1949. Rumor-Happy Berlin

New Wave of Speculation Over the Blockade

"Loudspeaker vans carry the latest news to blockaded West Berliners," May 1945 (Photo by Charles Steinheimer - source)

Bill Downs

CBS Berlin

April 19, 1949

Berlin is "rumor happy" today. On the streetcars, in the subways, in the shops, and on street corners, all you hear is: "Is it true that the Russians are going to lift the blockade?"

The only answer to this question still lies with the Russians. The highest Western power officials here say they have no indication that the Soviet authorities intend to change their blockade policy.

This latest wave of speculation was touched off a week ago by proposals of Soviet zone German officials that trade should be resumed between the Eastern and Western parts of this divided country. Four days ago the mayor of the East Berlin rump government made a similar proposal to open trade between the blockaded and un-blockaded sections of this city.

Since German authorities in the Soviet zone speak only under direction of the Communists, the natural assumption is that the party is preparing to change its line on Germany.

There is no doubt that there is a lot of wishful thinking going on in Berlin today, both by the Germans and by some officials. Rightly or wrongly, they are the optimists who see hope of settlement of the Berlin crisis now emerging.

These men will point out that the new Soviet military governor, General Chuikov, today notified his American, French, and British counterparts that he has now assumed his new post. By this action, says this school of thought, the Russian military government of Germany still recognizes the four-power Allied Kommandatura for Berlin.

Another optimistic straw-in-the-wind is the departure for Poland today of General Frank Howley, the American commandant for Berlin. Howley is going as a guest of the Polish military mission.

The general said there is no political importance to his trip. However, the optimists ask: "Would the satellite Poles invite an American general to their country if some kind of East-West agreement is not in prospect?"

This is Bill Downs in Berlin. Now back to CBS in New York.

1943. Russian Civilians Contribute to the War Effort

Blast Furnace Victory

Militiamen at the Stalingrad Tractor Plant pass through ruins on their way to the front line (source)

The parentheses indicate portions that did not pass Soviet censors for military or propaganda reasons.

(For more, see the complete 1943 Moscow reports)

Bill Downs

CBS Moscow

January 15, 1943

The story behind the Red Army's winter offensive is something more than white camouflaged infantry and tanks fighting their way through drifts of German bodies and snow-filled Axis pillboxes. It's the old story of production.

You would rather hear of the daring exploits of the United States Army than any other phase of the war. Russians feel the same way about it. Undeniably, there's more romance attached to pulling the trigger of a machine-gun than pulling the trigger of a chattering rivet hammer.

However, the Russians, I believe, realize more fully than anyone else the importance of the man behind the man behind the gun.

A good example was today's Moscow newspapers. The one story that took up more space than the account of any single battle at the front was the story of a blast furnace. The building of this furnace was accomplished in a mere seven months. Ordinarily blast furnaces for the smelting of iron take from twelve to eighteen months to build.

This furnace was built east of the Ural Mountains, one thousand miles from Moscow (in the big industrial district which has been developed out there.)

When the government started laying the foundation for this big furnace last May, it imported many workers from Russia's industrial centers in the west which had been captured by the Germans. (These men and women set up a tent city around the building site because there was no accommodation in the small town near which the furnace was to be built.)

As the work progressed, the nearby townspeople also came in on the job. Then someone started a competition. (The furnace became a sort of goal.) Whole families, including the kids, helped carry fire bricks. (Others dug pipelines. When the super-structure started going up, people got in each other's way trying to get things done.) Gangs which ordinarily would have been installing power lines after the towers were up began right away, putting in a cable here as soon as the emplacement was ready.

This furnace was almost built "simultaneously." The furnace was tapped for the first time yesterday, (and its first molten iron poured into ingots.)

Today this achievement was hailed in the Soviet press with almost the same enthusiasm as was the Red Army's capture of Mineralnye Vody and Velikiye Luki.

Reserves have been the secret behind the Red Army's winter offensive. This means reserves in industrial as well as manpower.

Today's "blast furnace victory" on the Ural front is in many ways just as important as today's victories by the Red Army in the Northern Caucasus and the Lower Don. It's the same in all the United Nations. Put these victories together, and they spell a quicker end to the war.

1949. Western Occupation Powers Urge Statehood for West Germany

The Western Political Initiative in Germany

The three Western military governors in Germany gather in Frankfurt to approve the basic law of the Federal Republic of Germany. From left to right, French General Kœnig, British General Robertson, and American General Clay, May 12, 1949 (source)

Bill Downs

CBS Berlin

April 23, 1949

America, Britain, and France moved today to hasten the creation of a West German state by sending a note of conciliation to the German constitutional convention now deadlocked by political party differences in Bonn.

