Churchill and Unconditional Surrender

[Roberto]

Smith should get used to the idea that sending his opponents to the library when they voice a legitimate request for backup to his assertions is not likely to convey the impression that he knows what he’s talking about.

Not my problem.

Smith has never cared much for his credibility indeed.

I have amply made my point.

I wonder who, other than Smith himself, considers him to have amply made his point.

Now, if Roberto contests the existence of JCS 1067, then perhaps we have another thread.

I'm not contesting the existence of the document. I just want to see something more than Murphy's blanket references to its contents to be convinced that Smith has a point when stating that the Morgenthau Plan was partially implemented.

When I get to it I'll post more from my notes, but Clay is not hard to find and that corroborates Murphy.

I'm looking forward to that. Hopefully Clay tells us a little more about the contents of the document than Murphy.

Indeed, all of this is rather standard fare for the genre. Better spend a little less time posting and more time reading, my good man.

For all his arrogant playing the big fat historian, Smith's sending his opponents to the library is a concession that he's not quite able to demonstrate the accuracy of his contention.

But that's his problem.

[Scott Smith]

Keep it up, Roberto. You're talking yourself right out of my cooperation. If it isn't in your Genocide historians it doesn't exist, does it? Not surprising, really.

[Qvist]

Roberto, Scott

You know, sometimes those bitter discussions of yours can look a lot like bickering. Fair's fair - Scott has posted an excerpt written by a relevant contemporary, which to a certain extent is to the effect that what he sees as the Morgenthau mentality was still active in US occupation policies. I don't know Murphy, but his statements cannot be dismissed for no better reason than that they were posted by Scott. I look forward to hearing a little more about him, and particularly about JCS 1067. Also, I'd have to agree with Scott on the Stimson point. The excerpt says quite clearly that Stimson opposed the MP, but that all the departments shared some common ground in that they all wanted occupation policies that Murphy would call "not soft". There is AFAICS no neccessary contradiction here.

cheers

[Roberto]

Roberto, Scott

I don't know Murphy, but his statements cannot be dismissed for no better reason than that they were posted by Scott. I look forward to hearing a little more about him, and particularly about JCS 1067.

That was basically my statement as well, my objection to Smith's presenting Murphy as evidence to his assertions being related to the fact that he would high-handedly dismiss the same kind of evidence if it refuted his contentions.

Also, I'd have to agree with Scott on the Stimson point. The excerpt says quite clearly that Stimson opposed the MP, but that all the departments shared some common ground in that they all wanted occupation policies that Murphy would call "not soft". There is AFAICS no neccessary contradiction here.

OK, I’ll accept Murphy’s statement quoted below:

Stimson soon persuaded Roosevelt to withdraw his unqualified approval of the Morgenthau Plan, and a Joint Committee representing the White House and the three departments tried to reach a compromise which would satisfy the President. (pp. 226-227)

in this sense, although it suggests a weaker stand in relation to the plan than Stimson’s statement that the same constituted “a crime against civilization”, especially if you look at the preceding passage:

Hull and Stimson and Morgenthau were in agreement that the Germans must be made to pay for Nazi crimes, and no one in Washington was recommending any "soft" occupation. But opponents of the Morgenthau Plan believed that the postwar reconstruction of all Europe depended on utilizing Germany's resources and skilled workmen, and they were aghast when the President became so impressed with the Treasury Department's proposal that he wrote on a preliminary draft of it: "O.K. FDR."

which does not seem to count Stimson among the opponents of the plan.

The ensuing sentence

Stimson soon persuaded Roosevelt to withdraw his unqualified approval of the Morgenthau Plan, and a Joint Committee representing the White House and the three departments tried to reach a compromise which would satisfy the President. (pp. 226-227)

leaves it open whether Stimson opposed the plan himself or was moved by someone else’s opposition to advise Roosevelt against it, in my opinion.

If Murphy's statement preceding this sentence had been "But they [Hull and Stimson] and other opponents of the Morgenthau Plan ...", it would have been clear enough.

Even in that case, however, I would be less confident of Murphy's assessment than if he had not omitted a statement as vehement and significant as Stimson's calling the Morgenthau Plan "a crime against civilization".

But maybe I’m too demanding in regard to the memoirs of an American diplomat.

