Office of the Historian

740.00119 EW/10–2245

The United States Political Adviser for Germany (Murphy) to the Secretary of State

Berlin, October 22, 1945—3 p.m.
[Received October 22—1:08 p.m.]

828. General Clay has telegraphed Warcad regarding advance reparations as follows:

“British have presented following proposal in Coordinating Committee:

(a)
That list of plants reported available should be circulated to countries entitled to reparations with request they indicate within 14 days plants in which they are interested;
(b)
That Economic Directorate should report within 21 days after field examination, a recommended unit of allocation for each plant, that is, whether a part of the plant or the whole plant would be considered as a unit in effecting deliveries, and also establish a relative value for each unit as an approximate assessment pending agreement on final evaluation;
(c)
The Coordinating Committee, taking these relative values, would allocate to the extent of 25% to the Soviet Union, including Poland, reserving 75% for other claimant countries; and
(d)
In the interim, action towards accurate valuation will be expedited.

It is believed the proposed procedure would serve to expedite advance deliveries and that some procedure of this type is essential to indicate good faith on the part of all concerned and to get reparations actually moving.

I propose to support this measure. It appears to accord fully with the procedures proposed by the State Dept in their cable number 678 of October 17 to Ambassador Murphy.70 It will be noted, however, that under the British proposal the data requisite for allocations would be available in approximately 21 days. In view of the desire of the State Dept for our representative on IARA to participate in these allocations, in which we are in full agreement, it might be embarrassing to us if this procedure is approved not to have our member of IARA available here in Berlin by that time. In its cablegram to Ambassador Murphy, the State Dept suggests our diplomatic missions to which copies of the list should be furnished. If the British proposal now before the Coordinating Committee is approved, Ambassador Murphy will be asked to send the lists of plants in the Western Zone reported available to these diplomatic missions by the quickest method possible. If the British proposal is not accepted, we will propose the immediate circulation of these lists to countries concerned through diplomatic representatives without awaiting establishment of operating procedures for allocations. We anticipate that this question will come up in meeting of Coordinating Committee on October 22, at which we will support the British proposal. I have discussed with Murphy who agrees with me that British proposal is within our policy.”

Sent to Dept, repeated to London for Reinstein as 121.

Murphy
  1. Not printed.↩