"Another sceptic, Franz Nitsch, said: 'Let me tell you this: as a boy, I
lived for many years across the street from where the Russians were based in
Vienna -- and I never saw a Russian tank. He said it all on purpose -- and
that’s bad.' "

An eyewitness acount of growing up in soviet occupied vienna many years
"pre-ahhnood"
http://timewitnesses.org/english/~ernest.html
The girl recalls Russian soldiers passing out candy and riding around on
bicycles - that's strange, no mention of scary tanks......

Again, a "scarier" mention of a border crossing in cold-war soviet occupied
Austria, but no mention of tanks in the town (Semmering) Ahnoodd now claims
(in the post-convention 'corrective' interview) to have been terriifed in...
http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/AD...williams2.html
We might also question whether the Schwarzenegger family had a special fear
of border crossings, since Ahnood's father was identified in many documents
as a Nazi and a brownshirt - both of which would have marked him for a
dificult time if his name appeared on any lists that the Soviets might have
had in their possession. It also makes one wonder WHY the uncle needed to
travel to Semmering and to bring a little boy there.....

The Allied Occupation (From the CIA handbook on Austria)
"In the meantime Austria had been divided into four zones of occupation
controlled, respectively, by the United States, France, Great Britain, and
the USSR. Vienna was similarly divided. By the terms of a June 1946
agreement, the Austrian government received qualified authority over the
entire country, including the right to legislate and to administer the laws.
The occupation powers retained authority on such matters as demilitarization
and the disposal of German-owned property. German economic assets in each
zone were assigned to the respective occupying power. Laws passed in 1946
and 1947 eliminated Nazi influence from public life, but former Nazis
without criminal records were allowed to participate in general elections in
1949."

This was not military occupation of the type that the Soviets used in
Hungary and the rest of Eastern Europe, since those nations, whether under
pressure or not, voted in Communist governments immediately after the war,
which gave the Soviets carte blanche to train guns and weapons on the
populace. To have done the same in Austria would have provoked an
international incident, since Austria voted in a CONSERVATIVE,
NON-COMMUNIST, NON-SOCIALIST government in 1946 - a government which had
sovereignty over ALL zones, including the Soviet zone..

Did the Soviets have tanks in the soviet-occupied zone of Austria?
Undoubtedly. Did they use them as primary transport on the streets, such
that ordinary citizens commonly saw them? Apparently not, from the few
eyewitness accounts available on the net.



"Bill Oliver" wrote in message As it stands,
Schwarzenegger said that *when he crossed
to the Soviet sector* he saw Soviet tanks. There were
40,000 Soviet troops there, and Soviet doctrine was
tank-heavy. Unless you believe in invisible soldiers,
you are ****ing in the wind.