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56 Ronald W. Pruessen harder and harder to develop the vast potential that did exist? Throughout 1950, for example, there was a great deal of US hand-wringing over the “neutralist” temptations of European allies. On July 14, Acheson told the Cabinet that “It is becoming apparent to the world that we do not have the capabilities to face the threat, and the feeling in Europe is changing from one of elation that the United States has come into the Korean crisis to petrified fright.” From London, a dismayed Ambassador Lewis Douglas observed that “the will to fight (...) lies largely dormant” on the continent – “not because the great majority of the French people and of the German people and of the Belgians and the Dutch prefer communism, but because they doubt that the Soviet hordes can be resisted.” 15 Early and mid-1950 anxieties led to specific policy conclusions – which in turn eventually led to EDC. Whatever the costs, Washington concluded, NSC-68’s blueprint for a dramatic buildup of “Free World” strength had to be vivified. Mobilization on a variety of fronts was to be rapidly undertaken, with a willingness to tolerate risks and waste: as Acheson put it, “Prompt action is worth more than perfect action.” 16 A layer upon layer effort was envisioned. First, significant expansion of the US’s own forces would be necessary. Truman would go to Congress in order to – again in Acheson’s words – “ask for money, and if it is a question of asking for too little or too much, he should ask for too much.” 17 Second, European allies should be pressed toward maximum military preparedness as well. Aside from the fact that this would valuably augment overall anticommunist strength, it would also nudge Congress toward greater generosity by demonstrating the stalwart support lining up behind new US leadership. Third, however, Washington would also take steps to make it easier for the Europeans to be more forthcoming in the first place. Aside from continuing or expanding the material aid already arranged under the Military Assistance Program, the Truman administration opened itself to reconsideration of a longterm placement of US divisions in Europe and to the appointment of an American supreme commander for NATO. As Ambassador Lewis Douglas phrased it, such steps would “spur (...) the will to fight” among continental allies – there would be a “heavier weight upon America for the defense of Europe” and it would become clear that the US was willing to “wear the toga” of both immediate and ultimate responsibility. 18 Fourth, yet another step would be required in order to make it easier for both Americans and European allies to take the preceding ones: some means of tapping West Germany’s potential military strength would be devised. Given the massive costs of massive rearmament, Germany seemed as necessary for movement as it had when continental economic recovery had been the objective. In spite of many qualms about giving any kind of military capacities to a hated enemy only five 15. FRUS, 1950, I, 345; FRUS, 1950, III, 191. 16. FRUS, 1950, I, 345. 17. FRUS, 1950, I, 344-345. 18. FRUS, 1950, III, 190-191.
Cold War Threats 57 years after its defeat, Cold War necessities helped to force US and allied hands. Le Monde commented on the ultimate necessity of recognizing that “the rearming of Germany is contained in the Atlantic Pact like the yolk in the egg” – while some Germans began to accept the argument that adequate European defense was “nur ein Torso ohne Deutschland.” In the end, as Acheson put it to Harry Truman in July 1950, the question became “not whether Germany should be brought into the general defensive plan but rather how (...).” 19 Fifth, and finally, both Americans and Europeans would also have to take steps to induce the West Germans to actually follow through on any abstract inclination to contribute to defense. On one level, this came to involve a complex choreography of military design – in which Germany’s nascent power could be kept substantively limited, but not too noticeably. On another level, difficult “contractual” negotiations would be required regarding the dimensions of political sovereignty. 20 II As Acheson’s words to Truman suggest, Washington’s decision to tie the strengthening of NATO to West German rearmament was quite clear by the mid-summer of 1950. Within two months, the State Department and the Pentagon had settled broad details of what the military called the “one package” proposal – and the Secretary of State had personally presented it to NATO ministers at meetings in New York. But the EDC treaty was not signed until May 1952. Why did it take more than a year and a half to move from Point A to Point B here, especially given US emphasis on the Cold War crises that had helped generate a determination to move in this direction in the first place? In design, diplomacy, and other realms, it is often said that “the devil is in the details.” It is certainly easy enough to imagine considerable potential for time-consuming negotiations concerning any multilateral defense and budget rearrangements. But in the case of EDC, it is now generally accepted, a significant additional layer of complexity was foreordained by the fact that at least two devils were lurking in the details. On one hand, that is, preceding anxiety concerning Soviet behavior intruded in transatlantic developments in a continuing way – primarily via Moscow’s attempt to use alternating threats and peace offerings as a means of stymieing German rearmament. 21 On the other hand, however, it was precisely in the working out of rearmament specifics that the great potency of worries about Ger- 19. Le Monde quoted in SCHWARTZ, America’s Germany: John J. McCloy and the Federal Republic of Germany, 113; “nur ein Torso” quote from DOCKRILL, Britain’s Policy For West German Rearmament, 1950-1955, 11; Acheson to Truman in FRUS, 1950, III, 167. 20. The course of various negotiations with Germany is followed in detail in SCHWARTZ, America’s Germany: John J. McCloy and the Federal Republic of Germany, Chapters 8-9. 21. ACHESON, Present at the Creation, incorporates regular commentary on Soviet efforts to influence the fate of EDC: see, for example, Chapters 47, 57, 61, 64, 67.
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JOURNAL OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION HIS
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Page 67 and 68: Cold War Threats 65 IV The story of
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Notices - Informations - Mitteilung
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Abstracts - Résumés - Zusammenfas
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Abstracts - Résumés - Zusammenfas
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Contributors - Auteurs - Autoren 12
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Books received - Livres reçus - Ei
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