Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe 9780857450166

Table of contents :
Contents
Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 – An Intricate Web: Ostpolitik, the European Security System and German Unification
2 – Peaceful Change of Frontiers as a Crucial Element in the West German Strategy of Transformation
3 – France and the German Question in the Context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1969–1974
4 – Transformation or Status Quo: The Conflict of Stratagems in Washington over the Meaning and Purpose of the CSCE and MBFR, 1969–1973
5 – Britain, the German Question and the Transformation of Europe: From Ostpolitik to the Helsinki Conference, 1963–1975
6 – Finlandisation in Reverse: The CSCE and the Rise and Fall of Economic Détente, 1968–1975
7 – The Warsaw Pact, the German Question and the Birth of the CSCE Process, 1961–1970
8 – Romania, Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1967–1975
9 – Preserving the Status Quo or Promoting Change: The Role of the CSCE in the Perception of Polish Authorities
10 – Bulgaria, Balkan Diplomacy and the Road to Helsinki
11 – Unintended Consequences: Soviet Interests, Expectations and Reactions to the Helsinki Final Act
Archival Sources
Archival Sources
Contributors
Index

Citation preview

Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe

Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe

o

Edited by

Oliver Bange and

Gottfried Niedhart

Berghahn Books New York • Oxford

Published in 2008 by Berghahn Books www.berghahnbooks.com © 2008 Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Helsinki 1975 and the transformation of Europe / edited by Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 978-1-84545-491-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. 2. Germany (West)—Foreign relations—Europe, Eastern. 3. Europe, Eastern—Foreign relations—Germany (West). 4. Europe—Politics and government—1945. 5. European cooperation. 6. Detente. 7. Cold War. I. Bange, Oliver. II. Niedhart, Gottfried. JZ1592.H45 2008 327.4304709'046—dc22 2008008213 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Printed in the United States on acid-free paper

Contents

o Preface

vii

List of Abbreviations

ix

Introduction Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

1

1. An Intricate Web: Ostpolitik, the European Security System and German Unification Oliver Bange

23

2. Peaceful Change of Frontiers as a Crucial Element in the West German Strategy of Transformation Gottfried Niedhart

39

3. France and the German Question in the Context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1969–1974 Marie-Pierre Rey 53 4. Transformation or Status Quo: The Conflict of Stratagems in Washington over the Meaning and Purpose of the CSCE and MBFR, 1969–1973 Stephan Kieninger 67 5. Britain, the German Question and the Transformation of Europe: From Ostpolitik to the Helsinki Conference, 1963–1975 Luca Ratti

––

83

vi | Contents

6. Finlandisation in Reverse: The CSCE and the Rise and Fall of Economic Détente, 1968–1975 Juhana Aunesluoma

98

7. The Warsaw Pact, the German Question and the Birth of the CSCE Process, 1961–1970 Csaba Békés

113

8. Romania, Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1967–1975 Mihail E. Ionescu

129

9. Preserving the Status Quo or Promoting Change: The Role of the CSCE in the Perception of Polish Authorities Wanda Jarząbek

144

10. Bulgaria, Balkan Diplomacy and the Road to Helsinki Kostadin Grozev and Jordan Baev

160

11. Unintended Consequences: Soviet Interests, Expectations and Reactions to the Helsinki Final Act Svetlana Savranskaya

175

Archival Sources

191

References

193

Notes on Contributors

200

Index

203

Preface

o The conflict between East and West focused on numerous locations around the globe. From the very beginning, Europe, with divided Germany at the frontline of the conflict, was its epicentre. It was also in Europe that this conflict reached a decisive turning point in the 1960s, leading towards the era of détente. The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), with its Final Act in Helsinki in August 1975 also comprising the non-aligned and neutral states in Europe, led to a rapprochement between East and West in the fields of security, economy and culture. A decisive precondition for this multilateral phase of détente was the fact that the Federal Republic of Germany with her ‘new’ Ostpolitik had established new and constructive relations with her neighbours in Eastern and Central Europe. The changes in the mutual perceptions and rapprochement between the FRG and the member states of the Warsaw Pact are the focus of an international research project at the University of Mannheim, coordinated by the editors of this volume and financed by the VolkswagenStiftung (see http:// www.CSCE-1975.net). The project brings together colleagues from all former Warsaw Pact states, thus providing a framework for the kind of multinational approach to archival research deemed necessary to cope with the issues at stake. The majority of authors contributing to this volume participate in the Mannheim project. In addition, colleagues from countries not normally represented in the project agreed to contribute to this publication. The editors wish to express their gratitude to all of the contributors, who by working so successfully along the lines of the working hypotheses of this volume, have made possible one of those rare instances whereby the pieces fall into place and immediately connect to each other – an edited volume with one overriding argument.

– vii –

viii | Preface

Thanks also go to the native speakers – Philip and Martin Griffiths, Douglas McNichol, Girma Parris, George Wilkes, David Williamson – for their essential linguistic advice. Finally, special thanks go out to Marion Berghahn, who readily agreed to and supported our publication proposal. Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

Abbreviations

o AA Auswärtiges Amt AAPD Akten zur Auswärtigen Politik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland ABM Anti-Ballistic Missile(s) APAG Atlantic Policy Advisory Group BAPU Bulgarian Agrarian People’s Union BCP Bulgarian Communist Party CBM Confidence Building Measure(s) CC Central Committee (of CPs) CDU Christlich Demokratische Union CESC Conference on European Security and Cooperation (later to become the CSCE) CoCom Coordinating Committee for Export to Communist Areas COMECON Council for Mutual Economic Assistance CP Communist Party CPSU Communist Party of the Soviet Union CSCE Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (later to become the OSCE) CSSR Ceskoslovenská Socialistická Republika CSU Christlich-Soziale Union DBPO Documents on British Policy Overseas DzDP Dokumente zur Deutschlandpolitik EC/EEC European (Economic) Community ESC European Security Conference ESS European Security System FCO/FO Foreign (and Commonwealth) Office

– ix –

 | Abbreviations

FDP Freie Demokratische Partei FRG Federal Republic of Germany FRUS Foreign Relations of the United States GATT General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade GDR German Democratic Republic HSWP Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party IMEMO Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Moscow IMF International Monetary Fund IRBM Intermediate-Range Ballistic Missile KGB Komitet gosudarstvennoj bezopasnosti (Committee for State Security) KOR Workers’ Defence Committee MBFR Mutual Balanced Force Reductions MFA Ministry of Foreign Affairs MFN Most Favoured Nation MPT Multilateral Preparatory Talks (for CSCE) NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization N+N Neutral and Non-aligned (states, participating in CSCE) NPT Non-Proliferation Treaty NSC National Security Council (US) OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OSCE Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe PC Political Committee (the Politburo of the HSWP) PCC Permanent Consultative Committee (of the WP) PUWP Polish United Workers’ Party RCP Romanian Communist Party RFE Radio Free Europe SALT Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands SED SPD Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands UN United Nations Organization Union of Socialist Soviet Republics USSR US/USA United States of America WP Warsaw Pact WTO World Trade Organization

