The Road to Berlin (103 page)

The issue of co-ordination and co-operation brought a sudden intervention from Admiral Leahy, to the effect that General Eisenhower should have his own
mission in Moscow, this being his own ‘very frank’ opinion—which came as quite a surprise to the British. Brooke intervened deftly, insisting that the British and Americans shared the same view about the need for effective liaison, but the whole thing must be soundly based in a proper commission whose function would be to settle all questions of ‘higher strategy’ with the British and American Chiefs of Staff. At a lower level there should be liaison between theatre and army group commanders. Antonov made no objection to the principle of closer liaison but insisted that it would have to be handled through the several military missions in Moscow and with the Soviet General Staff; General Marshall protested vigorously at such an amputation of liaison, insisting on the need for tactical as well as strategic co-ordination. Antonov dismissed this out of hand, arguing in turn that confusion and collision in air operations had been brought on by blunders in navigation rather than deficiencies in co-ordination. In any event, since Soviet air force operations were directed centrally from Moscow, that was where co-ordination should be effected. The Chief of the Air Staff (Royal Air Force) Sir Charles Portal agreed that strategic air missions could be handled at the highest level, but this did not dispose of tactical co-ordination for air operations in Italy and the Balkans. Khudyakov came straight to the point and told the Allied officers that any question of immediate tactical liaison would have to be approved by Stalin himself.

In an attempt to repair the situation, Antonov proposed an ‘arbitrary line’ running through Berlin, Leipzig, Vienna and Zagreb as an operational limit for Allied strategic bombing operations. This, Brooke observed, ‘did not suit us’ and the fixing of a bombing line was held over to the next meeting. At this juncture and towards the close of the conference Admiral Leahy abruptly demanded a planning date for the end of the war from Antonov. Nonplussed, Antonov scouted any idea of firm predictions and would not commit himself to mere supposition, in spite of pressure from Admiral Leahy and General Marshall, who stressed that planning for shipping must be set afoot. Allied assumptions reckoned on the beginning of July or the end of December as likely terminal dates. Antonov did not disagree, mentioning in turn summer as the likeliest early date and winter as the latest. (Stalin himself had earlier mentioned that the war ‘might well go on till the summer’ and Antonov was in no position to contradict or to amplify.)

Whatever his private thoughts about the duration of these final operations and the ending of the war, Antonov could scarcely draw much encouragement from this meeting. The Allies could give no firm assurance that German troop movement would be effectively hampered, much less inhibited. The Soviet General Staff must now calculate that appreciable German reinforcement could and would reach the Eastern Front—a preliminary impression which received doleful and definite confirmation the next day, 6 February, at a subsequent meeting of the Chiefs of Staff, when Antonov patiently winkled out the unpalatable truth that much of the German armour used in the abortive Ardennes offensive was presently speeding eastwards to meet the Red Army. Nor would help be forthcoming for the Soviet drive on the southern flank, presently locked in fierce fighting in
Hungary but aimed eventually at Vienna. German troops held in Norway would also inevitably join the main battle for the
Reich
. Any idea of a ‘non-stop’ offensive on Berlin, if not actually dead, was dying on its feet. The Soviet General Staff was reckoning on full-strength German divisions, while Soviet divisions had fallen as low as 4,000 men, a weakness compounded by the shortage of fuel and ammunition; local air superiority enjoyed by the
Luftwaffe
also made life hard for the Red Army. The conclusion to which the Soviet General Staff was increasingly drawn envisaged large enemy forces available for the defence of Berlin, with the prospect of these forces being appreciably reinforced. In this context Antonov could have little by way of encouragement to report to Stalin.

