Word: westing
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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With a rolling of diplomatic drums, the world this week was informed that Dwight Eisenhower, Britain's Macmillan, France's De Gaulle and Germany's Adenauer would meet in Paris on Dec. 19 to lay their plans for East-West summit talks. After the immemorial manner of chancelleries, the announcement was made to seem an example of renewed Western unity. In fact, it was simply an admission that granitic
...problem. On this the Western powers are in disarray. At one side stands the U.S., still inclined to feel that the division of Germany into two nations is, in the long run, both untenable and dangerous, but pledged to seek new ways of solving the "abnormal" situation of isolated West Berlin. At the other extreme stands De Gaulle, who sees no reason to want any change in the German situation, opposes reunification of East and West Germany on the ground that it might mean the end of West Germany's integration into the Western European community...
Privately Adenauer looks forward to a summit, where no Germans will be represented, with extreme nervousness. Fortnight ago he cryptically suggested that Germany might yet have to make more sacrifices in order to complete "the liquidation of the effects of World War II." What Adenauer fears is that the West may agree to some erosion of its position in West Berlin and may, at least by implication, accept Soviet hegemony in Eastern Europe as legitimate. The simple French position is that to renegotiate on Berlin is to call into question the West's existing right to be there...
...Soviet budget is unlike anything in the West. Since the government runs not only itself but almost all industry, shops, and farms, its budget determines not only its own spending but how many TV sets will be made and how many shoes sold. At 745 billion rubles (roughly $74.5 billion), it is on the same order as President Eisenhower's $77.1 billion budget, but to be really comparable, the U.S. budget would have to include the spending of U.S. Steel, General Motors, A.T. & T. et al. But if the Russian budget is hard to compare...
Meat in the Soup. Similar evidence that religion in Russia is alive is provided by one of the latest Soviet novels to reach the West (via an Italian translation). The Miraculous Icon is a 19th century moral tale in reverse: hero sinks down and down into the depths of Christianity, is saved in the nick of time by conversion to clear-eyed atheism...