The Pittsburgh Press (July 16, 1945)
President blames German for ruins
By Merriman Smith, United Press staff writer
POTSDAM, Germany (UP) – President Truman and Prime Minister Churchill toured Berlin today while awaiting tomorrow’s opening session of the Big Three conference, for which the stage was set by the reported arrival of Premier Stalin this afternoon.
Mr. Truman and Mr. Churchill took two hours out from pre-conference business to inspect the devastation of Berlin in separate whirlwind tours of the capital’s battered heart where Nazism rose and throve.
Has armored escort
Mr. Truman left Potsdam at 3:30 p.m. CET with an armored escort. For two hours he traveled through the streets of Central Berlin, critically viewing the destruction wrought by the Allied armies and air forces.
It was a serious study of destruction which Mr. Truman said was due to a man “who overreached himself.”
The President wedged his Berlin tour into a crowded schedule, which included a formal call by Mr. Churchill and a steady round of conferences with other leaders of the American delegation.
Blames Germans
When he stopped before the shattered, burned-out shell of the Chancellery, Mr. Truman observed with a pensive shake of his head: “It’s a terrible thing, but they brought it on themselves.”
He looked up at the jagged remains of a balcony where Adolf Hitler enflamed the world with his ranting speeches and said: “It’s just a demonstration of what can happen when a man overreaches himself. I never saw such destruction. I don’t know whether they’ll learn anything from it or not.”
Blank stares from Germans
As Mr. Truman looked and spoke, ragged Germans stumbled through the rubble still littering sections of the city. The Germans paid little attention to him. When they did, it was mostly blank, sullen stares.
Mr. Truman, confident and in excellent spirits after his eight-day sea voyage from Washington, was ready to brush aside as much formality as possible and get down to business immediately.
His two main objectives were a speedy end to the Pacific War and an agreement on the future world peace which would be at least the forerunner to a full-dress peace conference sometime after Japan’s complete surrender.
Discussions secret
The Big Three discussions were cloaked by a strictly-enforced censorship that even banned reporters from the immediate conference scene and the only current news while they last – perhaps three weeks or more – was expected to come from periodic official communiqués.
But informed observers believed the agenda would cover at least these major topics:
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Russia’s plans in the Pacific and the results of her interrupted discussions with China.
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The joint administration of Germany.
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The reparations to be exacted from beaten Germany: whether in money, goods or manpower or all three. Russia reportedly is asking for four million German men to rebuild her ruined cities.
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Settlement of the various territorial claims now being advanced by France, Yugoslavia, Poland, Bulgaria, etc.
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The Anglo-Russian conflict over Middle Eastern oil resources, including the tie-in problem of the Arab-Jewish impasse in Palestine.
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Russian territorial demands on Turkey and the Soviet request for revision of the Montreux agreement of 1936, under which the Turks were Permitted to fortify the Dardanelles.
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Reorganization of the Soviet-sponsored Austrian government, which Britain and the United States have refused to recognize.
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The still-unsolved question of the hundreds of thousands of Polish troops who have reiterated their loyalty to the defunct exile government in London and have refused to return to Poland.
Canal control up
More remote is the possible discussion of a Russian seat on the control board of the Suez Canal and future joint control of the Panama Canal which neither Britain nor the United States is likely to concede.
The Levant states’ demand for complete independence from France also may come before the Big Three, although in the light of French resentment at Gen. Charles de Gaulle’s exclusion from the conference no definite action on that point appeared likely.
Unconfirmed reports reaching London said Gen. de Gaulle might be invited to join the conference later.
Docks at Antwerp
The President stepped down the gangway of the cruiser USS Augusta at Antwerp at 11:10 a.m. yesterday (5:10 a.m. ET), to become the first Chief Executive to set foot on Western European soil since Woodrow Wilson went to Paris 26 years ago for the peace that failed.
Accompanied by Secretary of State James F. Byrnes, Fleet Adm. William F. Leahy and a small party of advisers. the smiling man from Missouri was met by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Adm Harold R. Stark, Charles Sawyer, U.S. Ambassador to Belgium Charles Sawyer and local British and American military commanders.
Flies to Potsdam
The presidential party motored to the Melsbroeck Airdrome on the outskirts of Brussels and Mr. Truman boarded Gen. Eisenhower’s special plane, arriving in Potsdam at 4:15 p.m. (10:15 a.m. ET).
At Potsdam, he was greeted by Soviet Marshal Gregory K. Zhukov’s deputy, Gen. Alexander Sokolovsky, and Col. Gen. Alexander Gorbatov, Red Army commandant of Berlin.
Immediately after the arrival ceremonies, he was whisked 15 miles away to his official residence, a 30-room house expropriated from a wealthy Berliner and furnished by the Red Army, within 10 minutes’ drive of the meeting place.
Churchill also flies
Mr. Churchill, fresh from a week-long vacation in Southern France, flew into Potsdam about two hours after the President, accompanied by his daughter, Mary.
Wearing the uniform of an army colonel, the 73-year-old Prime Minister lit up his inevitable cigar as soon as he touched the ground tucked his stuck under his arm and went briskly through the reception ceremony. He broke off the official inspection of the honor guard abruptly, however, apparently to avoid undue strain.
Throughout the late hours yesterday, planes were shutting in continually with new arrivals for the meeting, including most of the top-ranking American and British military staff officers whose presence suggested strongly that the Pacific War might play an important part in the discussions.
Stimson there
Among the American arrivals were Secretary of War Henry Stimson, Gen. George C. Marshall, U.S. Chief of Staff, Gen. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold, Air Forces commander, and Gen. Brehon B. Somervell, chief of the Services of Supply.
Fleet Adm. Ernest J. King, chief of naval operations, was already in Berlin, along with W. Averell Harriman, U.S. Ambassador to Russia, and Presidential Envoy Joseph E. Davies.
In Mr. Churchill’s entourage were virtually all the top army, navy and air force commanders who helped direct the defeat of Nazi Germany, plus Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and Labor Party Leader Clement Attlee, who was invited by Mr. Churchill against the possibility of a reversal in the still-untallied general election that might unseat the present Conservative government.
Belgians greet Truman
From the moment the USS Augusta poked her nose into the Scheldt estuary and started upriver toward the battle-scarred port of Antwerp, cheering crowds of Belgians were on hand to greet President Truman.
Throughout the brief plane trip from Brussels to Potsdam, the President was interested in the utter destruction wrought on the German cities below and the apparent fertility of the surrounding farm lands.
The latter raised the question of whether Europe could produce more food for its own peoples with a resultant lowering of the feeding burden on the United States and other Allied countries. It was expected the President would bring that issue up at the Big Three meeting.
Mr. Truman was hopeful that the entire world could be given a fairly comprehensive picture of the day-to-day negotiations and said he favored issuance of regular communiqués during the discussions.