The West's newest ally, West Germany, was making a most disagreeable impression on its friends last week. Chiefly responsible was crabbed, pfennig-pinching Finance Minister Fritz Schäffer. Schäffer was flatly unwilling to pay what Germany's NATO partners consider a fair share of Western defense.
NATO's troubles with Herr Schäffer began in December, when Schäffer told the NATO council that the most prosperous country in Europe could not afford any more than 9 billion Deutsche Marks ($2 billion) a year for defense during the three-year period required to build a twelve-division army. The NATO...
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