Introduction

o

Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

Throughout the 1960s, international relations, and particularly those between East and West, underwent a constant yet momentous change. ‘Berlin’ and ‘Cuba’ became the synonyms of a Cold War on the verge of a worldwide catastrophe. At the same time, the acknowledgement of this volatile and potentially fatal situation by both the wider public and key decision makers led to a comprehensive rethinking of the East-West conflict on both sides and to a number of new approaches, all aimed at ‘civilising’ the confrontation. The variety of stratagems developed at that time are widely subsumed under the term of ‘détente’, which was so generally deemed to be of central significance that it even lent its name to an entire era. For the Soviet Union, the hegemonic power in Eastern Europe, the decisive precondition for entry into this era of détente was the recognition of the post-war status quo. Ultimately, this was the Soviet motive behind the call for a European Security Conference. The FRG remained crucial to the West’s positive reaction to this idea, and all the more so since it was traditionally a revisionist state. Things began to move in the second half of the 1960s, when Bonn began to talk and to negotiate with its neighbours in Central and Eastern Europe about the concept of a mutual renunciation of force in their respective relations. Yet even the new Ostpolitik now emerging in Bonn did not envisage the recognition of the current status quo, merely declaring West Germany’s intention to respect it. This constituted an axiomatic conflict of interests between Bonn and Moscow. Now, however, both sides were determined to change the character of this confrontation, away from Cold War behaviour Notes for this section begin on page 16.

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patterns to the kind of antagonistic co-operation which became a trademark of the détente years. De Gaulle’s ‘détente’, Johnson’s ‘bridge building’, Brandt’s Ostpolitik, Brezhnev’s ‘peaceful coexistence’ – all of these concepts (like the actual course of events which would follow in the early 1970s) began with bilateral treaties, paving the way for multilateralisation and even institutionalisation of this new mode of conduct. Through this process, the European Security Conference originally envisaged became the CSCE – the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe – essentially based on a Western concept of mutual security. The CSCE process focused on both the territorial order in Europe, to which the German question still held the key, and the lessening of tensions in EastWest relations by expanding the contacts between Western and Eastern Europe. The CSCE’s Final Act, signed on 1 August 1975 in Helsinki, offered a perspective at last on how the division of the continent might eventually be overcome. The nature of support for this vision varied according to the different actors and their motives. As seen from the Federal Republic of Germany, the CSCE at least offered an opportunity to work for greater permeability of the inner-German border and – in the long run – for an end to the nation’s division. Bonn’s second long-term goal was the liberalisation of Eastern Europe by opening up the Soviet empire to the West, thus weakening the hold of its hegemony over its allies. The reactions of the Warsaw Pact’s member states ranged from open rapprochement to an emphasis on the threat posed by the West’s diplomacy, according to their national interests and self-perception. The contributions collected in this volume focus on two overriding themes: (1) the mutual perceptions of national interests – their underlying differences and partial parallelism; and (2) the stages of rapprochement particularly noticeable at the dividing line of the East-West conflict. From the very start, the book project worked on the assumption that national perceptions are based both on a relatively rigid historical picture of the other side and – simultaneously – on long-term changes in attitude. By pursuing these lines of argument through different phases of the history of détente leading up to Helsinki in the summer of 1975, as well as through the differing national perspectives on the subject, the book seeks to offer an important contribution to the history of national perceptions and relations for the period in question. Furthermore, it assembles some momentous and new insights into the key factors ruling the perception of Germany’s role within an enlarged Europe. With these contributions in mind, this book does not attempt a comprehensive history of the CSCE. Instead, its purpose is to collect and put forward in an accessible form recent research on, and early interpretations of, what the authors consider to be the most important issues dealt with within the CSCE: peaceful change of frontiers and free movement of persons and ideas, with the German question naturally being of special relevance to both issues.

Introduction | 

Because the Helsinki Final Act of August 1975 did incorporate both of these core issues, the CSCE up to 1975, and then the continuing CSCE process, did indeed become the multilateralised instrument for change, which Western proponents of a strategy for transforming communist societies had long envisaged it to be. If the German problem was the key to a successful CSCE, the transformation of East European societies and existing geopolitical realities was the main impetus for the government in Bonn to go along with a European Security Conference. This, of course, leads to the questions how and how far Western strategies for transformation were perceived by the member states of the Warsaw Pact. Eastern Bloc calculations depended on a variety of national interests and viewpoints as much as on a remarkably wide spectrum of opinion about future developments based on multilateral détente.

Object, Scope and Aims The range of essays that follow have been selected to highlight the complicated web of relations emerging from the late 1960s onwards at the frontline of the East-West conflict in Europe. This development was only possible because both in the East and the West the confrontational policies of the Cold War began to subside in favour of considerations at how a relative détente could be reached that would serve each party’s specific national or bloc interests. Important impulses came from the United States, where the Johnson administration pursued its ambiguous policy of ‘bridge building’,1 from France, where de Gaulle’s policy of détente questioned the logic of bloc confrontation,2 from Brussels, where in 1967 NATO accepted in the Harmel report its double strategy of deterrence and détente,3 but also from the Soviet Union, where a new concept of the status quo was proclaimed that – at least from a Western perspective – constituted important progress over the offensive nature of Soviet approaches during the years spanning the Berlin and Cuban crises from 1958–1962.4 However, real progress in East-West relations in Europe could only come about if and when the FRG would come to pursue a ‘new’ policy towards the East – the Neue Ostpolitik, which overturned the axiom developed in the 1950s that a solution of the German question would have to precede détente. The Grand Coalition that came to power in December 1966 was prepared to steer this new course and to put into operation the policy of ‘change through rapprochement’ that Brandt and Bahr formulated from 1963 onward. The ‘Prague Spring’ had its sources in the local reform movement. At the same time, the reformers’ attempt to break through Czechoslovakia’s international isolation by turning to the West – and that meant not least to West Germany – greatly contributed to the international dimension of the resulting crisis. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, Bonn had every interest in showing that its establishment of diplomatic relations

 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

with Romania in January 1967 was not intended to constitute an exception. The FRG therefore negotiated with Prague on various secret and official levels until the Soviet intervention in August 1968 put a brutal end to the relationship. The Ostpolitik of the Grand Coalition became a target of both Eastern propaganda and French diplomatic opposition, both accusing Bonn of intending to break the CSSR out of the Warsaw Pact.5 This fractious situation did not last for long, however: the détente-minded faction in Moscow soon obtained the upper hand, arguing for a political and economic détente including the FRG. Already months before the establishment of the social-liberal coalition in Bonn in October 1969, secret Soviet-West German exchanges became a regular feature. In 1969/70 the FRG became the Soviet Union’s favourite partner in Western Europe. On the Western side, the FRG had rapidly transformed from a prime obstacle into a proponent of détente. Reactions to Bonn’s Ostpolitik within the Warsaw Pact varied greatly. However, the result was a de-escalation of the East-West conflict through treaties on various levels. This did not necessarily constitute a linear process that had to result in the multilateralisation of the CSCE. The present multi-perspective research project will attempt to follow the steps towards progress and the set-backs leading up to the Helsinki Final Act of 1975, to the destruction of enemy-images and to various forms of rapprochement across the continent’s still existing line of division. After long years of negotiations, the conference of the heads of government that gathered in Helsinki in 1975 stood both for the recognition of postwar realities in Europe and for the beginning of a new form of multilateral dynamism in East-West relations. With regard to both aspects, Bonn’s new Ostpolitik proved crucial – despite having met with rather mixed responses in the East. At the beginning, various national positions could be distinguished. Gomułka in Poland and Ulbricht in the GDR harboured serious concerns about the dangers of the new West German ‘strategy of subversion and softening-up’.6 They felt their fears confirmed by the events in the CSSR. The Czech reformers provoked an immediate counter-reaction from the dogmatic forces in the Warsaw Pact. At the same time, Hungary – after successfully buying room for domestic and economic manoeuvre through strict obedience in foreign policy – was only waiting for a signal to open up relations with the West. In Romania Ceauşescu had long cast himself as the protagonist of East-West détente – a détente that was not to lead to any liberalisation in his own country. The leader of the Bulgarian CP, Todor Shivkov, did not want – nor was he able – to leave the protection of Bulgaria’s almighty Soviet comrades – though at the same time he would have liked to reactivate his country’s traditional economic ties with Germany, more precisely with the FRG, as soon as possible. Since 1954, calls for a European Security Conference had been a standard feature of Eastern propaganda. However, it was only in the so-called Budapest appeal of March 1969 that rhetoric was replaced by a serious desire for negotiation. This

