DECISION MAKING IN THE U.S. ADMINISTRATION AND THE ROLE OF BUREAUCRACY DURING THE BERLIN CRISIS 1961

A Thesis

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree of a Master of Arts in the

Graduate School of the Ohio State University

By

Schanett Riller

*****

The Ohio State University 1998

Master's Examination Committee:

Approved by Dr. Peter L. Hahn, Adviser

Dr. Carole Fink

Dr. Ahmad Sikainga ABSTRACT

This thesis investigates the role bureaucracy played during the Berlin crisis in 1961/62. It focuses on two aspects: first, the process of decision making in the Kennedy administration before August 13, 1961, and second, the question of policy implementation in Berlin from September

1961 to April 1962.

With regard to the question of decision making, this thesis finds that Kennedy's informal governmental style and accessability for his staff provided him with a broad range of opinions on all matters concerning the Berlin problem. He

established several working groups on Berlin, who discussed policy options in an open atmosphere and made valuable

recommendations. In Washington, therefore, the policy making body worked smoothly and enabled the President to make

carefully considered decisions.

The record of the policy-implementation process, however,

looks different, for implementation was not ensured. Both

technical problems and personal differences between commanders

in the European theater disrupted the execution of

instructions from Washington. General Clay's presence in

ii Berlin as Kennedy's Personal Representative complicated the situation further. Though Clay had no authority technically, he still initiated actions of his own. The climax of this policy was the dangerous confrontation of U.S. and Soviet tanks at the Checkpoint Charlie in the end of October. It was no longer the President who made policy in Berlin but, in fact, his Personal Representative.

This present thesis as a historical case study proves that lower levels of bureaucray can and do influence both the decision and the policy making. While the decision-making machine worked relatively well throughout the Berlin crisis, the implementation of the chosen policy was not ensured.

Still, Kennedy approved of Clay's actions in Berlin and made

Clay's policy his own ex post facto. Paradoxically, therefore, it did not matter that the machinery for implementing policy did not function smoothly. Kennedy could have improved the

functioning of the bureaucratic apparatus by providing the

Berlin personnel with more authorities than he did. To keep control of as many actions and decisions as possible, however, he chose to rather take the risk of delays in policy

implementation than risk a nuclear war resulting from miscalculations on lower levels of the policy making body.

iii For Emre

iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to thank Dr. Bryan van Sweringen for helping me to

find some of the sources for this research paper, and Prof.

Allan Millett for helping me to find Bryan van Sweringen.

I am very grateful to former Berlin Brigade Commander

General Frederick Hartel for his willingness to answer my questions.

Moreover, I thank John Davidson, who spent some of his precious time to read my draft. I also wish to thank Dr. Peter

Hahn for his patience and his helpful suggestions on how to

improve my thesis.

And thank you very much to a dear friend, to whom this

thesis is dedicated.

v VITA

August 4, 1973 ...... Born - Goslar, Federal Republic of Germany

May 17, 1993 ...... Abitur, Christian-von-Dohm Gymnasium, Goslar

October 1993- September 1994 ... Rheinische Friedrich­ Wilhelms-Universitat, Bonn

October 1994-September 1997 ..... Universitat Hamburg

October 1994 ...... Equivalent to a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science, Universitat Hamburg

April 1996 ...... Equivalent to a Bachelor's Degree in History, Universitat Hamburg

May 1996 ...... Equivalent to a Bachelor's Degree in Philosophy, Universitat Hamburg

September 1997- present ...... Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, Graduate Research Associate, Ohio State University

PUBLICATIONS

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field: History Minors: Philosophy, Political Science

vi TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

De di ca ti on ...... iv

Ac know 1 edgmen ts ...... v

Vita ...... vi

List of Abbreviations ...... viii

Chapters:

1. Introduction ...... 1

2. The Berlin Crisis: The Development of Berlin after 1945 ...... 10

3. The Kennedy Administration ...... 19

3.1 Kennedy's Foreign Policy ...... 19 3.2 The Organization of Foreign Policy and Kennedy's Governmental Style ...... 29 3.3 The Crisis Organization after Vienna ...... 33

4. The Organization at Work ...... 39

4.1 Consultations and Policy Planning Before the Wall ...... 39 4.2 Crisis Management After the Wall ...... 47 4.3 The Role of the German Elections ...... 56 4.4 General Clay in Berlin ...... 68 4. 4 .1 Steinstucken ...... 7 5 4.4.2 The Tank Crisis ...... 78 4.5 Petering Out of the Crisis ...... 92

5. Conclusion ...... 101

Bibliography ...... 115

vii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CDU Christlich-Demokratische Union [Christian

Democratic Union]

CIA Central Intelligence Agency

CINCEUR Commander in Chief, Europe

F.R.G. Federal Republic of Germany

G.D.R. German Democratic Republic

!CG Interdepartmental Coordinating Group

NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization

NSC National Security Council

NSAM National Security Action Memorandum

SAC EUR Supreme Allied Commander, Europe

SBZ Sowjetische Besatzungszone [Soviet Zone of

Occupation]

SED Sozialistische Einheitspartei [Socialist Unity

Party]

SHAPE Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers, Europe

SMAD Sowjetische Militaradministration Deutschland

[Soviet Military Administration Germany]

viii SPD Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands

[Social Democratic Party of Germany]

US COB United States Command, Berlin

USIA United States Information Agency

ix CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

On October 27, 1961, Soviet and U.S. tanks faced each other in Berlin for the first time in the Cold War, while on- looking journalists awaited the outbreak of World War III. 1

Ten weeks earlier, access from East Berlin to West Berlin had been cut off when East German authorities erected a wall through the city. While the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact members publicly approved the closing of the border by the

East Germans, 2 the Western Allies hesitated in supporting their West German ally: it took the United States one week before it demonstrated its commitment to the population in the

Western Sectors of the divided city. One of the measures the

U.S. took to calm the situation in Berlin was to send Lucius

Clay to the city. Tension did not ease, however, and the tank crisis developed. Paul Ni tze later would confirm that the

1 See Peter Wyden, Wall - The Inside Story of Divided Berlin (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989), 262.

2 Declaration of the Warsaw Pact Powers, August 13, 1961, reprinted in: Documents on Germany, 1944-1961, ed. by the Committee on Foreign Relations (Washington: U.S. Govern­ ment Printing Office, 1961), 721-723.

1 danger of nuclear confrontation between the United States and

the Soviet Union during the Berlin crisis was higher than

during the Cuban missile crisis. 3

A look at the scholarly writing on Berlin reveals that -

despite Nitze's assessment - the Berlin crisis seems to stand

in the shadow of the Cuban missile crisis. While there is

extensive literature on the Cuban missile crisis, analyses of

the Berlin problem are rather sparse. The most comprehensive

books on Berlin may be Curtis Cate's The Ides of August (1978)

and Norman Gelb' s The Berlin Wall (1986). 4 Both authors,

though, "tell the story of the Wall" 5 rather than analyze the

chain of events from any specific aspect. The same is true for

the latest record of the Wall by Peter Wyden, 6 who gives a

view of the developments from 1961 to 1988 from an East

Berliner's perspective. In The Crisis Years, Michael Beschloss

3 , Paul Nitze, From Hiroshima to Glasnost. At the Center of Decision: A Memoir (New York: Grove Weinfeld, 1989), 205.

4 Curtis Cate, The Ides of August. The Berlin Wall Crisis 1961 (New York: M. Evans and Company, 1978); Norman Gelb, The Berlin Wall (London: Michael Joseph, 1986) .

5 Norman Gelb, The Berlin Wall, 5.

6 Wyden, Wall.

2 also addresses the Berlin crisis. 7 He focuses on the personal relationship between Kennedy and Khrushchev and thereby implies that these two men were the main actors in the international crises between 1960 and 1963.

Another recently published book covering the Berlin crisis is Frank Mayer's study of the German-American relations from 1960 to 1963. 8 Like Beschloss, though, Mayer concentrates on the personal relationship between the two countries' leaders, this time Adenauer and Kennedy. Mayer blames Kennedy for his lack of understanding of the German situation and policy, which finally led Adenauer to turn away from the

United States and tighten Germany's bonds with France. While

Kennedy's relationships with Khrushchev and Adenauer undoubtedly affected the outcome of the crisis involving the

United States, Germany, and the Soviet Union, it was not the only influential factor.

This thesis will turn away from the personal level and scrutinize the institutional, bureaucratic side of policy

7 Michael Beschloss, The Crisis Years. Kennedy and Khrushchev 1960-1963 (New York: Harper Collins, 1991).

8 Frank Mayer, Adenauer and Kennedy. A Study in German­ American Relations, 1961-1963 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996) .

3 making during the Berlin crisis. In a system of complex governmental structures, it seems too simplistic to concentrate on the president. Rather, one has to ask how much of the policy output can be traced back to the president. What roles do the decision making process and the process of policy implementation play in a crisis?

An early case study on decision making during the Berlin

Wall crisis by Honore Catudal fails fully to answer these questions. 9 Catudal bases his study on the model of the rational actor, which traditionally sees the government as one unitary actor, neglecting possible internal differences. 10

According to this investigation, Kennedy was the outstanding actor during the Berlin Wall crisis, "rose above 'bureaucratic inertia'", made all important decisions, and earned responsibility for their outcome. 11 Catudal's study, however, has several weaknesses. It is dated, and new sources have

9 Honore Catudal, Kennedy and the Berlin Wall Crisis. A Case Study in U.S. Decision Making (Berlin: Berlin Verlag, 1980).

10 See Graham T. Allison, Essence of Decision. Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston: Little, Brown, 1971), 32.

11 Catudal, Kennedy, 253.

4 since been declassified, which might reveal new information.

Moreover, Catudal concentrates mainly on the time before the erection of the Wall. Finally, his question of whether Kennedy was able to put himself into the position of the "Berlin desk officer"12 and make all the important decisions by himself, does not seem to grasp the crucial problem of whether the

President was provided with enough information to make decisions adequately. Moreover, when he made decisions in

Washington, were they implemented in Berlin? How much of the

Berlin crisis has to be blamed on inefficiencies in the bureaucracy? Escalations like the tank confrontation at

Checkpoint Charlie might not even have occurred, had the bureaucratic apparatus worked better.

My approach to the present study in decision making and bureaucracy is inspired primarily by Graham Allison's study in decision making during the Cuban missile crisis, Alexander

George's study on presidential decision making, and Francis

Rourke's investigations into bureaucracy and foreign policy. 13

12 "Berlin Desk Officer" is said to have become Kennedy's nickname during the crisis. See Catudal, Kennedy, 35; and Wyden, Wall, 262.

13 Allison, Essence; Alexander L. George, Presidential Decision Making in Foreign Policy: The Effective Use of

5 Allison scrutinizes the Cuban missile crisis under three different models of governmental decision making. The first sees the government as a unitary actor making decisions according to the model of the rational actor. The second and third approaches look into governmental action as organizational output and as the result of a bargaining process among the advisers and organizations. Allison favors the latter two because his analysis has shown that they give a more complete account of the factors upon which policy-as- action actually depends . 14

George differs from Allison as he concentrates on the factors contributing to the president's decision making, leaving aside the question of how much of the president's decision is actually implemented. However, he takes into account the internal governmental processes and organizational behavior . 15 He enumerates a number of useful behavioral patterns of organizations, such as their tendency to acquire

Information and Advise (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1980); Francis C. Rourke, Bureaucracy and Foreign Policy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1972).

14 Allison, Essence, 2 54-2 63.

15 George, Presidential Decision Making, chapters 4 and 5.

6 information to protect their own views or interests, to discredit the policy analyses of their rivals, and to rely on policy routines. 16

In his book on bureaucracy and foreign policy, Rourke points in the same direction when he briefly examines

Kennedy's decision to withdraw U.S. missiles from Turkey. 17 He concludes that the "way in which executive agencies handle these routine responsibilities may well decide whether or not a crisis emerges or even predetermine its outcome." 18 Whether this was the case in the Berlin crisis will be scrutinized in this thesis.

Any theoretical model of foreign policy or decision making is, of course, controversial or disputed. There is, consequently, criticism of Allison's study Essence of

Decision. Jonathan Bendor and Thomas Hammond, for example, accentuate inconsistencies and shortcomings within Allison's models of decision making. 19 They expect each of his models to

16 Ibid. I 111-113.

17 Rourke, Bureaucracy, 48.

18 Ibid., 65.

19 Jonathan Bendor and Thomas H. Hammond, "Rethinking Allison's Models," American Poli ti cal Science Review,

7 be applicable to all stages of the Cuban crisis and any other crisis. Consequently they criticize the oversimplifications or complications that necessarily arise in the use of models for this purpose. The goal of this thesis is therefore not to find a single model that perfectly describes or explains the development and course of the Berlin crisis. Rather, it examines the crisis historically and uses the theoretical categories only as references.

Taking into account all the assumptions mentioned above, this essay will begin with a brief outline of Kennedy's approach to foreign policy and look at the significance of

Germany and Berlin within Kennedy's perception of the Cold

War. After that, I will examine Kennedy's general, daily routine style as president and then look at the changes the organizational structure underwent in response to the new challenges during the Berlin crisis. The ensuing task will be to analyze the effect the organizational structure had on the policy making.

Because this thesis focuses on the German-American aspect of the Berlin crisis rather than on the Soviet-American

86: 2 (1992): 301-322.

8 aspect, it also discusses the influence Chancellor Konrad

Adenauer and his opponent, the Governing Mayor of Berlin,

Willy Brandt, had on the U.S. decision making and on the

outcome of the crisis.

To prevent confusion with the terms decision making and

policy making, I will use "decision making" in the literal

sense, thereby restricting it to the process of bargaining and

exchanging advise before a decision is made. "Policy making"

will be used to describe the actions taken after a decision is

made. It will stand for the process of implementation of a

policy chosen, for it is the implementation that determines

the actual, visual policy. In some cases, however, the two

processes may be indistinguishable.

9 CHAPTER 2

THE BERLIN CRISIS: THE DEVELOPMENT OF BERLIN AFTER 1945

The Berlin crisis in 1961 had its origin in the settlement over Germany in the end of the Second World War.

When the Allied Powers (U.S.A., Great Britain, and the Soviet

Union) defeated Germany, they did not sign a peace treaty with

Germany, but decided to divide Germany into three occupational zones and a special Berlin area. Each Power was responsible for one zone, while Berlin was under joint occupation by the

Three Powers. 20 This London Agreement was terminated until a peace settlement and a final agreement on the boundary lines of Germany would be found. France later joined the occupation, so that by 1945 Germany consisted of four occupation zones and

Berlin. The Four Powers formed an Allied Control Council to administer Germany as a whole, and an Inter-Allied Governing

Authority, the Kommandatura, was to direct the administration of Berlin. However, in the wake of the increasing differences

20 Protocol on Zones of Occupation and Administration of the "Greater Berlin" Area, September 12, 1944. Printed in: Documents on Germany, 1944-1961, 1-3, 1.

