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DOCUMENTS ON GERMANY, 1944-59
the Potsdam Agreement, obligations which have outlived themselves
and which the western powers are clinging to, and to pursue with
regard to Berlin a policy that would spring from the interests of the
Warsaw Treaty.
The leaders of Western Germany say that good relations between
the Soviet Union and the Federal Republic of Germany can only
be established if the Soviet Union ceases to support the German
Democratic Republic and if it brings pressure to bear on it in a di-
rection needed by the West. Bonn does not, apparently desire good
relations with the Soviet Union if it entertains such absurd hopes.
-If the government of the Federal Republic really wants to have good
relations with the Soviet Union it should abandon, once and for all,
the hope that we shall cease to support the German Democratic
-Republic.
The government of the Polish People's Republic has shown valuable
initiative in proposing the establishment in Central Europe of a zone
where atomic hydrogen and rocket weapons would not be manufac-
tured or kept. This constructive proposal has been supported by the
governments of the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, the German Demo-
cratic Republic and other socialist and nonsocialist countries which
firmly stand for the preservation of peace. The ruling circles of West-
ern Germany, however, have turned down the Polish proposal and
have taken the road of equipping the Bundeswehr with atomic and
rocket weapons. German militarism today is more dangerous to the
world than before. German militarists hope to swallow the German
Democratic Republic and to take Poland's ancient western lands
away from her. They lay claims to the territory of Czechoslovakia
and other socialist countries.
But they are playing with fire. The Oder-Neisse frontier is a
frontier of peace. Any encroachment by German revenge-seekers on
the German Democratic Republic would be regarded as an encroach-
ment on the Oder-Neisse frontier, as a threat to the security of our
peoples.
The Polish people can rest assured that they have in the Soviet
Union a reliable friend and ally in the struggle against German mili-
tarism and imperialist aggression.
Remarks at News Conference by Secretary of State Dulles, on
Berlin, November 26,19581
[Extracts]
*        *       *        *       *        *       *
Q. Mr. Secretary, have the United States, Britain, France, and West
Germany agreed on plans to meet any contingency which may arise
in East Germany and Berlin?
A. The basic position of the Three Western Powers and, indeed,
of the NATO Powers is pretty well-defined by prior decisions and
declarations.
You ask whether we have plans to meet any contingency. Of course,
I can't anticipate all the contingencies that there are, but I think that
I Department of State press release 721, November 26, 1958.
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