German reunification - a short history | DW Documentary

The division of Germany in 1989 into two countries was something that many, particularly in France and Britain, thought should remain that way. The transition. The French ambassador told me that this cold

reunification

wants to form a single state. That's crazy. Yes, we always think that France and Germany together in the same bed are problems, yes, problems for the British. Germany was a vengeful country in the eyes of all the Soviet people back then, they were all revanchists who were just trying to swallow East Germany. East Germany was my country. Germany is a united country. Homeland, I grew up in a time when that was not conceivable at all, people, freedom is enormous and that is what happened, thank you, Germany in 1989, a divided country, if it were ever reunited, it would need the consent of the four victorious powers of the world.

World War II, the Soviet Union, the United States, Great Britain and France had so-called reserved rights. In the fall of 1989, the peaceful Revolution spreading throughout the Eastern Bloc had also reached East Germany, but the communist regime ignored the voice of the people, instead of reforms, it carried out the largest military war. The parade never took place, the demonstrations during the mass exodus of its citizens put the regime under enormous pressure, it was finally forced to open its borders to the West. I left my East German translator to follow the rest of the press conference and samoski said yes, the wall is done. open or worse than effects and my translator who had never been to the West was one of the first to stop by Victor Homela and he rushed and started begging people he met to take him to my hotel, he had no idea where the hotel.

It's and suddenly he knocks on my door but I'm writing a story I don't know what happened and he bursts in and I tell him Victor listen I'm writing a story grab something from the mini bar and I'll talk to you in a minute and suddenly I think Victor Homila is here in West Berlin, he can't be here, he's in East Germany, Victor, what are you doing here? And he finally he says that's what I'm trying to tell you. The wall is down I was at the launch and experienced the fall of the Berlin Wall in the Bundestag when the MPs stood up and sang the German national anthem it was heartbreaking, only the West German Chancellor was absent on this historic day Elmwood Choral had just landed In Warsaw for an inaugural visit to the first non-communist government of the Soviet bloc, this trip to Poland was to have been a great celebration of reconciliation between this new first free government in Poland and the former West Germany led by Casco Cole, of course We were all there and we thought well now for the big dinner it was the night of November 9th and I was sitting in my hotel when suddenly the news appeared live on television the wall is open I almost fell out of bed it was quite clear this is Surprisingly calm and thoughtful, he did not burst into obvious euphoria, but it was obvious that he was wondering what he should do now in a delicate situation.

A British Army helicopter I borrowed flew 33 hours later to Berlin and landed next to the wall on the western side. It was very cold very early in the morning and the best thing about that scene was that the British army in Berlin had set up a Free tea is right on this side of the wall, so the first experience of Freedom that many people had was tea from the British Army, who is very strong, very hot and very sweet. The first thing Helmut Cool did after his return from Warsaw was He spoke to all the senior partners.

He spoke by telephone with the president, Margaret Thatcher and General Secretary Gorbachev. AI, basically what came out of these phone calls was that everyone said we had to stop chaos from breaking out. The entire process must be kept under control. at the plant after the fall of the wall there were calls for Soviet troops to intervene immediately but the man who decided everything was General Secretary Gorbachev um Gorbachev did not want violence and sent a messenger to Bonn it was a real surprise for the Chancellor's office a The immediate trigger was a Soviet visitor to my office, a journalist who we later learned was a KGB general, we had always suspected it, but didn't know until later.

They had simply sent it to me with a list of questions and all these questions revolved around the issue of German unification, I was really electrified because I thought that Portugalov always represents the dogmatic line of the Soviet party and now here it is suddenly talking about German unification, if you dare to do that, I told the Chancellor at the time and he publicly. took the leader three weeks after the fall of the wall Cole's advisor, the horse Telchik, called me to my office, that was unique. I didn't expect that and he said that the chancellor was going to make an important statement and they wanted to invite us foreigners who were planning German

reunification

. a plan that his foreign minister was not aware of the 10 point plan for Germany Germany were de facto steps towards reunification on November 25 haircut made his statement and agrees with me as Prime Minister of East Germany on that we needed to be bound by a treaty, although we did not know exactly what it meant to be bound by a treaty, I said that we would think of something we wanted to reduce the resistance of East Germany and the Soviet Union by accepting their proposals, the ten-point speech surprised us to everyone because we had the so-called reservation rights on what the solution to the German question would be and Cole had adopted unification without consulting the other countries that had to accept that.