Cheers,

Roberto

[Roberto]

What follows is a transcription of the assessment of the Morgenthau Plan by US Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson in a memoradum for President Roosevelt written on 15 September 1944.

September 15, 1944

MEMORANDUM FOR THE PRESIDENT:

Since the meeting with you on September 9th attended by the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Hopkins, and myself, I have had an opportunity to read the latest papers submitted to you by the Secretary of the Treasury on the treatment of Germany. There is no need to make any extended or detailed reply to these papers. My views have already been submitted to you in other memoranda. I merely wish to reiterate briefly that I still feel that the course proposed by the Treasury would in the long run certainly defeat what we hope to attain by a complete military victory, that is, the peace of the world, and the assurance of social, economic and political stability in the world.

The point of difference is not one of objective, - continued world peace - it is one of means. When we discuss means, the difference is not whether we should be soft or tough on the German people, but rather whether the course proposed will in fact best attain our agreed objective, continued peace.

If I thought that the Treasury proposals would accomplish that objective, I would not persist in my objections. But I cannot believe that they will make for a lasting peace. In spirit and in emphasis they are punitive, not, in my judgment, corrective or constructive. They will tend through bitterness and suffering to breed another war, not to make another war undesired by the Germans nor impossible in fact. It is not within the realm of possibility that a whole nation of seventy million people, who have been outstanding for many years in the arts and the sciences and who through their efficiency and energy have attained one of the highest industrial levels in Europe, can by force be required to abandon all their previous methods of life, be reduced to a peasant level with virtually complete control of industry and science left to other peoples.

The question is not whether we want Germans to suffer for their sins. Many of us would like to see them suffer the tortures they have inflicted on others. The only question is whether over the years a group of seventy million educated, efficient and imaginative people can be kept within bounds on such a low level of subsistence as the Treasury proposals contemplate. I do not believe that is humanly possible. A subordinate question is whether even if you could do this it is good for the rest of the world either economically or spiritually. Sound thinking teaches that prosperity in one part of the world helps to create prosperity in other parts of the world. It also teaches that poverty in one part of the world usually induces poverty in other parts. Enforced poverty is even worse, for it destroys the spirit not only of the victim but debases the victor. It would be just such a crime as the Germans themselves hoped to perpetrate upon their victims-it would be a crime against civilization itself.

This country since its very beginning has maintained the fundamental belief that all men, in the long run, have the right to be free human beings and to live in the pursuit of happiness. Under the Atlantic Charter victors and vanquished alike are entitled to freedom from economic want. But the proposed treatment of Germany would, if successful, deliberately deprive many millions of people of the right to freedom from want and freedom from fear. Other peoples all over the world would suspect the validity of our spiritual tenets and question the long range effectiveness of our economic and political principles as applied to the vanquished.

The proposals would mean a forcible revolution in all of the basic methods of life of a vast section of the population as well as a disruption of many accustomed geographical associations and communications. Such an operation would naturally and necessarily involve a chaotic upheaval in the people's lives which would inevitably be productive of the deepest resentment and bitterness towards the authorities which had imposed such revolutionary changes upon them. Physically, considering the fact that their present enlarged population has been developed and supported under an entirely different geography and economy, it would doubtless cause tremendous suffering involving virtual starvation and death for many, and migrations and changes for others. It would be very difficult, if not impossible, for them to understand any purpose or cause for such revolutionary changes other than mere vengeance of their enemies and this alone would strongly tend towards the most bitter reactions.

I am prepared to accede to the argument that even if German resources were wiped off the map, the European economy would somehow readjust itself, perhaps with the help of Great Britain and this country. And the world would go on. The benefit to England by the suppression of German competition is greatly stressed in the Treasury memorandum. But this is an argument addressed to a shortsighted cupidity of the victors and the negation of all that Secretary Hull has been trying to accomplish since 1933. I am aware of England's need, but I do not and cannot believe that she wishes this kind of remedy. I feel certain that in her own interest she could not afford to follow this path. The total elimination of a competitor (who is always also a potential purchaser) is rarely a satisfactory solution of a commercial problem.

The sum total of the drastic political and economic steps proposed by the Treasury is an open confession of the bankruptcy of hope for a reasonable economic and political settlement of the causes of war.

