prominent role in the "postbox war", a lengthy struggle over whatever the postboxes in Danzig should be painted red and white (the colours of Poland) or red, white and black (the colours of the right in Germany; red, black and yellow were the colors of the left in Germany). The selection of colours was a victory for the right-wing inclinations of the Danzig Senate. that governed the Free City of Danzig. As the head of the Polish sub-desk within the Eastern Desk at the Auswärtiges Amt, Dirksen played a key role as an aide to Foreign Minister Gustav Stresemann in formulating German policy towards Poland, and in 1925 Dirksen was one of the leading advocates of using economic pressure to force Poland to return the Polish Corridor, Danzig and Upper Silesia to Germany. In early 1925, Dirksen wrote that the Polish Corridor and Upper Silesia would not be returned unless Poland was "weak", which led him to suggest that Germany and the "Anglo-Saxon powers" should follow a strategy of weakening the Polish economy to make Poland as militarily as weak as possible. Though the Auswärtiges Amt knew that there was no evidence that Poland was seeking war with Germany, the Wilhelmstrasse seized upon any rumors of Polish military movements towards the German frontier to portray Poland as an aggressive and expansionist state that was a menace to the peace of Europe, which was part of a broader public relations campaign waged in Europe and the United States to emphasise the theme of "Polish chauvinism and racial hatred". Dirksen had successfully argued that Germany's chances of regaining the Polish Corridor, Danzig and Upper Silesia would be better if world opinion was turned against Poland. In a debate within Auswärtiges Amt, Carl Schubert, the State Secretary of the Auswärtiges Amt, argued against making loans to Germany conditional on the return of the lost territories and wrote that "only force" would force the Poles to return the Corridor and Upper Silesia. Schubert argued that since war with Poland was not yet practical, Germany should make loans to Poland under onerous conditions with high-interest rates to weaken Poland economically and thereby reduce the Polish military budget until Germany had rearmed, when Germany would take back the lost lands by war. Dirksen, however, also agreed that taking back the lands lost to Poland was "inconceivable without force", but argued that any sort of German loans