Margaret said that we knew from the beginning that Margaret Thatcher would be against it. so we didn't tell him that the ten point plan was announced, of course the reaction in Paris was mild horror, yes we only found out from the press, although we work very closely together and speak on the phone every day with the staff from the West German chancellery, the French ambassador told me this coal, this reunification, he wants to form a single state and that is crazy, no consultation, etc., come to my office and bind on Monday and I will explain to you how the things.

I didn't go, of course, because I knew Cole was right; had taken advantage of a moment in

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when it was necessary for President Bush to give the speech about an hour and a half before Cole did, but it was in German, so he couldn't read it in advance, the danger was that otherwise I could have called Helmut and said Helmut, great speech, you know, I support you, but let's talk first. There were many anxieties among the countries of the West. There was anxiety in the Eastern countries about what would happen. you have a new midteropa, so the notion of a united NATO was for a Germany in NATO partly to preserve the stability that we have had for the last 25 or 30 years.

The Soviets had a problem with that exactly, for them NATO was an opponent. military alliance and at first they could not imagine it Moscow was dissatisfied Soviet correspondent Vladimir contract explained on the Press Club program on German English television why the Russians were also worried about their own problems after the collapse of the Soviet bloc the country was suffering a Great supply crisis people began to have actions like in wartime, of course this caused a lot of discontent and in this context Billy's foreign policy issues, such as the reunification of Germany, went almost unnoticed by most.

I remember very clearly on the 18th of December, Cole flew to Dresden and I was with him and he came into the city and there was a huge huge crowd of people, we were just shouting height of iron height of iron there was a chant and Cole then said that was the moment he realized that it cannot be delayed, it's like all the general secretaries of the Warsaw Pact modro started with a boring written statement about peace, disarmament and so on, he didn't give us the feeling that he knew what it was really the situation in your country, what the conversations with Cole were like.

At that time it was about unification issues, it was just about the joint treaty. Cole was not willing to negotiate with me any additional rights, it was a clear reform program, but the only reform program he had was that he wanted 15 billion and then he gave it to us. a list of everything he wanted to buy in West Germany to supply the East Germans well, but it couldn't be the answer. An important moment came on December 22, 1989, when East Germany officially opened the Berlin Wall and Coal Helmet and Prime Minister Mojo walked. together through the Brandenburg Gate foreigner In fact, I was supposed to participate in the live broadcast from the other side of the Brandenburg Gate for ARD, they had placed a microphone on me, but I couldn't access it because of the crowd what was happening.

I was 50 centimeters from the microphone but it went on and on and then we all crossed the Brandenburg Gate together and here you see it again the immense crowd euphoric and full of commitment and it really felt like a historic moment thanks to the best operation the allies of Western Europe , France and England, were more than skeptical; in fact, at first they were against it. They didn't hide it. Margaret Thatcher. I think that if it had been up to her, there certainly would not have been German reunification. In the 1930s, he had grown up with the rise of Nazism, his family had taken in Jewish refugees from Germany, so he had that knowledge of what had happened and the lesson he learned from that process was that Germany was too big and too aggressive if left as a Member State. only large state in the center of Europe and did not believe that the German character had fundamentally changed, it is true that Mrs Thatcher occasionally in the past had a map of Europe showing the size of Germany at different times in

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in her famous bag and I think there was a meeting with President Mitchon when she produced the map, but that is an incident Margaret Thatcher told Francois during my summer holidays.