I plead for no "soft' treatment of Germany. I urge only that we take steps which in the light of history are reasonably adapted to our purpose, namely, the prevention of future wars. The Carthaginian aspect of the proposed plan would, in my judgment, provoke a reaction on the part of the people in this country and in the rest of the world which would operate not only against the measures advocated but in its violence would sweep away the proper and reasonable restrictive measures that we could justifiably impose.

I have already indicated in my memorandum of September 9, 1944, the lines along which I would recommend that we should go pending further light on other questions which can only be obtained after we have ac- quired greater knowledge of conditions and trends within Germany as well as of the views and intentions of our Allies.

Henry L. Stimson

Secretary of War

Source of quote:

http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/psf/box31/t297j06.html

[Scott Smith]

General Lucius Clay, in his memoirs Decision in Germany, (Greenwood Press, CN: 1950) calls JCS 1067 a "Carthaginian Peace."

There is no doubt that JCS 1967 contemplated a Carthaginian peace, which dominated our operations during the early months of our occupation.

Unfortunately, there is only one copy of the book in the entire Phoenix area so I would have to get it via Interlibrary Loan to mine more "smoking-gun" quotations for Roberto.

Nevertheless, Edwin Hartrich's The Fourth and Richest Reich, (Macmillan, NY: 1980) has chapters on Disarmament, Denazification, Deindustrialization, and Democratization, which are interesting, especially the chapter on deindustrialization (pp. 74-90). However, I am not too inclined to type it all out for him.

The Morgenthau Plan of the Quebec conference in September, 1944 was leaked and Nazi propagandists used it to rally their forces, so it was officially dropped, although FDR liked it. Stimson and Hull did not like it because forcing Germany to fight to the bitter end only destroyed more infrastructure that they wanted for Germany to produce reparations with.

The Morgenthau Plan, as revealed by Nazi propaganda, thus undermined the Allied propaganda of Unconditional Surrender, which was that as long as Germany's leaders were punished, Germany itself would NOT be. There would be no new "Stab in the Back" legend from Germany's generals this time that Germany's military did not lose the war but her politicians and diplomats did. Or, in other words, Allied "terms" were a sort of open-ended "conditional Unconditional Surrender," meaning that there was no one to negotiate any peace terms with since German leaders were all "criminals." Utter hypocrisy and doublethink of the first order.
:roll:

The JCS 1067 directive was the new Morgenthau Plan as implemented with compromises from Stimson's and Hull's plans, and Hartrich too calls it a Carthaginian Peace and "unworkable" (pp. 108-109).

Permanently hauling away industrial plant as infrastructure and using Germans for forced-labor were key features of the Morgenthau Plan as initially envisioned. Hartrich estimates that only about one-third of infrastructure could actually be relocated successfully, and most was merely shipped away and scrapped, i.e., simply destroyed, but lost to Germany nevertheless. Some 25 percent of their 10 billion dollars in reparations promised to the Soviets at Yalta and Potsdam came from Western Allied sectors; and additionally, the Soviets traded foodstuffs to the Allies for additional plant from western sectors. It is estimated that $12.5 to $25 billion was extracted from East Germany in reparations (pp. 82-83). The Allies could never completely agree on the issue of war-booty, and when the Soviets defaulted on their food shipments the first cracks developed in the wartime alliance with the Soviets.

The milder JCS 1779 replaced JCS 1067 in July, 1947 with the preamble "an orderly and prosperous Europe requires the economic contribution of a stable and productive Germany" (p. 85).

The premise of the Truman Doctrine was that stable and prosperous allies would act as a conterpoise to Communist subversion and thereby contain it. Hence, on account of Cold War pressures, the Marshall Plan replaced the Morgenthau Plan and politico-economic balkanization, and therefore I stand by my previous assertion that the Morgenthau Plan was initially implemented.

Best Regards,
Scott

[Roberto]

General Lucius Clay, in his memoirs Decision in Germany, (Greenwood Press, CN: 1950) calls JCS 1067 a "Carthaginian Peace."

There is no doubt that JCS 1967 contemplated a Carthaginian peace, which dominated our operations during the early months of our occupation.

Unfortunately, there is only one copy of the book in the entire Phoenix area so I would have to get it via Interlibrary Loan to mine more "smoking-gun" quotations for Roberto.