Introduction | 

meant that Bonn’s new policy towards the East met with relatively positive conditions in Eastern Europe. Against this background, the planning staff in Bonn’s foreign office under Egon Bahr drew up a strategic blueprint envisaging, after a phase of bilateral treaties on the renunciation of force, a multilateralisation of Ostpolitik that would institutionalise détente in Europe. The aim was a conference at which a comprehensive European Security System should be established, which would eventually help to put the German question again on the international agenda. Furthermore, this conference would lead to more freedom of information and movement of people throughout the Warsaw Pact. It was thus an instrument to induce change in the societies and economic systems of Central and Eastern Europe. With its acceptance of the territorial status quo in Europe, Bonn delivered a necessary precondition for the realisation of the conference. At the same time, this provided the necessary leverage to get the central Western demands, shared and put forward by the member states of NATO and by the neutral states equally, codified in Basket III of the Final Act. Only this turned the original Soviet ideas on the contents and results of a European Security Conference into the opposite of what the Soviets had intended.

Levels of Analysis The contributors to this book have each analysed three aspects of the history of East-West relations. Through these leading questions, the specific national findings are virtually interlinked. The following levels of analysis can be distinguished: (1) the level of East-West communication; (2) the level of mutual perceptions; and (3) the level of bilateral relations within the international system. The essays clearly show that these levels remained inseparable, presenting a net of mutual influences. The term ‘communication’ is a key issue in two ways. Apart from serving as a kind of chiffre in the language of some key actors at the time, it has been used in historiography and the social sciences as having specific analytic connotations. For the proponents of a ‘new’ Ostpolitik of the FRG, the term even encapsulated the gist of their policy. For Brandt, as mayor of West Berlin, the building of the Berlin Wall meant that one needed ‘as many points of real contact and as much meaningful communication as possible’.7 What Brandt and others were aiming for was a policy of East-West communication,8 such as did indeed take shape in the Final Act of the CSCE in 1975. Communication was not meant to harmonise fundamental antagonisms, but to de-escalate existing conflicts of interest. ‘Communicative methods’9 introduced a new element to East-West détente, providing for the exchange of information and thus introducing an element of greater precision to the formation of perceptions of each other. Carriers of communication could be political leaders or top officials, as was, for

 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

example, the case with the secret communication channels established in late 1969 in the triangle Bonn-Washington-Moscow.10 In the early phase of détente, informal forms of dialogue prevailed,11 non-official contacts through journalists, businessmen, church-representatives, academics, representatives of political parties or trade unions, understanding that they were not simply acting in their own private interest. Non-governmental actors often stood in for their governments who did not (yet) maintain diplomatic relations.12 The network of lines of communication between East and West, growing continuously over the decade preceding the CSCE summit in 1975, remains central to all of the essays assembled in this book. As to communication as an analytical tool, the term refers to the concept of –‘communicative action’13 as developed in the political sciences in conjunction with the work of Jürgen Habermas. According to this discussion, two types of ‘communicative action’ have to be distinguished: those communicative actions that are aimed at reaching an understanding with the recipient; and those that aim at strategic advantages in pursuit of outflanking the other side and pushing through one’s own position. In theory, this makes for two types of juxtaposed behaviourism. However, historically it can safely be assumed (and has already been shown in preliminary works)14 that the two approaches were overlapping. The course of détente proved that both the FRG and the USSR and its partners in the Warsaw Pact pursued both co-operative communication on the one hand and egotistic defence and increase of power, influence and status on the other. The second level of analysis – focusing on mutual perceptions – is dedicated to the description of this ambivalence. Here, the starting point is the hypothesis that an increased flow of information between the states of the Warsaw Pact and the FRG and the increasingly dialogical form of communication led to a destruction of the rigid inimical images of the Cold War, while the fundamental juxtaposition of both sides in the East-West conflict remained intact. The conflict between the Warsaw Pact (who insisted on the acceptance of the status quo and the maintenance of its system) and the FRG (who aimed at overcoming the status quo in a process of peaceful change) continued and dominated analyses made on both sides. On this level of analysis, all of the contributions in the present book investigate the relations between the states of the Warsaw Pact and the FRG in the perception-paradigm.15 This means that the details of the self-perceptions and the definition of interests of the states in question are brought into relation with the perception of their counterparts. How compatible were self-perception (how does each side view itself?) and the perception of the other (how does each side view the other?)? To what extent were actors able to develop empathy and put themselves in the position of the other? West Germany’s Ostpolitik calculated on changing the status quo – the division of Germany and of Europe – in the long term by preliminarily accepting

Introduction | 

it within the framework of a new European Security System. The central question posed is how the Federal Government estimated the chances for realising its strategic goal and what possibilities were seen to influence the East and to induce the process of system change. On the other hand it is asked if this West German double strategy (communication through contacts and the inducement of change in the East through this communication) was recognised by the states of the Warsaw Pact; and if so, how it was judged. Naturally, these processes of perception were multifaceted in nature, and conflicting perceptions resulted both from the interests of groups involved (parties, economy, military, etc.) and from the ideological-programmatic background. Exactly how perceptions were transformed into policy during the détente era of the East-West conflict is the focus of the third level of analysis. This level deals with the bilateral and multilateral relations of the states involved and the decision-making process of their governments. Individual phases and steps in the construction of relations between the states of the Warsaw Pact and the FRG (as sketched out before) are described and analysed under both cross-bloc and intra-bloc auspices. Of particular importance is the question of the room for manoeuvre of the individual states. How and to what extent did the détente- and CSCE-process influence the state and nature of the respective alliance systems? The starting point for both the analysis of political relations and the other two levels of analysis is the assumption that the traditional usage of the term ‘Cold War’ requires both limitation and further precision. International research habitually uses the term for the description of the entire period between the end of the Second World War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. But the various forms of the East-West conflict differed too significantly to allow for a single characterisation of relations as simply being in the state of Cold War. It is therefore better to adopt the term ‘East-West conflict’16 to describe the global political conflict which dominated international politics in the second half of the twentieth century. Furthermore, the individual findings assembled here support the hypothesis that the period 1966–1975 saw a transformation of the Cold War – one form of the East-West conflict – towards détente, viewed as a new form for the pursuit of this conflict.17 Already contemporaries spoke about the fact that ‘the traditional categories of “East” and “West” [had] lost their importance’.18 In 1973, Brezhnev declared the ideology of the Cold War to be obsolete,19 and Kissinger stressed in 1975 that the East-West conflict was then pursued by ‘modern methods’, which stood in marked contrast to those of the Cold War.20

