S. decision mating during the Berlin crisis, see Shlaim, Berlin Blockade, 171-280; Oneal, Foreign Policy Making, 241-50. The most recent evi- dence from Russia seems to demonstrate the accuracy of U.S. assumptions that the Kremlin did not want to go to war. See Victor M. Gobarev, “Soviet Military Plans and Activities During the Berlin Crisis 1948-1949,” paper pre- sented at the conference on “The Soviet Union, Germany, and the Cold War, 1945-1962: New Evidence from Eastern Archives” (Essen, 1994).
113 Summary of Discussion, October 22, 1948, Minutes of the Meetings of the NSC, DNA, RG 273; also see “The Situation in Berlin,” by Bohlen, July 29, 1948, DNA, RG 59, Bohlen Papers, box 4.
114 Oneal, Foreign Policy Making, 247-51; JCS to Secretary of Defense, Oc- tober 20, 1948, DNA, RG 335, SAOUS, Draper/Voorhees, box 17.
The Struggle for Germany 61
demilitarization controls. This settlement, he hoped, would lead to a retrenchment of Soviet power, avoid the division of Europe, and win the appreciation of the German people. The time was ripe, Kennan argued, to make such a daring proposal. “It is my feeling that if the division of Europe cannot be overcome peace- fully at this juncture, when the lines of cleavage have not yet hardened completely across the continent, when the Soviet Un- ion (as I believe) is not yet ready for another war, when the anticommunist sentiment in Germany is momentarily stronger than usual, and when the Soviet satellite area is troubled with se- rious dissension, uncertainty and disaffection, then it is not likely that prospects for a peaceful resolution of Europe's problems will be better after a further period of waiting.”115
Kennan's proposals, which reappeared in revised form in No- vember, triggered a stormy debate in top policymaking circles. He wanted to erode Soviet predominance in eastern Europe, contract Soviet power in East Germany, and open the possibility of win- ning all of Germany for the West. The initial task was to capital- ize on Tito's defection, appeal to eastern European nationalist sentiment, and “maneuver the Russian bear back into his cage” where he no longer could threaten to gobble up the technical skills and industrial infrastructure of Europe and combine them with the manpower and resources of the Soviet Union. By recag- ing the bear, the raw materials and foodstuffs of eastern Europe would become accessible to West Germany and western Europe, thereby alleviating the chronic dollar shortage in the West, reduc- ing the burden on American taxpayers, and insuring the success of U.S. reconstruction policies. By rejoining eastern and western Europe, moreover, a European unit would
115 PPS 37, “Policy Questions Concerning A Possible German Settle- ment,” August 12, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:1289-96. The quotation is on p. 1295. Also see Minutes of Meetings, August-November 1948, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 32.
 62 Melvin P. Leffler
be created large enough to absorb German energy and power without risking German domination.116
But powerful opposition to Kennan's views immediately emerged because he was espousing a radical reorientation of American national security policy. Kennan's proposals contem- plated Germany's unification and neutralization, American and Soviet disengagement, and the gradual emergence of a third force in world affairs. John Hickerson, the director of the Office of European Affairs, did not want to jeopardize the progress already made toward integrating West Germany into western Europe. The United States, he stressed, must not do anything that might allow Germany to be drawn into a Soviet orbit. Lovett accepted Hickerson's views as official policy. In February 1949, Averell Harriman, who was now in charge of implementing the ERP in Europe, told the House Committee on International Relations that the aim of American policy was to prevent a neutral third force from emerging in Europe.117
116 For the revised paper, see PPS 37/1, “Position to be Taken by the U.S. at a CFM Meeting,” November 15, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:1320-25; for the quotation, see Kennan, “Contemporary Problems of Foreign Policy,” September 17, 1948, Kennan Papers, box 17; Kennan, “United States For- eign Policy,” October 11, 1948, ibid.; Kennan to Marshall, October 18, 1948, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 33; Minutes of Meetings, August-November 1948, ibid., box 32.