I reread Churchill's War Memoirs. Aren't you afraid to talk about a common European currency? Aren't you afraid of being absorbed by Germany the economy is not crucial World politics we think Mitarong played a double game yes he pretended uh when he talked to Thatcher he pretended he was 100 against unification when he talked to Gorbachev he tried to get that Gorbachev stopped unification but when he spoke publicly and when he spoke with Helmut Cole, everything you know was hand in hand and very moving stories, actually Meteorol and Cora agreed from the beginning that Paris would give the green light for reunification if Coral allowed Europe a greater role. the chancellor was even willing to give up the deutsche mark the brits were left in the dark the price it had to be european currency european army european foreign policy you know eurovision i mean everything you know um and we were really worried about this you know , because we don't want that kind of Europe, we want a different kind of Europe and the hull core was not going to give us a choice, so German unification meant we had less choice, thanks when Mrs Thatcher was in Moscow and the The conversation turned to reunification, she asked that no

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hand records be kept, but of course after that everything was recorded in the interview, she clearly said that we think it is very dangerous and that the Germans are trying to establish a hegemony. , she was of the opinion. that the Soviet Union should take a stronger position against reunification Gorbachev suspects, believes that he has been groomed to be the scapegoat, and, frankly, Gorbachev thinks about these people: Will I choose France and Great Britain or will I choose the United States in Germany and think? the last two were probably the safest path they were very understanding of Gorbachev they didn't do what used to happen during the Cold War instead they welcomed his reforms they said there would be new opportunities for Russia and the Soviet Union that no one at the time imagined that the USSR itself would collapse in two years a special summit was held in Ottawa, NATO and the Warsaw Pact met and German reunification became the main topic of an international conference, for the first time we had to think of a mechanism that allowed us to address four - Power Rights addresses internal issues of German unification, but also some of these other issues, so we worked with the team and came up with this two plus four idea.

We emphasized two before four because we wanted to emphasize that the unification of the Germanys would be the main part and I remember when Baker tried to advance this idea with the British and the French and others, some would say oh four plus two, some would use six, there was a certain resistance to this and I remember, it was a pretty important moment when we finally got full acceptance of this by the Soviet Union in a median in Ottawa,Thus the two plus four format was born, but no one knew what Moscow's position would be, hence East and West.

The German governments wanted to talk to God as soon as possible, each had their own plans for Germany. When Hans Mojo returned from Moscow and talked about a United German Homeland, I got very angry, he was just now trying to persuade us that they were heading towards reunification before his trip to Moscow everything sounded very different he was still talking about a step-by-step reunification process by step the chancellor of West Germany was in a hurry East Germany was literally bankrupt, who would help them then if we didn't? that would also have been the main message to Gorbachev in Casey asked Helmut Cool to explain why he wanted German unification, but he never got that far because 20 minutes after his statement, Gorbachev completely surprised us and accepted our exactly foreign reunification still represented by hundreds of Thousands of soldiers in East Germany agreed that Germany could be one again, so it was no surprise that this mood in these moments of strong emotions emerged on the plane where seasoned politicians raised their glasses and Then they just cleaned the glasses for the cameras, thank you.

Germany had friends in the west and these friends had to recognize German unification, otherwise they would no longer be friends or allies, it was clear. To Margaret Thatcher as to all of us after the famous meeting between Colon Gorbachev, that unification had been inevitable for Margaret, but diplomats were relieved at how problematic she found the British Foreign Office. The prime minister's opposition to her only became clear almost two decades later. This is a telegram. by Christopher Melody and bom and says that despite our Leon support for the German desire to achieve unity through self-determination, the United Kingdom is perceived here as perhaps the least positive of the three Western allies and the least important and in the margin can be seen Mr. status writing because we are foreigners.

I guess I wouldn't say we wanted to change the image. I think we wanted to give all the documents that were relevant to allow people to form their own opinion and I think what had happened was that opinion about British politics had been based very heavily on Mrs Thatcher's own Memoirs and that became the dominant narrative actually because of comments that Mrs Thatcher had made publicly before, it seemed that we had been against unification privately in the negotiation. Douglas heard that the British Foreign Secretary was negotiating very, very helpfully, making some of the best suggestions that were made for reaching an agreement with the Soviet Union before formal negotiations had even begun.

