The Cold War and the German Unifica tion: A Twenty Year Retrospect Ricardo K. S. Mak Department of History, Hong Kong Baptist University
Dec 23, 2015
The Cold War and the German Unification: A Twenty Year Retrospect
Ricardo K. S. MakDepartment of History, Hong Kong Baptist University
The Emergence of a Bipolar World
The decline of the old world order The expansion of the USA and of the USSR The two superpowers and the two camps
The Two Superpowers A superpower must be
able to conduct a global strategy including the possibility of destroying the world; to command vast economic potential and influence; and to present a universal ideology
http://www.wellesley.edu/Polisci/wj/ChinaLinks-New/coldwar.html
Different Forms of Cold War Deterrence and com
pellence Armament race Military
interventions Ideological warfare Financial aid Alliance
The Basic Aim of the Two Superpowers
USA, “The government realized that economic prosperity had been produced by the war, and that the only way to keep it going was by restoration of the Open Door Policy and a world safe for capitalism.”
The USSR, export of the “continuous revolution”
World map in 1982
The Fate of Individual Nations
Subordination of national interests to superpowers: sovereignty, independence, security, geopolitics, domestic needs., etc.
Exceptions: China, Yugoslavia, Austria, Switzerland, etc.
The German Question before 1990 The "German question" refers to the division of Germany a
nd the ways to unify or reunify Germany. “It existed for 184 years, the German Question. It arose on
August 6, 1806 when Franz II, the last Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, bowed down to an ultimatum from Napoleon, laid down his crown, relieved the Estates of their duties and thereby dissolved the “Old Empire”. The German Question was resolved on October 3, 1990, with the approval of the four former occupying powers, when the German Democratic Republic acceded to the Federal Republic of Germany.” (http://www.tatsachen-ueber-deutschland.de/en
/history/main-content-03/farewell-to-the-german-question.html)
The German Question after 1990
“The German Question has therefore been almost entirely concerned with its national identity within a European context…In this context, the national drive for German unification became possible not only because of the domestic situation but largely because it could be built upon the premise of unfettered European integration.” (Bill Cash, a British Conservative MP)
Major Western Powers’ Perception of Germany since 1945 1946-49: Containing Germany 1949-89: Containing the USSR,
through integrating Germany into Western Europe
Since 1989: Requiring Germany to help maintain Western diplomatic and military presence in troubled regions, achieve a stable European economy, and combat terrorism in the post-911 era
New Global Trends since the 1990s
Nationalist conflicts Regionalism and globalization The eclipse of superpowers Multi-polar world
Is the New Germany, an Embedded European Power, Satisfied with its New Role?
The biggest population (over 80 million) compared with Italy, France and the UK
The biggest exporter of the world EU countries absorbed 70% of the German export The greatest contributor to the EU, 1/3 more than
France. Germany possesses all of the four components of
economic dominance: control over raw materials, control over markets, control over sources of capital, and a competitive advantage
How about military strengths?
The USA and the USSR’s Growing Participation in European Affair: A Prelude of the Cold war in
Europe
From neutrality to growing participation
Franklin Roosevelt’s position
The Pearl Harbour Incident 7th December, 1941
Roosevelt’s Message to the Congress 6th January, 1941 In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look for
ward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms…The first is freedom of speech and expression everywhere in the world; the second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way everywhere in the world; the third is freedom from want, which translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants everywhere in the world; the fourth is freedom from fear - which, translated into world terms, means a worldwide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor - anywhere in the world.
And the Soviet Union… The Nazi-Soviet Pact on
28th August 1939 The invasion of Poland
and Finland Operation Barbarossa,
15th May 1941
The Confrontation Began
The USSR: the Master of the East The American Supremacy: from 1939 to 1
945 population increased from 131 to 140 million, GNP from US$90 billion to US$211billion
Conferences of Teheran and of Yalta
The German Question in the “Stunde Null” (Zero Hour) President Truman’s
anti-communism The argument over r
eparation The formation of the
Bizonia in Feb., 1947 The Iran Incident The Greek Civil War
President Truman’s Speech to Congress, 12th March, 1947 At the present moment in world history nearly every nation
must choose between alternative ways of life. The choice is often not a free one. One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion, and freedom from political oppression. The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and radio, fixed elections, and the suppression of personal freedom. I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.
Occupied Germany and Austria 1945-1948
The Principle of the Marshall Plan It is logical that the United States should do
whatever it is able to do to assist in the return of normal economic health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace. Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist.
The Escalation of the Confrontation
The Soviet Union excluded from the European Recovery Plan
Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Rumania’s withdrawal
The formation of the Cominform Purging democratic elements in Eastern
European nations
The Berlin Blockade France joint the Bizo
nia in early 1948 A by-product of the S
talin-Tito confrontation
The Blockade
The Western Military Formation
The Brussels Pact in March 1948 The Vandenberg Resolution June 1948 The Formation of NATO on 4th April, 1949
The NATO Strategies and the Division of Europe “Shield and Sword”: European conventional f
orce plus USA Strategic Air Command (SAC) The birth of the PRC and the Korean War The first Soviet atomic bomb test on Aug. 29, 19
49, at Semipalatinsk Test Site, in Kazakhstan. Eisenhower became Supreme Allied command E
urope The Warsaw pact 1955 New strategy of “massive retaliation” The end of the plan of “rolling back communis
m”
International Politics in a Bipolar World
In a bipolar world: a state faces threat from either the USA or the USSR and needs to seek help from either one. Conflicts among lesser states are to be regulated by the superpowers.
