The election of a new U.S. president, John F. Kennedy, in November 1960 renewed the East- West tensions surrounding the city of Berlin that had simmered since the Allied occupation of Germany in 1945. Kennedy�s first meeting with Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961 did nothing to diffuse the sense of confrontation. During their personal discussions, Khrushchev handed an aide-memoire to Kennedy that seemed to dare the president to oppose Soviet intentions. The missive accused the Federal Republic of Germany of cultivating �saber-rattling militarism� and of advocating revisions to the borders that had been established after World War II. Only a permanent peace treaty that recognized the sovereignty of both East and West Germany, as they had evolved, would guarantee
that they would not again threaten the European peace. The conclusion of a German peace treaty, the document went on, would also solve the problem of normalizing the situation in West Berlin by making the city a demilitarized free zone registered with the United Nations. Naturally, the memorandum concluded, any treaty, whether the United States signed it or not, would terminate Western occupation rights.