117 For opposition to Kennan, see Memorandum, by Hickerson, August 31, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:1287-88, footnote 1; Hickerson to Harriman, De- cember 3, 1948, ibid. 3:306-9; Minutes of Meetings, October 14-November 8, 1948, DNA, RG 59, PPS, box 32; Kennan to Lovett, November 18, 24, 1948, ibid., box 33; Lovett to Kennan, December 1, 1948, FRUS, 1948, 2:1320, footnote 1. See also Testimony, by Harriman, February 9, 1949, U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on International Relations, Historical Series, Selected Executive Session Hearings of the Committee; 1943-1950: Foreign Economic Assistance Programs, pt. 2, vol. 4 (Washington, 1976), 24-25; Wilson D. Miscamble, George F. Kennan and the Making of American Foreign Policy, 1947- 1950 (Princeton, 1992), 147-69.
 The Struggle for Germany 63
When Truman chose Dean Acheson to be secretary of state in January 1949, Acheson was forced to turn his attention immedi- ately to the German question. General Clay and Secretary of the Army Kenneth Royall were appalled by France's reluctance to implement the London accords and cede real power to a new West German government. Delays were alienating the German people and providing unwarranted opportunities for the Kremlin to make political inroads.118 James Riddleberger, who had taken Robert Murphy's job as Clay’s political advisor, described the growing appeal of Soviet propaganda, which called for German unity and a Rapallo-type relationship between Germany and So- viet Russia.119 Fearing the rebirth of nationalism or the specter of neutralism, Acheson authorized Kennan to make a trip to Ger- many in order to get a better grasp on what was happening.
Kennan was awed by the gravity of the situation. Democratic forces inside Germany could falter easily, and a new totalitarian- ism might arise. The Western world was at a critical turning point. “This is one of the moments,” he wrote, “when you hear the garments of the Goddess of Time rustling through the course of events. Who ignores this rustling, does so at his peril.” Kennan wanted to bolster democratic forces by allowing Germans con- siderable leeway in writing their own constitution, removing most occupation controls, and granting the German government full authority over the German economy. Otherwise,
 118 Royall, “Presentation to Secretary Forrestal,” January 4, 1949, Eisenhower Papers, File 1652, box 42; Royall to Truman, January 7, 1949, DNA, RG 330, CD 6-4-22; Clay to Royall, January 23, 1949, FRUS, 1949, vol. 3 (Washington, 1974), 84-87.
119 James Riddleberger to Secretary of State, March 26, 1949, and April 2, 1949, FRUS, 1949, 3:231-35.
64 Melvin P. Leffler
German nationalism would be fueled and it would assume an anti-Western orientation.120
While Kennan's ideas intrigued Acheson, the secretary of state put Robert Murphy in charge of a new Office of German and Austrian Affairs and asked Philip Jessup, one of his most trusted aides, to oversee critical aspects of German policy. Murphy as- sumed responsibility for preparing a revised State Department position paper on the German question. Working closely with Tracy Voorhees, the new assistant secretary of the army, they agreed that the essential task was to integrate as much of Ger- many as possible into free Europe. They did not want to jeopard- ize the London accords nor repudiate U.S. support for the estab- lishment of a West German government In order to bolster de- mocratic forces within the new West Germany, diminish antici- pated friction between the provisional government and the West- ern powers, and stifle the temptation of the new Germany to look eastward, Murphy and Voorhees advised that the United States should be prepared to relinquish substantial authority to the new German government and reserve only a small number of powers for the United States, Britain, and France.121
American officials realized there were substantial risks in this course of action. In a paper that Acheson approved and handed
 120 Kennan's draft letter (not sent), March 29, 1949, Kennan Papers, box 23; see also Paper Prepared by Kennan, March 8, 1949, FRUS, 1949, 3:96- 102; for Kennan's trip to Germany, see Kennan, Memoirs, 451-65.
121 “U.S. Policy Respecting Germany,” by Murphy, March 23, 1949, FRUS, 1949, 3:118-31; “Tentative Outline of Approach in the Discussions with the British and French Foreign Ministers on Germany,” by Murphy, March 30, 1949, ibid., 140-42; Paper Prepared in the Department of State, “Outline of New Approach in Military Government-Western German Gov- ernment Relationship,” March 30, 1949, ibid., 154-55.