The German Question in the Bipolar World Why was it a exclusive question in the West? The transplantation of the Soviet Model in East
Germany: centralized bureaucracy, planned economy and personal cult of Walter Ulbricht
But West Germany which adopted parliamentary democracy and market economy would eventually regain full sovereignty. How to watch over this government with great industrial and military potential was an issue to be concerned.
At the same time, West Germany could be a major bulwark against a possible Soviet invasion.
Western integration as a solution: West Germany’s admission into ECSC in 1951, the NATO in May 1955.
West Germany’s Western Integration
Konrad Adenauer’s Chancellorship (http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/
marcuse/classes/133c/133CwImages/PortAdenauer.jpg)
West Germany’s Western Integration
Hallstein Doctrine: A basic foreign policy principle of the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1955 to 1969. According to this doctrine, the Federal Republic asserts the exclusive right to represent the entire German nation. It will not establish or maintain diplomatic relations with states that recognize the German Democratic Republic (DDR). The doctrine is applied for the first time against Yugoslavia (1957), followed by Cuba (1963) and Arab countries (1965).
The Consolidation of the Two Germanies The Hungarian Crisis in 1956: the help from the Wes
t was not on the way The routinization of the communist rule in East Ger
many The “Sputnik” shock and the NATO’s new tactic
of “massive retaliation” The conclusion of the Franco-German Friendship Tr
eaty 20th June 1963
Despite Destalinization, Berlin remained Problematic Khrushchev, “Berlin is the testicles of
the West. Every time I want to make the West scream, I squeeze on Berlin.'
But it was not only the problem of the West, as 184,198 East German fled to the West in 1954.
A series of events 1957-1960. The Berlin Wall
Photo: Germans running away from East Germanyto West Germany through a house
which was built on the common border
The Age of Disillusion, the 1960s and the 1970s Europe sidelined Tyranny in the West …but socialism was n
ot an alternative either
Detente (Salt 1 from November 17, 1969 until May 1972 ) and West Germany’s Ostpolitik
Street riothttp://graphics8.nytimes.com/
images/2008/04/30/world/22973953.JPG
Street riot http://pagesperso-orange.fr/titi.nanou/images/prague.jpg
The Hopeless Economic Giant West Germany’s economic
miracle But still a political dwarf in
Ronald Reagan's plan of combating “the evil empire”.
The Installation of Pershing II in Britain, Holland, Belgium, Italy and West Germany from 1983 to 1984
The German unification 1989-1990
The Unified Germany
The Unified Germany in the Post-Cold War Era
Strong states such as Germany has suddenly more options: Germany’s recognition of Croatia and Slovenia, refused to participate in the Iraq War, reservations to European economic integration
New calculation over pain and gain Domestic pressure Even as a member of the EC/EU, Germany
now wanted to seize a leading position
The Case of the Independent Movement in the Balkans in 1991
1991 Germany unilaterally recognized the independence of Slovenia and Croatia
Weak international regimes and conflicting norms
Domestic drive, political culture and historical memory
Yugoslavia: ethnic division, 1991
The EU’s Direction CSCE (Conference on Security and Cooperation in E
urope) supported the existing border EC’s resolution on 25th June 1991 (1) preserving Y
ugoslavia, (2) enabling ex-communist states to participate in reshaping new Europe (3)providing loans for a united Yugoslavia
The Brionde Accord concluded by Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands succeeded in convincing the Serbs to withdraw from Slovenia but not Croatia in which 600,000 Serbs lived.
Even the UN and the USA stood aside
Germany’s Basic Direction
West Germany’s decade-long policy of liberating East Germany produces the following strategy: “To the extent that this norm shaped Germany’s post-war foreign policy, elites may have calculated high domestic ‘gains’ from being the champions of self-determination in the Yugoslav conflict.”
New Variables The Mass Media of Germany (Süddeu
tsche Zeitung and FAZ) The ruling party’s (CDU) new self-im
age The lobbying activities of Croatia in F
ebruary 1991 The offensive of the Green/Bündnis 9
0 The SPD’s political bandwagoning
http://www.iranfocus.com/uploads/img440b5b4d704f0.jpg
Some More New Variables
The survey of mid-July 1991 (38% for the independence of the two states, 34%, 27% neutral)
The ideological dilemma posed by the German unification in the 1990
The visit of Kohl and Genscher, the German Foreign Minister to Yugoslavia
The EC Turned to Follow Germany
EC vs. Croatia and Slovenia Serbia and Montenegro excluded the
other Republic from the federal leadership
EC decided in August 1991 that the recognition would be delayed for two months. For Germany the green light was on.
The Last Month
On 8thDecember, Germany indicated that it would recognize these states soon.
France and Britain showed that they would bright this issue to the UN
The CDU party convention in Dresden in which Kohl should show a new course in foreign policy
EC backed down and Germany’s recognition of the two states on 23rd December 1991
Conclusion
International Politics in a Multi-polar world
Suggested reference:
Mary Fulbrook, A History of Germany, 1918-2008: The Divided Nation (Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009)
Otis C. Mitchell, The Cold War in Germany: Overview, Origins, and Intelligence Wars (Lanham: University Press of America, 2005).