This surprise move—which is an unconcealed attempt to bring about reconciliation between the right and left-wing parties—proves the urgency felt by the Western powers to establish a democratic government in Western Germany.

In other words, the creation of the new West German state has become a keystone of United States foreign policy; a policy which calls for the consolidation of all democratic Western Europe into an economic whole to expedite the workings of the Marshall Plan.

The three-power note to the German politicians said that the occupation powers would review sympathetically the points of disagreement between the Socialists, who demand a strong central government, and the Christian Democrats, who are going along with Western power demands that the new Western Germany be a federalized state.

After all the bitter words that have passed between the German politicos the past eight months, it comes as a bit of a surprise this morning that all factions welcome the three-power note as a means of settling their differences.

They are meeting now in Bonn to discuss a compromise constitution. Whether all differences will be settled by Monday when the constitution committee is scheduled to meet with the Western military governors is problematical. However, the wheels of organization of this new state are again turning, and it would appear that the West once more has the political initiative in Germany.

This new development has not yet evoked reaction from the German Communists or the Soviet occupation authorities. Last week, when formation of the West German state seemed imminent, a flood of rumors about the lifting of the Russian blockade appeared designed to halt work by the West German political leaders.

Whether these rumors will recur, or whether the Russians actually will lift the blockade in an attempt to block formation of the new government, is not clear today.

The theory is that the lifting of the blockade, which splits Germany economically, would make a political split of the country unnecessary, and that the German political parties from the East and West could then attempt to work out a unified country.

This is Bill Downs in Berlin. Now back to CBS in New York.

__________________________

Bill Downs

CBS Berlin

April 25, 1949

General Lucius Clay and his British and French colleagues heading the occupation of Western Germany flew to Frankfurt this morning to attend what may be a historic meeting in the fight for postwar European recovery.

The three military governors will, in a half hour from now, join a seventeen-man delegation of German political leaders. The purpose is to study German proposals for a compromise constitution for a new West German state.

So important is the meeting that the State Department sent the head of its German and Austrian section, former ambassador Robert Murphy, to attend.

The disputing German Socialists and right-wing Christian Democrats reached agreement on the compromise proposal over the weekend after the Western powers modified their demands that the new government be federalized with strong powers to the states. The new constitution will provide for a more centralized form of government, particularly in the field of financing.

The atmosphere in Frankfurt is optimistic this morning. It is expected that if all goes well, the basic law constitution will be ratified by the Bonn parliamentary council next month. After that, there must be elections for the two houses of the new German parliament, and British authorities say that the new West German state should be operational by August or September.

There as yet has been no reaction to these rapid political developments from the Soviet Union.

With the Communist holiday, May 1, only five days away, the Russian-licensed newspapers of East Berlin are beginning the ritual of printing the slogans to guide the struggle of the workers. The Communist SED party of the Soviet zone has fifty-two slogans for the occasion, but none of them reveal any change in the party line.

There are the usual demands for German unity, a "just peace and a withdrawal of occupation troops," and the usual invocations against the Marshall Plan and "warmongery."

But the Russians have yet to make a countermove against our urgent efforts to get a West German government established and working.

This is Bill Downs in Berlin. Now back to CBS in New York.

1967. Republicans Consider Candidates for the Upcoming Election

Liberal Wing of the GOP Pushes Back

Republican nominee Richard Nixon stands on his motorcade car during a parade in Chicago on September 4, 1968 (source)

Bill Downs

ABC Washington

March 12, 1967

Both the Democratic and Republican National Committees held political pow wows in this national capital over the past week, serving notice to the party professionals that the 1968 presidential election is only some eighteen months away.

For the Republicans the sessions were less of a strategy nature than they were a fashion show of the GOP's candidate potential in the upcoming race for the White House. Michigan's muscular Governor George Romney was here in the role of the under-reluctant, middle-distance man carefully timing himself for the nomination sprint at the Republican National Convention. California's dimpled Governor Ronald Reagan flew into town as a publicly announced favorite son candidate from the Golden State—also disavowing any national ambition despite the fact that Reagan is on record as describing the Victorian governor's mansion in Sacramento as a fire trap.

Former GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater continued to ride hard on the conservative wing of the party and displayed that Republican cunning which some political professionals call the "GOP death wish." Goldwater's contribution to Republican unity was to allow as how he might vote for George Romney if Goldwater became convinced that the Michigan governor had "rejoined the Grand Old Party."

Also making the GOP scene were some impressive dark horse possibilities for the Republican ticket, the most outstanding being the freshman senator from Illinois, Charles Percy, whose first two and a half months in the US Senate has attracted more attention from the national news media than most members of Congress get in ten years of legislating.