Another witness speaking horrors about this mysterious document JCS 1067.

Why does none of the witnesses get more specific about the contents of that document ?

Nevertheless, Edwin Hartrich's The Fourth and Richest Reich, (Macmillan, NY: 1980) has chapters on Disarmament, Denazification, Deindustrialization, and Democratization, which are interesting, especially the chapter on deindustrialization (pp. 74-90). However, I am not too inclined to type it all out for him.

Smith should realize that he is doing nothing for me. Whether and to what extent he provides evidentiary support to his contentions is his problem.

The Morgenthau Plan of the Quebec conference in September, 1944 was leaked and Nazi propagandists used it to rally their forces, so it was officially dropped, although FDR liked it.

My source tells me something else:

Morgenthau, who was a friend of US-president Roosevelt, seemed to be successful when at the British-American conference in Quebec on 15 September 1944 Premier Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt initialed an (already softened) version of the Morgenthau plan. But Cordell Hull, the American foreign minister, as well as his British colleague Anthony Eden protested against the plan already on the following day, and the American war minister Stimson called the program “a crime against civilization“. When the Morgenthau Plan reached the public due to a deliberate indiscretion on 21 September 1944, the reaction was so negative that even Roosevelt distanced himself from the plan. The Morgenthau Plan disappeared in the drawers already at the end of September 1944 without ever having been formally discussed by the competent bodies.

So it seems that

a) the leaking was deliberate and

b) what caused Roosevelt to distance himself from the plan was the negative reaction of British and American public opinion, rather than its use by Nazi propagandists.

But I’m willing to consider Smith’s contentions if he can demonstrate a causal sequence between the Nazi propaganda use of the plan and its being dropped.

Stimson and Hull did not like it because forcing Germany to fight to the bitter end only destroyed more infrastructure that they wanted for Germany to produce reparations with.

In my last post I quoted Stimson’s assessment of the plan in his memorandum for Roosevelt of 15 September 1944.

Smith is invited to demonstrate, on hand of that assessment, that Stimson’s primary considerations were the ones he alleges.

The next paragraph of Smith’s post contains one of his irrelevant statements of opinion decorated with some of his staple rhetorical baloney, so I’ll skip it and move to the ensuing statement:

The JCS 1067 directive was the new Morgenthau Plan as implemented with compromises from Stimson's and Hull's plans, and Hartrich too calls it a Carthaginian Peace and "unworkable" (pp. 108-109).

Now we seem to have three negative assessments of that mysterious directive, but still nothing about its contents that would allow us to establish whether and to what extent those assessments were justified.

Never mind, I’ll accept that Murphy, Clay and Hartrich knew what they were talking about, for want of evidence to the contrary.

Clay’s statement provided by Smith is of special interest in one respect, however:

There is no doubt that JCS 1967 contemplated a Carthaginian peace, which dominated our operations during the early months of our occupation.

Emphasis is mine.

Compare this with the assessment of American diplomat Robert Murphy, also quoted by Smith:

The spirit-and sometimes the letter-of the Morgenthau Plan was reflected in many mandatory provisions of the top-secret directive JCS 1067, which haunted Military Government for several postwar years.

Emphasis is mine.

While Clay states that JCS 1967 dominated occupation policies during the first months, Murphy maintains that it “haunted” the military government for several years.

Is Clay understating the significance of the directive, or is Murphy exaggerating it?

Permanently hauling away industrial plant as infrastructure and using Germans for forced-labor were key features of the Morgenthau Plan as initially envisioned. Hartrich estimates that only about one-third of infrastructure could actually be relocated successfully, and most was merely shipped away and scrapped, i.e., simply destroyed, but lost to Germany nevertheless. Some 25 percent of their 10 billion dollars in reparations promised to the Soviets at Yalta and Potsdam came from Western Allied sectors; and additionally, the Soviets traded foodstuffs to the Allies for additional plant from western sectors. It is estimated that $12.5 to $25 billion was extracted from East Germany in reparations (pp. 82-83). The Allies could never completely agree on the issue of war-booty, and when the Soviets defaulted on their food shipments the first cracks developed in the wartime alliance with the Soviets.

