Russia's Conference Proposal
Mr. Bevin and M. Schuman have now expressed themselves, as Mr. Dean Acheson had already done, on the Soviet Note of Novem- ber 3rd, proposing the convention of a Four-Power Conference to Prepare a treaty of peace with Germany. The Foreign Secretary's attitude will be generally approved. If there is any chance of a reasonable agreement with Russia it must be seized without hesita- tion. On that there must be universal agreement with Lord Salis- bury's earnest plea in the House of Lords on Wednesday. But to enter a conference doomed in advance to be abortive would only aggravate the present tension further. To talk simply of going back to Potsdam is idle, though it is a very natural Russian move ; having taken the initiative in violating the Potsdam agree- ment, and found that in the end the violation did not pay her, Russia very naturally is for starting from Potsdam again. That is impossible. The starting-point must be the situation at the end of 1950, not the situation in the middle of 1945. Neither does the talk of the demilitarisation of Germany drop very convincingly from the lips of the Power which has been methodically remilitarising the part of Germany under her control. Nor again is the zeal for a treaty about Germany quite explicable in the State which year after year has been making the conclusion of a much simpler treaty over Austria impossible. These are questions on which, not indeed agree- ment, but the glimmer of some possibility of an agreement, must be achieved before formal conversations can be entered on with any hope of success. That such conversations should take place is highly desirable. Newspaper polemics and Lake Success tirades can, lead nowhere. But the ground must be well sounded first. The Western Foreign Ministers are quite clear about that, and they are unquestionably right.