The Struggle for Germany 65
to the president, Voorhees wrote that the United States “recog- nizes a certain danger to its own security and that of Germany's neighbors inherent in the industrial potential and facilities of an economically recovered Germany through their possible capture and utilization by another power for the purposes of aggression.” There was also the prospect that a sovereign West German po- litical entity, if not effectively integrated into the West, could choose on its own volition to make an accommodation with the East or to develop its own independent power. To allay the fears of France and other western European countries about these possibilities, Voorhees reiterated that the United States should be prepared to assume unprecedented commitments. It should re- tain its occupation forces in Europe indefinitely, sign the North Atlantic Treaty, offer a program of military assistance, create a Military Security Board, support the Ruhr Control Authority, and contemplate Germany's eventual armed contribution to the Western alliance structure.122
When Bevin and French Foreign Minister Robert Schuman came to Washington in April 1949 to sign the North Atlantic Treaty, they discussed German affairs extensively and concluded far-reaching understandings on such matters as the occupation statute, trizonal fusion, the German constitution, and the re- served powers. The three allies were on the verge of creating a viable West German political and economic entity when the Kremlin indicated its willingness to lift the blockade of Berlin. Stalin asked only that the Western governments suspend their economic countermeasures against East Germany and agree to a
 122 Memorandum by the Secretary of State to the President, “U.S. Policy Respecting Germany,” March 31, 1949, ibid., 142-47. The quotation is on p. 145. Also see Paper Prepared in the Department of State, ND [late March 1949], ibid., 131-36.
66 Melvin P. Leffler
new meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers to discuss German unification.123
The Soviet overture, the product of weeks of confidential talks between Jessup and Jacob Malik, the Soviet representative to the United Nations, precipitated another full-scale American reap- praisal of policy objectives. Such a reassessment could not be avoided because top policymakers, Kremlinologists, and intelli- gence analysts agreed that the Soviets might really be interested in striking a deal, unifying Germany, and ending the division of Europe. Jessup, Bohlen, Kennan, and Murphy believed the Sovi- ets were hurting badly from Western economic countermeasures against East Germany. They suspected that the Kremlin feared the establishment of a West German government, felt overex- tended in eastern Europe, and still wanted to participate in run- ning the Ruhr. There appeared, then, to be a real opportunity to negotiate a comprehensive accord that might provide for the lift- ing of the blockade, the withdrawal of Soviet troops from East Germany, the contraction of Soviet power in eastern Europe, and the unification of all of Germany. Kennan pushed hard for a re- consideration of his own ideas. Jessup, who was charged with re- sponsibility for preparing for a possible meeting of the foreign ministers, was not unsympathetic to Kennan's desire to end the division of Germany in conjunction with ending the division of Europe.124
But as American officials pondered risks and benefits, they once again rejected the appeal of Kennan's vision. Their primary national security goal was not to unify Germany or ease tensions
123 Ibid., 156-86, 694-751.
124 Summary of Daily Meeting with the Secretary, March 22, 1949, ibid., 705-7; also see ibid., 856-62; for Clay's views, see ibid., 746-47; CIA, “Re- view of the World Situation,” May 17, 1949, Truman Papers, PSF, box 206; CIA, “The Soviet Position in Approaching the CFM,” May 18, 1949, ibid., box 256.
