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Show ' News fix Behinl TrWN By Paul Maliaon Released by Western Newspaper Union. POSTWAR PLANS FOR GERMANY UNSETTLED WASHINGTON. All officials have been more than a trifle timid in commenting com-menting on the Morgenthau plan f" '" "1 to cut the indus- I trial segment out J of the postwar German map, as ' f well as upon the f earlier plans to 'l'''' divide her into ?Z three or more , parts. Congress, how- 1 . .1 ever, seems to be Henry generally opposed Morgenthau Jr. to both, as far as. sentiment among the absentee leaders lead-ers has been canvassed. Briefly their average unexpressed thoughts run about like this: There will be 30 to 40 million people peo-ple in Germany, or into whatever parts it is divided and these people will have to live or be disposed of in some other way. I If they are unable to make an existence ex-istence at home, you could dispose of them by following Nazi custom, and allow them to be carted off to Russia as slave labor. Or you could follow another Nazi custom of shooting shoot-ing them. Things like that might bring on future wars. They brought on this one. They cannot or shoulcTnot be considered. The economy of Germany was tied to her industry, not to her agriculture. She never raised enough on her farms to feed her people, and had to import much of her grain, fruits and other foods. But she existed, and largely through the resources of her industrial production In such a restricted way as to give Hitler Hit-ler an excuse for being. Therefore, I believe the average congressman" would have some plan to keep her at least on a self-sustaining basis. If she can be kept, demilitarized, assuredly so, it would satisfy them. If Allied commissions have access to Inspection or some means of that nature is devised to guarantee no future revolts it could no doubt get congressional approval where any simple dismemberment scheme would fail to stand the test of full debate. Another point, you hear from congress, off the record, is this: We will have to occupy Germany, Ger-many, perhaps for a long time. If she is not to have any industry, in-dustry, a WPA will have to be created to feed her indefinitely, and presumably at our expense or at the expense of the Allies. These are the prevailing sentiments senti-ments as I get them and thoroughly sincere, not in any way subject to a charge of sympathy -for Germany. The justification is purely in our own self interest. INTERNATIONALIZATION PLAN The scheme of Republican Candidate Candi-date Dewey for internationalization only of the Ruhr valley also might fall in congress to the same objections, objec-tions, although it seems to me to be In a rlifTArpnt ratiunrv fcnprinllv if in a different category, especially if the proceeds from Ruhr industries were used to rebuild the damage which the Germans have done in Europe and thus help to pay the cost of reconstruction. What to do then about Germany? Ger-many? Shall she be maintained in a reasonable separate coherence, coher-ence, as little burden to us as possible? Should she be all taken tak-en and divided and thus rcacb some degree of economic sustenance sus-tenance for her remaining people? peo-ple? Or should she, indeed, be built up our way economically and crushed only militarily? No one here yet seems to have an answer to these questions which others will agreeably accept. The inner debate on the Morgenthau Morgen-thau peace proposal has been advertised adver-tised as a struggle of a harsh versus ver-sus a soft peace, but it was hardly that. The plan of the treasury secretary sec-retary to dcindustrialize Germany Ger-many as well as demilitarize her was harsh enough, it is true. The purpose was to crush her completely so she could never rise again. But no one around the cabinet circle in which the fight revolved wants to be particularly light on -the Nazis. The plan was resisted resist-ed by State Secretary Hull and War Secretary Stimson for an other reason. How much more may be needed Is evident behind the final reports on the Dumbarton Oaks deliberations delibera-tions before publication of the agreement. agree-ment. Our people, and presumably also Britain, wanted to prevent any of the Big Five United Nations (France is eventually to come into the Big Four) which becomes involved in-volved in a war-threatening controversy contro-versy from voting on whether to take action against an aggressor. They wanted an objective and judicial ju-dicial decision by uninterested parties, par-ties, but Russia objected, so the plan was dropped. |