In this respect it is interesting to have a look at the assessment of German historian Wolfgang Ramonat, published on pages 128 to 132 of Wolfgang Benz et al, Legenden, Lügen, Vorurteile, 12th edition 2002 by dtv Munich. The translation from the German original is mine, as are the emphases where not otherwise indicated.

[…]The problem of reparations and thus a decisive war aim of the USSR initiated the sneaking breach of the “Anti-Hitler Coalition” in the spring of 1945. At the Potsdam Conference from 17 July to 2 August 1945 the “Big Three” reached a no more than formulary agreement on the principles of democratization, demilitarization, denazification and decentralization of Germany, while about the amount of material reparations to be provided by Germany (Stalin had already at Yalta proposed 20 billion dollars and claimed half thereof for the USSR) no agreement was reached. According to the London Agreement among the four powers an international military tribunal was organized, which at Nuremberg tried the major National Socialist war criminals from November 1945 to August 1946. All that remained of the original war aim of dismemberment [italics in the original] was the postulate of decentralization and thus the creation of federalist internal structures in Germany in contrast to the centralized National Socialist state. The concept of a common “democratization” of Germany failed due to the differences between the liberal-democratic system of parliamentary representation in the western zones of occupation and the communist-directed pseudo-democratic “block politics” in the Soviet occupation zone.
About the extent of the hauling away of industrial plant no agreement could be reached. The Soviet plans required a reduction of German heavy industry to 20 per cent of its volume. The USSR at Potsdam supported the principle of an economic union of Germany out of an elementary interest of its own, for it thus hoped to obtain reparations also from the western occupation zones. It required a special four-power administration for the Ruhr area, but fell through with this pretension due to the protest of the US. The principle of reparation policy established at Potsdam, according to which each occupation power should satisfy its reparation claims mainly out of its own occupation zone, soon made the principle of economic unity become obsolete.[…]

The above suggests that the “Carthaginian” nature of directive JCS 1967, which seems to have resided especially in the hauling away of German industrial plant, was related to Soviet reparation claims rather than to the Morgenthau Plan. Accordingly Clay (an early and determined opponent of Soviet policies, as far as I know) doesn’t seem to have seen a relation between directive JCS 1967 and the Morgenthau Plan, as Murphy did.

The premise of the Truman Doctrine was that stable and prosperous allies would act as a conterpoise to Communist subversion and thereby contain it. Hence, on account of Cold War pressures, the Marshall Plan replaced the Morgenthau Plan and politico-economic balkanization, and therefore I stand by my previous assertion that the Morgenthau Plan was initially implemented.

Fine. I stand by mine that whatever resemblance of the Morgenthau Plan characterized Allied occupation in its early days was based not on that plan, but on the policies that the four victorious powers agreed upon or failed to completely agree upon, the hauling away of German industrial plant being mainly related to Soviet demands that the Western Allies, as pointed out by Ramonat, did not wholly agree with.

[Scott Smith]

In any case, the Allied peace terms were balkanization and plunder, although this was called "reparations," the justification for which was, as in the last war, the charge of unilateral War-Guilt. The Germans were justified in resisting for as long as they physically could. And they are justified in resisting Bundestablishment brainwashing today, AFAIC.

[Roberto]

In any case, the Allied peace terms were balkanization and plunder, although this was called "reparations," the justification for which was, as in the last war, the charge of unilateral War-Guilt. The Germans were justified in resisting for as long as they physically could. And they are justified in resisting Bundestablishment brainwashing today, AFAIC.

If anyone in the audience considers a response to the above to be required, please let me know.

Otherwise I will let Smith be happy with what he would like to believe.

He seems to need it.

[valadezaj]

I don't see what's wrong with Scott's post. That's exactly what happened.

[Roberto]

I don't see what's wrong with Scott's post. That's exactly what happened.

You're entitled to that opinion, but if you want other to share it you'll have to come up with more than "that's exactly what happened".

[Scott Smith]

Roberto, in response to your earlier confusion regarding Murphy stating that JCS 1067 was the plan in force for several years (until replaced) and Clay stating several "months" of confusion, Murphy makes it quite clear (as I believe Clay does as well) that Clay considered JCS 1067 Carthaginian and unworkable so that therefore every effort was made to circumvent the law. It did remain the law (albeit Top Secret) until replaced by the milder and public JCS 1779 in July, 1947.