Research Status These complex questions can only be adequately tackled both by extensive research in international archives and overcoming the national perspectives

 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

usually observed by most authors. Compared to this requirement, research on the CSCE process is still in its very beginnings, partly due to the international thirty-year rule for archival access. All contributions in this volume give proof of the fact that their authors had to break new academic ground. When Jost Dülffer recently named the desiderata for research on the CSCE, he was entirely correct in stating that so far the CSCE had ‘not been analysed on the basis of internal documents’ and that there exists a lack of ‘in-depth research’ on various aspects of the rapprochement between East and West.21 This is not to say that the research presented in this volume is isolated from recent trends in historiography. Of course, it builds on a body of research dealing with the era of détente in general22 and with the early history and the beginnings of the CSCE in particular. However, the issue of a European Security Conference has thus far either remained a domain of political scientists23 or a subject of memoirs by former diplomats.24 Historical research going beyond published material and beyond long-established academic axioms25 still remains at a rudimentary stage. A conference on ‘Eastern Europe and Western Europe in the Cold War 1965–1975’ recently organised by Wilfried Loth and Georges Soutou produced first insights.26 But even here, the focus was placed on the CSCE as a new kind of institution for – to stay in contemporary terminology – ‘civilising’ the conflict between East and West, or as a catalyst for the liberalisation of individual member states of the Warsaw Pact. Its importance for the changes in perceptions and relations, particularly regarding the two German states and their European neighbours, was still not addressed. Generally, this was also true of the conference ‘At the Roots of a European Security System’ in Zurich in September 2005, which looked at the international system during the years of détente from the perspective of almost all states participating in the CSCE.27 Regarding the international relations of states in Central and Eastern Europe, the research collected in this volume could build on various studies, partially by the authors themselves. Thus, Wanda Jarząbek has contributed a chapter to an edited volume on the reaction of the states of the Warsaw Pact towards the Ostpolitik of the FRG.28 This volume is among the few examples of historiography aiming at transnational, comparative analysis. Another work that falls into this category is the documentation of the history of the Warsaw Pact by Vojtech Mastny and Malcolm Byrne.29 On the question of threatperception and the assessment of the military potential of the other side, this book is complemented by volumes edited by Gustav Schmidt on NATO.30 Oliver Bange’s forthcoming book on the origins of détente in the late 1960s goes well beyond the established national perspective in trying to reconstruct the beginnings of Bonn’s relations with Eastern Europe within the context of the international system, working from a multifaceted, multi-archival perspective.31 A further volume worth mentioning is that edited by Hans Süssmuth on

Introduction | 

the image of Germany – or of the two Germanys – in Eastern Europe,32 and the latest volume of the Archiv für Sozialgeschichte has undertaken the laudable task of assembling the latest research on the relationship between society and state within the context of East-West détente since the 1960s.33 As to new directions and the latest status of research on Ostpolitik, the article by Niedhart and Bange and a recent research report in the Archiv für Sozialgeschichte (2006) provide the reader with ample information.34 With respect to particular aspects, Axel Schildt gives an overview of the various reasons for Bonn’s tense relations with Eastern Europe.35 Karsten Rudolph focuses on the concepts for a new Ostpolitik developed by West German industry.36 Pertti Ahonen analyses the role of the refugee organisations and their impact on the FRG’s relations with Eastern Europe, particularly for the 1950s.37 Of course, the German question with all its various aspects and implications constituted a central problem not only to both German states but also to the states of Central and Eastern Europe. Both the question of the GDR’s recognition and the formation of German-German relations have attracted considerable academic attention.38 Mary Sarotte’s work deals exclusively with the policies and strategies pursued by the GDR’s leadership.39 However, relatively little is known about either the GDR’s role within the Eastern bloc40 or the GDR’s impact on the Eastern debate about Germany’s future. Smaller publications by Douglas Selvage at least show the attempts of the East German and Polish leadership to construct a line of defence against Bonn’s Ostpolitik.41 This policy reached its limits when the Soviet Union’s interest in East-West détente became apparent in 1969/7042 and when Poland also changed course towards constructive détente with the West. Despite the fact that Poland – ‘between Germany and Russia’43 – played an important role for Ostpolitik, and beyond for the entire system of states in Eastern Europe, the body of historical research dedicated to the country’s role in the era of East-West détente is still rather limited, mainly contained within publications by Jarząbek,44 Bingen45 and Tomala.46 Historiography on East Germany’s role in an internal, particularly a CSCE, context is equally scarce. Due to the general state of research the GDR is in fact the only Warsaw Pact country missing from this volume. Yet the GDR was – both as an object and a player – a central element in the CSCE negotiations. Back in October 1969, the GDR took what might be called an aggressive posture regarding the aims and prospects of a future conference on European security. A position paper prepared by Siegfried Bock’s department, the Grundsatzabteilung, in East Berlin’s foreign ministry spoke on over fifty pages about ‘driving the Americans out of Europe’, ‘preventing the EEC from developing into a political union’, ‘stopping the special relationship between Bonn and Washington’, ‘using the French to drive a wedge into Western Europe’, ‘overcoming the aggressive NATO’ and ‘spreading socialism in Western Europe’.47 By September

10 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

1971, however, the SED Politburo was feeling the heat. There was pressure from Moscow, even from Brezhnev himself, to speed up the inner-German negotiations in order to open up the road to what would then become Helsinki.48 After some heavy tutelage by Soviet diplomats, the Grundsatzabteilung got back to the drawing board and prepared a number of documents which amounted to an almost 180 degree turn. Now the GDR goals were redefined as ‘keeping peace in Europe’, ‘guaranteeing the state borders’, ‘economic and other cooperation’ with the West – and ‘developing socialism in one’s own country’ – effectively a defensive posture.49 This change in the GDR’s policy goals, combined with the eventual signature of what might be considered its own death call, of course raises a number of important questions: Was the aggressive posture of 1969 still co-ordinated with Soviet policy? On which levels and how were Moscow’s wishes for a constructive GDR course in the CSCE negotiations channelled to the East Germans? And – most importantly – why did the new SED leadership under Erich Honecker not pursue its own interests more forcefully, particularly after being warned by its own secret service over the eventual consequences of a CSCE agreement to the GDR’s internal stability?50 The CSCE project at Mannheim has started to fill this much-desired historiographical gap. First results were published as an e-dossier in co-operation with the Cold War International History Project, aided by translations of key documents from the GDR’s foreign ministry.51 It is generally true that, due to the accessibility of documents, research on East-West relations has tended to concentrate on Western players. By contrast, this book, with its fair share of Eastern and Western perspectives, might contribute to rebalancing our view of the détente era, at least – it is hoped – as far as the history and the impact of CSCE and German-Soviet relations within this context are concerned.52 In 1967/68 Bonn’s Ostpolitik was very much focused on Czechoslovakia, which changed dramatically through the Soviet crushing of the ‘Prague Spring’.53 As a consequence, the establishment of official relations between Prague and Bonn in 1973 was the last of the critical bilateral treaties foreseen in the grand design of Ostpolitik.54 And it was only after the Treaty of Prague that the FRG’s relations with Hungary and Bulgaria could also be normalised.55 The preceding overview has concentrated on research and publications in the last decade, during which the so-called New Cold War History56 has formed a new phase in the historical analysis of East-West relations. For reasons of space and argument, the literature of the 1980s, which often profited in Western countries from private paper collections becoming accessible well before the thirty-year rule, was not listed here – although it can easily be located through the cited works. Finally it can be said that the research in this book – by drawing on some relevant preliminary works and greatly assisted by newly accessible source

