I heard this on the radio yesterday, and had two questions in my mind.
1) What happened to the debt when Germany split in half? Did the treaty cover this issue somehow? And, related:
2) Were they required to pay reparations after WWII, or was there so little left of the nation that they weren’t even requested? After all, the US virtually rebuilt Germany’s neighbors.
AFAIK there were no reparations for WWII.
On the contrary, Germany (West Germany) received Marshall Plan aid from the US. Which was repaid - under very generous conditions! - by 1971. Britain received about three times as much Marshall Plan aid which was not repaid.
The GDR (East Germany) was bled dry by the USSR. The Russians also received some dismantled industrial installations from West Germany. Read the Marshall Plan article on Wikipedia if you’re interested in further details.