Editorial Note
In a letter to Marshal Sokolovsky dated June 18, General Clay announced the terms of the currency reform for the western zones of occupation of Germany, effective on June 20, but not applicable to Berlin. General Robertson sent a similar letter to Marshal Sokolovsky on the same day. In his reply to General Clay on June 20 (also sent to General Robertson), Marshal Sokolovsky took the position that the currency reform was illegal and completed the division of Germany, and he warned that Soviet occupation authorities would be obliged to take actions to protect the economy of the Soviet zone of occupation. In a letter of June 21, General Clay denied an implication made by Marshal Sokolovsky that Berlin was a part of the Soviet zone of [Page 910] occupation. Soviet authorities were invited to send their experts to a meeting with American, British, and French experts in order to resolve differences arising over the currency reform.
The texts of the letters exchanged between General Clay and Marshal Sokolovsky are printed in Berlin Senate, Berlin, Quellen und Dokumente, pages 1334 and 1341–1343, and Documented Chronology, pages 108–110. For the text of General Robertson’s letter of June 18, see Cmd. 7534, page 17, and Documents on Berlin, pages 33–34. Marshal Sokolovsky’s reply of June 20 is printed in Carlyle, Documents on International Affairs, pages 579–580, The Soviet Union and the Berlin Question, pages 25–27, and Documents on Berlin, pages 63–64.