Berlin полностью

Khrushchev got his chance to squeeze Kennedy on Berlin during their first face-to-face confrontation at the Vienna Summit in June 1961. The meeting had hardly gotten underway when the Soviet premier began to complain about Washington’s “impossible” position on Berlin and Germany. But instead of “solving” the problem through the creation of a neutral, reunited Germany, the Soviet leader now called on the West to acknowledge Germany’s permanent division by pulling out of Berlin. By staying in West Berlin, remilitarizing West Germany, and feeding Bonn’s dreams of reunification, he said, America was creating the preconditions for a new world war. As an interim solution, Khrushchev repeated Moscow’s offer to make West Berlin into a “free city” with guaranteed access to the wider world, but without any contractual ties to the West. Glaring at Kennedy, he said that he wanted to reach an agreement “with you,” but if he could not, he would sign a peace treaty with the GDR. Then “all commitments stemming from Germany’s surrender will become invalid. This would include all institutions, occupation rights, and access to Berlin, including the corridors.”

Before coming to Vienna, Kennedy had been advised by Allan Lightner, the U.S. minister in West Berlin, to “tell Khrushchev in blunt language” that the “Soviets should keep their hands off Berlin.” This, in effect, is what he proceeded to do. While thanking the chairman for being so “frank,” he reminded him that “the discussion here is not only about the legal situation but also about the practical facts, which affect very much our national security. . . . This matter is of the greatest concern to the U.S. We are in Berlin not because of someone’s sufferance. We fought our way here, although our causalities may not have been as high as the U.S.S.R.’s. We are in Berlin not by agreement by East Germans, but by our contractual rights.”

Having expected at least some give from the young American president, Khrushchev became increasingly angry, lecturing him like a schoolchild on the stakes at play in Berlin. The former Nazi capital, he said, was “the most dangerous spot in the world.” Upping his ante in metaphors, he fumed that his government was determined “to perform an operation on this sore spot, to eliminate this thorn, this ulcer.” By signing a peace treaty with East Germany Moscow would “impede the revanchists in West Germany who want a new war.” Slamming his hand on the table, he shouted: “I want peace. But if you want war, that is your problem.”

Despite a regimen of amphetamines prescribed by a quack doctor for his Addison’s disease, Kennedy remained calm under the barrage. “It is you, and not I, who wants to force a change,” he replied. America would not abandon Berlin. If as a result Moscow followed through on its threats and signed a peace treaty with East Germany in December, it would be “a cold winter,” he said grimly.

Kennedy’s calm at Vienna was deceptive. After the meeting he admitted that Khrushchev “just beat hell out of me.” More importantly, he unburdened himself in private regarding his actual feelings about Berlin, which were much more ambivalent than he had made out in Vienna. “We’re stuck in a ridiculous position,” he confided to his aide, Kenneth O’Donnell. “It seems silly for us to be facing an atomic war over a treaty preserving Berlin as the future capital of a reunited Germany when all of us know that Germany will probably never be reunited.” Contradicting an earlier assertion that the freedom of Western Europe hinged on the defense of West Berlin, he added:

God knows I’m not an isolationist, but it seems particularly stupid to risk killing a million Americans over an argument about access rights on an Autobahn. . . or because the Germans want Germany reunified. If I’m going to threaten Russia with a nuclear war, it will have to be for much bigger reasons than that. Before I back Khrushchev against the wall and put him to a final test, the freedom of all Western Europe will have to be at stake.

Thinking about the issue from the Communists’ point of view, Kennedy could even sympathize with their desire to shut down West Berlin: after all, the place was draining East Germany of vital manpower. “You can’t blame Khrushchev for being sore about that,” he allowed. But you could blame the West Germans and West Berliners for insisting that America do their dirty work for them while they focused on getting rich. Bonn wanted the United States “to drive the Russians out of East Germany. It’s not enough for us to be spending a tremendous amount of money on the military defense of Western Europe . . . while West Germany becomes the fastest-growing industrial power in the world. Well, if they think we are rushing into a war over Berlin, except as a last desperate move to save the NATO alliance, they’ve got another think coming.”