Where the News Ends
CHAMBERLIN, WILLIAM HENRY
WHERE the NEWS ENDS By William Henry Chamberlin Berlin—Dramatic And Inspiring BERLIN AN ISLAND IN A totalitarian sea, a frontline outpost of freedom—political and economic, cultural and...
...His comment on the proceedings at Geneva could well be recommended to the attention of the diplomats there: "The Western Foreign Ministers should talk to Gromyko in the language he understands, hard and threatening...
...tactfully backed away from overt criticism of Western diplomacy at Geneva...
...And even this may be avoided if President Eisenhower makes it clear that the price of trying to destrov the freedom of West Berlin is war...
...Dramatic, because the fate of its 2.2 million inhabitants hangs in the balance until a viable East–West settlement is made...
...Although they know they live in a precarious situation, even more vulnerable economically than militarily, the Berliners have not lost their heads...
...Inspiring, because one does not hear one voice in favor of surrender, one quavering note of appeasement, among the West Berliners...
...The Federal Government in Bonn backed with credit assurances a massive inflow of new orders...
...Of all the radio stations which try to pierce the Iron Curtain, RIAS...
...no wonder Gromyko launched into a tirade against this station last May...
...And then America itself will not be safe...
...Both militant, indefatigable, tireless Mayor Willy Brandt and a student who had just made his break for freedom, and is now lodged in a West German refugee camp, exemplify Berlin's one mood—a prayer addressed to Western diplomats: Stand firm, don't give in...
...or from the Soviet Zone inhabitants who write letters to RIAS, the American radio station in Berlin...
...West Berlin is now more prosperous, with less unemployment, than at any time since the end of the war...
...A new extension of the subway has been started...
...The student, talking fast from pent–up emotion, gathered a whole group of fellow refugees around him, when, after answering some questions about life in the Soviet Zone and his reasons for leaving, he burst out: "Don't you see in America that, if freedom falls in Berlin, it will not last long in Germany, or in Europe...
...One of the most recent, at the time of my visit, was a locomotive driver from Halle, in the Soviet Zone...
...Somehow, however, one doubts whether there will be another blockade...
...If the Western powers in Geneva go on in this way they will achieve nothing in the way of German reunion...
...One certainly hopes this is the case: for the moral effect of retreat from RIAS, or from any other position challenged by the enemy, would be most disastrous...
...among the refugees who continue to stream across from the Soviet Zone at the rate of hundreds a day...
...WHERE the NEWS ENDS By William Henry Chamberlin Berlin—Dramatic And Inspiring BERLIN AN ISLAND IN A totalitarian sea, a frontline outpost of freedom—political and economic, cultural and personal—West Berlin is one of the most dramatic and inspiring cities one can visit in Europe today...
...But he made no secret of the fact that he saw seeds of danger in some of the concessions which were made in the Allied offer of June 16 and suggested that he would have liked to see the Western powers stand by the less compromising statements they originally made last December...
...West Berlin is prepared, if necessary, to stand a long siege...
...the American radio station in West Berlin, has by far the largest response...
...It is fairly easy to slip over from East Berlin to West Berlin and RIAS receives a number of visitors...
...the Conrad Hilton is only one of a number of new hotels which have opened: and bit by bit the massive ruins, due to wartime bombing, are giving way to attractive apartment houses, complete with kindergartens and schools on the premises, green plots and banks of flowers in every balcony...
...According to its director, A. A. Klieforth, RIAS in 1953 received about a quarter of a million letters, of which about a third were from the Soviet Zone...
...It now has a stockpile of several million tons of coal and an assorted variety of provisions and raw materials capable of supplying the population at a fairly high standard of living for as much as a year...
...Some Americans here believe this tirade may have turned the tide against considering offering up RIAS on the altar of appeasement...
...Mayor Brandt, interviewed at a reception which he gave for the able and popular chief of the American mission here, Bernard Gufler...
...don't start down any slippery slope of appeasement...
...The Russians regard the courtesy of the Western powers as weakness and therefore commit still more acts of insolence...
...For our sake, but also for America's, we hope America will stand firm...
...No wonder the Quisling press of the Soviet Zone foams at the mouth when RIAS is mentioned...
...It is infinitely better provided than it was at the time of the blockade in 1948– 49...
...And this student is far from being a lone voice from the silenced and oppressed population of the Soviet Zone...
...More probable is a series of economic pinpricks and harass– ments...
Vol. 42 • October 1959 • No. 38