10 of opinion concerning the German policy between the West and the Soviet Union, cooperation between the Four Powers soon broke down, and an agreement on Germany's future as a state eluded them.

From the very beginning the four occupation powers pursued very different policies. While the Three Western

Powers supported free enterprise economies and let the Germans establish Western-style democratic regimes in their three zones, the Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) in its zone of occupation (SBZ) enforced land and economic reforms that prepared a socialist system. The "uniformity of treatment of

21 the German population throughout Germany" , which had been announced in the Potsdam Agreement of August 1945, was never implemented. Within the course of four years two different social, political, and economic systems arose on German soil.

In March 1948, the three Western zones announced a joint currency reform to improve the economic situation in Germany.

The SBZ could have joined this economic union, but the SMAD rejected the offer and left the Allied Control Council.

Premier Josef Stalin protested the currency reform as a

21 Protocol of the Potsdam Conference, August 1, 1945, Documents on Germany, 1944-1961, 29-39.

11 deviation from the Potsdam Agreement. The Western Powers, however, did not assess this protest as justified, because the

SMAD had, for example, pursued land reforms in the SBZ before without caring about the Potsdam Agreement.

To impose his will, Stalin decided to take action against

the Western Powers in Berlin. Harassments of Western traffic

to Berlin started in the SBZ, and the day the currency reform

in the Western zones came into effect, traffic between Berlin

and the Western zones by land and by water was cut off

completely. Trade between the SBZ and West-Berlin was

interrupted, and even the electricity supply of the Western

Sectors from East Berlin stopped. 22

The legal position of the Western Powers in Berlin was

disadvantageous. Although the London Agreement of 1944 stated

their right to be in Berlin, no treaty provided access rights by land or by water. The only written agreements were those

establishing three air corridors from the Western zones into

22 Dokumente zur Berlin-Frage 1944-1962 [Documents on the Berlin Question], ed. by the Forschungsinstitut der deutschen Gesellschaft ftir Auswartige Politik (Mtinchen: Oldenbourg, 1962), 68.

12 West Berlin. 23 Consequently, the Western powers responded to the Soviet blockade with the organization of an airlift under the management of the military governor of the U.S. zone in

Germany, General Lucius Clay. The airlift had been meant as an interim solution until negotiations with the Soviet Union would lead to a new agreement on the status of Berlin or the

German economy, but it lasted for nearly a year.

Because the Western Powers managed to keep West Berlin alive by means of their airlift, the first attempt by the

Soviets to blackmail the Western powers based on their geographical advantage in Berlin failed. Stalin could neither achieve a reversal of the currency reform nor suspend the formation of a West German state. 24 When its pointlessness became apparent and the economic counter blockade the West had established against the Eastern European countries caused negative effects, Stalin ended the Berlin blockade in May

1949. In June 1949, the Foreign Ministers of the Four Powers

23 See Hans Georg Ruge, Das Zugangsrecht der Westmachte auf dem Luftweg nach Berlin [The Access Right of the Western Powers to Berlin by Air] (Berlin: Dunker und Humblot, 1968), 28.

24 Avi Shlaim, The United States and the Berlin Blockade, 1948-1949. A Study in Decision-Making (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), 314.

13 signed a communique to prevent similar cases in the future.

The agreement obligated the occupying power of each zone to

ensure normal functioning of transport and communication between all zones and Berlin. 25

During the Berlin blockade, Berlin became a symbol of

Western strength and commitment to the freedom of all nations

resisting communist influence. As long as the Potsdam

Agreement could be kept alive and valid by the Western Powers'

presence in Berlin, borders in Europe were not definitive and

Soviet hegemony over Eastern Europe was challenged. The

airlift proved that the United States (when it was in its own national interest) was willing and able to provide ways and means effectively to support freedom-seeking countries against

the Soviet Union. The Berlin airlift not only kept the Berlin

population alive, it also successfully served the interest of

keeping West Berlin as well as the West German population on

the side of the West. The popularity of the United States

among the Berlin citizens increased steadily throughout the

25 Communique on the Sixth Session of the Council of Foreign Ministers, June 20, 1949, Documents on Germany, 1944- 1961, 94-95.

14 blockade despite the remaining supply problems. 26 As organizer of the airlift, Lucius Clay would later be honored with the citizenship of Berlin.

In the aftermath of the Berlin blockade, when the Federal

Republic of Germany (F.R.G.) and the German Democratic

Republic (G.D.R.) had been founded, Berlin played an additional important role. Under the regime of state and party leader Walter Ulbricht, East Germany established a repressive, one-party, socialist state system. While a planned economy held down the standard of living, a state security service countered political freedom. Since West Germany did not recognize the German Democratic Republic as a legitimate state, it regarded all East Germans as potential citizens and provided them with West German identity papers as soon as they entered the country. From 1950 to 1961, therefore, nearly 3.5 million East Germans decided to leave the G.D.R. and start a supposedly better life in the F. R. G. . While the average

26 Anna J. Merritt/Richard L. Merritt, Public Opinion in Occupied Germany. The OMGUS Surveys 1945-1949 (Urbana/ Chicago/ London: University of Illinois Press, 1970), 253; Berlins Wirtschaft in der Blockade [Berlin's Economy During the Blockade]. Ed. by the Deutsches Institut flir Wirtschaftsforschung (Berlin: Dunker und Humblot, 1949), 12.

15 refugee flow per year fluctuated between 100,000 and 150,000,

125,053 refugees already had come to West Germany during the first seven months of 1961. 27 This flow of refugees threatened to destablize the regime of the G.D.R. politically as well as economically, because the refugees were young, qualified, skilled workers, doctors, and engineers.

Berlin contributed to the refugee flow in two ways: On the one hand it served psychologically as a display window advertising the Western way of life in the middle of the

G.D.R .. On the other hand, it technically enabled the East

Germans to escape to the F.R.G .. Once they had found a way to get to East Berlin, they could walk into West Berlin and from there travel to the Federal Republic. Because the Socialist

Unity Party (SED) of Ulbricht failed to reform the G.D.R. from within and make it more attractive to its citizens, the only solution to stop the growing refugee flow in 1961 was to close the border to West Berlin. 28

27 Jurgen Ruhle/Gunter HolzweiBig, 13. August 1961. Die Mauer von Berlin [August 13, 1961. The Wall of Berlin] (Koln: Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, 1981), 151.

28 Michael Lemke, Die Berlinkrise 1958 bis 1963. Interessen und Handlungsspielraume der SED im Ost-West-Konflikt [The· Berlin Crisis 1958 to 1963. The Goals of the SED and its

16 The Berlin crisis preceding the erection of the Wall in

1961 began in 1958/59, when the Soviet Chairman of the Council of Ministers Nikita Khrushchev sent an ultimatum to the United

States, Great Britain, and France. As Stalin had done in 1948,

Khrushchev declared the Potsdam Agreement on the Four Powers' rule over Germany outdated and therefore invalid. The new

"legal" situation resulting from this termination, according to Khrushchev, left two alternatives to the Western Powers.

Either the Four Powers would find a solution for Germany as a whole and sign a peace treaty with a German government, or the

Soviet Union would sign a separate peace treaty with the

G.D.R. and hand all responsibility for Berlin matters over to the government of East Germany. 29

The Three Western Powers rejected Khrushchev's ultimatum.

First of all, they did not accept a unilateral termination of the Potsdam agreement, the London Agreement of 1944, or the

Communique of the Foreign Ministers of 1949. The United

Scope of Action] (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1995), 46-57.

29 Note der Regierung der Sowjetunion an die Regierung der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika zur Lage Berlins [Note of the government of the Soviet Union to the government of the U.S.A. on the situation in Berlin], in: Jlirgen Rlihle/ Gunter HolzweiBig, 13. August 1961, 22-35.

17 States, Great Britain, and France insisted on their right to be in Berlin and the Soviets' obligation to ensure the transport of goods and persons as well as communication between Berlin and the Western zones. 3° Furthermore, they did not recognize the G.D.R. as a sovereign state and refused to deal with Walter Ulbricht.

Still, the Western Powers were willing to talk with the

Soviet government. During Khrushchev's visit to the United

States in September 1959, President Eisenhower and Khrushchev agreed to have a summit meeting in Paris in May 1960, where they would discuss the German question. Because of the U-2

incident - a U.S. reconaissance plane was shot down by the

Soviet Union - however, Khrushchev decided not to attend the

summit. He announced that he would wait for the Presidential

elections in the United States and bring up the Berlin

question again with the new administration - which he did, when he met with President Kennedy in Vienna in June 1961 and

entered a new stage of the crisis.

30 Notes of the governments of the United States of America, France, and Great Britain to the government of the Soviet Union, December 31, 1958, in: Rlihle/HolzweiBig, 13. August 1961, 35-45.

18 CHAPTER 3

THE KENNEDY ADMINISTRATION

3.1 Kennedy's Foreign Policy

John F. Kennedy's main interest as a politician always

lay in the field of foreign policy. "Domestic questions only

lose elections, but foreign policy questions can kill us all,"

Secretary of State Dean Rusk paraphrased Kennedy's attitude. 31

Kennedy formed his general ideas about foreign policy during

his student days, when he spent a semester in Europe in 1939

and looked into the question of the outbreak of World War II. 32

After returning to Harvard, he wrote his senior thesis about

Great Britain's containment policy toward Germany in 1938.

31 Dean Rusk, "Reflections on Foreign Policy", in: The Kennedy Presidency. Seventeen Intimate Perspectives of John F. Kennedy. Ed. by Kenneth W. Thompson (Langham/New York/London: University Press of America, 1985), 189-201, 192. See also Roger Hilsman, To Move A Nation. The Politics of Foreign Policy in the Administration of John F. Kennedy (New York: Doubleday and Company, 1967), 53; and Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy (New York: Harper and Row, 1965), 509.

32 Lewis J. Paper, The Promise and the Performance. The Leadership of John F. Kennedy (New York: Crown Pub­ lishers, 1975), 36.

19 In Why England Slept, the book version of his thesis,

Kennedy blamed the British public and government for their omissions on the eve of the Second World War. Both had underestimated the strength, threat, and determination of

Hitler's Germany and failed to prepare politically and militarily to face the dictator's expansionism. By not rearming, Great Britian had maneuvered itself into a position of weakness, which did not leave Prime Minister Neville

Chamberlain any other option but to appease Hitler at the

Munich conference in 1938 and thereby encourage the dictator to take further steps in 1939. 33

The conclusive lesson from the British experience - not to limit one's policy options by failing to build up one's own strength - became a constant throughout Kennedy's perception of foreign policy. Seventeen years later, in the agitation

following the Sputnik shock of 1957 - when the Soviet Union had succeeded in launching the first satellite into space -

Kennedy, now U.S. Senator for Massachusetts, sided with

President Eisenhower's critics. He blamed Eisenhower for neglecting the national security and letting the U.S. fall

33 John F. Kennedy, Why England Slept (New York: Wilfred Funk, 1940).

20 behind the Soviet Union by not building up the U.S. missile program. 34

One of Kennedy's electoral campaign issues in 1960 became

the supposed missile gap between the United States and the

Soviet Union and his challenge to Eisenhower's defense

doctrine of massive retaliation. Kennedy agreed with

Eisenhower's former Chief of Staff and his future military

adviser Maxwell Taylor that the United States needed a new

defense strategy. 35 Since the United States would probably not

use atomic weapons in conflicts over minor issues and would

have to back down in these cases, neither Taylor nor Kennedy

believed in the credibility and effectiveness of massive

nuclear retaliation, so they recommended a conventional build-

up. The new concept of flexible response was to enable the

34 Richard A. Aliano, American Defense Policy from Eisen­ hower to Kennedy. The Politics of Changing Military Requirements, 1957-1961 (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 1975), 228-256.

35 For Maxwell Taylor's explanation of the concept of "flexible response see his The Uncertain Trumpet (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1959). Kennedy had read his book and even sent him a letter saying that "it has certainly helped to shape my own thinking." Maxwell Taylor, interview recorded by Elsbeth Rostow and W.Y. Smith, April 12, (no year), page 4, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

21 U.S. to respond to any kind of provocation - nuclear or conventional - adequately and thereby improve the credibility and the U.S. position in negotiations with the Soviet Union.

In his inaugural address, Kennedy summarized the essence of

this concept, when he announced that his administration would never negotiate out of fear.

His second train of thought, however, was that the United

States should never fear to negotiate, either. 36 Kennedy

stressed the willingness of his administration to seek peace

and understanding whenever possible. Following this doctrine, his administration succeeded in calming the tense situation in

Laos and signing a Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty with the

Soviet Union. Contributing to the peace-seeking image, Kennedy moreover managed to enhance a humanitarian reputation of the

United States throughout the world by founding the Peace

Corps, the Alliance for Progress with Latin America, and the

Food for Peace Program, and by supporting the independence of

former colonies such as the Congo. 37 Al though none of these

36 Sorensen, Kennedy, 511.

37 Thomas G. Paterson, "Kennedy and Global Crisis." Introduction to Kennedy's Quest for Victory. American Foreign Policy, 1961-1963. Ed. by Thomas Paterson (New York/ Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1989), 19, and

22 organizations worked as successfully as they should have, and

Kennedy himself may not have cared about them too much, people appreciated the supposed goodwill and noble intentions behind them. 38

Because of the two poles of Kennedy's foreign policy -

U.S. strength and military build-up on the one hand and the search for peace on the other - scholarly writing on Kennedy's foreign policy is divided. Those who favor Kennedy emphasize the aforementioned achievements and praise his willingness to negotiate, while revisionist historians such as Richard Walton and Louise Fitzsimons characterize Kennedy as a tough Cold

Warrior who introduced counterinsurgency and provoked unneccesary risks in Berlin and Cuba by taking too firm a stance. 39 Herbert Parmet, however, tones down this judgment by

Timothy P. Maga, John F. Kennedy and New Frontier Diplomacy, 1961-1963 (Malabar, FL: Krieger Publishing Company, 1994), 38-63.

38 Kennedy never meant the Peace Corps to be an instrument in the Cold War but rather had adopted it as somebody else's campaign issue. He remained surprised about the popularity of the Corps until 1963. Maga, John F. Kennedy, 56.

39 Richard J. Walton, Cold War and Counterrevolution. The Foreign Policy of John F. Kennedy (New York: The Viking Press, 1972); Louise Fitzsimons, The Kennedy Doctrine (New York: Random House, 1972); and Henry Fairly, The

23 pointing to the fact that everybody in the early sixties was a Cold Warrior and Kennedy could not have become President had he not used his Cold War rhetoric. 40

Most scholars agree that Kennedy was less an idealist than a pragmatic politician. 41 Staff members of the foreign policy body such as Director of German Affairs Martin

Hillenbrand, Chairman of the Policy Planning Council George

McGhee, General Lucius Clay, and Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson supported this view by emphazising Kennedy's open mindedness and quick intellect, which prevented him from thinking along rigid conceptual lines. It was difficult to get Kennedy to consider a generalized policy statement, for he was interested

in concrete solutions to concrete problems, not in idealistic concepts. 42

Kennedy Promise. The Politics of Expectation (New York: Doubleday and Company, 1973).

