The Wilmington morning star., 1946-09-16
MORE ABOUT
LIPPMANN
FROM PAGE ONE

FROM PAGE ONE a.
TOW inveighed in his statement la
.Julv. He knew that a federel Ger
many. where political power wa
not monopolized by Berlin, was
Germany which could least easil.
be captured by the Communis
nartv, which could least easily b.
bribed and coerced into partner
ship with the Soviet Union.
In conceding this vital point tt
the Russians, and in appeaslne
The German nationalist who from
Bismark to Hitler have hated
the idea of a decentralized Ger
many, Mr.. Byrnes has not In
creased his chances of a better
economic arrangement between the
Soviet zone and the British-Amer-
lean zones. For what he has done
is to relax the hold of the Western
powers on the industrial centers
of Germany by offering to turn
them over to a central government
in Berlin. This central govern
ment located in the Russian zone,
is bound to be less amenable to
British and American influence
than would be local state govern
ments in the British and American
zones.
The proposal, if it we're adopted
is therefore much more likely to
give the Russians a hold upon the
Ruhr and western Germany than
it is to give up influence in east
ern Germany. Moreover, now that
the offer has been made on Amer
lean authority to let Berlin be
sovereign again in western Ger
many, all Germans in the western
zones are on notice that their own
personal future and their private
interests are in jeopardy if they
cooperate in working for states
rights and a dece%ntralized Ger
many.
While Mr.. Byrnes is not going
10 get Immediately the economic
unification which he wants. he
will get a kind Of u~nification
later on, when the situation which
the Russians have been preparing,
has matured. But he will get the
unification of Germany on terms
he does not want-namely under a
Berlin government which is sub
servient to md in cahoots with
Moscow.
The Stuttgart address shows
that Mr.. Byrnes does not expect
to get the economic u%nification
now. All he is counting on is the
u~nification of British and Ameri-
can zones. What then? He must
try to induce the French and the
Russians to give up the control
of their zones. But having reck-
offered to . hand back the
Ruhr and the Rineland to a Ber-
lin government, without even al
to the constructive British
compromise which is to make
them autonomous states within a
federation, he has taken
a position to which no French gov
eminent can voluntarily consent.
AS for the Russians, they will
consent when it suits them-that
is when they have made sure they
can dominate the Berlin govern
ment which MI. Byrnes is in such
a hurry to establish. When the
time comes to set up that govern
ment, Mr.. Byrnes will have little
left to bargain with. For he will
have discarded his trumps-the
control of we stern German indus
try-before the hands which de-
eide the fate of Germany are
played out.
Mr.. Byrnes's German policy is
dlscomboblated by a basic mis-
conceptlon-that the economy Of
Germany can be reorganized be-
lore and apart from the reorgani-
cation of the German state. In ad-
dltlon to weakening the whole DO
sltion in Germany of the West
ern nations. this misconception
prevents him also from having
a sound economic policy.
The idea Of putting a ceiling on
German production was a counsel
o desperation. It was adopted by
the Allied governments because
they despaired of reforming the
Germans and felt that they must
deprive the Germans of the eco
nomlc power to be dangerous. But
mere was another solution-which
was to decentralize the German
Reich, to reduce radically the
sovereign power of Berlin, to in