 The Struggle for Germany 67
in Europe; their primary aim was to harness Germany's economic and military potential for the Atlantic community. In long, per- ceptive, and exhaustive appraisals of the tradeoffs that inhered in any prospective deal, U.S. officials came to realize once again that a unified Germany posed a triple threat: it could associate with the Kremlin, maneuver between the two superpowers, or regain its own independent strength. Moreover, a unified Germany would be difficult to integrate into the western European econ- omy because its prospective domination of such a grouping would impel other powers to resist its presence. They concluded, then, that although they could not overtly oppose unification, lest the Soviets reap an enormous propaganda victory in Germany, the United States would accept unification only on terms that were compatible with its long-defined security interests. “The end in view,” Jessup concluded after meeting with Acheson, Bohlen, Kennan, Murphy, Hickerson, and Dean Rusk on May 5 and 6, “is to support the Western European strength which has already been achieved and to expand it.”125
On May 18, the secretary of state summed up weeks of policy analysis to a meeting of the National Security Council, at which the president presided. Acheson stated that the United States would “go ahead with the West German government, and to agree on unification on the basis of consolidating the Eastern Zone into ours.” In the key policy paper that explained the ra- tionale behind Acheson's conclusions, the State Department em- phasized that “our concern is with the future of Europe and not with Germany as a problem by itself. We are concerned with
125 “U.S. Position in a CFM on Germany,” by Jacob Beam, April 13, 1949, DNA, RG 43, Records of the Jessup-Malik Conversations, box 304; Office of German and Austrian Affairs, “U.S. Program for a CFM on Ger- many,” April 21, 1949, ibid.; Jessup to Byroade, April 25, 1949, ibid.; Hicker- son to Byroade, April 26, 1949, ibid.; for the quotation, see Jessup to Ache- son et al., May 7, 1949, ibid.
 68 Melvin P. Leffler
the integration of Germany into a free and democratic Europe . . . . If we can integrate a greater part of Germany than we now control under conditions which help and do not retard what we are now doing, we favor that; but, only if the circumstances are right.” Right circumstances meant that American troops would not be pulled out of Germany even if the Soviets proposed a mu- tual withdrawal. Right circumstances meant that Germany must participate in the ERP. Right circumstances meant that the USSR would not have a significant voice in the Ruhr authority, would not get substantial reparations, and would not influence the level of German industry.126
What is important is that American officials defined their in- terests in this manner at a time when they thought an accord really could be reached with the Kremlin. In other words, inte- grating the skilled labor, industrial potential, and raw materials of western Germany into an Atlantic community, amenable to American influence, was considered more important than work- ing out a comprehensive German settlement, averting a division of Europe, or seeking a relaxation of tensions with the Kremlin. The CIA put the matter succinctly: “the real issue . . . is not the settlement of Germany, but the long-term control of German power.” Most American officials feared that a unified and inde- pendent Germany might elude Western control and choose ac- commodation with the East, thereby augmenting the potential power of a hostile bloc. The French and British felt
 126 Memorandum for the President, Summary of Discussion at the 40th Meeting of the NSC, May 18, 1949, DNA, RG 273, Records of the NSC; for the quotation, see “An Approach to the CFM,” May 11, 1949, FRUS, 1949, 3:872-73ff.; also see Memorandum of Conversation, by Beam, May 10, 1949, DNA, RG 43, Malik-Jessup Conversations, box 304; Louis Johnson to Acheson, May 14, 1949, DNA, RG 330, CD 6-4-8, box 37; CIA, “Review of the World Situation,” especially p. 5, May 17, 1949, Truman Papers, PSF, box 206.
The Struggle for Germany 69
this way even more strongly than the Americans. But the U.S. policy preference was not the result of Allied pressure. However much Kennan lamented this decision, his was a minority voice. Most of his colleagues in Washington and in western European capitals were not interested in making a unified Germany the linchpin of a third force in world affairs.127
Before he departed for the Paris meeting of foreign ministers, Acheson explained the U.S. negotiating position to a closed meet- ing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. His attitude was so uncompromising that Senator Arthur Vandenberg worried aloud that the course outlined by Acheson would institutionalize a permanent Cold War. Acheson retorted that his intent was in- deed not to end the Cold War but to guarantee the preponder- ance of Western strength. When Vandenberg suggested that Acheson identify certain concessions that the United States might make to the Soviet Union if the latter seemed conciliatory, the secretary of state affirmed that his aides had looked for possible quid pro quos but could not find any “sugar” to offer the Rus- sians. Acheson rebuffed suggestions that he seek to treat the Kremlin fairly, stating that one could not trust the Soviets.