40 Herbert S. Parmet, JFK. The Presidency of John F. Kennedy (New York: The Dial Press, 1983), 354.

41 Fitzsimons, The Kennedy Doctrine, 17; Paterson, Kennedy and Global Crisis, 18; Maga, John F. Kennedy, 26; Parmet, The Presidency of John F. Kennedy, 335; Paper, The Promise, 47.

42 George C. McGhee, recorded interview by Martin Hillen­ brand, August 13, 1964, page 19; Llewellyn Thompson, recorded interview by Elizabeth Donahue, March 25, 1964,

24 Consequently, Kennedy had no firm concept for a policy toward Germany. Before he took office, Germany had not been a major point of interest for him. In 1957 he published an article, in which he complained about Eisenhower's lack of new ideas and energy. Kennedy drew a parallel between the old

Eisenhower and the even older German Chancellor Adenauer, announced their age should be over, and recommended that the

United States turn to a new generation of leaders in Germany. 43

However, this article did not deal with German policy, but rather with policy style both in the U.S. and abroad. In regard to U.S. policy toward Germany, Kennedy as presidential candidate stressed Germany's importance in the competition between the free world and communism. If Germany were neutralized, he said, all of Western Europe would soon fall to the Soviet Union. In a televised debate with Richard Nixon, he insisted that the United States must meet its commitment to

Berlin, and he regarded the city as a symbol of the U.S.

page 7; Martin Hillenbrand, recorded interview by Paul R. Sweet, August 26, 1964, page 7; and Lucius D. Clay, re­ corded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 15, all: John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

43 John F. Kennedy, "A Democrat Looks at Foreign Policy", Foreign Affairs, 36: 1 (1957): 44-59.

25 commitment to the protection of Western Europe's security. 44

Kennedy saw Germany not as a means in itself, but as a means to win the Cold War.

When Kennedy became President, Adenauer, still Chancellor of the Federal Republic, feared any "new ideas" Kennedy might bring to U.S. foreign policy. Adenauer had backed Eisenhower's massive-retaliation doctrine and had a very close relationship with Secretary of State John Foster Dulles. 45 Despite Kennedy's campaign remarks about Berlin, the German government expected new efforts for a detente between the United States and the

Soviet Union and feared it might be reached at the cost of

German reunification or Berlin. 46 Martin Hillenbrand from the

German desk at the State Department recalled that the Kennedy administration was not at all committed to any specific solutions of the Berlin and German problems when Kennedy took

44 Walton, Cold War, 76; and Paper, The Promise, 89.

45 See Detlef Felken, Dulles und Deutschland. Die ameri­ kanische Deutschlandpolitik 1953-1959 [Dulles and Ger­ many. The American Policy toward Germany 1953-1959] (Bonn/ Berlin: Bouvier Verlag, 1993).

46 Wilhelm Grewe, recorded interview by Joseph O'Connor, November 2, 1966, page 3, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

26 office. 47 However, as soon as Kennedy had the Berlin question investigated, he chose exactly the policy Adenauer had foreseen.

As Frank Mayer has shown in his Adenauer and Kennedy,

Kennedy's pragmatic approach to negotiate over the Berlin question even if it meant compromising on issues like the

Oder-NeiBe boundary line contradicted Adenauer's policy of non-recognition and Western strength. 48 Kennedy and Adenauer had conflicting definitions of their countries' vital interests, and German-American relations worsened throughout the Berlin crisis. In the beginning of 1963, Adenauer finally turned away from the U.S.A. and signed a treaty of friendship with French President De Gaulle, which symbolized decreasing

Anglo-American influence in Western Europe.

This thesis will, however, not investigate the political mistakes Kennedy may have made during the Berlin crisis, but concentrate on the organizational, bureaucratic aspect. From the organizational perspective, scholarly writing on Kennedy's

47 Martin Hillenbrand, recorded interview by Paul R. Sweet, August 26, 1964, page 8, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

48 Mayer, Adenauer and Kennedy, 96.

27 foreign policy record suggests a development from the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961 to a better handling of the Berlin crisis and finally to the triumph of the Cuban missile crisis in October 1962. 49 While the Bay of Pigs disaster resulted from poor advice and lack of communication in the administration (see chapter 3. 2) , during the Cuban missile crisis Kennedy made sure the decision making body worked. He heard different opinions and examined all policy options before deliberately choosing one. This thesis will examine which place the Berlin crisis takes between these two poles.

49 Walton, Cold War, 93; and Irving L. Janis, Victims of Groupthink. A Psychological Study of Foreign-Policy Decisions and Fiascos (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1972), 14-49, and 138-166.

28 3.2 The Organization of Foreign Policy and Kennedy's

Governmental Style

As opposed to Eisenhower's formal organization of government, Kennedy's governmental style was generally informal and collegial. 50 While Eisenhower's administration was characterized by hierarchical structures and lines of communication, Kennedy emphasized teamwork. He directed various advisers and departments to share responsibility and discuss issues before enacting policy. His intent was to widen the perspective on issues discussed and avoid neglecting

important aspects. The debating forum was not the Cabinet, but

smaller groups of experts or confidantes. 51 In fact, Kennedy decreased the number of Cabinet meetings. Whenever he wanted

to hear alternative opinions, Kennedy would contact officials on all levels of bureaucracy directly and even reach beyond

those employed in the administration. 52

50 George, Presidential Decision Making, 154-157; and I. M. Destler, Presidents, Bureaucrats, and Foreign Policy. The Policy of Organizational Reform (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1972), 96.

51 Theodore Sorensen, Decision-Making in the White House. The Olive Branch or the Arrows (New York/London: Columbia University Press, 1963), 63.

52 George, Presidential Decision Making, 158.

29 Following the recorcunendations of the Jackson Subcorcunittee on National Policy Machinery, which had investigated inefficiencies within the government throughout 1960, Kennedy abolished the National Security Council Operations Planning and Coordinating Boards and several related interdepartmental corcunittees that had arisen under the Eisenhower administration. The original purpose of the NSC boards had been the preparation of NSC meetings and the coordination of implementation of decisions. However, neither board worked efficiently, and Kennedy decided to reassign a more important role and more responsibility for the foreign policy implementation to the State Department. 53 Moreover, he abandoned the weekly meetings of the National Security Council and surcunoned the Council only when needed. Kennedy also employed a smaller White House staff than Eisenhower in order to streamline the policy-making body.

During the Bay of Pigs episode in April 1961, reliance on a single agency and a single channel of information - the CIA

had proved to be a disastrous mistake. In fact, the CIA had worked against other agencies such as the State Department to

53 Catudal, Kennedy, 71; and Hilsman, To Move a Nation, 23.

30 withhold from the President additional information on the risks of invading Cuba. 54 To prevent similar situations,

Kennedy therefore formed his own advisory staff in the White

House. McGeorge Bundy's office of the Special Assistant for

National Security was moved into the White House and became, in the words of Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs

George Ball, "a foreign office in microcosm."55

In the State Department, Dean Rusk also took steps to improve the work of his Department by establishing an

Operation Center. Its purpose was to coordinate, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, any information on foreign policy issues that came in from the intelligence community, the press tickers, or diplomatic cables. 56 The relationship between Kennedy and the Department of State was initially uneasy, but improved in the course of 1961 and, according to the Officer of German Affairs Martin Hillenbrand, became very

54 See George, Presidential Decision Making, 129; Maga, The Kennedy Promise, 36; and Irving L. Janis, Victims of Groupthink, 14-49.

55 George Ball, The Past Has Another Pat tern. Memoirs (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1982), 172.

56 Catudal, Kennedy, 78.

31 close during the Berlin crisis. 57 While Kennedy appointed non-

State officials as heads for his task forces on Vietnam and

Cuba, he entrusted the Berlin question to the State

Department. 58

In the summer of 1961, the complexity and urgency of the

Berlin problem, however, begged for further changes in the everyday organizational structure of the foreign policy making body. Kennedy responded to this need after his summit meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961, at which Khrushchev presented the Western Powers a new ultimatum on Berlin. The

Soviet Chairman threatened to sign a separate Soviet peace treaty with the G.D.R. in December 1961 unless the Western

Allies agreed to a new settlement of Berlin. The ultimatum pressured the Kennedy administration to find a policy which on the one hand Great Britain, France, and West Germany would accept and which on the other hand would not lead to a

57 See Robert Kennedy: In His Own Words. The Unpublished Recollection of the Kennedy Years. Ed. by Edwin O. Guthman and Jeffrey Shulman (New York: Bantam Books, 1988), 287; Martin J. Hillenbrand, recorded interview by Paul R. Sweet, August 26, 1964, page 10, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

58 Thomas J. Schoenbaum, Waging Peace and War. Dean Rusk in the Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson Years (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988), 274-280.

32 confrontation with the Soviet Union. The following chapter will examine the specific organizational structure that met the demands of the Berlin crisis.

3.3 The Crisis Organization after Vienna

When Kennedy took office, he decided to review the Berlin policy of his predecessor. For this purpose, he appointed former Secretary of State Dean Acheson to write a report on the possibilities of negotiations and the general position the

U.S. should take toward Berlin. 59 Acheson formed a small Berlin advisory group and worked on his reports until about July

1961. 60 As will be shown in chapter four of this thesis, these reports strongly influenced the President's decision making. 61

After Kennedy had formulated his basic policy toward Berlin,

59 Walt W. Rostow, The Diffusion of Power. An Essay in Recent History (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1972), 224.

6° Catudal, Kennedy, 43. 61 See Reports by Dean Acheson, June 28, 1961, and undated, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, Berlin Crisis, 1961-1962, hereafter cited as FRUS, 1961-1963, (Washington: GPO, 1993), 14: 138-159 and 245-259.

33 however, Acheson withdrew from the advisory panel. 62

After the Vienna meeting with Khrushchev in June, the crisis organization in the administration took shape. Kennedy set up two working groups on two different levels. The first was the Berlin Steering Group consisting of the Secretary of

State Dean Rusk, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara,

Secretary of the Treasury Douglas Dillon, Attorney General

Robert Kennedy, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency

Allen Dulles, the President's Military Representative Maxwell

Taylor, Director of the United States Information Agency

(USIA) Edward Murrow, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of

Staff General Lyman Lemnitzer, and the President's Special

Assistant for National Security Affairs McGeorge Bundy, who was in charge of keeping records of the meetings. Kennedy wanted the Group to discuss all options and prepare memoranda for him that would include "the principal alternatives considered" as well as a recommendation for a course of action. The Steering Group was coordinated by the Secretary of

State and was to meet at least once a week to clarify the

62 He returned briefly in September and October, when he was contacted by the German ambassador as a confidential advocate for the German concerns. Memorandum of conver­ sation, October 11, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 490.

34 items discussed in the National Security Council meetings.

Because of the high and possibly paralyzing number of members, the President suggested "to leave out members who are not necessary for the discussion at hand."63

The Steering Group was supported by a lower level

Interdepartmental Coordinating Group ( ICG) under Assistant

Secretary of State for European Affairs Foy Kohler. This committee met infrequently and took charge of day-to-day operations and detailed planning on Berlin. 64 It was designed to be the "focal point for interdepartmental planning. " 65

Kohler had to assign the different tasks to the departments, establish relationships of the department to one another, and make sure they were all in step. The highest ranking members were Kohler for the State Department and Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Paul Nitze for

63 Suggested Remarks Before Meeting on Berlin, John F. Kennedy to Dean Rusk, July 17, 1961. Declassified Documents, 1995, 1289.

64 Meeting on Berlin, July 17, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 211.

65 Ibid ..

35 the Department of Defense. 66 At the end of July, Kennedy formed one more interdepartmental group on Berlin, the Berlin Task

Force. After the building of the Wall, the Berlin Task Force, also under Foy Kohler, met daily and worked as an open debating forum of all Berlin problems. 67 Kohler devoted himself to the Berlin problem exclusively and was released from his other duties. 68

On the international level, Foy Kohler would also meet with the so-called Ambassadorial Group on Berlin. This group had existed since 1959, but met only infrequently and had no institutionalized basis. During the first half of 1961 it consisted only of Kohler, French Ambassador Herve Alphand, and

British Aambassador Sir Harold Caccia. 69 In April 1961,

Chancellor Adenauer asked for German participation in

66 John c. Ausland, Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Berlin-Cuba Crisis 1961-1964 (Oslo: Scandinavian University Press, 1996) I 26.

67 Records of its meetings were neither kept regularly nor available for this study, though. Therefore the diffe­ rence between the Berlin Task Force and the Interdepart­ mental Coordinating Group cannot be clarified. Ausland, Kennedy, 199; and Paul Nitze, From Hiroshima, 202.

68 ICG Meeting, July 5, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 169.

69 David Ormsby Gore succeeded Caccia in October 1961.

36 contingency planning for Berlin. It was not until August, however, that German Ambassador Wilhelm Grewe finally joined the meetings. The purpose of the qadripartite group was to pursue an agreement on a unified allied position on all Berlin matters and to coordinate their policy. Meetings took place almost daily, and the French, British, and German Embassies in

Washington reinforced their personnel to facilitate its continuous work. 70

The coordination of the NATO allies in regard to the military contingency planning for Berlin took place in Paris under General Lauris Norstad, who was the head of Live Oak (a secret airborne command post for the Supreme Headquarters

Allied Powers Europe), Supreme Allied Commander in Europe

(SACEUR), Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces Central Europe

(CINCEUR), and U.S. Commander in Chief, Europe, at the same time. Norstad therefore reported on the one hand to the governments of France, Great Britain, and the United States, while in his second function he was responsible only to the

70 Memorandum of the meeting of the Quadripartite Ambassa­ dorial Group, August 9, 1961. FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 320; Ausland, Kennedy, 28; Catudal, Kennedy, 128; Martin J. Hillenbrand, interview recorded by Paul R. Sweet, August 26, 1964, page 5, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

37 United States. 71 Norstad's subordinate as Commander in Chief

for the U.S. Army in Europe was General Bruce Clark in

Heidelberg, Germany. The Commandant of the U.S. troops in

Berlin was Major General Albert Watson. Other important posts

in Europe were naturally the U.S. Embassy in Bonn under

Ambassador Walter Dowling and the Mission in Berlin, headed by

Allan Lightner. On September 19, 1961, one more person entered

the European setting, when President Kennedy dispatched

General Lucius Clay as his Personal Representative to Berlin.

This list of agencies and persons involved in the

handling of the Berlin policy is obviously rather

comprehensive. What influence did this complex structure have

on the decision and policy making processes? The following

sections will scrutinize examples of the setting in

Washington, the communication between Washington and the

European posts, and finally possible shortcomings within the

European environment.

71 Catudal, Kennedy, 128.

38 CHAPTER 4

THE ORGANIZATION AT WORK

4.1 Consultations and Policy Planning Before the Wall

Examining the meetings of the Interdepartmental

Coordinating Group and the Berlin Steering Group raises the questions of whether in the process of consulting any of the departments or persons involved withheld any information, tried to outmaneuver their rivals, or denied certain positions to the President. As the President frequently took part in the meetings, however, the last point is not of major importance for he heard all differing positions and knew they existed.