East Germans participated in a free election for the first time. represent them Helmut Cole campaigned vigorously, including imagining Helmut's coal in city squares, up to 250,000 GDR citizens in the square, had never experienced anything like it in West Germany in his life, of course, which inspired him when a quarter of a million people, cheer up and of course you are going to say I am the greatest, a fundamental decision was being made that was not about saying and another four years and another 99 but that is a fundamental choice of Management that was being made for this country and This is how it was, so we had free elections, an elected government, an elected Parliament with a mandate and the clear desire to organize German reunification, and that is exactly what happened.

The agreements were negotiated under pressure from East German citizens who wanted things to move quickly. They tried. save something from East Germany, but he stood no chance and Demisier simply saw himself as responsible for an orderly delivery. English Germany confronted its own regime with the cry "We are the people," which soon became "We are of one people." This was a clear call for unification to say that West Germany pounced on its neighbor and swallowed it is wrong, the majority of East Germans clearly decided that they wanted to join the federal republic foreignization of Germany and of course he made the classic comments about the flourishing landscapes and German reunification could be paid after petty cash and we have reported everything, it was important for the people at home.

I also wasn't one to believe all that petty cash stuff, for example, but it wasn't for me anyway. was intended to reassure the West German taxpayer. There were enormous financial transfers and the people and the former federal republic did not rise up in arms over it; perhaps they were not enthusiastic about it, but they accepted it and knew in their hearts that it was necessary even if they did not like it spring saw new developments on the international level the Europeans agreed to unification and declared that the new Germany would be part of the European community they began the two plus four negotiations four meetings were scheduled to negotiate the agreement details the Germans had two foreign ministers at the talks Marcus Mecca for East Germany and Hans Dietrichencher for the West the question of the future status of United Germany whether we would regain full sovereignty of the four powers Victory or not second would a unified Germany be a member of NATO and, if so, in what form, then the withdrawal of Soviet forces 370,000 Soviet troops in East Germany.

Gorbachev was concerned that Cole was putting his foot on the accelerator in a destabilizing way and the fact that Bush developed a relationship of trust with Gorbachev, including At that Malta meeting, I think he provided some support, as Cole did what had to do to take advantage of this moment in history. I think Cole, in that sense, just knew that there has to be a price. be a give and take, it's asking Gorbachev to do something historically incredibly brave to seed, you know, what they saw as their empire and that's how it came about, but that wasn't the key, the key was that first you know you're agree that it's going to happen and now let's figure out how we can make it acceptable and let the Russians leave without humiliation, that was what was left then.

Gorbachev was willing to allow these countries to unite. I am the economic breadbasket that offered to help with the treaty in exchange for the withdrawal of Soviet forces, the German government would pay almost 4 billion German marks and indicated its willingness to grant even larger loans would have been insolvent by the end of June 1990 Helmut Cole ordered me to go to Moscow with the heads of two major German banks on a secret trip to negotiate everything and the clear message I received from Gorbachev: we want this deal and we want this loan. I had to explain to him that we were prepared to do this, but that it was part of an overall solution.

Visit abroad to the US in the summer, Gorbachev was very enamored of the principles of the CSE and I remembered that one of the principles of the CSE was that each country is free to join its own Alliance, so the President Bush says that Gorbachev in the cabinet room, you know, Mikhail, do you agree that under the CSE? principles that we will not say that Germany will join NATO, we will say that Germany is free to make its own choice according to the principles of the CSE and that if it chooses NATO, we will accept it and Gorbachev says yes, I can accept that, so that was The moment Gorbachev accepted the notion of a United Germany and NATO, we had to make concessions, but there was one condition: if United Germany became a member of NATO, there would be no NATO bases on the territory of the NATO. former East Germany.