 127 For the quotation, see CIA, “Review of the World Situation,” May 17, 1949, p. 8, Truman Papers, PSF, box 206; also see Office of German and Austrian Affairs, “U.S. Position at the Council of Foreign Ministers,” May 15, 1949, FRUS, 1949, 3:900-2; for Kennan's lament, see Kennan to Ache- son, May 20, 1949, ibid., 888-90; for the views of the British and French, see ibid., 709-12, 724-28, 730-31, 748-50, 863-74, 867-72, 877-79, 881-84; for analyses that stress the significance of British and French pressure, see John L. Gaddis, “The United States and the Question of a Sphere of Influence in Europe, 1945-1949,” in Western Security: The Formative Years, ed. Olav Riste (New York, 1985), 60-91; Miscamble, Kennan and Foreign Policy, 169-77. Nei- ther Gaddis nor Miscamble has used the materials in RG 43, and both have ignored the testimony by Acheson cited in note 128 below. Their stress on external factors seems unwarranted in light of this evidence.
70 Melvin P. Leffler
His aim, he said, was not to seek an agreement with the Soviet Union but to integrate West Germany into a flourishing Western community that would serve as a magnet to the Kremlin's East- ern satellites.128
When the meeting of foreign ministers opened in Paris on May 23, 1949, Acheson led from strength. He assailed Soviet actions and blamed the Kremlin for splitting Germany. He challenged Soviet leaders to accept a program of unification based on the ar- rangements that the Western powers had designed for West Germany. These arrangements, of course, were unacceptable to the Russians because they would undermine Soviet control over East Germany. The Soviet delegation, led by Andrei Vishinsky assailed the West for departing from the Yalta and Potsdam agreements and for splitting Germany. Rather than gamble for all of Germany and thereby risk either a Germany totally integrated into the West or a neutral Germany acting as a third force, the Kremlin opted to retain control in East Germany.129
American officials were impressed by the defensive orientation of Soviet diplomacy.130 Yet once again, rather than seek avenues for compromise, they preferred to capitalize on their position of strength. After reaching an agreement to end both the Soviet blockade and Western countermeasures, Acheson hur-
 128 Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, Reviews of the World Situa- tion: 1950, Historical Series, 81st Cong., 1st and 2nd sess., 1974, 2-22; for Acheson's desire to lure eastern Europe out of the Kremlin's grasp, see House of Representatives, International Relations, Historical Series, Execu- tive Session Hearings, pt. 2, vol. 4, 39-46.
129 For developments at the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers, see FRUS, 1949, 3:913-1040.
130 For assessments of the defensive orientation of Soviet diplomats, see Bohlen to Acheson, June 9, 1949, DNA, RG 59, Bohlen Papers, box 1; CIA, “Review of the World Situation,” July 20, 1949, Truman Papers, PSF, box 250.
The Struggle for Germany 71
ried home to prod Congress to ratify the North Atlantic Treaty, to work out a military assistance program, and to expedite the es- tablishment of the Federal Republic of Germany, fully integrated into the West. On August 9, 1949, the elections to the first West German Bundestag took place. One month later, Ulbricht, Pieck, Grotewohl, and Oelssner went to Moscow and won Stalin's sup- port for the formation of the GDR.131
In the struggle to control German power, the victorious World War II allies split Germany, divided Europe, and institutionalized a bipolar Cold War international system. Both the United States and the Soviet Union had minimum and maximum goals in postwar Germany. At a minimum, Moscow, Washington, and London wanted to control their zones of occupation and harness the resources of their parts of occupied Germany for their own purposes. The Kremlin wanted reparations, uranium, technology, and scientific know-how as well as security from a revitalized foe who might someday regain autonomous power. The Americans and the British wanted to control the resources of the Ruhr and the Rhine, not only for the reconstruction of western Europe along noncommunist lines but also to thwart the resurgence of independent German power. At a maximum, the Americans and the Soviets also would have liked to attract a united Germany to their respective ways of life. From the internal documents and memoirs that we now have from both Moscow and Washington, and from their respective military governments, we can see that a united Germany was an option that some officials in both capitals as well as in the Soviet and American military administrations took very seriously.
