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The Reparations Settlement and Germany's Peacetime Economy: Statement by the U.S. State Department (Press Release of December 12, 1945)

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12. The role of the occupying authorities in the process of German revival should, in general, be that of providing and setting the conditions within which the Germans themselves assume responsibility for the performance of the German economy. To this end, the occupying authorities should devote primary attention in planning revival to the development of German administrative machinery, not only in the fields of intrazonal production and trade but in interzonal and international trade, and in the application of common policies in transport, agriculture, banking, currency, taxation, etc.

As one aspect of this process, de-Nazification should be satisfactorily completed during the present period. For the rest, great importance attaches to the conclusion within the Allied Control Council of agreements governing policies to be followed in various aspects of the German economy enumerated, and devising interzonal German machinery for their application.



Source: U.S. Economic Policy towards Germany, U.S. State Department Publication, Washington, DC, 1946, pp. 93-101; reprinted in Beata Ruhm von Oppen, ed., Documents on Germany under Occupation, 1945-1954. London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1955, pp. 93-97.

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