Austria's Fight for Survival
WOLFE, HENRY C.
Austria's Fight for Survival Between Liberation and Liberty. By Karl Gruber. Praeger. 240 pp. $4.50. Reviewed by Henry C. Wolfe Author of "The Imperial Soviets" and other hooks It is a...
...Austria and the three Western occupation powers negotiated with the Kremlin in a persistent effort to get the Russians to keep their word...
...This is the same Clementis, incidentally, whom the Communists liquidated a few years later...
...It ranges widely from Washington, London, Paris, Belgrade and Bonn to Moscow...
...Reviewed by Henry C. Wolfe Author of "The Imperial Soviets" and other hooks It is a fascinating but inconclusive pastime to conjecture what might have happened in a given country had other leaders been in power at a critical turn of events...
...But apparently the Russians had no intention of ever getting out...
...Austria is preparing to arm itself...
...But Dr...
...In the end that proved to be the decisive factor in the Austrian situation...
...They found that the Red Army, far from making recruits for Communism, was itself being infected by association with a free citizenry...
...For almost ten years...
...Would Czechoslovakia, for instance, have survived as a free country after World War II if there had been more resolute men at the head of the Government...
...In the light of his dealings with the Kremlin, the author observes: "The Russians hate to make a firm offer...
...In Austria there was economic collapse, an almost worthless currency, war ruins and-worst of all-Russian occupation of the most valuable provinces...
...In a passage that might well have been written as a word of warning to the Western delegates to the 1955 Geneva conferences, Dr...
...It was their purpose, evidently, to build up a strong Austrian Communist party, wear down the patriotic Austrian leaders and eventually take over the country from the inside, as they did next door in Czechoslovakia...
...They ran into their first roadblock, however, when they failed to cow the Austrian leaders...
...This high-minded teamwork opposed a powerful front to Communist infiltration and divisive tactics...
...Hovering in the background of the interview, however, was Communist Vlado Clementis, Secretary of State to the Foreign Minister...
...The fact that the Russians, by intimidation and promises, could not raise the Communist vote in Austria above 5 per cent may have been the decisive influence in their willingness to leave...
...We do not know for sure...
...For at the end of World War II Austria's situation was far worse than Czechoslovakia's...
...But when Foreign Minister Karl Gruber of Austria visited Prague in late 1945, he found an atmosphere of political unreality...
...The roads were filled with trucks headed toward Hungary...
...during the war years he was head of the anti-Nazi resistance, forces in the Tyrol...
...Last August, the reviewer toured the Austrian border province of Burgenland and saw the Russian army in process of evacuation...
...Gruber brought excellent credentials to his post...
...Gruber, "was the reason why our talks did not go beyond generalities...
...It has many interesting conversations, intriguing sidelights and some rather shrewd observations...
...This meant that both dominant parties repudiated support from the extremes of Left and Right...
...As a consequence, in the three national elections held in Austria since the war the Communist vote never exceeded 5 percent...
...Had it not been for the courage, foresight and determination of men like Raab...
...The book is, however, more than a chronology of events in Austria...
...Next in importance was the fact that the two major Austrian political parties-the moderately leftist Socialists and the moderately rightist People's party -cooperated...
...Gruber says that his country must have a defense force "so that an attack would be no harmless stroll...
...From our past experiences we had learned the bitter lesson that the precondition of outside help is always the capacity for self-defense...
...Their tactics in negotiation are to lean back and say 'No' until their opponent's patience is all but exhausted and he is willing to make concessions...
...The situation seemed, indeed, a set-up for a Soviet infiltration job and eventual takeover...
...What of the future...
...Austria was to be treated, according to the Moscow war-time agreement, as a liberated country...
...Gruber points out: "The Western world has nowhere yet offered that picture of consolidated strength that might perhaps have made the Soviet rulers realize that a detente demanded a higher price...
...The presence of Clementis, reports Dr...
...In that way,' he said, 'the free future of Czechoslovakia is assured.'" When Dr...
...The Austrians are too realistic, of course, to believe that they could stand alone against the military might of the Soviet Empire...
...Gruber talked with Jan Masaryk, the Czech Foreign Minister, the latter for once did not go into his usual story that the Communists in Czechoslovakia were good Czechs first, Communists second...
...In contrast to the tragic events of the Thirties, when there was fratricidal political strife, the responsible Austrian political leaders put the national welfare first...
...Will the Russians come back...
...They are never anxious to put their cards on the table and seldom regard an opponent's offer as honest and never as his last...
...President Benes "was proud of his success in 'negotiating' the Soviets 'out' of Czechoslovakia...
...While we cannot be certain that stronger leadership would have saved Czechoslovakia, we can be pretty sure that weak leadership in Austria would have doomed that country...
...Figl, Scharf, Jonas and Gruber, the Kremlin would certainly be in control of Austria today...
...It saved the country...
...long trains loaded with tanks and guns crowded the rail yards...
...The story of Austria's struggle to survive is vigorously told in this volume by the man who was Foreign Minister from 1945 to 1953...
...Not even harsh rules against fraternization with the Austrian population could hide from Russian soldiers a standard of living and culture vastly higher than that of the Soviet Union...
Vol. 38 • November 1955 • No. 45