Introduction | 11

material in the archives of all states covered – provides a first impulse for new research on a comprehensive documentary basis. All contributions in this volume point to the same set of questions, apparently essential for our understanding of the processes at work throughout the 1970s and 1980s. These questions include the origins and nature of the process of transformation in Europe, national perceptions and their changes, and the – ultimately – peaceful solution of the German question and the border issues involved. If there is one general conclusion from the findings of this volume, then it must be that further multi-archival and multi- and transnational research is urgently needed. From this then, one might expect valid explanations for the process leading to an integrated Europe with all its optimistic hopes and unavoidable stagnation, in an era which saw the most momentous change in European post-war history, and which has to be perceived as the starting point of the development leading up to 1989/90.

Contributions – Their Findings and Arguments The significance of the German factor for détente and for the role granted to the CSCE in national and bloc policies – both internally and externally – turned out to be the major theme connecting all contributions. It therefore seems apt to start the book with an explanation of what West Germany’s Neue Ostpolitik was about. As Oliver Bange explains, the fact that the final results of the CSCE played well into the hands of Bonn’s Ostpolitik was far from a coincidence. When asked by Willy Brandt during the Grand Coalition of the late 1960s to draw up a blueprint for a new policy towards Eastern Europe and on national unification, Egon Bahr immediately pointed at the opportunities which the West – and particularly West Germany – could gain by seizing Moscow’s ESC pet-toy. For Brandt and Bahr, the ESC/CSCE constituted only an intermediary step between the initiation of détente through bilateral – yet interlinked – treaties and their final aim of establishing an all-European security system. This, it was thought, would meet the legitimate security interests of all states involved in Europe (including the United States and the USSR), thus providing an ideal framework in which a coming-together of the two German states might finally be envisaged. The CSCE and successful negotiations on a large-scale reduction of troops on both sides (MBFR) – and particularly along the German-German border – were seen as catalysts for a gradual looseningup and even dismantling of the two blocs and as preconditions for the final framework of a European security system. The analysis shows that this security-dimension constituted the second important long-term strategy encapsulated in Ostpolitik, besides the multiplication of contacts, which were intended to transform communist societies from within.

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It is this other strategy behind Ostpolitik that Gottfried Niedhart’s contribution focuses on. He rightly depicts the FRG as a revisionist state in search of peaceful means for obtaining its national objectives. Although the Helsinki Final Act referred to the ‘peaceful change of frontiers’, Niedhart’s analysis widens the scope of ‘peaceful change’ to include the transformation of Eastern European societies under communist rule, something which Bonn’s diplomacy sought to attain with the help of Basket III. For the key decision makers in Bonn, ‘peaceful change’ and ‘free movement’ remained inseparably linked throughout the CSCE negotiations. They successfully withheld their agreement on the territorial status quo until the decisive phase of the negotiations in late 1974/early 1975, when, in a classic piece of triangulation between Washington, Bonn and Moscow, a tit-for-tat deal on these issues – so essential for a successful outcome of the CSCE – was finally struck. Marie-Pierre Rey paints a comprehensive picture of President Pompidou’s calculations in the age of Ostpolitik and of the CSCE. Pompidou differed in a variety of ways from his famous predecessor, Charles de Gaulle. For him, Europe certainly did not stretch from the Atlantic to the Urals; and the concept of a lofty ‘grandeur’ was alien to him personally and also presented a political stance no longer feasible in times when Brandt’s Ostpolitik led the way to ever increasing East-West contacts. His doubts about Ostpolitik were more about matters of procedure than content. While supportive of the underlying rationale for transforming communist rule in Eastern Europe, he also feared that quick successes might incense German nationalism and that a scenario similar to the Prague spring on German soil could drag the entire world into a nuclear catastrophe. Likewise, Pompidou differed fundamentally from Nixon, whose attempts to obstruct the transformative intentions behind Ostpolitik and détente he repeatedly denounced. For Pompidou, as Rey perceptively points out, the CSCE became the ideal solution. On the defensive side, CSCE would multilateralise Ostpolitik and thus bring it back under control; and on the offensive side, CSCE offered an ideal platform to conduct France’s own European policy, thus enabling it to play a crucial role in the reshaping of the continent while pursuing the transformation and liberalisation of Eastern Europeans, something in which Pompidou took a life-long interest. Stephan Kieninger’s research offers some exciting new answers to the question of why the CSCE became a success despite the hostile attitude displayed towards it by Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger. Presenting new and rich source material, Kieninger argues that the important and constructive role of the United States in proceedings was underpinned by three factors: first, the almost clandestine survival of the American transformation strategy, developed during the Johnson years within the State Department; second, the White House’s almost utter neglect of the negotiations in Geneva and Helsinki;

Introduction | 13

and third, the long-established networks encompassing key West European proponents of the transformation strategy. The strategy could galvanise US policy makers as long as it was sufficiently low key so as not to be spotted and then counteracted upon through written guidance by the White House. With his interpretation – confirmed and refined by numerous eye witnesses – Kieninger goes well beyond established historiography, which has tended to dismiss the issue as a mere clash of personalities between National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger and Foreign Secretary William Rogers, or as a classic bureaucratic struggle. Luca Ratti’s contribution then examines the attitudes of the British government towards the CSCE. Once again, it becomes clear how important the dynamic set off by Ostpolitik was for the position taken by the major Western powers with regard to new relations with Eastern Europe. Two conclusions from Ratti’s analysis are of particular relevance in this respect. Only a very restricted circle of persons within the government and Whitehall had a full understanding of the long-term strategy of transformation, so actively pursued from Bonn and Paris. While Prime Minister Edward Heath generally supported Ostpolitik, he remained sceptical about the virtues of a CSCE, an attitude which changed significantly once Harold Wilson was re-elected in 1974. However, throughout the Conservative and Labour governments of the period it seems that questions of status – or rather loss of status in East-West affairs and particularly in Western Europe – remained a decisive factor determining British diplomacy in and around the CSCE. The ‘boom and bust’ of economic détente – encapsulated in Basket II of the Helsinki Final Act – is scrutinised by Juhana Aunesluoma. The author deals with historiographical sophistication with a well-known cliché about the latter stages of the East-West conflict, namely that Western economic aid prolonged the life of communist regimes unnecessarily and irresponsibly, that economic interdependency first and foremost led to compromising Western positions particularly with regard to the Polish crisis in 1979–81. Instead, Aunesluoma looks at the effects of economic interdependency on the communist regimes of Eastern Europe. Whilst acknowledging that the CSCE did not trigger an East-West economic boom, Aunesluoma is nevertheless able to show that the relaxation and extension of economic and trade contacts did have an important impact on the organisation of Eastern economies and on the perception of the capitalist West and the communist self by Eastern Europeans, particularly within the smaller Warsaw Pact states. At the same time, economic détente – pioneered by German Osthandel in the 1960s – led to a growing dependence of communist regimes on Western trade and finance, thus increasing Western security. Dependence, security, societal uneasiness and desire for change, Aunesluoma claims, constituted the key factors behind the generally peaceful transformations taking place in 1989/90.

