GERMANY: Key to Peace

The whole distressing history of the Allied post-war policy with relation to a divided Germany is laid bare in Mr. Warburg's latest study of the European situation. Often restating what he has maintained in his earlier books on the Marshall Plan and the problems of co-existence with the communist world, he works his thesis from the point of view that a united, settled Germany could not be other than the ideological as well as the physical bulwark with which to resist Moscow. Were such a Germany attacked by Russia, the moral victory at least would belong to the West. With the hodge-podge we have made of central Europe, such a prize cannot be ours. To make this point and to open the way to suggestions for a more creative program, Mr. Warburg gives the events, since 1947, that have lead up to the present situation, a thorough going over. His analysis is exhaustive as he recounts fiascos at Yalta and Potsdam, the Truman Doctrine and an unworkable bi-partisan foreign policy built on stemming recurrent hostilities rather than a true reconstruction, the Marshall Plan and the return to reason it heralded, the lost chance for change when in 1949 we embarked on the loud sounding but unsubstantial North Atlantic Treaty agreements that foolishly thrust the military cart before the economic horse. With the rearmament of West Germany, France's fears are now just as great and the read to the spiritual and economic unity necessary for real defense, rockier than ever. A challenging, disturbing study for our time.