The published records of the Interdepartmental

Coordinating Group cover only the time from June 16 to August

15, 1961 - that is approximately from Khrushchev's threat to sign a peace treaty with the G.D.R. to the erection of the

Wall. Dean Acheson, whom Bundy would at one occasion describe as "the belle of the balln, 72 determined the content of the meetings. In response to Kennedy's request, Acheson presented

72 FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 518, footnote 2.

39 his views on the Berlin situation, which served as a basis for

the ensuing discussions of the Berlin problem. In the face of

the Soviet threats to sign a separate peace treaty, he

recommended a strong U.S. position and leadership among the

allies to convince the Soviet Union of the American commitment

and determination to stay in Berlin. To emphasize this policy,

he asked for a strong build-up of conventional forces and a

declaration of a national emergency. In the event the Soviet

Union should attempt to restrict the U.S. rights in Berlin,

Acheson suggested that the U.S. take successive

countermeasures beginning with an air lift and culminating in

the use of nuclear weapons. 73

Despite Acheson's strong personality and authority as

former Secretary of State, his proposals were not quietly

accepted by the !CG, but were extensively discussed. Paul

Nitze, who had served as director of the policy planning staff

in the State Department in the early 1950s, supported Acheson

in his request for a military build-up and the declaration of

a national emergency. This declaration would facilitate

calling the reserve forces to active duty and thereby

73 Meeting on June 16, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 119-124. For the Acheson report text, see ibid.,145-159.

40 strengthen the U.S. negotiating position, 74 a goal Nitze had pursued since his days as policy planning director. Nitze had introduced the idea of a flexible response defense strategy based on a strong conventional build-up, and the Berlin crisis certainly was an example to prove his demands justified.

The historian Arthur Schlesinger, serving as Special

Assistant to the President, took the opposite position.

Together with the Harvard professor and occasional adviser

Henry Kissinger, he wrote a memorandum recommending that

Kennedy explore the possibilities of negotiations with the

Soviet Union and warning against the danger of nuclear war. 75

Assistant for National Security Affairs Bundy pointed in the same direction: he remained skeptical of the implications of a national emergency and considered it to be too provocative a step. 76

U.S.· Ambassador to Moscow Llewellyn Thompson took the

74 Meeting on July 12, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 188.

75 Arthur Schlesinger, A Thousand Days. John F. Kennedy at the White House (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1965), 387; and Memorandum from the President's Special Assis­ tant Schlesinger to the President, July 7, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 173-176.

76 !CG Meeting, July 12, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 187-191.

41 Soviet perspective when he insisted that Khrushchev not be pushed into a situation that would deprive him of the possibility to "back down." Moreover, he pointed out the importance of a unified allied position as a prerequisite to dealing with the Soviets. 77 Thompson was also concerned about the role of public opinion. To him it seemed essential to win international public support for the U.S. position on Berlin, because he thought the Soviet Union might become more daring and venturesome if public opinion were on its side. As an effective means to identify the aggressor in Berlin, Thompson suggested holding a referendum among the Berlin population which would clearly vote for the freedom of the city. In regard to a military build-up, he agreed with the White House staff that an overhasty build-up should be prevented, because it might present the United States as a warmonger. Instead, military preparations should be pursued unnoticed by the public - but noticed by the Soviet intelligence to convince them of U.S. seriousness and determination. 78

Attorney General Robert Kennedy took up the question of

77 Meeting on June 16, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 122.

78 Memorandum from Llewellyn Thompson to Dean Rusk, June 19, 1961. Declassified Documents, 1995, 64.

42 public opinion and asked the Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, Walt W. Rostow, to study how the U.S. could win the Berlin conflict in the realm of propaganda. Rostow suggested treating the Berlin crisis not as a conflict over the city, but as a test of the will and unity of the Western world and the NATO. The U.S. should work to dispel anti-German feelings of its allies and convince them to take higher risks to prove Western strength. 79

A discussion of the same issues in the Berlin Steering

Group further elucidated the disunity and plurality of opinions among the advisers. While Vice President Lyndon B.

Johnson favored Acheson's suggestion for all possible speed to reinforce the U.S. forces substantially, Rusk and Defense

Secretary McNamara wanted to exclude the national emergency.

The President's Military Representative General Maxwell Taylor did not have any objections to declaring an emergency, but did not want to call up the reserves. 00 Moreover, he complained about the lack of non-military planning for direct talks with

79 Memorandum from Walt Rostow to the President, July 20, 1961. Declassified Documents, 1995, 1706.

00 Meeting on July 13, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 194.

43 the Soviet Union, 81 serving as an example of Theodore

Sorensen's contention that "a military solution was opposed by military minds. " 82 According to Sorensen, several presidential

advisers would occasionally be more concerned about their

image than about the issue at hand and would take unexpected

positions to shape or improve their image. In the case of

Berlin talks, however, Taylor's position seems to be relevant

and reasonably motivated, because his point had not yet been

raised by anyone else.

Beside the Steering Group and the ICG, the Kennedy

administration also sought the advice of non-government

experts. The Secretary of Defense and CIA director Dulles

visited former President Eisenhower to learn his views on the

Berlin question. Eisenhower agreed with McNamara that Kennedy

should not declare a national emergency, because he believed

that it would give Khrushchev too much influence on U.S.

policy. The U.S. could not afford to react to every Soviet

threat or peace offer. However, Eisenhower also thought that

the West should not give way in Berlin. The G.D.R. should not

81 Steering Group meeting on July 20, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 223.

82 Sorensen, Decision-Making, 63.

44 be recognized; if the Soviet Union decided to sign a separate peace treaty with the G.D.R., the Western powers should deal with the G.D.R. personnel only under the assumption that they were considered agents of the Soviet Union. 83

As Kennedy had demanded, the memoranda from Bundy informed him about all points and positions under discussion. 84

It was up to the President to choose an option between the hard line of Acheson and the more moderate suggestions by

Schlesinger. In his July 25 television speech, Kennedy emphasized the U.S. determination to maintain its rights in

West Berlin and announced increases in both the Army strength and the defense budget. At the same time, though, he asserted

U.S. readiness to negotiate with Khrushchev and to "search for peace. " 85 Acheson's original proposal was clearly recognizable in Kennedy's speech as it very somberly stressed the seriousness and importance of the Berlin question for the

United States. However, Kennedy did not declare a national

83 Memorandum of Conference with former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, July 15, 1961. Declassified Documents, 1996, 2930.

84 Memoranda from George Bundy to President Kennedy, June 10 and 19, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14:107-109, and 217-218.

85 Documents on Germany, 1944-1961, 700.

45 emergency, but rather included Schlesinger's, Thompson's, and

Taylor's line by leaving the door open to future negotiations.

His characterization of the Berlin crisis as a "great testing place of Western courage and will, a focal point where our solemn commitments ... and Soviet ambitions now meet in basic confrontation"86 also paid tribute to Rostow' s recommendations, and the offer of a free vote in Berlin showed Thompson's influence. Kennedy combined all essential points his advisory staff had raised and delivered a rather circumspect speech.

Khrushchev's reading of the speech of July 25 shows that the declaration of the military buildup overshadowed the simultaneous readiness to negotiate. 87 The Germans also focused on the hard-line part and tenor of the speech and expected a firm U.S. stance on Berlin matters. 88 However, irrespective of whether this reception was intended or not, Kennedy's speech

86 Report to the Nation on the Berlin Crisis by President Kennedy, July 25, 1961, in: Documents on Germany, 694- 701, here: 695.

87 Sorensen, Kennedy, 592.

88 Murrow explained the disappointment of the Berlin population over the U.S. reaction to the erection of the Wall with the high expectations the July 25, 1961, speech had raised. Telegram from the Mission at Berlin to the Department of State, August 16, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 340.

46 very clearly was the result of intense consultations and his own approved choice. The decision making machine worked.

4.2 Crisis Management After the Wall

While the consultations before August 13 did not take place in an atmosphere of high tension, urgency demanded quick decisions and created a changed environment for the decision and policy making after the erection of the Wall. It was no longer sufficient to make contingency plans in Washington, but the U.S.A. needed to respond and act in Berlin, which added the dimension of implementation to the policy making. The headlines of the German newspapers a few days after the closing of the border in Berlin indicate the sense of crisis gripping the country: "The West does not do anything!

President Kennedy remains silent, Macmillan goes hunting [ ... ] . " 89

The first information about the activities in Berlin on

89 "Der Westen tut nichts! Prasident Kennedy schweigt, Macmillan geht auf die Jagd und Adenauer schimpft auf Willy Brandt", Bild Zeitung, August 16, 1961, in: Hanns Jlirgen Klisters, Adenauer. Teegesprache [Adenauer. Tea­ talks] (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 1988),312. The last part of the headline, 'Adenauer sneers at Willy Brandt' will be dealt with later in this thesis.

47 August 12-13 reached the State Department's Operations Center

around 4:00 a.m. on Sunday, August 13. Messages from Berlin to

Washington took four to six hours to be delivered through

numerous stations in between. 90 The incoming cables were partly

contradictory, and John Ausland, the Berlin Task officer on

duty, was unable to find out what was going on in Berlin until

he was informed by a German journalist who happened to be

around the Department and had just called USIA in Berlin. The

State Department officials had orders not to use insecure

phone lines to Berlin and consequently could not take any

initiative to contact the Mission in Berlin. 91 Nobody in the

State Department called Berlin before Secretary Rusk and

Assistant Secretary Kohler arrived at 10 a.m. and decided to

violate the rule by calling the head of the Mission Allan

Lightner in Berlin.

In the meantime, the Berlin Mission had not been

inactive, but had contacted the French and British political

advisers and, in conjunction with them, was about to publish

a protest statement of the Western Allies when Kohler's call

9° Catudal, Kennedy, 129.

91 Catudal, Kennedy, 27.

48 reached Lightner. Kohler told Lightner to cancel this undertaking and wait for Washington to act. 92 The Secretary of

State then called President Kennedy, who was spending the weekend at Hyannis Port, and informed him about the situation in Berlin. Kennedy decided not to come back to Washington before Monday, 93 but agreed to publish a State Department statement which condemned the contravention of the Four Power

Agreement and announced future protests "through appropriate channels."94 Had Kohler called Lightner later than he did, a potentially stronger protest of the Three Western Powers would have been published in Berlin. This way, however, by disregarding their own rules the State Department and the

President managed to remain the determining policy makers.

Immediately after the closing of the border, telegrams coming into the State Department from the Embassy in Bonn and the Mission in Berlin unanimously emphasized the need for a strong American response. 95 On August 16, USIA director Murrow

92 Curtis, The Ides, 320.

93 Ibid., 333.

94 Documents on Germany, 725-72 6.

95 See telegrams from Dowling and Lightner to the Department . of State, August 13 and 14, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14:

49 even warned that the disappointment of the Berlin and German population in the inactivity of the West was so high and their morale consequently so low that further absence of U.S. action might seriously aggravate the relationship between the United

States and Germany. 96 Different information, though, came from

General Norstad in Paris: in accordance with General Clarke, the Commander in Chief for the U.S. Army in Europe, Norstad found the situation in Berlin quiet and the Westberliners

~strong and of good morale."~

Did the contradictory information coming in from the U.S. representatives in Europe contribute to the hesitation in

Washington to respond to the Berlin provocation? The only actions taken were the release of protest notes to the Soviet

Commandant in Berlin and to the Soviet Foreign Ministry in

Moscow on August 15 and 17. 98 Twenty hours passed before U.S. patrols, requested by the Governing Mayor of Berlin, Willy

326, 328, and 332.

96 Telegram from the Mission at Berlin to the Department of State, August 16, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 339-341.

97 Message to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, August 18, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 350.

98 For the text see Documents on Germany, 726-727.

50 Brandt, were sent to the border; forty hours passed before the protest note to the Soviet Commandant was on its way; and,

seventy-two hours expired before the first official protest was addressed to Moscow. In his memoirs, Willy Brandt

remembers these long hours of waiting and reproaches the

silence of the Western governments. 99

Despite the impression of the German press and the

Governing Mayor, however, the U.S. government was not

inactive. From August 14 onward, the Berlin Steering Group was

thoughtfully and intensively discussing how to respond to the

closing of the border. Options ran from restricting travel permits for East Germans to an economic boycott against the

Eastern bloc. 100 The group finally recommended that Vice

President Johnson and Lucius Clay be sent to Berlin on August

19, and the garrison in Berlin be increased as a demonstration

of u. s. commitment. According to Robert Kennedy's

recollection, the President ordered troops to Berlin, but did

99 Willy Brandt, Begegnungen und Einsichten: Die Jahre 1960- 1975 [Encounters and Insights. The Years 1960-1975) (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1976), 13.

100 See the meetings of the Ambassadorial Steering Group on August 14, 1961, !CG Meeting on August 16, 1961, and Meeting of the Berlin Steering Group, August 17, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 329-349.

51 not know they were stationed in Heidelberg and therefore two days away from the East German border . 101 If he was right, troops should have gone to Berlin sooner than they actually did. By saying that "once again he [JFK] had not been told",

Robert Kennedy indicated that the delay of action was due to missing information and therefore to shortcomings within the bureaucratic apparatus. 102 According to FRUS documents, however, the first proposal to reinforce the West Berlin garrison occured in the Steering Group meeting on August 15 . 103

The next day, August 16, Berlin Mayor Willy Brandt also proposed this step in a letter to Kennedy. 104 In a meeting on

August 17, the Steering Group discussed this proposal, and the

President inunediately asked how long it would take to send the troops to Berlin. Kennedy decided to transfer them to Berlin on August 20, where they would be greeted by Johnson and

101 Robert Kennedy, In His Own Words, 2 7 5.

102 Ibid ..

103 Steering Group Meeting, August 15, 1961, FRUS, 1961- 1963, 14: 334.

104 Letter from Berlin Mayor Brandt to President Kennedy, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 345-346.

52 Clay . 105 Thus, Robert Kennedy's reproach seems to be unjustified. The delay of the troops' dispatch to Berlin was not due to misinformation - and even if it had been due to technical problems, Kennedy still could have calmed the Berlin population by at least announcing their transfer earlier.

The long days of external inactivity of the U.S. administration resulted rather from the unwillingness of members of the advisory circle to perceive the closing of the

Wall as a major crisis. Kennedy's first reaction that a wall was better than a war over Berlin, 106 was supported by his advisory staff. Discussion of crisis solving focused on the

Soviet Union and a settlement over Berlin, rather than on improving the situation for the Germans. 107 In a memorandum to

Kennedy, Bundy wrote that there was "unanimity in your immediate staff for the view that we should take a clear initiative for negotiations within the next week or ten days -

105 Meeting of the Steering Group on August 17, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 347.

106 See Beschloss, The Crisis Years, 266-290; and Gelb, The Wall, 213.

107 Bundy admits this shortcoming of the U.S. government in Danger and Survival (New York: Vintage Books, 1988), 370.

53 safely before the Neutral Nations Conference."108 This statement supports the interpretation that the White House advisory circle cared more about unaligned, neutral countries than about Germany. Nor did the White House staff care too much about the U.S. allies: If they disagreed with the United

States, the memorandum went on, Kennedy himself should pursue a strong policy and take the lead.