Reality shows that, although there may be a lot of good will and finding words in politics, unfortunately you can only believe in documents, thank you, damage the sky and Germany, reduce the commitment to German unity, be a member of NATO, recover the total sovereignty and I think in the end. He agreed to the entire development because he hoped that this great, united, economically powerful and technologically strong Germany would be for him the most important partner for the modernization and development of the Soviet Union. Expectations were really high; at that time it was believed that Russia and Germany were we were entering a new era and everything would evolve very well and no one at that time could imagine that Russia would face great difficulties, he had said at the talks in Moscow at the beginning of February, yes, Chancellor, you You can have East Germany and I'll give it to you. and it would cost you a hundred billion, if we had said no, no, to that extent, but in the end we financed relatives, especially since a large proportion was also made up of loans in the summer of 1990, there was only one problem left to solve the order .

Prettiest line Poland had been waiting since the end of World War II for West Germany to recognize the border along the two rivers. Both East Germany and the four victorious powers supported Poland's position and it was decided to resolve the matter at the Two Plus Four Summit in Paris held by the Poles. The Foreign Secretary was invited to attend Ed. The new government was under enormous pressure over the border issue and each day of delay undermined it further. The government needed the trust and credibility of its population. It was a Polish existential question. Its western border and that was at a time when the first democratic government had to embark on radical reforms.

Remember that France had also taken back Alzheimer's from Germany and this border was inviolable, so the Polish borders should also be invaluable. It was like a balance. My proposal was for the two German states. sent Poland to draft a border treaty which would then be signed and ratified immediately after German unification. Cole was totally against it. had set everything as a condition for German unification, this was not just an internal problem due to the cold and the Americans intervened unequivocally in Bonn and said friends, if you don't do it, the agreement is cancelled, so from the point of view German choice was unification. with East Germany and Berlin but with the final loss of former territories in Eastern Europe or nothing after four months of negotiations but less than a year after the war broke out the unification treaty was finalized two states two societies and two armies were would become a single country a thousand pages regulated the accession of East Germany to the federal republic the international treaty two plus four was also signed in Moscow four victorious powers that returned full sovereignty to a united Germany 45 years after the end of the Second World War thanks there are some reviews that say oh you should have spent more time trying to design a new european this or that or others well good luck I mean you know achieving all this in 11 months was quite difficult and frankly to do it in a way that would create a structure for a unified Germany in NATO a changing European commission that offers possibilities for the then Soviet Union and also possibilities for other Eastern European countries seems to me to be a pretty good year of work abroad and my best moment was living and working in the federal republic at that time of reunification.

I bought a case of beer and distributed the bottles among my friends and we all drank for the health of the German people in front of the camera. Here's to the fact that Germany had achieved its goal, her dream had come true and she was now the main one. What we are experiencing now is to all intents and purposes a break with those previous hopes. A lot has been achieved, but I think it will take the same amount of time until the difference is no longer noticeable, but now I don't see it with younger colleagues who are 25 or 26 years old when they start working for us, they are united Germans, it is the best story that you can experience as a journalist and, of course, we are delighted on a personal level. a great story and 25 years later things look very different the old fears of a Berlin Republic of German domination of Europe those fears have simply evaporated now it has a paradox because suddenly we have realized that we need Germany, we need this great Germany reunited under this powerful Angela Merkel because we need to change our relationship with Europe and we can only do it with the help of the Germans, so the Germans have become our best friends, yes, and if you had a silent revolution better that we, the French, ruled without heads, I salute you.

Don't overestimate your options, they are limited. Germany is too big for everyone else, but also too small for Europe. The Germans never really revealed the depth of what it meant to their identity to have this history of World War II and the ever-dangling Nazi past. about them and living with this physical evidence of their historical shame and all these things and suddenly they come together again and it's a relief it's an affirmation that we can be one people again um and you know, witnessing that was enormously powerful see what is theend of your Penance means that it was indeed a foreign grace