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Csaba Békés extends the analysis to the intentions, expectations and perceptions current within the Warsaw Pact as regards the CSCE. His analysis focuses on the different national interests in proclaiming and pursuing a conference on European security matters between 1964 and 1970. The ‘German issue’ appears to have been omnipresent, as the Hungarian leadership in their repeated attempts at mediating between conflicting allies were soon enough to find out: Walter Ulbricht was after international diplomatic recognition of the GDR; Wladyslaw Gomułka after Bonn’s final acceptance of the Oder-Neisse border; for the Czechs and Slovaks the legal repercussions of the Munich Agreement were of tantamount importance; while Shivkov, Ceauşescu and Kadar were longing for an increase in beneficial economic ties with the FRG, and Brezhnev was still trying to consolidate his leadership in Moscow. Once this was done – much helped by the crisis in Czechoslovakia in 1968 – things began to move towards multilateral détente. The climax of international détente – as it was then envisaged in Eastern European capitals – was to be a CSCE, which promised to hold the answers to everyone’s desires. Based on recently declassified documents, Mihail Ionescu’s analysis of Romania’s interests in close ties with Bonn throughout the period under consideration offers numerous, fascinating insights into the frictions then already in existence within the Warsaw Pact. Ionescu is able to show the highly significant effect for Romania’s economy of the establishment of official relations with Bonn in 1967. This ‘special relationship’ between Bucharest and Bonn also paid off for both sides during the CSCE negotiations. Ceauşescu’s motives for engaging in such a close relationship with West Germany were manifold: apart from handsome economic and financial advantages and international recognition, a strong impetus came from the ‘Yalta syndrome’ – Bucharest’s fear of Soviet domination. One of the most remarkable and important aspects of Ionescu’s research is the revelation that Romania’s communist leadership, in their overriding interest in revising the post-war system, were aware of the goals behind Ostpolitik – German unification through transforming communist societies – and not concerned about them. Wanda Jarząbek then looks at the Polish approach to the CSCE, from the early Rapacki proposals to the late 1980s. According to Jarząbek, three considerations dominated Polish CSCE-diplomacy throughout: the security of its borders and security from Germany; improvements to the country’s economy; and more independence from the Soviet Union. In the summer of 1975, at the height of détente, Warsaw was satisfied that it had obtained safe Western borders through their preliminary acknowledgement by Bonn in the Warsaw Treaty of 1970 and through the ‘inviolability of frontiers’ codified in the Helsinki Final Act. The other side of Polish strategy within the CSCE was much influenced by the EEC’s success in integrating Western economies. Through economic détente within a CSCE framework, the Polish authorities planned

Introduction | 15

to link up to this new market, obtaining up-to-date technologies, modernising Polish production, raising living standards and thus easing internal unrest, and, as a result, limiting their dependence on the Soviet Union. For Bulgaria, as Jordan Baev and Kostadin Grozev argue, European-wide détente suddenly offered a whole spectrum of new and promising options which might be subsumed under the headings of military, economic, political and regional détente. Important economic advantages were to be gained, particularly in relations with West Germany, an undertaking much eased by the absence of bilateral conflicts, though Sofia continued to play good ally to East Berlin by supporting demands for its international recognition. Considerations for the furtherance of regional security through talks with the governments in Athens and Ankara came to be at least equally important. Initiatives for a ‘Nuclear Free Balkans’ and significant troop reductions in the region met with doubts from both superpowers, but continued well into the 1980s, thus constituting in themselves a stabilising factor. Perhaps due to the country’s geopolitical location, the Bulgarian CP leadership remained almost untouched by worries over ideological subversion, so common in other communist capitals at the time. Svetlana Savranskaya’s chapter analysing Soviet approaches to and perceptions of the CSCE is the story of a momentous historical irony. Moscow sought the conference, and by its successful realisation the Soviet leaders thought that they had made an important step towards obtaining their ultimate goals: confirmation of the status quo in Europe, recognition of the principle of nonintervention in internal affairs and an impetus for a European Security System which in time would replace both blocs, thus driving the Unites States effectively out of Europe. As Savranskaya notes, the Soviets lost on all accounts: the two German states united, the United States was there to stay and the rule of communism ceased. Tanks proved far less effective than ideas. The ink on Brezhnev’s signature under the Helsinki Final Act had not yet dried when dissident groups sprang up all over his empire citing the text of the document. The international CSCE process now followed hindered reckless prosecution of the dissidents. Many officials shared the ideas of the dissidents anyway, and later joined Mikhail Gorbachev in his attempt to reform the Soviet empire. Some dissidents even became members of the first democratically elected Supreme Soviet. The editors believe that this volume does more than serve their original intentions – which once again proves the value of multi-archival, multi-perspective, multi- and transnational approaches to historical research. By combining various pieces of the puzzle – which still remains far from complete – the final product, now in the hands of the reader, impressively shows the significance of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe for the course and outcome of the East-West conflict. By focusing on what were first

16 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

assumed and then proven to be the most important themes of the CSCE – the German question, peaceful change and free movement of persons and ideas – the synthesis of the contributions allows for a number of important conclusions. As the epitome and arguably the climax of European détente, the CSCE process and the negotiations leading up to it show what conditioned this era of détente. The importance that governments attached to it, and the efforts they directed towards its success, make clear the extent to which Europe was at the centre of the East-West conflict. Moreover, the eventual groundwork laid in Geneva and Helsinki, maintained during numerous follow-up conferences, albeit at times with great difficulty, had enormous consequences – and it is now clear that this was both intended and foreseeable – for the course and outcome of this ideological competition.