State Department officials surrounding Rusk disagreed with the White House staff's demand for quick negotiations.

They favored a four-power process of planning (the Three

Western Powers and the F.R.G.) and agreed with the French that the Three Western Powers should come to an agreement among themselves about whether or what to negotiate over Berlin before they would offer negotiations to the Soviet Union. 109

Like the White House advisers, however, the State Department did not consider the German perspective. Rusk and Kohler were relieved that a solution to the refugee flow from East Berlin

108 Memorandum from the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy) to President Kennedy, August 14, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 330.

109 Ibid ..

54 had been found. 110 The Secretary of State expected that the closing of the border would faciliate a settlement over

Berlin, although he was also aware that there might arise a problem with the outrage in Germany and Berlin.

Obviously, the President and his advisers were more concerned with the "big picture" of the international situation than with the local situation in Berlin and its implications for the U.S.A .. There were differences in degree between the White House strongly favoring U.S. leadership for negotiations, and the State Department asking to consider the allies. But it seems that in spite of Rusk's considerations the cited warnings from German posts were routinely handled as exaggerated results of "Berlinitis", the tendency of Berliners and Americans living there to see Berlin as the center of the world. 111

There was no information deficit, but a lack of attention paid to the available information and a wrong evaluation of the situation. Therefore, it took a few days before the

110 Ausland, Kennedy, 204; Memorandum from Bundy to Presi­ dent Kennedy, August 14, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 330- 331; Rusk in Steering Group Meeting, August 15, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 334.

111 Howard Trivers, cited in Catudal, Kennedy, 131.

55 implications of the U.S. position was perceived as a serious problem, relative to its relationship with Germany. By discussing their options, the advisory staff did not sufficiently consider that delaying decisions was in effect a decision. 112 The impulse to change their attitudes towards

Germany and their policy by finally taking action may have come from a German protagonist, Willy Brandt.

4.3 The Role of the German Elections

When examining the perception of the arising Berlin crisis within the U.S. administration, one also has to take into consideration the German protagonists involved and the part they played in conveying the German picture. On the one hand, the United States had to deal with the eighty-five-year old Konrad Adenauer. Chancellor since 1949, Adenauer could rely on an absolute majority of his Christian Democratic

Party (CDU) in the German federal parliament. On the other hand the United States needed to deal with the forty-eight­ year old Social Democrat Willy Brandt as the authority of

Berlin. Brandt had been Governing Mayor of Berlin since 1957

112 Sorensen, Decision-Making, 32.

56 in a coalition of the CDU and the Social Democratic Party

(SPD), and he was the latter's candidate for chancellor in the upcoming federal elections.

The differences of policy, style, and character between

Adenauer and Brandt could hardly have been any sharper.

Adenauer stood for a bourgeois, conservative, anti-socialist domestic policy and the economic upswing of the fifties, while his foreign policy goal was to reintegrate Germany into the community of democratic nations. He hoped to achieve German unification in the long run by challenging the Eastern bloc through Western strength. The priority in his foreign policy therefore was the political, economic, and military integration of West Germany into a strong Western Europe.

Willy Brandt had a Hanseatic working-class background and had been a left-wing socialist in his youth. He wanted to reform the fossilized structures of the Federal Republic and he campaigned for more democracy and participation of citizens to supersede Adenauer's authoritarian, patriarchal style of government. With respect to foreign policy, his contempt for the totalitarian communist Soviet Union and the East German regime of Walter Ulbricht was as strong as Adenauer's.

However, he questioned whether Adenauer's one-sided policy of

57 Western integration would ever lead to a German reunification and therefore suggested negotiating with the Eastern side as well. He saw the Berlin question not as the cause, but as the product of East-West tensions, which therefore had to be cleared up before the Berlin problem could be solved. 113

1961 was the year of federal elections in the Federal

Republic. Because Khrushchev's Berlin ultimatum of 1959 had just petered out without leading to any solutions regarding

Berlin and the German question, Willy Brandt feared another crisis in the course of 1961 - as did Adenauer . 114 Brandt therefore suggested a declaration of solidarity among all parties in case any new Berlin crisis should occur during the election campaigning of the summer of 1961. Adenauer, though, ignored this proposal. 115 When the Berlin Wall crisis occurred,

Adenauer and Brandt did not speak with one voice. The crisis even became an issue of the election campaign.

113 Willy Brandt, "The Means Short of War", Foreign Affairs 39: 2 (1961): 196-207, 197.

114 Hans-Peter Schwarz, Konrad Adenauer. A German Politician and Statesman in a Period of War, Revolution and Recon­ struction. Vol. II, The Statesman: 1952-1967 (Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1997), 522.

115 Brandt, Begegnungen, 18.

58 On August 12-13, both Adenauer and Brandt were in the middle of their election campaigns. The news of the closing of the border in Berlin reached the Berlin Mayor in the middle of the night on a train to Kiel. He got off the train at the next stop and flew to Berlin. 116 He summoned a special meeting of the Berlin Senate on Sunday and delivered a very strong speech in which he asked the Western Powers to insist that the measures taken be reversed. 117 Brandt then met with the representatives of the Western Powers in the Kommandatura to ask them to protest to the Soviet Commander, but found that they were not authorized to do anything without first consulting their governments. 118

On August 16, the Berlin Mayor decided to contact John F.

Kennedy directly by sending a letter that warned of two dangers if the Western Powers remained inactive: a loss of confidence in the Western Powers among the Berlin or German

116 Brandt, Begegnungen, 9.

117 Dokumente zur Deutschlandpolitik [Documents on the German Policy], IV. Reihe/Band 7, 12. August bis 31. Dezember 1961. Ed. by the Bundesministerium flir Inner­ deutsche Beziehungen (Frankfurt am Main: Alfred Metzler Verlag, 1976), 13-18.

118 Brandt, Begegnungen, 11.

59 people, and an exaggerated confidence of the East German regime that would lead to further provocations. He suggested the Western Powers demand a re-establishment of the Four-Power responsibilities, or if this was not possible, to give a

Three-Power guarantee for West Berlin. Moreover, the Mayor made the proposal to take the Berlin case to the United

Nations and closed the letter by saying that he would appreciate at least an increase of the U.S. garrison in

Berlin. 119 In a mass rally in Berlin that afternoon, he delivered another speech asking the Allies to act and mentioned that he had written a personal letter to the qPresident of the United States. 120

For his part, Adenauer neither interrupted his election campaign, nor travelled to Berlin. He and his advisers thought that the Chancellor's presence in Berlin might encourage the people in East Berlin to a political uprising against Ulbricht

119 Brandt in his memoirs justifies his letter by saying that during his meeting with the President in March 1961, Kennedy had offered him to call or write him per­ sonally whenever he would think it necessary. Brandt, Begegnungen, 29. The memorandum of their conversation, however, does not mention this offer. FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 25-30.

120 Dokumente zur Deutschlandpoli tik, 52-58.

60 and thereby cause more tension, maybe even war. Another possible scenario was that access to and from Berlin might be cut off while he was there. To avoid these risks, he decided not to go. Another consideration, according to the Adenauer specialist Hans-Peter Schwarz, may have been the tactical point of view regarding the election campaign: Adenauer could not speak side-by-side with his rival Brandt and still lead a convincing, polarizing election campaign. Adenauer's arguments against Brandt would have lost their credibility if he had associated with his opponent. 121

On August 13, the Chancellor released a short statement on Berlin condemning the East German regime for its actions and asking the German population to remain calm and trust in the German government and its allies to take the necessary countermeasures . 122 On August 14, he made what Schwarz called an ~unfortunate television appearance with his Foreign

Minister, " 123 Heinrich von Brentano, which did more to reveal

Adenauer's helplessness than to reassure anybody of his

121 Schwarz, Adenauer, 538.

122 Dokumente zur Deutschlandpoli tik, 11.

123 Schwarz, Adenauer, 539.

61 determination to relieve the tension. On the evening of that same day, the Chancellor went to Regensburg for a campaign rally, where he made one of the biggest mistakes of his political career by personally attacking Brandt for his past instead of showing national solidarity in a time of serious crisis. 124

Adenauer did not deliver any public speeches asking for allied support for Berlin and restrained himself from any propagandistic measures, although he was very aware of the seriousness of the matter. Still, he made his position quietly known to the Allies through Ambassador Grewe in Washington and through the Allies' ambassadors in Bonn. Without emotionally over-reacting, the German Federal Government asked for Allied steps to prevent the Soviet Union and the Ulbricht regime from implementing further restrictions. 125

Chancellor Adenauer was very cautious not to disgruntle the Western Allies, upon whom the Federal Republic so much

124 Adenauer disparagingly referred to Brandt as "Brandt alias Frahm," questioning the Social Democrat's patrio­ tism and commitment to Germany. Brandt had spent the period of the Third Reich as a political exile in Norway and changed his original name Frahm to Brandt.

125 Meeting with ambassadors in Bonn and Washington on August 14, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 328 and 329-330.

62 depended, by demanding unrealistic countermeasures. 126 Thus, he was very upset and outraged, when he heard about Brandt's

letter to Kennedy. Brandt had not contacted the Federal

Government before he sent the letter, but had a copy sent to

the Foreign Ministry in Bonn. However, because the Berlin

representative to Bonn, who should have delivered the letter,

could not get an appointment in the Foreign Office, it was not

handed over before the morning of August 17. At that point,

Kennedy had already received the letter, and Ambassador Grewe

in Washington had been asked what the German government

thought about it. Adenauer, therefore, learned of the letter's

existence from the U.S. State Department, which also reported

that Kennedy was angry about the letter's tone and content.

The Chancellor dissociated himself from Brandt's assessment of

the situation and reassured the U.S. government that things

were not as dramatic as Brandt presented them. 127

With the U.S. administration annoyed, the Christian

Democrats in the German Foreign Off ice seem to have decided to

use Brandt's letter for their election campaign. They hoped to

126 Adenauer, Teegesprache 1959-1961, 540-554.

127 DER SPIEGEL, August 30, 1961, 11-13.

63 discredit the Berlin Mayor by exposing his inappropriate writing style. Despite Brandt's assurance to Kennedy not to publish the letter, they handed a copy to the press, which the

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung published on August 18. Since the Kennedy administration, meanwhile, had decided to send

Vice President Johnson to Berlin and increase the garrison, however, the publication of the letter became a public relations success for the Social Democrats. 128

Vice President Johnson's visit to Germany also became swept up in the Federal Republic's election campaign. Johnson,

General Clay, and Special Assistant Bohlen came to Germany, first stopped in Bonn for a courtesy call on the Chancellor.

Adenauer, who had still not been to Berlin, asked his visitors if he could join them on their trip to the city. Johnson rejected this plea, because the United States did not want to intervene in the German election campaign. 129 However, by rejecting Adenauer's wish, the U.S. administration actually did just that. The German Chancellor interpreted Johnson's

128 Ibid ..

129 Schwarz, Adenauer, 544; and Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 4, John F. Kennedy Oral History Program.

64 visit as an invasion in the campaign, because it contributed to Brandt's popularity. On September 6, Adenauer complained about the discrimination against him and asked Johnson to make a public statement clarifying the situation. 130 Lucius Clay later said that for a fair solution, Brandt should have come to Bonn, and both Adenauer and Brandt should have accompanied the Vice President both in Berlin and Bonn, which would have made more sense than paying a short courtesy call to Adenauer in Bonn and then having Brandt celebrated in Berlin. Clay saw the decision not to have Adenauer in Berlin as an indication of the poor or at least deteriorating relationship between

Kennedy and Adenauer. 131

A look at the differing reactions to the Wall by Adenauer and Brandt shows that one has to distinguish between the general reaction of the public on the one hand and the official reaction by the Federal Government and the CDU on the

130 Telegram from Ambassador Dowling to the Secretary of State, September 6, 1961. National Security Files of John F. Kennedy, Box 82-91.

131 Jean Edward Smith, Lucius D. Clay. An American Life (New York: Henry Holt Company, 1990), 644-645; and Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 4, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

65 other, when speaking of the increasing crisis of morale of the

German and Berlin population. According to public opinion polls of August 1961, only 32 per cent of the Germans agreed with Adenauer's Berlin policy, while 41 per cent disagreed with it. A majority of 63 per cent favored Brandt's approach, and only 10 per cent thought Brandt was wrong. 132

The election campaign dominated the Chancellor's Berlin policy and consequently also dragged the SPD and the Western

Allies into it. While only 16 per cent of the German population had the impression that Brandt had "put on a good deal of showmanship for the elections," 35 per cent blamed

Adenauer for caring more about the elections than about

Berlin . 133 During the special meeting of the Bundestag on

August 18, representatives of both parties delivered their speeches according to the policy of their candidates. Foreign

Minister Brentano's announcement to the Western Allies that the Bundestag session would "make clear [that] government and

132 The Germans. Public Opinion Polls 1947-1964. Ed. by Elisabeth Noelle and Erich Peter Neumann. Institut flir Demoskopie Allensbach (Allensbach: Verlag flir Demos­ kopie, 1967), 493-494.

133 Allensbach, The Germans, 4 94.

66 opposition [would be] united on Berlin" did not come true. 134

The CDU and the SPD took advantage of the situation and questioned each other's policy on German reunification instead of trying to find a solution for the Berlin situation. 135 There may have been no solution, and certainly none the Germans could have pursued, because Berlin was legally not part of their responsiblity. But while Adenauer knew this and did not pretend he could do anything, Brandt at least undertook the symbolical steps the people wanted to see. In the week after

August 13, the popularity of the CDU sank from 49 per cent in the end of July 1961 to 35 per cent in mid-August. Never before had there been such a sudden loss of favor in

Adenauer' s tenure. 136

As the White House had to deal with the calmer official policy of the Federal Republic, the perception of the Berlin development in Washington differed from that of the Berlin officials, who were surrounded by an upset public and

134 Brentano in a meeting with the three Western ambassadors on August 14, 1961. FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 328.

135 See the debates in the Bundestag on August 18, 1961, Dokumente zur Deutschlandpolitik, 74-107.

136 Schwarz, Adenauer, 543.

67 confronted by a very concerned Mayor. Had Adenauer not acted so circumspectly and calmly, Kennedy and his advisory staff in

Washington would have gained a different impression of the development of the crisis among the Berlin population and might have acted more rapidly. Adenauer represented reason and raison d'etat, but not the actual opinion of the German people. The divergence between public and official positions in the F.R.G. thereby contributed to the misperception within the U.S. government.

4.4 General Clay in Berlin

Although the Berlin population had reacted enthusiastically to Johnson's and Clay's visit, the Berliners knew it was only a symbolic gesture to reassure them of U.S. support for their case after the long days of inaction. The

Berliners remained upset and anxious and, as Mayor Brandt had foreseen in his letter to Kennedy on August 16, rather than a flight to Berlin now saw the "beginning of a flight from

Berlin. " 137 While before August 13, only 500-600 Westberliners per week left the city to move to West Germany, this number

137 Letter from Willy Brandt to John F. Kennedy, August 16, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 345-346.

