The American people want peace. They have long since ceased to talk of a hard or a soft peace for Germany.

Friendship without self-interest is one of the rare and beautiful things of life.

Important as economic unification is for the recovery of Germany and of Europe, the German people must recognize that the basic cause of their suffering and distress is the war which the Nazi dictatorship brought upon the world.

The conditions which now exist in Germany make it impossible for industrial production to reach the levels which the occupying powers agreed were essential for a minimum German peacetime economy.

That was the principle of reparations to which President Truman agreed at Potsdam. And the United States will not agree to the taking from Germany of greater reparations than was provided by the Potsdam Agreement.

The American people want peace. They have long since ceased to talk of a hard or a soft peace for Germany.

Provision was also made for the distribution of Germany's foreign assets among the Allies.