Notes 1. T. A. Schwartz, Lyndon B. Johnson and Europe (Cambridge, MA, 2003). 2. M. Vaїsse, La Grandeur: Politique étrangère du général de Gaulle 1958–1969 (Paris, 1998). 3. A. Wenger, ‘Crisis and Opportunity: NATO’s Transformation and Multilateralization of Détente, 1966–1968’, in Journal of Cold War Studies, 6/1 (Winter 2004): 22–74. 4. J. van Oudenaren, Détente in Europe: The Soviet Union and the West since 1953 (Durham, 1991). 5. For references to the current literature, see the section on the research status below. 6. For example, see Walter Ulbricht’s explanations during the SED Politburo meeting on 30 October 1969. SAPMO: DY30/3294. 7. DzDP IV/9, p. 567. Brandt in his speech at Tutzing on 15 July 1963, referring to his speech at Harvard in October 1962. 8. K.E. Birnbaum, The Politics of East-West Communication in Europe (Farnborough/ Hants., 1979). 9. H. Haftendorn, ‘Versuch einer Theorie der Entspannung’, in Sicherheitspolitik heute, 1975 (2), 232; G. Niedhart, ‘Deeskalation durch Kommunikation: Zur Ostpolitik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in der Ära Brandt’, in C. Hauswedell (ed.), Deeskalation von Gewaltkonflikten seit 1945 (Essen, 2006), 99–114. 10. For the back channel between Bonn and Moscow, see W. Keworkow, Der geheime Kanal: Moskau, der KGB und die Bonner Ostpolitik (Berlin, 1995). See also E. Bahr, Zu meiner Zeit (Munich, 1996), 282–286. 11. See H. Stehle, ‘Zufälle auf dem Weg zur neuen Ostpolitik: Aufzeichnungen über ein geheimes Treffen Egon Bahrs mit einem polnischen Diplomaten’, Vierteljahrs­ hefte für Zeitgeschichte, 43 (1995): 159–171. 12 An example of this informal communication was the special role played by Berthold Beitz, a leading manager of Krupp, who in 1969 informed the Polish

Introduction | 17

leadership in Warsaw about Brandt’s opinion that ‘the improvement of PolishGerman relations [ranks among] the most important requirements of foreign policy’. Brandt to Beitz, 4 June 1969; edited in W. Brandt, ‘Ein Volk der guten Nachbarn’: Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik 1969–1974, vol. 6 (Bonn, 2005), 235. An early example of this kind of ersatz-diplomacy was Khrushchev’s meeting with representatives of the ‘Aktion Sühnezeichen’ in January 1963 in East Berlin, after Mayor Brandt had to cancel an invitation by Khrushchev due to pressure by Berlin’s CDU. See M. Thomas, Communing with the Enemy: Covert Operations, Christianity and Cold War Politics in Britain and the GDR (Oxford, 2005), 92ff. See also G. Niedhart, ‘The East-West Problem as Seen from Berlin: Willy Brandt’s Early Ostpolitik’, in Wilfried Loth (ed.), Europe, Cold War and Coexistence 1953–1965 (London, 2004), 285–296. 13. J. Habermas, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, 2 vols. (Frankfurt/M., 1981). (English translation: The Theory of Communicative Action, 2 vols., 1985–1989). H. Müller, ‘Internationale Beziehungen als kommunikatives Handeln’, Zeitschrift für Internationale Beziehungen, 1 (1994): 15ff. This essay triggered a lengthy academic debate. 14. See G. Niedhart, ‘Revisionistische Elemente und die Initiierung friedlichen Wandels in der neuen Ostpolitik 1967–1974’, Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 28 (2002): 233–266. 15. For the methodological background, see R. Jervis, The Logic of Images in International Relations (Princeton, 1970); idem, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton, 1976); idem et al., Psychology and Deterrence (Baltimore, 1985); M. W. Richter, ‘The Perception Method for Analysing Political Conflicts’, in K. Gottstein (ed.), Tomorrow’s Europe: The Views of Those Concerned (Frankfurt and New York, 1995), 731–751; R. Frank, ‘Mentalitäten, Vorstellungen und internationale Beziehungen’, in W. Loth and J. Osterhammel (eds.), Internationale Geschichte: Themen – Ergebnisse – Aussichten (Munich, 2000), 159–185; G. Niedhart, ‘Selektive Wahrnehmung und politisches Handeln: Internationale Beziehungen im Perzeptionsparadigma’, in ibid., 141–157. 16. See W. Link, Der Ost-West-Konflikt: Die Organisation der internationalen Beziehungen im 20. Jahrhundert, 2nd ed. (Stuttgart, 1988). 17. See J. Hanhimäki, ‘Ironies and Turning Points: Détente in Perspective’, in O. A. Westad (ed.), Reviewing the Cold War: Approaches, Interpretations, Theory (London, 2000), 326–342. 18. AdsD, HSA, vol. 5990, Finance Minister Schmidt in a speech welcoming his American colleague George Shultz, Bonn, 5 October 1973. 19. AdsD; WBA, BKA, f. 51, letter by Pompidou to Brandt, citing Brezhnev, 30 June 1973. 20. H. Giusto, M. Munteanu and C. Ostermann (eds.), The Road to Helsinki: The Early Steps to the CSCE, Selected Documents (Collection of Documents, distributed for the participants of the International Conference on the CSCE, Florence, 2003), memcon President Ford, Japan’s Prime Minister Miki, Henry Kissinger, Washington, 5 August 1975. 21. J. Dülffer, Europa im Ost-West-Konflikt 1945–1991 (Munich, 2004), 187–188. 22. See, for example, G. Schmidt (ed.), Ost-West-Beziehungen: Konfrontation und Détente 1945–1989, 3 vols. (Bochum 1993–95); R. L. Garthoff, Détente and Confontation: American-Soviet Relations from Nixon to Reagan (Washington D.C.,

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1994); W. Loth, Helsinki, 1. August 1975: Entspannung und Abrüstung (Munich, 1998); G. H. Soutou, La guerre de cinquante ans: Le conflit Est-Ouest 1943–1990 (Paris, 2001); J. Suri, Power and Protest: Global Revolution and the Rise of Détente (Cambridge, MA, 2003); D. C. Geyer and B. Schäfer (eds.), American Détente and German Ostpolitik 1969–1972 (Washington D.C., 2004); J. Hanhimäki, The Flawed Architect: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy (Oxford, 2004); Wenger, ‘Crisis and Opportunity’; J. L. Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History (New York, 2005). For a comprehensive overview, see Dülffer, Europa. 23. See P. Schlotter, Die KSZE im Ost-West-Konflikt: Wirkung einer internationalen Institution (Frankfurt, 1998); S. Pöllinger, Die KSZE/OSZE als Friedens- und Menschenrechtsorganisation 1966–1998 (Munich, 2000); D. C. Thomas, The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism (Prince­ ton, 2001). 24. Beyond the usual scope of memoirs, see J. J. Maresca, To Helsinki: The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe 1973–1975 (Durham, 1987). 25. See V. Mastny, Helsinki: Human Rights and European Security: Analysis and Documentation (Durham, 1986); P. Becker, Die frühe KSZE-Politik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Hamburg, 1992). 26. W. Loth and G. H. Soutou (eds.), The Making of Détente: Eastern and Western Europe in the Cold War 1965–75 (London, 2008). 27. A. Wenger, V. Mastny and C. Nünlist (eds.), At the Roots of European Security: The Early Helsinki Process Revisited, 1965–1975 (London, 2008). 28. W. Jarząbek, ‘PRL wobec nowej polityki wschodniej RFN 1966–1967: Relacje w bloku wschodnim’, in J. Fiszer and J. Holzer (eds.), Recepcja Ostpolitik w RFN i w krajach bloku komunistycznego (Warsaw, 2004). 29. V. Mastny and M. Byrne (eds.), A Cardboard Castle? An Inside History of the Warsaw Pact 1955–1991 (Budapest, 2005). 30. G. Schmidt (ed.), A History of NATO: The First Fifty Years, 3 vols. (London, 2001). See also D. H. Allin, Cold War Illusions: America, Europe and Soviet Power 1969– 1989 (New York, 1998). 31. O. Bange, Ostpolitik und Détente: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mannheim, 2004) (publication forthcoming, 2009). For these decisive years, see also D. Taschler, Vor neuen Herausforderungen: Die außen- und deutschlandpolitische Debatte in der CDU/CSU-Bundestagsfraktion während der Großen Koalition (1966–1969) (Düsseldorf, 2001); K. Schönhoven, Wendejahre: Die Sozialdemokratie in der Zeit der Großen Koalition 1966–1969 (Bonn, 2004). 32. H. Süssmuth (ed.), Deutschlandbilder in Polen und Russland, in der Tschechoslowakei und in Ungarn (Baden-Baden, 1993). Focusing on the final days of the EastWest conflict, but with an eye on the historical dimension, see G. Trautmann (ed.), Die hässlichen Deutschen? Deutschland im Spiegel der westlichen und östlichen Nachbarn (Darmstadt, 1991). 33. Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 45 (2005). Among the authors are S. Berger and N. LaPorte (‘Britische Parlamentarierkontakte nach Osteuropa 1945–1989’), K. H. Schlarp (‘Die ökonomische Untermauerung der Entspannungspolitik’), G. Thiemeyer (‘Wandel durch Annäherung: Westdeutsche Journalisten in Osteuropa 1956–1977’), D. Bingen (‘Ostpolitik und demokratischer Wandel in Mittel- und Osteuropa: Der Testfall Polen’), N. Bégin (‘Kontakte zwischen Gewerkschaften in Ost und West’).