68 tripled to an average of 1500-1700 in September. 138 The u. s. government therefore on the one hand had to find a way to assure the Germans of its firm position in Berlin, while on the other hand it needed to find an understanding with the

Soviets. Khrushchev had not yet withdrawn his threat to sign a peace treaty with the G.D.R. and could aggravate the already bad situation any time by handing the access responsibility to the G.D. R ..

To resolve the difficult situation, Kennedy on August 21 asked Secretary Rusk to form a small working group of

Assistant to the Secretary of State Charles Bohlen, Henry Owen of the policy planning staff of the State Department, Berlin

Task Force Director Martin Hillenbrand, Theodore Sorensen, and

McGeorge Bundy to reformulate the U.S. position on Berlin.

Following Bundy's recommendation, Kennedy wanted to take a strong U.S. lead in a policy toward negotiations with the

Soviet Union even if the Allies disagreed. The President insisted on the freedom of West Berlin, but was willing to negotiate the Four Power occupation rights and the idea of

138 DER SPIEGEL, October 10, 1961, 36-38.

69 separate peace treaties with the G.D.R. and F.R.G .. 139

Consultations with the French and British in Washington revealed that while Great Britain was ready to follow the U.S. initiative to negotiate with the Soviet Union, the French disagreed strongly. They considered any readiness to negotiate in the Berlin situation a sign of Western weakness. 140

Secretary of State Rusk agreed with the French that the Soviet

Union was the aggressor in Berlin and that the Western Powers should not negotiate any of the rights they been legally granted through the Four Power Agreement. As a compromise, however, Rusk proposed to have exploratory talks with the

Soviets to find out whether anything else could be negotiated.

Because the Berlin problem bore the constant possibility of escalation, Rusk insisted that the United States demonstrate its willingness to negotiate so that it would not be blamed

139 Memorandum from President Kennedy to Secretary of State Rusk, August 21, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 359-360.

140 Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in France, August 21, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 361-362; Memorandum of Conversation between Rusk, Kohler, Alphand, and others, August 24, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 366-368; Letter from President de Gaulle to Presi­ dent Kennedy, August 26, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 377- 378; Memoranda of conversations of the Foreign Mini­ sters' Conference, September 15, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 411-424.

70 for any escalation. By suggesting exploratory talks, the

U.S.A. would prove its willingness to come to a diplomatic solution over Berlin without giving anything to the Soviet

Union . 141 Al though Kennedy himself was ready to make concessions in order to come to an agreement over Berlin and was serious about reopening negotiations on Berlin, he let

Rusk pursue his idea and instructed Ambassador Thompson to take up meetings with the Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko in

September. 142

To find a solution to the German dimension of the Berlin problem and in response to the lasting disquiet of the Berlin population, Kennedy on August 30 announced that he would appoint General Lucius Clay as his Personal Representative to

Berlin. Clay had been the hero of the Berlin air lift in

1948/49 and was mainly appointed for the psychological effect his presence would have on the Berlin population. Since Clay was a Republican, his appointment moreover had the domestic

141 Rusk during the Foreign Ministers' Conference, September 14-15, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 406-424.

142 Memorandum from President Kennedy to Secretary of State Rusk, September 12, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 402-403; Telegram from Rusk to Thompson, September 3, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 388.

71 advantage of mitigating possible opposition from the

Republican Party. Kennedy had initially wanted Clay to be a

U.S. Military Commander, but McNamara and Chairman of the

Joint Chiefs of Staff General Lemni tzer thought that rank would lead to confusion within the existing structure of command. 143

Clay's rank and authority, however, were not any clearer as Personal Representative. He had the status of an ambassador, but was subordinated to the American Ambassador in

Bonn, because the State Department did not want to undermine

Dowling' s position . 144 Still, Clay did not have to report to

Washington through the Bonn Embassy, but sent his reports directly to the State Department and only had to inform

Dowling. Moreover, he had the right to contact the President directly - a direct phone line from Berlin to Washington had finally been installed - whenever he thought it necessary.

Because he did not want to abuse this right, however, he

143 Memorandum from McNamara to Kennedy, August 24, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 369.

144 Smith, Clay, 651.

72 seldom made use of it. 145

When Clay came to Berlin on September 19, his ability to act was extremely limited. He was a four star general and thereby had a higher rank than the Commandant in Berlin, Major

General Watson. Since Clay had no military command, however,

Watson's superior was not Clay, but General Clarke in

Heidelberg . 146 If Clay wanted to use U.S. troops in Berlin,

Watson would have to contact Clarke, who in turn needed the approval of Norstad in Paris. General Clarke, though under instructions to support Clay logistically, refused to work with Clay and asked Watson to report directly to Norstad. As

Norstad was the U.S. Commander in Chief for Europe and at the same time Supreme Allied Commander, Clay felt very uncomfortable with this command structure, for he never knew whether his cables to Paris would go to the NATO or to the

American command. 147 For the same reason, he disapproved of the fact that the U.S. command in Germany had no direct contact to

145 Smith, Clay, 651; Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 7, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

146 Cate, The Ides, 462 and 469.

147 Smith, Lucius D. Clay, 657.

73 the Department of Defense, but had to go through Norstad. 148

Norstad and Clay had opposing positions on the Berlin problem. While Clay was a hard liner and emphasized the importance of a strong U.S. stand in Berlin, Norstad tended to a softer position especially on prospective German concessions that might ease tension in Europe. 149 Norstad did not support

Clay, because he feared Clay's hard policy in Berlin might lead to an escalation. 150 As NATO Commander he was concerned about General Clay's rather unilateral approach of boldly facing the Soviets in Berlin and took the multilateral perspective of the NATO countries, who favored a political, negotiated solution of the Berlin problem. 151 Clay would later say, that Norstad's perspective may have been more objective

148 Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 6, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

149 Conversation between Norstad and Kennedy, October 2/3, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 462.

15° Conversation Norstad and Kennedy, November 7, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 557.

151 Letter from U.S. Permanent Representative to the NATO Thomas Finletter to President Kennedy, August 30, 1961, Declassified Documents, 1986, 1868.

74 than his. 152 Still, in 1961/62 the two men had to work together in spite of their divergent views.

4.4.1 Steinstucken

Clay saw his mission as a political and symbolic one. He wanted to demonstrate the determination of the United States not to give way to the Soviet Union in Berlin and took the initiative on numerous actions which aroused high public and media attention. The first action occured right after his arrival, when he flew East Berlin refugees out of the West

Berlin enclave of Steinstticken.

Steinstticken was a little village of three hundred inhabitants in the outskirts of West Berlin which belonged to the district of Zehlendorf, but was cut off the city since

August 13. To get to Steinstticken, the Westberliners had to pass posts of the East Berlin police. Residents of

Steinstticken increasingly suffered harrassments within their own borders, too, when East German police searched for Eastern refugees. Clay therefore wanted to demonstrate U.S. commitment

1 ~ Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 9, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

75 to the little enclave and temper the boldness of the East

German regime.

The National Security Council had dealt with the

Steinstlicken problem before Clay went to Berlin. The contingency the NSC expected was a blocking of access to the exclave. Walt Rostow issued a National Security Action

Memorandum (NS.AM) that authorized the U.S. Commander in Berlin to send an M.P. patrol by car or helicopter into the exclave to assert U.S. rights there. Force should not be used unless it seemed unavoidable, and Norstad secured "authority from

Washington" first. In case Steinstticken should be cut off its connection to West Berlin, the NS.AM allowed supply of the village by a helicopter airlift. However, as long as none of these contingencies occured, no "special overt measures should be taken. " 153

Clay decided to go to Steinstticken on September 21, only two days after he had arrived in Berlin. He originally wanted to go by car, but because the Berlin press had learned about his secret plan and was gathering in crowds at the Checkpoint to Steinstlicken, he decided to go by helicopter. He did not

153 NS.AM No. 94, September 14, 1961, PRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 404.

76 want to take the risk of being stopped by East German police and suffer a defeat in his very first week in Berlin. When

Clay asked for a helicopter, both Clarke and Norstad turned down his request because they considered his undertaking too risky, too "overt". Clay therefore ordered the helicopter he was allowed for his personal use and went to Steinstticken disregarding Norstad' s interpretation of the NSAM. 154

In Steinstticken, Clay found an East German refugee there and flew him out on his way back. Since more refugees managed to get into Steinstlicken, Clay asked the State Department for authority to fly them out, too. His suggestion was approved.

Because the proposal had to be discussed in Heidelberg, Paris, and Washington, however, it took twenty hours before any action could be taken. 155 Quick reactions to the emergency proved impossible within the established command structure.

The case of Steinstticken therefore lays bare two ways in which the bureaucracy interfered with Kennedy's policy. First,

Clay had another interpretation of what needed to be done in

154 Smith, Clay, 658-659. 155 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, September 28, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 441-443, and "Record of Events" (no further identified), Declassified Documents, 1995, 0685.

77 Berlin and disregarded the anxious, cautious instructions of

Kennedy's Washington advisory circle. He and not the Berlin

Task Force or the National Security Council in Washington decided on a stronger policy on the spot. Second, Steinstlicken revealed the technical difficulties within the command structure, which led to delays in policy implementation.

A few weeks later, Clay complained about the paralysing command structure and asked for more authority for the people on the spot, mainly General Watson. 156 However, he was never granted it, and the question of approval for quick reactions in Berlin remained a major problem affecting U.S. policy making in Berlin throughout the crisis until Clay's departure in May 1962.

4.4.2 The Tank Crisis

Ten days after the erection of the Wall, which interrupted civilian traffic between East and West Berlin,

East Berlin also restricted the Allied circulation between the

Eastern and Western Sectors by closing numerous crossing points. The number of crossing points diminished to seven, of

156 Letter from General Clay to President Kennedy, October 18, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 509-513.

78 which only one was open for international and Western Allied traffic. Although President Kennedy did not regard access to

East Berlin as a vital interest of the U.S., Maxwell Taylor pointed out that the restrictions of East German police against the Western Allies meant a humiliation before the

German public and would diminish the morale of the Berliners.

Therefore, the U.S. should not back down, but rather protest against any further restrictions of Allied traffic in Berlin and insist on their right of access to the Eastern Sector. 1 ~

Guidance to General Norstad from the Joint Chiefs of

Staff for the case of East German resistance at the remaining access points provided gradual reactions to four different kinds of harrassments. In case of administrative resistance

"such as abnormal requests for identification, " 158 the JCS laid down that the U.S. personnel ask for a Soviet officer to prove they did not recognize the authority of the East Germans, and

157 Memorandum to the President by M.D. Taylor, August 24, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 364-365.

158 Prior to the Berlin crisis, both the U.S. Commandant and the East German police had regarded a license on the vehicle as sufficient identification. U.S. personnel entering East Berlin was not asked for identification papers when wearing uniforms or driving a U.S. car. The British and French, however, accepted to show their papers to East German police.

79 still held the Soviet Union responsible for any single incident. U.S. vehicles on their way into East Berlin should just overrun any passive obstacles. If the passive obstacles were too heavy and their removal required for bulldozers or tanks, the U.S. vehicles should withdraw and consult higher authority before taking further steps. In the event that East

German troops or police should block the pas sway, the JCS expected the U.S. personnel to ask for a Soviet officer and wait for instructions from higher authority if entry without combat seemed impossible. 159

In September, the first administrative harrassments of

U.S. personnel at Checkpoint Charlie began. East German police denied the U.S. personnel permission to enter the Eastern

Sector and refused to call a Soviet officer. Following his instructions, the U.S. Commandant protested formally to the

Soviet Commandant Marshal Konev - without any effect. These kinds of harassments did not occur on a regular basis, but rather randomly. Still, Clay asked Secretary Rusk for new

159 Telegram from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Commander in Chief, Europe (Norstad), August 25, 1961, FRUS, 1961- 1963, 14: 370-371. For a specified revision see Comments on the guidance to Norstad, Declassified Documents, 1995, 1236.

80 instructions how to respond if this harassment developed a pattern. 16° Clay himself saw two alternatives: either do nothing but announce the seriousness of the matter, demanding it be brought to the Soviet government, or physically destroy any barrier the East Germans might erect by force. He recommended the latter. 161

Rusk in his answers of October 3 and 4, 1961, agreed with

Clay that the United States should not compromise on its access to East Berlin even if it was not a vital interest. He and the President wondered, however, what the U.S. should do after the East German barrier would be knocked down, since neither the U.S. nor its allies were willing to fight over the issue of access to the Eastern Sector. Rusk feared an escalation once force was employed. 162 Clay thereupon suggested that tanks knock down the barrier and take a defensive position inside the East-Berlin entry point. In case they should be attacked, however, they should retreat into West

160 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, September 26, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 437-438.

161 Telegram from Clay to the Department of State, September 29, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 443.

162 Telegram from Secretary Rusk to General Clay, October 3 and 4, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 463, and 467-468.

81 Berlin and take position there.

Clay's proposal was discussed by the State Department, the Defense Department, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. While the latter two supported Clay's proposal, the State Department remained skeptical about the question of disengagement. As an alternative, it proposed immediately to withdraw the U.S. tanks into West Berlin, before any attack happened. A quick withdrawal would also have the advantage of not raising hopes among the Berliners that the U.S. may have decided to pursue a harsher course and ultimately knock the Wall down. Instead, it would be a short, completed action.

Having to choose between the above mentioned earlier provisions for a closing of Checkpoint Charlie and the State

Department's compromise, the JCS and the Defense Department favored State's proposal. 163 President Kennedy's approval of this recommended course of action was cabled to Berlin and

Paris on October 18, 1961. 164 Although the new contingency plan did not exactly concur with Clay's proposal, it clearly was

163 Memorandum from Acting Secretary of State George Ball to President Kennedy, October 14, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 498-502.

164 Telegram from the Department of State to the Mission in Berlin, October 18, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 508-509.

82 based on his original recorcunendation and represented a definite policy change in response to his urging. Had he not suggested a harsher course of action against East German harrassments, the advisory staff in Washington would have continued pursuing the cautious course of action and would not have discussed this issue.

When on the evening of October 22, Allan Lightner of the

Berlin Mission wanted to drive to East Berlin through the checkpoint FriedrichstraBe (Checkpoint Charlie), East German police asked him to show his identification papers. According to his instructions, he refused to do so. He informed Watson and Clay, and insisted on talking to a Soviet officer. It took more than two hours, however, before the Soviet political adviser Major Lazarev came to the Checkpoint. Since the East

Germans had objected to admitting Lightner because he was wearing civilian clothes, Clay in the meantime decided to have the chief of the Berlin Mission escorted into the East by military patrols. To further emphasize the U.S.'s determination to insist on its right to enter the Eastern

Sector, Clay ordered four U.S. M-48 tanks take positions near

83 the checkpoint. 165

Clay's response to the East German harassments only partly concurred with what the contingency planning provided for in the event that Checkpoint Charlie was closed. The U.S.

