Even though we were still at the beginning stages of the Cold War (at the time we didn’t know it was going to last as long as it did), we were hopeful that cooler heads prevailed and those who had experienced enough of the war, now three years old, were determined not to repeat it.
The notion was spreading in Washington and to some extent in Europe that the cold war which had endured two years may come to an end in the autumn of 1948. But before it does – and if it does the same experts who foresee the end of the cold war think there may be a ” sharp crisis in Germany in July or August”. Their reasons for thinking the cold war may come to an end are based on the simple idea that the essence of the cold war is the fear that it may develop into a shooting war. And if that fear should evaporate the cold war then would be transformed Into a sort of prolonged diplomatic coolness and haggling – but the sharp tension and genuine fear of diplomatic collapse and conflict would be gone.
The American rearmament program is described by those who take this view as being the prime factor leading toward the end of the cold war. American rearmament makes the cold war too unsafe for either Russia or ourselves to keep it up. And time no longer is on the side of the Russians. Each month, the relative military strength of the United States as opposed to Russia’s will increase. Therefore, the Russians must either move to liquidate, or at least soften, the cold war, or they must risk a showdown by some kind of military action.
Naturally, Korea, Germany and Turkey were spoken of as the most possible fields for such Soviet action. Greece was also mentioned. But Germany was described as the more logical and from the Russian point of view the safest place.
A Russian move in Korea Turkey or Greece would seem almost certain to bring an instant world war. On the other hand it was possible for the Russians to make a limited military move that would serve their long-range ends in Germany and clothe it in legalistic pretense. For example, they were contending that with the creation of the new German state in the west with a second capital at Frankfurt – there was no need for the western allies to stay in Berlin. Russia might therefore move in July or August to use military force to shut off all British-American supplies of food, water and power in Berlin This could have lead to limited military operations only slightly larger in scope than the skirmishes our troops under MajorGeneral Moore have had with the Yugoslavs at Trieste. General Clay might use paratroopers, armed trucks and tanks to run ‘food into Berlin and to restore water and power lines.
Such a crisis would be frightening, but almost certainly it could be contained and would not lead to war. If the Russians went no further than that, if the summer were to pass without a big Soviet move at a point where the Russians have the overwhelming superiority to deal us a hard blow it is likely that we in the west would slowly come to the conclusion that the danger of war were passing. But even if the cold war should end this fall, we still face long years of difficulties with the Russians over Germany, Korea and Greece.
Discussing this issue are Senators Claude Pepper, Homer Ferguson and Ralph Flanders in this edition of The Chicago University Roundtable from NBC Radio on May 23, 1948.