 131 Naimark, Russians in Germany, 317.
72 Melvin P. Leffler
But to achieve their respective maximum goals of coopting a united Germany, both sides realized that they would have to make concessions to the other. The Americans would have to permit reparations; the Soviets would have to allow real political competition in a federalized state that might not be amenable to SED domination. In struggling to achieve their maximum goal, both Moscow and Washington had to face the prospect that they might endanger their minimum goals. The Soviets might lose control over the East, the Anglo-Americans might lose their abil- ity to coopt and direct the resources of the Ruhr and the Rhine. Moreover, both sides had to face the prospect that in the pursuit of maximum goals, they would have to agree to a united yet neu- tral Germany, which, in turn, would gain leverage to act inde- pendently in pursuit of its own interests. Both sides worried that a united Germany might become an independent threat or might orient itself into the orbit of the other great power.
Both Moscow and Washington came to feel that achievement of the minimum goals was more important than risking every- thing in pursuit of their maximum objectives. What is interesting is that the Americans definitely came to this decision before the Soviets. Stalin was still vacillating at the Moscow Conference in the spring of 1947; he was still pondering the possibility of a united Germany. Notwithstanding Clay's desire to gamble on a united Germany, Marshall, Dulles, and Acheson decided they would rather split Germany in order to insure their ability to har- ness the resources of the western zones for the reconstruction of western Europe. This goal was essential in order to overcome the payments crisis; defeat autarky, bilateralism, and statism; and subdue the Left. Despite all the old literature illuminating the bu- reaucratic and organizational conflicts in the Roosevelt and Truman administrations, it is now interesting to see that policy- making was more coherent and cohesive in Washington than in Moscow. The tradeoffs and decisions were complex and tough, but U.S. officials chose to rebuild and integrate the West
The Struggle for Germany 73
rather than work out agreements with Moscow, the results of which would be uncertain and which might have the double li- ability of recasting independent German power or merging it with an unrequited Soviet Union.
This viewpoint aligns my analysis squarely with a key theme of Eisenberg's new book: the United States and Great Britain bear primary responsibility for the division of Germany. But in saying that both Moscow and Washington wanted to control their own parts of Germany in order to achieve their respective conceptions of self-interest, moral equivalency should not be assigned to the actions perpetrated in the respective zones of occupation. For al- though Eisenberg does an excellent job demonstrating the con- servative turn of U.S. labor policies as well as its decartelization and denazification practices, and although U.S. officials clearly feared the revival of German power and sought to control it to serve U.S. purposes, the types of actions pursued in the western zones were nonetheless of a fundamentally different character than in the East. Each great power sought cooperation on its own terms. But although the terms of cooperation may have pos- sessed certain similarities from a geopolitical perspective, they meant something fundamentally different for the peoples of the eastern and western zones. The conservative restoration of the Federal Republic was hardly comparable to the repression and brutalization of the GDR.
Eisenberg, of course, is aware of this truism. In fact, she uses it as justification for her larger conclusion that U.S. decisions to di- vide Germany were counterproductive. She argues that American policies contributed significantly to the destruction of civil society not only in East Germany but throughout all of eastern Europe. She also claims that U.S. initiatives spawned the arms race as well as the worldwide rivalry for influence and power. In splitting Germany and dividing Europe, Eisenberg concludes, the United States caused the Cold War, triggered the strategic arms competi- tion, and worsened the plight of tens of
74 Melvin P. Leffler
millions of people in eastern Europe and perhaps a couple of hundred million inside the Soviet Union.
The logic of this argument seems questionable. Of course, here we get into counterfactuals, but the counterfactuals are impor- tant. Eisenberg assumes that a united, neutralized Germany would have quelled Soviet fears, averted the ongoing crackdown in eastern Europe, and constrained the arms race. But is this right?
If there had been an accord on a united, neutralized, demilita- rized Germany in 1947 or 1948, the Kremlin might have been more, rather than less, fearful. It would have had to ponder the possibility that a united Germany would not choose to remain neutral or demilitarized. It would have been fearful that a united Germany would regain independent power, cease reparation de- liveries, call for equality of armaments, and demand rectification of the eastern border. Officials in the Kremlin would have had to worry that a united Germany might seek to orient itself into a Western bloc notwithstanding promises about neutralism. Logic suggests that given a united Germany, the Kremlin would have been more rather than less worried about its security, that it would have had greater incentive to clamp down elsewhere in eastern Europe, and that it would have had to work more fever- ishly to build the atomic bomb. Soviet leaders would have in- sisted even more fervently on their right to retain troops in east- ern Europe as well as their need to restrict the autonomy of their neighbors' foreign policies.