Command Berlin (USCOB) - as mentioned above - was allowed to use tanks. According to the State Department's instructions, however, their purpose would have been to knock down physical barriers and then retreat into the Western Sector. Since on

October 22, the East Germans did not erect any physical barrier, but decided on administrative resistance, the use of tanks was questionable. Clay, though, did not invade the

Eastern Sector and left the tanks on the U.S. side of the checkpoint. Moreover, he left them in the background and did not position them directly at the checkpoint. Although the contingency plans did not directly call for this action, they did not explicitly interdict this course of action either.

General Clay's decision to let M.P. patrols escort the civilian U.S. vehicle was his own. During the contingency discussions for Checkpoint Charlie, General Norstad had suggested that after the removal of the barricades, jeeps or

165 Cate, Ides, 477.

84 other vehicles should be sent through immediately. The State

Department, however, had refused this proposal as too dangerous and "not sufficiently limited," although Norstad had even specified that no arms would be used except for defensive purpose. 166 Had Clay consulted the State Department before sending armed patrols through the crossing point, approval would have been highly unlikely. The Soviet Political Adviser of Berlin protested the military escort as an armed incursion into East German territory. 167

The following day, on October 23, General Watson sent a protest note to the Soviet Commandant, and probes with and without escorts - the latter unsuccessful - continued. On

October 24, Clay sent a cable to Secretary Rusk suggesting that the U.S. summon the Soviet Ambassador in Washington in order to protest the Checkpoint Charlie incidents and threaten to call off any Berlin talks with the Soviets. Clay suspended

166 Telegram from General Norstad to the Department of State, October 14, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 501 (Footnote) .

167 Telegram from Allan Lightner to the Department of State, October 23, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 524-525.

85 further probes awaiting Rusk's answer to his proposal. 168 The

State Department was rather surprised by Clay's decision to suspend the probes and considered it "a serious tactical mistake." Once the probes had begun, Rusk and Kohler thought it wiser to continue them with both armed and unarmed escorts and instructed Clay accordingly. 169 Rusk agreed with Clay that the U.S. should protest the harassments to the Soviet government and instructed Ambassador Thompson to see the

Soviet Foreign Minister in Moscow. However, he did not share

Clay's view that cutting off negotiations with the Soviets would be of any help. Still pursuing exploratory talks - and not yet negotiations - he did not want to rule out the option of a diplomatic solution to the crisis. 170

On October 25, the USCOB resumed the probes with escorts.

For the duration of each probe, Clay and Watson positioned ten tanks in the vicinity of the checkpoint. Moreover, Watson

168 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, October 24, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 532-534.

169 Memorandum from Assistant Secretary Kohler to Secretary Rusk, October 24, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 535.

170 Telegram from Secretary Rusk to General Clay, October 25, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 536.

86 placed the Berlin Conunand in operational readiness. 171 A meeting of the Soviet Conunandant Solovyev and Conunandant

Watson did not ease the tension or yield any results, but only clarified each side's determination to insist on their position . 172 To emphasize their position, two days later the

Soviets, too, decided to have tanks show up in the Eastern

Sector: thirty-three Soviet tanks were dispatched to East

Berlin, ten of which took position at Checkpoint Charlie. Clay

responded by ordering the U.S. tanks to return to the checkpoint, so that Soviet and American tanks were finally directly facing each other. 173

At that point, Clay called President Kennedy and personally informed him about the situation and announced he would suspend further probes with uniformed personnel until

the next day. 174 Later in the evening Kennedy called Clay to make sure no escalation would occur. Clay assured him the

171 Record of Events (no further identified), Declassified Documents, 1995, 0685.

172 Telegranun from the Berlin Mission to the Department of State, October 25, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 537-539.

173 Cate, The Ides, 457-487; Smith, Clay, 659-661.

174 Telegram from Watson to Norstad, October 27, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 543.

87 situation remained calm and could even be continued for a few days since the U.S. Command in Berlin had strong enough nerves to face and win this war of nerves. 175 The dead end situation, however, ended the next morning, when the Soviets withdrew their tanks first and thereby allowed the U.S. to pull back their tanks without losing face in front of the world press.

President Kennedy had asked his brother, Attorney General

Robert Kennedy, to contact Georgi Bolshakov, the press attache at the Soviet Embassy in Washington, and probably offered a deal if the Soviets removed their tanks first. According to

Khrushchev's memoirs, though, the withdrawal of the tanks was a responsible and friendly move of the Soviets initiated by the Chairman himself . 176

The events of October 22 to 27 clearly contradicted the policy President Kennedy had decided upon in Washington - exploratory talks with the Soviets, finding a diplomatic solution, and no fighting for access rights to East Berlin.

175 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, October 27, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 543; Lucius D. Clay, recorded interview by Richard M. Scammon, July 1, 1964, page 8, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

176 Nikita Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers. The Last Testament (Boston: Little, Brown, 1974), 507; Beschloss, The Crisis Years, 334-335.

88 Clay, Lightner, and Watson sent telegrams informing the State

Department of what they were doing. Clay also asked for instructions and advice from the State Department. On October

26, for example, Clay asked for Secretary Rusk's opinion on the idea of raiding East Berlin and tearing down parts of the

Wall. Rusk rejected this idea, and Clay abandoned it, which proves that in case the State Department disagreed with any of

Clay's ideas, they would tell him and prevent him from implementing them. 177 The prerequisite for this, however, was that Clay would inform Rusk or the President before taking any of his steps - which the urge for quick decisions during the tank crisis interdicted. When Lightner was not allowed to pass the checkpoint, a reaction had to come immediately or not at all. Clay decided to react immediately, and did not leave

Kennedy any option but to back him in the face of the Berlin population and the world press, which had gathered in number at the checkpoint. Kennedy, moreover, trusted and respected

Clay, and on the phone was easily convinced that a hard stance in Berlin would be advantageous for the U.S. as long as he had

n 7 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, and telegram from Secretary Rusk to General Clay, October 26, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 539-541.

89 the guarantee that the situation would not escalate. Three days after the confrontation the State Department sent a cable to Clay saying "[The] President feels we have achieved [a] favorable result in provoking [a] Soviet intervention in [the]

Friedrichstrasse situation."178

During the tank crisis, Clay exceeded his authority and interpreted existing contingency plans very liberally. The implementation of Kennedy's policy, therefore, was not ensured in Berlin. Clay made access to East Berlin appear as a point of vital interest of the U.S.A., although it was not. Had one of the Soviet or U.S. soldiers accidentally shot, the situation might have escalated and the U.S. may have fought over a minor issue. Ex post facto, President Kennedy concurred with Clay's course of action, but he would not have initiated it, had it not been for Clay's presence in Berlin. 179

A supplement to the tank crisis, which has to be mentioned when examining Clay's influence on policy making in

Berlin, is the Soviet perspective on the confrontation, which

178 Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in Germany, October 30, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 551.

179 See also Foy Kohler, transcript of tape, October 1964, page 6, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

90 was also determined by Clay. Soon after his arrival in Berlin,

Clay had asked General Watson to replicate a piece of concrete wall and let U.S. troops practice and experiment how to breach it. 100 If knocking down pieces of the Wall should ever become necessary, Clay made sure it would be technically possible.

Washington officials never learned anything about this mock wall - be it because it was just a minor routine decision not worth reporting to the State Department or because Clay intentionally did not want to inform anybody. 181 Someone who did find out about this U.S. exercise, however, was the East

German intelligence. They informed the KGB, who in turn reported the incident, supported by photographic evidence, to

180 Lothar Schr6ter, "Friedensgef~hrdende Aktivit~ten sei­ tens der NATO um den 13.August 1961" [Peace-threatening Activities of the NATO around August 13, 1961], Militar­ geschichte, 1987, 26 (4): 343-346; Raymond L. Garthoff, "Berlin 1961: The Record Corrected," Foreign Policy, 1991 (84): 142-156; Beschloss, The Crises Years, 335; and Henrik Bering, Outpost Berlin: The History of the American Military Forces in Berlin, 1945-1994 (Carol Stream, IL: edition q, 1995), 157.

181 Berlin Task Force member John Ausland, when asked about this incident in 1996, has never heard of it, but, however, thinks "[i]t fits in the game they [the Berlin staff] were playing." Ausland, Kennedy, 201-202; see also Garthoff, "Berlin 1961," 147.

91 Moscow on October 22 - just one week before the tank crisis. 182

Knowledge of bulldozer tanks trying to breach the Wall certainly influenced the Soviet perception of U.S. tanks at

Checkpoint Charlie the following week. The Soviets may have expected - and prepared for - future aggressive acts against the border installations that Washington did not intend. Clay, therefore, not only determined the policy making by initiating the tank crisis, he also determined the perception of the crisis without the President or anybody else in Washington even knowing about it.

4.5 Petering Out of the Crisis

A few days after the tank crisis, on November 7, 1961,

Chairman Khrushchev publicly withdrew his December 31 deadline for a new Berlin settlement. He regarded the exploratory talks between Secretaries Rusk and Gromyko in September as sufficient indication of the U.S.' willingness to find a new solution for the Berlin problem - even if it took longer than the end of 1961. 183 Another factor contributing to the

182 Garthoff, "Berlin 1961", 148.

183 Beschloss, The Crisis Years, 336; Ausland, Kennedy, 34.

92 withdrawal certainly was the successful erection of the Wall, which stopped the refugee flow from the G.D.R. and took away the pressure for an immediate solution.

As a reciprocal reaction to the FriedrichstraBe harassments, the U.S. also restricted Soviet entry into the

American Sector to one access point. To prevent another escalation, U.S. civilian personnel refrained from entry into

East Berlin in order not to have to identify themselves. When in December Commandant General Watson wanted to take his civilian political adviser with him to an appointment with the

Soviet Commandant in the Eastern Sector and East German police again asked for identification papers, Watson returned and asked Washington for instructions. President Kennedy and the

State Department agreed that some reaction should follow this new affront, but left the concrete decision to the Berlin personnel. The only instruction the President gave - with the tank crisis just two months ago and probably still in mind - was that it should not be anything "excessive," whereupon

Watson and Clay decided to prohibit the Soviet Commander

Solovyev and his political adviser from entering the U.S.

Sector until corrective measures at Checkpoint Charlie would

93 be taken. 184

Generally seen, the situation in Berlin remained calm from November onward. From the American perspective, the focus of the Berlin crisis shifted from events in Berlin to difficulties among the Western allies about how to proceed with the Berlin problem. A quadripartite conference of the

Foreign Ministers in November very clearly showed their disunity: The French rejected any kind of negotiation with the

Soviet Union, even if they were only exploratory talks . 185

Adenauer did not disapprove of exploratory talks, but was very suspicious of Kennedy and feared the U.S. might after all still compromise at the cost of the Germans in Berlin. In

fact, Kennedy was prepared to compromise with the Soviets on the access question and suggested an international administration to control the autobahn to Berlin, which of course would have implied relinquishing some Allied rights and

184 December 23 and 27, 1961. Editorial note in FRUS, 1961- 1963, 14: 704.

185 Memorandum of conversation, Quadripartite Foreign Ministers Meeting, December 11, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 650-659.

94 let Adenauer fear further compromises. 186 Moreover, the State

Department considered negotiating a recognition of the Oder-

NeiBe boundary to come to a solution with Berlin, which was unacceptable to all German parties. 187

The British mainly supported the U.S. administration.

Kennedy and British Premier Macmillan agreed that exploratory

talks with the Soviets should continue, preferably in Moscow with U.S. Ambassador Thompson and Foreign Minister Gromyko. 188

Thompson opened a series of meetings with Gromyko in January

1962. These discussions, mainly focusing around the question

186 For disagreement among the Allies see Memorandum of Conversation, Quadripartite Foreign Minister Meeting in Paris, December 12, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 672-678; Telephone Conversation between Presidents De Gaulle and Kennedy, December 12, 1961, ibd. 679-681. Transcript of Interview With the President by Aleksei Adzhubei, November 25, 1961, Public Papers of the Presidents: John F. Kennedy, 1961 (Washington: U.S. GPO, 1962), 749.

187 Memorandum of Conversation between Chancellor Adenauer, President Kennedy, Secretary Rusk, Foreign Minister Schroder and others, November 21, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 603-614; for the position of the German SPD, see Fritz Erler, ~Probleme und Perspektiven der europaischen Sicherheitspolitik nach dem 13. August 1961" [Problems and Perspectives of European Security Policy after August 13, 1961], Europaarchiv, 16: 22 (1961): 635-642.

188 Memorandum of conversation between President Kennedy, Prime Minister Macmillan and others, December 21 and 22, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 696-704.

95 of access to Berlin, however, did not result in any new agreements. They indicated both sides' willingness to settle the Berlin crisis peacefully, but at the same time demonstrated that neither side was willing to accept the proposals of the other. 189

Probably to emphazise their power to control access to

Berlin and thereby strengthen their negotiation position, on

February 7, 1962, the Soviets started harassing traffic in the three air corridors to Berlin. Soviet officials informed the

Western Powers in the Berlin Air Safety Center190 that they wanted to use the Southern corridor for military manoeuvres

the following day, which implied that all Western flights during that period would have to be cancelled.

Clay immediately called Secretary Rusk, who agreed with him that U.S. flights should not be rescheduled. Rusk

concurred with Clay's proposal to have two unarmed military

airplanes fly through the corridor during the announced period of time. Right after the phone conversation with Clay, Rusk

189 Telegram from Ambassador Thompson to the Department of State, February 1, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 784-788.

190 The Four Powers in Berlin used the Air Safety Center to inform each other about their flight schedules in order to prevent collisions in the corridors.

96 called Secretary of Defense McNamara to get his approval of the suggested course of action, and then discussed the issue with Kohler, Hillenbrand, Bundy and the President. All agreed with Clay's proposal, and Kennedy's authorization was cabled to Berlin two hours after Clay's call. 191 The next day, instructions were carried out and the aircraft flew through the corridors. This time the policy implementation worked smoothly.

Unlike the tank crisis, which lasted only a few days, the air corridor crisis lasted nearly two months from February throughout March 1962. From its very beginning both General

Clay and General Norstad were in contact with the State

Department. The National Security Council provided Norstad as

Head of Live Oak with a contingency plan that authorized him to evade collisions with Soviet planes in the corridors by

flying in other altitudes. 192 There had always been a tacit agreement that both Western civilian and military planes flew

in altitudes under 10,000 feet, while the Soviets used

191 Memorandum for the record by Foy Kohler, February 7, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 792.

192 NSAM no. 128, February 14, 1962, FRUS, 1962-1963, 14: 813.

97 altitudes above 10,000 feet. Norstad now could instruct the aircraft to use any altitude the Soviets would not use.

Because of the risk a possible collision involved for the safety of the passengers, the U.S. used civilian planes, but manned them with military pilots and military crews.