If the immediate military future seemed murky, this did not deter the three Allied leaders from embarking in the late afternoon of 5 February on a discussion of ‘the German question’ and the fate of a defeated Germany; rather, they were impelled in this direction, by Molotov insisting to Eden that the division of Germany must be discussed, and by Stalin, who steered the meeting unerringly towards the issue of dismemberment. President Roosevelt opened the plenary session by suggesting a discussion of the occupation zones delineated by the European Advisory Commission (
EAC
), the proposal from the British side to allocate France its own zone and the question of French participation in the Allied control machinery. Stalin overrode this at once, virtually recasting the agenda. He wanted dismemberment discussed in full, both as a matter of principle and what it would mean in practice, the form of government—or administration—to be fastened upon Germany and what the actual terms of surrender would involve, bearing in mind that ‘unconditional surrender’ had not meant the absence of special conditions, at least in the case of Italy. What would happen in the case of Germany? Would unconditional surrender go hand in hand with the continued existence of ‘the Hitler government’? There was no option but to prescribe the terms of surrender in wholly unequivocal fashion. Finally, the issue of reparations must be decided.

Stalin argued relentlessly and in brilliant command of his facts. The President’s device of substituting talk of occupation zones was abruptly swept aside: dismemberment could not be called by any other name save that of dismemberment. At the Teheran Conference dismemberment had been agreed in principle, albeit not put to any strict legal tests and binding agreements; in Moscow in October 1944 the British Prime Minister had proposed the division of Germany into two states (Prussia and Bavaria), with the Ruhr and Westphalia internationalized. Stalin now required decisions. Here the Prime Minister swung into the attack: dismemberment was commonly agreed in principle, but so complex a matter could not be decided in days. Much remained to be considered in detail by some ‘special committee’, whose report would be needed before any decision could be reached. There would be no negotiation with the war criminals; in the most likely event of the death or disappearance of Hitler and Himmler, then others would treat for unconditional surrender and in this instance the Allies must consult
on whether to treat with them or not. The terms of surrender would be laid before them.

Stalin seized on that latter point, the surrender terms. They were far too vague. He proceeded to argue that the surrender terms automatically subsumed dismemberment and suggested simply adding a specific clause to that effect, though without spelling out the geographical details. Stalin and Churchill fell into a kind of truce in agreeing that the right to impose dismemberment, rather than the actual details of the political severance, was the paramount issue. While the Prime Minister fell back on suggesting that the problem be left to a future peace conference, the President intervened to reinforce his view that dismemberment was, in fact, fundamental to the act and instrument of surrender; he also accepted the idea that a study of the problem must be undertaken. He referred to Stalin’s own point about informing the Germans of their future at the hands of the Allies and then, at the prompting of Harry Hopkins, charged the Foreign Ministers with preparing a plan for dismemberment. Stalin stuck grimly to the fact of dismemberment and to its mandatory inclusion in the surrender terms with forthright visceral import and, with Roosevelt’s help, won his point. Reluctantly, the Prime Minister signified his assent to adding ‘dismemberment’ all unvarnished into Article 12 of the surrender instrument.

The President then swung the meeting towards a consideration of a place in the sun for France by allocating her a zone of occupation in Germany. This time Churchill pressed the attack and Stalin fought a stubborn delaying action. The Prime Minister went straight for the main question—the allocation to France of a specific zone of occupation and a prescribed place within the Allied control machinery for occupied Germany. The British government held this dear; a French zone could be formed out of the apportionment to the United Kingdom and the United States, leaving the Soviet share unaffected. The Prime Minister refuted Stalin’s objections that the introduction of France to ‘Big Three’ arrangements would open the door to other states: France and France alone was to be admitted. Moreover, Great Britain looked for a France restored to its traditional place as a counterweight to Germany, conceivably a resurgent Germany; an American military presence in Europe might not be a permanent feature of the post-war scene. President Roosevelt came speedily to the Prime Minister’s aid but in so doing loosed off a thunderbolt all his own. American troops, as he foresaw the situation, would remain in Europe for little more than two years after the war. The Prime Minister started, and Stalin listened the more intently. Now Churchill urged his case afresh, reminding Stalin that France was to Great Britain what Poland and its role
vis-à-vis
Germany represented for the Soviet Union. Giving way on this point, Stalin nevertheless fought against any idea of giving France access to the inter-Allied control commission, which must be confined to those powers which had stood firm against Germany from the very beginning: ‘so far’ France did not belong by right to this group. That was a strange mixture of tactical dexterity and self-delusion about past events. Suddenly recalling and
reviving the Franco-Soviet agreement, concluded only a matter of weeks ago, Stalin was content to call France ally and he found rather bizarre support for his opposition to French participation in the control commission from President Roosevelt. The President had to be reminded in another of Harry Hopkins’ sage and pithy notes that France was presently a full member of the European Advisory Commission—‘that is only body [sic] considering German affairs now’—and a decision about the control commission would be better postponed.