Presumably the text of JCS 1067 has been declassified and is in the archives. If you are interested, then perhaps you should look for it. But I have supported my point with the stated opinions of Clay and Murphy who actually saw it and implemented it.

Also, it is rather obvious, in my opinion, that the contents of the Morgenthau Plan were publicly leaked because not everyone agreed with FDR's policies. He was one of the most loved and most hated men in America. (The contents of the Yalta agreement--long the bane of anti-Communist wags--were leaked as well, and Goebbels had a heyday with that too.)

The least likely explanation is that FDR leaked the Morgenthau Plan himself in order to scuttle it or even as a trial-balloon to garner support for it.

Broadcasting on October 4 Goebbels warned the Allies not to under-estimate the powers of a people to resist occupation. He spoke of the 'Morgenthau Plan' devised by President Roosevelt's Treasury Secretary to destroy Germany's post-war economy; under it, six million Germans would probably die of starvation, and tens of thousands would be shot without trial including Hitler, Göring, Himmler, and Goebbels. Roosevelt and Morgenthau had just initialled this plan in Quebec. Even undistorted, it was a gift for Nazi propaganda. Even other Jews were horrified by it. In Goebbels' papers is an intercepted letter from a German Jew, a lawyer, in Switzerland, who wrote to Morgenthau that his plan was just 'designed to pitch the vanquished into the swamp of slavery.' 'Where hatred speaks,' warned this émigré, 'revenge answers.'5

Goebbels exploited the Morgenthau Plan as cynically in 1944 as he had Kaufman's book three years before, telling his propagandists to emphasize constantly the American Jew's premise of 'forty million Germans too many in the world.'6 Both the Allies and the Soviets had the same intent, Goebbels could now suggest in Das Reich:, 'Namely to truncate the German people by thirty or forty million.'7

From Canada, Churchill travelled onward to Moscow. Reading this hopefully as a sign of increasing frictions within the enemy coalition, Goebbels ordered newspapers to abstain from comment. 'I have the utmost respect,' he said in private, 'for this septuagenarian who flies half way around the world to glue together a crumbling coalition on which his entire war strategy depends.'8
[…]

[NOTES]

5 Letter intercepted by ABP (foreign letter intercept office) from Justizrat Victor Fränkl, Locarno, to H R Morgenthau, Oct 4, 1944 (ZStA Potsdam, Rep.50.01, vol.796).

6 On which see VB, Sep 26, 1944.-See PID analysis of JG's usage of the Morgenthau plan, DE.2/DIS.202 (Hoover Libr., Lerner papers); Der politische Soldat, No.14, Oct 1944 quoted the Swiss journal Vaterland as predicting a 'field of death from Kiel to Konstanz.' Willi Krämer, circular No.66, Dec 8, 1944 (NA film T84, roll 169, 6532f).

7 W J Donovan to FDR, Oct 17 and 25, 1944 (FDR Libr., PSF box 169).-The controversy was too juicy for even Goebbels' opponents in Moscow to eschew and the next issue of Freies Deutschland, No.9-10, Moscow, Oct/Nov 1944 also polemicized against Morgenthau & Co, 'the representatives of millions in Gold.' (Yivo, Occ E-FD-2).

8 Oven, 'Oct 11, 1944,' 493.

David Irving, Goebbels: Mastermind of the Third Reich. London (1994), pp. 869-870. [Emphasis added.]
CLICK link for free download!

[Roberto]

Roberto, in response to your earlier confusion regarding Murphy stating that JCS 1067 was the plan in force for several years (until replaced) and Clay stating several "months" of confusion, Murphy makes it quite clear (as I believe Clay does as well) that Clay considered JCS 1067 Carthaginian and unworkable so that therefore every effort was made to circumvent the law.

One difference between Murphy’s assessment and that of Clay, if I remember correctly, is that the former harked JCS 1067 back to the Morgenthau Plan, whereas the latter does not speak of such a relationship.

As I demonstrated, the supposed “Morgenthauan” features of the plan, namely the removal of German industrial plant, are more likely to have been related to a partial giving in by the Western Allies to Soviet demands for industrial compensation.

In what concerns the application of JCS 1067, on the other hand, Murphy’s assessment doesn’t seem to be so far away from that of Clay indeed, according to the quotes provided by Smith on this thread:

Both of Clay's advisors were shocked by the detailed prohibitions described in JCS 1067.