Clay considered this reaction to be too weak and suggested that fighter escorts accompany any Western planes through the corridors. Secretary Rusk, however, clearly told him that even though the U.S. would agree to this option, it could not be pursued since Norstad needed the approval of the

French and the British. In contrast to the tank crisis, this time the U.S. would not pursue a unilateral course, although in case of physical danger Norstad was allowed to grant

fighter protection to U.S. planes. 193 Clay throughout the air corridor crisis kept asking for stronger countermeasures.

However, even when Soviet planes dropped metal chaff in the corridors to jam the radar, the U.S. used fighters only to orbit at the entrances of the corridors.

In March, Secretary Rusk and also his British colleague

193 Memorandum of telephone conversation between Secretary Rusk and General Clay, February 14, 1962; and Memorandum from Assistant Secretary Kohler to Secretary Rusk, February 14, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 811-813.

98 Lord Home met with Foreign Minister Gromyko for a series of

Berlin talks at the disarmament conference in Geneva. Rusk and

Home complained about the harassments in the air corridors, but Gromyko claimed that the Soviet Union did not want to heighten tension in Berlin. 194 Talks between Rusk and Gromyko, as had been the case with the Thompson-Gromyko talks, did not

lead to any agreement. Rusk conceded that "some progress was made in clarifying points of agreement and points of difference, but points of difference remain fundamental."195

Still, the talks seem to have helped create a positive

atmosphere, since harassments in the air corridors stopped

immediately after the last day of meetings. Despite some minor

incidents, the crisis in the end of March was over. Clay sent

a telegram to Rusk, congratulating him for successfully

resolving the crisis and predicting a stable and quiet

situation for a period of several months. 196 Four weeks later,

194 Memorandum of conversation between Secretaries of State Rusk and Home and Foreign Minister Gromyko, and others, March 11, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 15: 22-25.

195 Telegram from Secretary Rusk to General Clay, March 27, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 15: 92.

196 Telegram from General Clay to Secretary Rusk, April 6, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 15: 98-99.

99 Kennedy recalled Clay from Berlin, and 750.000 West Berliners

- one out of every three - gathered at the Platz der Republik to show their gratitude to the old General and held a farewell ceremony for him. 1 ~

1 ~ Smith, Clay, 664. 100 CONCLUSION

The purpose of this thesis has been to investigate the role Kennedy's governmental style, the decision making in his administration, and the procedures of policy implementation played in the Berlin crisis 1961. The assumption that the organization of policy influences the decision making process

or at least that Kennedy shared this view - has been verified by the fact that Kennedy reorganized and streamlined his policy making body for the Berlin crisis by establishing new working groups and abandoning obsolte structures.

The investigation of Kennedy's decision making in this thesis has shown that Kennedy from the very beginning of his tenure sought to broaden his perspective on the Berlin question. His informal governmental style allowed him to seek advice beyond those who were members of his administration or party. Even before the Berlin problem turned into a new crisis, he appointed former Secretary of State Dean Acheson to reconsider the U.S. position on Berlin. After the summit meeting with Khrushchev, he also asked for former President

Eisenhower's opinion on the problem. Both Eisenhower's and

Acheson's advice influenced Kennedy's thinking.

101 Since Kennedy had just taken office and his staff was inexperienced in the field of foreign policy, it certainly paid to integrate men who had dealt with Chairman Khrushchev or Chancellor Adenauer before. Martin Hillenbrand, Director of the Berlin Task Force and the Off ice of German Affairs in the

State Department, remembers that Kennedy's White House staff

"felt that there must be some new solution to the Berlin problem which could be pulled out of the hat. " 198 The State

Department's realistic and more experienced position that such a solution did not exist was supported by Acheson's appointment.

Kennedy's decision to establish special bodies such as the Berlin Steering Group, the Interdepartmental Coordinating

Group, the Ambassadorial Group, and the Berlin Task Force ensured a broad discussion of any occuring new problems. Even though meetings with the quadripartite Ambassadorial Group may have not led to a better understanding among the allies, it at least guaranteed that information was passed among the governments involved. Discussions in the Steering Group took

198 Martin Hillenbrand, recorded interview by Paul R. Sweet, August 26, 1964, page 3, John F. Kennedy Library Oral History Program.

102 place in an open atmosphere. Every official seems to have stated his spontaneous thoughts rather than to have fought for the interest of the Department he represented. An example of this was General Taylor's demand for non-military approaches rather than proposing stronger military measures to solve the crisis.

There may have been personal differences among some of

Kennedy's advisers. For example, Secretary Rusk did not get along well with the President's Special Assistant Schlesinger.

"[W]hen people like Arthur Schlesinger were in the room, I kept my mouth shut," Rusk later admitted. 199 However, since

President Kennedy was easily accessible to all members of his administration, both Rusk's and Schlesinger's positions reached him. When Schlesinger felt his point of view was not adequately presented at the discussions, he could just send memoranda to the President, which he did.

Although the Berlin Task Force and the Steering Group represented various perspectives on the Berlin question, none of Kennedy's advisers adopted the German perspective. After the closing of the border in Berlin on August 13, no one

199 Dean Rusk, "Reflections on Foreign Policy," in: Thompson, The Kennedy Presidency, 193.

103 realized how serious the matter was for the Berlin population, and therefore also for the U.S. If the Berlin population panicked and left the supposedly endangered city, any U.S. effort to hold the city as a symbol for its commitment to

Western Europe - as Kennedy had proclaimed during his election campaign - would be pointless. Information about the panic among the Berliners reached the Washington advisory circle, but was not taken seriously. It may have been a matter of routine that information coming from Berlin was regarded as

Berlinitis and therefore as exaggerated.

Information reported from Europe was contradictory.

Generals Norstad and Clarke, who had never been to Berlin, gave another assessment than Allen Lightner of the Berlin

Mission and Edward Murrow from USIA. Norstad as Supreme Allied

Commander in Europe spoke in his own interest or at least took the NATO perspective. Since the NATO allies favored a diplomatic deescalation of the Berlin situation, Norstad neglected the German perspective Lightner and Murrow took.

Divergence between the German representatives even more supported these contradictory interpretations of the situation. German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer remained very calm and downplayed the crisis, while Governing Mayor of

104 Berlin Willy Brandt vociferously asked for Western, mainly

U.S., countermeasures against the violation of the Four-Power

Agreement of Berlin. The divergence in German views was encouraged by the fact that the erection of the Wall occurred in the middle of the Federal elections campaign, which caused an even stronger polarization of the SPD and the CDU.

Apart from the election campaign, the elections themselves also contributed to communication difficulties between the Kennedy Administration and its German counterpart.

Although it was very probable that Adenauer would win the elections, it was not definitely clear with whom the U.S. administration would have to deal after the elections. When

Adenauer did not gain the absolute majority of the vote in

September, he had to form a coalition government. The bargaining process to form this new government took several weeks, which even expanded the period of insecurity of what the next official German position on Berlin would be.

However, even if the German representatives had spoken with one voice and both Adenauer and Brandt had unambiguously asked for strong countermeasures against East Germany and the

Soviet Union, it is questionable, whether Kennedy's policy would have looked any different. Even when General Clay as

105 Kennedy's Personal Representative was in Berlin and very clearly spoke for the Berlin population and sent telegrams to the State Department every week, Kennedy did not change his main approach to resolve the Berlin crisis by means of negotiations with the Soviet Union and compromises on the

Four-Power status of the city. Kennedy's interest in an understanding with the Soviet Union was incompatible with

Adenauer's insistence on non-recognition of East Germany.

These were fundamental political differences between the two country leaders which should not be reduced to misunderstandings on a bureaucratic level.

Turning to the question of policy implementation and its effect on the course of events, the examination of Clay's presence in Berlin very clearly proves that lower levels of the policy making body could and did influence policy making during the Berlin crisis. President Kennedy and General Clay had different approaches to the Berlin problem, and Clay rather followed his own understanding of the situation than

Kennedy's instructions.

In September 1961, Kennedy had decided upon a policy of negotiations or at least exploratory talks with the Soviet

Union. When General Clay came to Berlin, however, he did not

106 support this strategy, but pursued his own policy of strength.

In the case of Steinstticken, he took action to insist on

Western rights in the enclave, although contingency plans

instructed the Berlin personnel not to take any action unless a contingency would actually occur.

Steinstticken as Clay's first step to face the East German provocations also revealed the technical problems which

existed within the European command and communication

structure. The insufficient communication network between

Washington and Berlin had already become apparent on August

13, when the State Department could not call Berlin to find out what went on there. Although the erection of a wall had not been foreseen in any of the existing contingency plans,

the problem of immediate communication with personnel in

Berlin would have been the same in any other expected crisis

or contingency. It therefore seems surprising that no secure

telephone lines between the Berlin Mission and the State

Department existed. When Clay went to Berlin, this shortcoming was corrected.

Still, the command structure problem remained. Clay could not rapidly act in Steinstticken and fly refugees out, because

it took twenty hours before approval came from all posts

107 involved. While in the case of the refugees this delay did not matter, it became more relevant in what turned into the tank crisis. When Lightner was denied entry into the Eastern

Sector, a response of the U.S. had to come immediately or never. Clay decided to act immediately without first contacting Washington. Technically, he could have called the

State Department or the President. However, he did not want to bother any of them for what he considered to be minor decisions.

General Clay unambigously initiated the tank confrontation. Once it was underway, he informed the State

Department and even got Kennedy's approval for his actions.

Had he not sent the first escorts and tanks to the checkpoint, however, the tank crisis would definitely not have occured.

Interestingly, Kennedy resolved the crisis by circumventing all bureaucracy and informally having his brother contact

Khrushchev's press attache. For implementing important decisions, the safest way seems to have been to contact

Khrushchev directly with as little interference as possible. 200

20° From September on throughout the crisis Kennedy and Khrushchev exchanged personal letters through unofficial channels. However, these letters did not refer to the acute crises like the Steinstticken case, the tank crisis,

108 Because Clay was able initiate the tank crisis, the bureaucracy had obviously not worked. Still, paradoxically, it did not matter that it did not work. The crisis did not escalate, but turned out as a success for the U.S., because it forced the Soviet Union to show that it backed the not at all independent SED-regime in the G.D.R .. Kennedy, moreover, may after all have agreed to Clay's course of action, since he always had his double-track strategy of negotiating for an understanding with the Soviet Union, but never negotiating out of a position of weakness. The President may not have regarded

Clay's policy of strength as contradicting his own course of negotiations.

Still, the tank crisis could have escalated and it may have been luck that it did not. One therefore has to ask if

Kennedy could have done anything differently. Could he not have dispatched General Clay to Berlin? Could he have given him more or less authority? Could he have dismissed Clay when the case of Steinstlicken already revealed his different approach?

or the air corridors. Rather, they discussed the Berlin question abstractly and had therefore no direct impact on the course of the crises discussed in this thesis.

109 Since the cold-blooded erection of a wall through their city shocked and scared the Berliners who had trusted and believed in the Four-Power status of Berlin, strong reassuring action on the side of the Western Powers was necessary to prevent an exodus of the Berlin population from West Berlin to the F.R.G .. Sending Clay, who had saved the city from falling to the Soviet Union before, was a brilliant move of Kennedy's.

The limited authority with which Kennedy provided Clay, however, gave his mission only symbolic value. Only by slightly exceeding his scope of action could Clay turn his presence in an effective means to reassure the Berliners of

U.S. commitment to at least the Western part of the city.

Could Kennedy have dismissed Clay when the General's intention to widen his limited authority became obvious?

Others who had exceeded their authority like the Information

Officer of the USCOB, Dallas Hoadley, who in September had deployed armed U.S. Gis at Checkpoint Charlie to pose for the television cameras of Jack Paar's NBC "Tonight Show," were discharged from their off ice. 201 Dismissing Clay, however, would not have been that easy. His withdrawal from Berlin

201 Curtis, The Ides, 4 60-4 61.

110 would have been worse than never dispatching him, because it explicitly would have revealed that the Kennedy administration favored a compromise agreement over Berlin. Ulbricht and

Khrushchev could have exploited the General's dismissal as a triumph of the East German policy. Therefore, Kennedy asked

Clay to stay even though Clay himself offered his resignation more than once. 202

Could Kennedy have provided Clay with more authority to improve working conditions in Berlin and enable the USCOB to react to incidents? In his speech of July 25, Kennedy had made it clear that access to West Berlin was a vital issue for the

United States. Contingency plans for the event that this access be cut off provided the use of nuclear weapons.

According to Kennedy, the implications of an escalation in

Berlin were too high to leave any decisions to lower levels of bureaucracy, and he therefore denied Clay, Watson, or Norstad more authority. 203 By delegating more responsibli ty to the

Berlin Command, he could have made the bureaucracy work, but

202 Telegrams from General Clay to President Kennedy and Secretary Rusk, October 18, 1961, and January 30, 1962, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 510-513 and 775-779.

203 Letter from President Kennedy to General Clay, October 8, 1961, FRUS, 1961-1963, 14: 485-486.

111 Kennedy's goal was to keep control of as many actions as possible even at the cost of slowing down reactions.

The resultant delays paralyzed and frustrated Clay in his aim of pursuing his own policy in Berlin. During the air corridor harassments, which were physically more dangerous than the tank crisis since planes could easily have crashed - and nearly did so - Clay had already resigned and no longer tried to change Kennedy's policy. He kept sending telegrams asking for stronger reactions, but did not initiate anything in Berlin. The policy implementation therefore worked smoothly in February and March 1962.

To come to an overall assessment of decision making and the role of bureaucracy during the Berlin crisis 1961, one can say that the decision making worked from the very beginning of the Berlin crisis. President Kennedy learned from the Bay of

Pigs experience and made sure he had an advisory circle providing him with various perspectives, aspects, and recommendations how to respond to the Berlin problem. He frequently took part in discussions with the Berlin Steering

Group, and whenever he did not, McGeorge Bundy kept him informed about all options. Discussions took place in an atmosphere of relative frankness and equality of the advisers.

112 Kennedy made all important decisions which were to be made in

Washington - and in this sense Honore Catudal was right in seeing Kennedy as the "Berlin desk officer."

Turning to the question of policy implementation, however, the record looks different. Severe technical problems in the command and communication structure between Washington and Berlin and between the different posts in Europe (Berlin,

Heidelberg, Paris) paralyzed the policy making body in Europe.

Kennedy could have changed the command structure by providing the Berlin Command, i.e. General Watson, or General Norstad with more authority than he did. Had he done so, long delays of communication could have been avoided, and quick reactions to East German measures could have been taken. However,

President Kennedy did not want to change the structure, but wanted to maintain a minimum of control over events in Berlin.

This was possible only as long as nobody in Berlin acted on his own initiative, which Clay did. As soon as Clay was in

Berlin, therefore, implementation of Kennedy's policy was no longer ensured. Clay pursued his own policy, but got the ex post facto approval of Kennedy. Kennedy had confidence in

Clay and made Clay's decisions his own - at least during the tank crisis. After that Clay's influence declined. His

113 frustration with the paralyzing command structure increased, and his tendency to initiate actions of his own thereby decreased. Therefore, in the end the policy implementation worked smoothly.

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