To end this plenary session Stalin called on Maiskii to present the Soviet position on reparations, a plan envisaging both the removal of industrial plant and equipment from Germany as well as ten annual payments, also to be made in kind. German heavy industry would be reduced to one-fifth of its present size, with all arms factories and synthetic oil plants to be dismantled within two years and a tripartite international control commission taking command of the entire German economy after ten years of such payments. Since payments would not of themselves cover wartime losses, the Soviet plan also called for monetary compensation to separate claimants based on their respective contributions to winning the war and on the losses incurred in war; the Soviet Union duly laid claim to 10,000 million dollars. The Prime Minister, while agreeing to the Soviet suggestion of a Reparations Commission, pointed to the fiasco of reparations after the First World War and voiced immediate doubt that Germany could furnish even the sum of money the Soviet Union demanded for itself. Great Britain faced a debt of £3,000 million for its wartime exertions, yet present and future British burdens would scarcely be relieved by German reparations. Other countries had suffered and their accounts must be rendered, but who would profit from a Germany reduced to starvation? Should the Germans be left to starve?

Stalin interposed calmly enough that there would indeed be food for Germans; as for British problems, they would follow their course wholly unaffected by any Soviet plan for reparations. Finally the Prime Minister came round to the idea of a Reparations Committee whose work would be secret, and he supported President Roosevelt when he in turn accepted the proposal for a Reparations Commission located in Moscow and charged with looking at the claims of a number of countries. Maiskii returned to his charge once more, pointing out that the Soviet reparations plan had nothing in common with the post-1918 schemes—reparations
in kind
ruled out the financial jiggery-pokery which had ruined that earlier design. Germany could assuredly pay the indemnity demanded by the Soviet Union and would not starve into the bargain. If the Germans ceased their colossal expenditure on weapons, the money would be to hand:
quod erat demonstrandum
. For the moment, however, Maiskii was content to leave matters in the hands of the proposed Commission.

Stalin seized on the points developed by Maiskii. All parties seemed to be agreed upon the establishment of a Commission, but it must have specific instructions: a principle which recommended itself to him was that those nations who had borne the greatest heat and heaviest burden of the battle should be
the prime claimants to compensation, signifying the Soviet Union, the United States and Great Britain. The Soviet Union should not be the sole recipient of reparations—let each nation decide upon the particular form of exaction they wished to implement. France again loomed disproportionately large in Stalin’s mind: the French contributed a mere eight divisions to the common war effort while the Yugoslavs fielded twelve but Stalin sought nothing in the name of the Yugoslavs. The conference must agree, and to this end the matter should be handed over to the foreign ministers rather than to some Reparations Commission. Churchill waved this away as a mere gesture and indicated that his own hold on elective office was questionable, only to be told peremptorily that victors would not be so easily vanquished. In a final rally the Prime Minister both referred to and deferred to a Soviet prescription, arguing that exertion in war should mean less than ‘from each according to his abilities and to each according to his needs’. Stalin revised Marxist–Leninist principles on the spot and refurbished this to read ‘to each according to his deserts’. The reparations question was, therefore, assigned to the Foreign Ministers for their deliberations.

From the outset a strange but intrusive dialectic involving the President’s commitment to a World Organization and Stalin’s preoccupation with Poland flickered like St Elmo’s fire over the proceedings at Yalta.