Monday, 21 January

I studied Italian on my own.

Representatives of West Germany made a statement to the press after their meeting in Paris. They said that West Germany prepared to send three to four hundred thousand people to participate in the military defense of Western Europe. Also, the newspapers reported that James [sic.] had investigated that the Soviet Union planned to deploy one thousand submarines that could be used in the sea. This was quite a big threat to the navies of Britain and United States.

Edgar Faure has organized a new French cabinet.

The Soviet Union has completed a canal which connects the Volga and Don Rivers. The length of the said river is sixty miles. Now the Volga River links to the Baltic Sea, therefore from this period Soviet fleets and commercial ships could go to the Black Sea from the Baltic Sea directly, and to Mediterranean Sea. The canal will be greatly instrumental to the deployment of the Soviet navy.