However, it was an ironic fact that the man with the best chance of getting the nod to head the Republican ticket in 1968 is the man who wasn't there. Former vice president Richard Nixon was overseas on business for his New York international law firm—at the same time, incidentally, building his own political image as a foreign affairs expert, which coincidentally is the area where Governor Romney and other GOP hopefuls are considered the weakest.

Thus Washington political pros are now assessing the Republican presidential picture this way. Romney's early move to make himself the GOP choice is a product of the Republican liberal frustration and shock at the way the Goldwater conservatives and Southern delegates took over the San Francisco convention. The GOP moderates and liberals had neither organization nor leadership. Romney and his backers, which included former Pennsylvania Governor William Scranton and New York's Nelson Rockefeller, decided this would not happen again.

Hence Romney's early candidacy. Too early, say most of Washington's press. The Michigan Republican, they contend, has already shown too much early-foot, and by making his move so far in advance of the convention, the governor has made himself a target at which his political enemies both in and out of the Republican Party can snipe at their leisure. Romney's early candidacy creates its own pressures. He is under compulsion to express himself on practically every current issue, a built-in trap for a politician intent on not picking his teeth with the point of his boot.

However, the political professionals in this town are not writing off the Romney campaign. After all, by sticking his political neck out, the Michigan governor already has achieved his first objective—giving the GOP liberals a rallying point. Secondly, his tremendous off-year election last November forces even the GOP conservatives to admit that the vigorous Boy Scout image of the former Detroit industrialist has a lot of political sex appeal. The Romney backers are also now trying to round up the best campaign brains available in the party, notably former New York congressman and Republican National Committee Chairman Len Hall, who has moved into the Romney-for-President headquarters here in Washington.

And thirdly, the Michigan governor will not have to "go for broke." His campaign already is well-financed by people like Winthrop and Nelson Rockefeller, the Scrantons, and others who fear for the future of the GOP if the right-wing conservatives again get hold of the party's reins. Another factor which cannot be ignored is Romney's Mormonism, which is both an asset and a drawback. Many Mormons regard the governor's presidential ambitions in the same light which American Catholics viewed the candidacy of John F. Kennedy. George Romney's religion, they insist, should have absolutely nothing to do with his politics. They dismiss as nonpolitical dogma the fact that Joseph Smith and the founders of the Mormon faith regarded Negroes as bearing the racial mark of Satan and thus unqualified for leadership in the Mormon tabernacles.

However, many of the church leaders are more concerned that the Salt Lake City church might become over-identified with right-wing extremism, notably the connection of former Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson with the John Birch Society. Benson, who is an elder of the church, made such ultraconservative political declarations and criticisms since he left that Eisenhower Administration that it was widely reported he was sent into a kind of exile—assigned to handle Mormon affairs in Europe, where he has spent most of the past few years. Nevertheless, Elder Benson's son, Reed Benson, is one of the most outspoken and persuasive members of the John Birch Society—so able that Robert Welch assigned the younger Benson to open the Society's Washington headquarters which he still heads.

As a result, many Mormons see George Romney, the liberal, as a way of balancing the political books of the church against the Benson conservatism. And as a matter of human nature, they would like to see the Michigan governor become the first Mormon president of the United States, proving as did the late President Kennedy the freedom of religion in the country.

Still, the political professionals in this capital make Richard Nixon the winter-book favorite to get the Republican nomination, despite the fact that he's a two-time loser on his last pair of outings. He lost the White House by a hair to John F. Kennedy, but more humiliating was his defeat in the contest for the California governorship, an event that was a factor in changing Nixon's residence from the West Coast to New York City.

Nixon is the Grand Old Party's long-distance runner. Since the Goldwater convention which badly split the GOP, and since the Johnson landslide of 1964 which almost buried the party, Richard Nixon has been stumping the country, traveling to the most remote places where the Republican cause needed help. Some say that the election defeats which bloodied Nixon's head were probably the best thing that ever happened to him. Certainly the former vice president has emerged with more maturity and style than he had before. Nixon's traumatic experiences also seem to have given him a greater insight about himself—a sense of humor and ability to laugh at himself, which he never had before. In stumping the country over the past two and a half years, Nixon is picking up political "due bills"—gaining delegate support which he can cash in at the GOP political convention. It's the same between-years tactic that enabled Barry Goldwater to go to San Francisco with the convention virtually in his pocket.

