History of Germany

GERMANY WAS UNITED on October 3, 1990. Unification brought together a people separated for more than four decades by the division of Europe into two hostile blocs in the aftermath of World War II. The line that divided the continent ran through a defeated and occupied Germany. By late 1949, two states had emerged in divided Germany: the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, or West Germany), a member of the Western bloc under the leadership of the United States; and the German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany), part of the Eastern bloc led by the Soviet Union. Although the two German states were composed of a people speaking one language and sharing the same traditions, they came to have the political systems of their respective blocs. West Germany developed into a democratic capitalist state like its Western neighbors; East Germany had imposed on it the Soviet Union’s communist dictatorship and command economy. Although the leaders of each state were committed to the eventual unification of Germany and often invoked its necessity, with the passage of time the likely realization of unification receded into the distant future. Relations between the two states worsened during the 1950s as several million East Germans, unwilling to live in an increasingly Stalinized society, fled to the West. August 1961 saw the sealing of the common German border with the construction of the Berlin Wall. In the early 1970s, however, diplomatic relations between the two states were regularized by the Basic Treaty, signed in 1972. During the remainder of the decade and during the 1980s, relations improved, and contacts between the citizens of the two states increased greatly. In 1987 Erich Honecker became the first East German leader to make a state visit to West Germany. As of the late 1980s, however, no well-informed observer foresaw German unification as being likely in the near future. In fact, its prospect seemed so remote that some politicians advocated abandoning unification as a long-term goal. Those who remained committed to Germany’s ultimate unification frankly admitted that decades would probably pass before it happened. The events leading to unification in October 1990 were unexpected, and they occurred at a frantic pace. In the eleven months between the opening of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 and unification, the forty-year-old East German dictatorship collapsed, Western political and economic systems were introduced in the East, new treaties altered long-standing diplomatic relationships between Germany and neighboring states, and two radically different societies began to grow together. The rapid collapse of the East German regime surprised everyone. East Germany appeared to be the most economically successful of all Eastern-bloc countries. Its citizens enjoyed a modest yet decent standard of living and cradle-to-grave security provided by a government-run welfare system. They traveled to other East European countries for their summer vacations, watched West German television, and hoped for better living conditions and more freedom in the future. Most East Germans acquiesced in the communist regime’s restrictions, having fashioned areas of personal freedom in their private lives. A small opposition movement operated within the shelter of the Protestant church, the country’s sole relatively independent social institution. When opposition figures became too troublesome, the regime dealt with them by depriving them of their livelihood, sending them to prison, or expelling them to West Germany. The regime’s elderly, hard-line leadership opposed the reforms of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who sought to make socialism more efficient by introducing capitalist incentives and reducing central control. Encouraged by this liberalization and the application of Gorbachev’s reforms in neighboring Poland and Hungary, the regime’s opponents became bolder during the summer and fall of 1989 and mounted mass demonstrations that doubled and doubled again in size from week to week. Soviet officials advised the Honecker regime not to expect outside support. Without foreign military assistance for the first time, the GDR leadership decided against the use of force to quell the burgeoning demonstrations. Honecker was ousted in mid-October, and more realistic leaders sought to save the regime by making concessions. In November travel abroad became possible, and East Germans swarmed into West Germany, many intending to remain there. Reforms could no longer satisfy East Germans, however, who wanted the freedoms and living standard of West Germany. West German chancellor Helmut Kohl (1982- ) seized the political initiative in late November with his Ten-Point Plan for unification. Yet, even he thought several years and an intervening stage, such as a confederational structure, would be necessary before unification of the two Germanys could occur. By early 1990, ho