[…]

The spirit-and sometimes the letter-of the Morgenthau Plan was reflected in many mandatory provisions of the top-secret directive JCS 1067, which haunted Military Government for several postwar years.

There is no doubt that JCS 1967 contemplated a Carthaginian peace, which dominated our operations during the early months of our occupation.

The juxtaposition of both statements suggests that the US military administration in Germany, especially General Clay, were not happy at all with JCS 1967 and does let it dominate their operations only “during the early months of our occupation” (Clay), whereas thereafter they did what they could to circumvent it.

This is indeed the conclusion presented by historian Wilfried Mausbach during a roundtable discussion at the Annual Meeting of the German Studies Association, Salt Lake City, October 8-11, 1998:

[…]Wilfried Mausbach (GHI) challenged Bacque's contention that the infamous Morgenthau Plan informed American actions. He demonstrated first that the notion of turning Germany into a huge "farm" was never part of American postwar planning; second, that the United States's occupation directive (JCS 1067) was not cast in Morgenthau's mold; and third, that the negative elements of JCS 1067 were deliberately postponed, and thereby in effect dismissed, by Military Government officers in the field. Instead of evaluating the available evidence, James Bacque's dramaturgy pits villains against heroes and surrenders scholarly differentiation to populism.[…]

Presumably the text of JCS 1067 has been declassified and is in the archives. If you are interested, then perhaps you should look for it.

Whose black beetle is it, Smith, yours or mine ?

But I have supported my point with the stated opinions of Clay and Murphy who actually saw it and implemented it.

Implemented it?

Hardly so. See above.

Also, it is rather obvious, in my opinion, that the contents of the Morgenthau Plan were publicly leaked because not everyone agreed with FDR's policies.

That’s not exactly a revolutionary Smithsonian thesis:

Morgenthau, who was a friend of US-president Roosevelt, seemed to be successful when at the British-American conference in Quebec on 15 September 1944 Premier Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt initialed an (already softened) version of the Morgenthau plan. But Cordell Hull, the American foreign minister, as well as his British colleague Anthony Eden protested against the plan already on the following day, and the American war minister Stimson called the program “a crime against civilization“. When the Morgenthau Plan reached the public due to a deliberate indiscretion on 21 September 1944, the reaction was so negative that even Roosevelt distanced himself from the plan. The Morgenthau Plan disappeared in the drawers already at the end of September 1944 without ever having been formally discussed by the competent bodies.

[Scott Smith]

Morgenthau wanted to preserve peace and punish Germany by eliminating German industry altogether; reparations by forced-labor and dismantling infrastructure or as booty were among ways of doing this.

Morgenthau also calls for dividing Germany into zones, i.e., politico-economic balkanization. This was done, and not only in the U.S. sector.

Hull and Stimson wanted to punish Germany by enslaving her to produce "reparations" with her industry.

In compromise, JCS 1097 meant the balkanization of industry and administration in the American zone, and this was considered unworkable by the occupation authorities except where economic paralysis was a desired result.

A ruined economy made German occupation expensive and nearly unmanageable, so Clay sought to circumvent the law where he could.

JCS 1779 (July, 1947) openly stated that the economy of Europe hinged upon the economic recovery of Germany. Therefore, continued punitive measures were not conducive to European prosperity, as admitted in the public decree. Price controls which created scarcity were dropped, for example (1948).

Although the British essentially followed the American lead and attempted to work together, Germany was still politically balkanized until reconstituted as West Germany in 1949--with consequent economic recovery.

I'd say that Mausbach saying Morgenthau was not implemented is merely splitting hairs dishonestly. The spirit of Morgenthau was a Carthaginian Peace, and a "Cathaginian Peace" was implemented, though illegally violated whenever convenient for the occupational authorities wherever they could. Then the Carthaginian Peace was officially softened (1947). Then West Germany was rehabilitated out of the western Allied sectors, and the balkanization of that part of Germany officially ended (1949).

[Roberto]

I must now leave for an appointment.

Until I come back, the audience may read my post and Smith's response and consider whether Smith has produced new arguments to be considered or just stubbornly repeated his articles of faith notwithstanding evidence to the contrary, as he usually does.

See you later, alligator.