And most important at this stage of the game, the Washington politicos point out that Nixon is emerging as the "compromise candidate." His other assets are his deep experience in government both as a congressman and as Dwight Eisenhower's vice president. And the nation still has not forgotten Nixon's skillful bearding of Nikita Khrushchev in the famous "kitchen debate" in Moscow, which makes him the Republican Party's foremost expert on foreign affairs.

However, the makers of the mythical "winter book" of presidential candidates admit that it's too early for serious speculation about personalities. Some of the so-called experts will take bets that Lyndon Johnson will not run again, which is a little like betting that the sun won't rise in the morning.

But a lot of things can happen to both men and issues between now and the national party conventions. And don't forget the dark horses, they say. Keep an eye on Ronald Reagan and Chuck Percy, and yes, even on the man in New York called Nelson Rockefeller.

Now, to get down to the Democrats, who also have been holding strategy sessions here in Washington.

After Lyndon Johnson's record-breaking victory in 1964, the Administration's party complacently looked forward to November's off-year voting with confidence. Certainly, the party in power always suffers some losses in these congressional campaigns, but the Johnson tide could not be reversed by the Republicans in just two years, yawned Democratic soothsayers—thus proving once again that there are no invulnerable political experts in this town.

When the voting was over last year, the president had lost his working majority that launched the Great Society program, and now he must buck the old Southern Democratic and Republican conservative coalition which has revived itself with almost a vengeance.

The Congressional Quarterly's authoritative assessment of the 1968 election prospects says that the Republicans have the opportunity to make substantial gains in the Senate contests, and if the GOP can pick up even a half-dozen seats, then the Republicans will have a chance to gain control of the Senate in 1970.

Assuming that the Vietnam War will still be the major concern of the American people when they vote in 1968, the Quarterly says that the Democratic senators who now appear to be in the most danger of losing their seats is the coterie of so-called "doves"—those Democratic liberals who have been most outspoken in their criticism of the president's policies for Southeast Asia. Up for reelection will be the leader of the Senate doves, William Fulbright of Arkansas—also Frank Church of Idaho, Joe Clark of Pennsylvania, George McGovern of South Dakota, Wayne Morse of Oregon, Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, and Alaska's Democratic Senator Ernest Gruening.

Presumably, the Republicans will campaign for a settlement in Vietnam, possibly in the pattern of General Eisenhower's handling of the Korean War issue. But the paradoxical irony of the situation as it is now shaping up is that Republican success in Congress in the upcoming elections will depend on defeating that bloc of Democrats who also made an issue out of settling the Vietnam crisis. It doesn't make much sense, but that's the way Washington politics often work out.

The latest Gallup poll published today says that the Vietnam War already has extracted a heavy toll in Lyndon Johnson's political strength and has been the chief factor in his popularity decline over the past year. The Gallup pollsters say that approval of the president's handling of the Vietnam situation is at an all time low, and that his general popularity has followed a downward trend.

The Washington Post today made its own survey of senatorial candidates who will be campaigning for office a year and a half from now. It reports that most Democratic incumbents are trying to put some political distance between themselves and the White House, and that with the polls showing Mr. Johnson's personal popularity on the wane, the Democratic candidates in the Senate fear that too close an identification with the Administration might cost them their seats.

The Post survey reports another Washington political paradox. The same senators who want to keep their coattails clear of any White House taint also say that Mr. Johnson will be the party candidate in 1968; that they'll campaign with and for him. Except for a few, these Senate Democrats emphatically rejected the suggestion that the Democratic convention switch to New York's Democratic Senator Robert Kennedy in 1968.

When questioned about the political dilemmas which constantly plague them, Administration leaders like to quote Will Rogers, who once was asked which party he subscribed to on the national scene.

"I don't belong to no organized party," the Oklahoma humorist replied, adding, "I'm a Democrat."

As this week in Washington ended, the Democrats appeared to be split more ways from heaven to breakfast than the Republicans could ever be. However, the Administration party leaders seemed less personally concerned, possibly because they're more used to the condition.

At a closed White House meeting with the Democratic National Committee last Thursday, the president let it be known that, come drought or high water, Lyndon Johnson is still in the driver's seat and head man of the Democratic Party.

Without mentioning any of the Democratic doves on Capitol Hill—and especially avoiding any mention of Bobby Kennedy—Mr. Johnson warned against "buying peace in Vietnam . . . in a campaign lust for political popularity."

Then the president laid it out on the line:

"If I've learned anything in the thirty-five years that I've lived in this town," Mr. Johnson is quoted as saying, "it is that you cannot have a dozen presidents . . . and twenty-five Secretaries of State, and a half-dozen Defense Secretaries . . . all of them dreaming dreams."

Here in Washington, this the stuff of which politics is made.

This is Bill Downs from Washington.