If there had been a united Germany, the only clear beneficiar- ies would have been the peoples of eastern Germany. Agreement on a united Germany would not have produced beneficial results for the Poles, the Czechs, or the Romanians. Nor would it have averted the arms race. The Kremlin would have faced the specter of multiple enemies in even more daunting combinations.
The Struggle for Germany 75
Meanwhile, an agreement on a united Germany might have had deleterious consequences elsewhere. A united Germany might not have been permitted to participate in the types of inte- grated programs that emerged in the western parts of Europe. Even if recovery would have continued without the Marshall Plan, as Alan Milward suggests would have happened, how might this have affected the politics and geopolitics of western Europe?
This question is the most difficult to answer because so many permutations and configurations are possible to envision. But could France have dealt with a united Germany? Could reason- able agreements have been worked out with a united Germany and an even more insecure Kremlin, yet a Kremlin that was now legitimately participating in the diplomatic and economic ar- rangements concerning the Ruhr and the Rhine? Might there not have been diplomatic stalemate and economic stagnation? Might not the Communists in France and Italy have capitalized on the ensuing unrest? And although these Communist parties might have acted more independently of the Kremlin than usually con- ceded, was it safe to make policy based on this assumption?
In discussing counterfactuals, we encounter the imponderables that policymakers faced when they made decisions in 1947, 1948, and 1949. The uncertainties were daunting. But if they had as- signed priority to forming a united Germany, there is reason to guess that the situation that unfolded in western Europe might have been much worse, and the conditions in eastern Europe and the Soviet Union (except for eastern Germany) not much better. A united Germany whose future power, domestic configuration, and geopolitical orientation would have been uncertain probably would have engendered greater anxieties everywhere, set back economic growth, and intensified the arms race.
76 Melvin P. Leffler
So I conclude on a rather anomalous note. I think that U.S. policies did much to split Germany, accelerate the division of Europe, and accentuate anxieties in the Kremlin. But to identify the negative consequences is not to say that U.S. actions were misguided. As indicated above, the consequences of alternative outcomes might have been considerably worse. U.S. decisions were understandable and prudent, given all the imponderables at stake and given the evils that inhered in the Soviet system, even if the rulers of that system were acting defensively, as I think they were. For although defensively motivated, there is every reason to think that the Kremlin would have tried to capitalize on any op- portunity for costless expansion. To the extent that Stalin wanted a united Germany, it was always because he hoped that the SED would maneuver successfully to gain leverage, if not power. U.S. officials, therefore, acted wisely to prevent this outcome.
But it is also appropriate to ask whether the West possessed exaggerated fears of the opportunism that inhered in Soviet poli- cies. Given the unpopularity of the SED, stemming from its as- sociation with the Kremlin, could it really have maneuvered suc- cessfully for power? Could it ever have brought all of Germany into a Soviet orbit? I would concede that U.S. officials probably did harbor unrealistic apprehensions about the appeal of the SED and about the ability of the Kremlin to lure a united Germany into its own orbit. But even had these worst-case scenarios not eventuated, my argument is that in the context of the late 1940s, a united Germany was not likely to have harmonized with the goals of establishing a peaceful, integrated, productive, and democratic Europe. U.S. efforts to control and coopt West German power, therefore, made sense even though these actions contributed sig- nificantly to the division of Germany and of Europe for the next forty years.
Reexamining the struggle for Germany is important not be- cause it should lead to agreement on who caused the Cold
The Struggle for Germany 77
War, or, more importantly, on whether policies were wise or not. Whether one agrees or not with my judgments, the important thing is to recognize that all policies involve tradeoffs, that trade- offs are fraught with uncertainties, that honest and sincere offi- cials can disagree about these tradeoffs, but that ultimately ordi- nary people bear the costs and consequences of the decisions. Policymakers, consequently, carry a huge responsibility. Scholars and commentators have an equal responsibility to subject these decisions to rigorous assessments. We shan't agree, of course, but history is a way of learning, clarifying the alternatives that ensue from weighty choices, and hopefully demarcating a better future for those who come after us.