Introduction | 19

34. G. Niedhart and O. Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit” beseitigen: Ostpolitik in der zweiten außenpolitischen Formationsphase der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Übergang von den Sechziger- zu den Siebzigerjahren’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004): 415–448; O. Bange, ‘Ostpolitik – Etappen und Desiderate der Forschung: Zur internationalen Einordnung von Willy Brandts Außenpolitik’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte 46 (2006): 713–736. 35. A. Schildt, ‘Mending Fences: The Federal Republic of Germany and Eastern Europe’, in E. Mühle (ed.), Germany and the European East in the Twentieth Century (Oxford, 2003), 153–179. See also O. N. Haberl (ed.), Unfertige Nachbarschaften: Die Staaten Osteuropas und die Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Essen, 1989). 36. K. Rudolph, Wirtschaftsdiplomatie im Kalten Krieg: Die Ostpolitik der westdeutschen Großindustrie 1945–1991 (Frankfurt/M., 2004). 37. P. Ahonen, After the Expulsion: West Germany and Eastern Europe 1945–1990 (Oxford, 2003). 38. H. Potthoff, Im Schatten der Mauer: Deutschlandpolitik 1961–1990 (Berlin, 1999); W. G. Gray, Germany’s Cold War: The Global Campaign to Isolate East Germany 1949–1969 (Chapel Hill, 2003); W. Kilian, Der diplomatische Krieg zwischen der BRD und der DDR 1955–1973 (Berlin, 2001); R. M. Booz (ed.), ‘Hallsteinzeit’: Deutsche Außenpolitik 1955–1972 (Bonn, 1995). 39. M. E. Sarotte, Dealing with the Devil: East Germany, Détente, and Ostpolitik 1969–1973 (Chapel Hill, 2001). See also J. Scholtyseck, Die Außenpolitik der DDR (Munich, 2003); O. Bange, ‘Die Außenpolitik der DDR: Plädoyer für ein vernachlässigtes Forschungsfeld’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004): 492–500. 40. For an important sub-issue, see R. Wenzke, Die NVA und der Prager Frühling 1968: Die Rolle Ulbrichts und der DDR-Streitkräfte bei der Niederschlagung der tschechoslowakischen Reformbewegung (Berlin, 1995). See also W. Schwarz, ‘Brüderl­ich entzweit!’ Die Beziehungen zwischen der DDR und der CSSR 1961– 1968 (Munich, 2004). 41. D. Selvage, ‘The Treaty of Warsaw: The Warsaw Pact Context’, in Geyer and Schäfer, American Détente, 67–79; W. Jarząbek, ‘“Ulbricht Doktrin” oder “Gomułka-Doktrin”? Das Bemühen der Volksrepublik Polen um eine geschlossene Politik des kommunistischen Blocks gegenüber der westdeutschen Ostpolitik 1966/67’, Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung, 55 (2006): 79–115. 42. On the general outlook of Soviet foreign policy, see J. van Oudenaren, Détente in Europe: The Soviet Union and the West since 1953 (Durham, 1991); and M. J. Ouimet, The Rise and Fall of the Brezhnev Doctrine in Soviet Foreign Policy (Chapel Hill, 2003). 43. A. D. Rotfeld, Polen und Mitteleuropa: Zwischen Deutschland und Rußland, in G. Niedhart et al. (ed.), Deutschland in Europa: Nationale Interessen und internationale Ordnung im 20. Jahrhundert (Mannheim, 1997), 131–147. 44. W. Jarząbek, ‘Die Haltung der Volksrepublik Polen zur Normalisierung der Bezie­ hungen mit der Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1970–1975’, Rocznik polsko-niemiecki/ Deutsch-Polnisches Jahrbuch 13 (2006): 85–130; idem, ‘The Authorities of the Polish People’s Republic and the Problem of Reparations and Compensation from the Federal Republic of Germany, 1953–1989’, Polish Foreign Affairs Digest 5 (2005): 177–201; idem, Polska wobec Konferencji Bezpieczeństwa i Współpracy w Europie: Plany i rzeczywistość 1964–1975 [Poland and the CSCE: Plans and Reality, 1964–1975] (Warsaw, 2008).

20 | Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart

45. D. Bingen, Die Polenpolitik der Bonner Republik von Adenauer bis Kohl 1949–1991 (Baden-Baden, 1998). See also W. D. Eberwein (ed.), Die deutsch-polnischen Bezie­ hungen 1949–2000 (Opladen, 2001). 46. M. Tomala, Deutschland – von Polen gesehen: Zu den deutsch-polnischen Beziehungen 1945–1990 (Marburg, 2000). See also W. Bartoszewski, Und reiß uns den Hass aus der Seele: Die schwierige Aussöhnung von Polen und Deutschen (Warsaw, 2005); U. A. J. Becher (ed.), Deutschland und Polen im 20. Jahrhundert: Analysen, Quellen, didaktische Hinweise (Hanover, 2001); C. Tessmer (ed.), Das WillyBrandt-Bild in Deutschland und Polen (Berlin, 2000); K. Ruchniewicz, Polskie zabiegi o odszkodowania niemieckie w latach 1944/45–1975 (Wroclaw, 2007). 47. MfAA, C 367/68, ‘Working Material for the Preparation of a European Security Conference’, 10 October 1969. 48. SAPMO, DY 30/3530 and -/3391, Brezhnev to Ulbricht, 16 October 1970, Brezhnev’s speech at the meeting of the Political Consultative Committee of the Warsaw Pact in East Berlin, 2 December 1970. SAPMO, DY 30/J IV 2/202/525, Winzer’s conversations with Gorinovitch and Sorin, 11 October, 18 and 19 November 1971. MfAA, G-A 444, conversations of GDR foreign minister Winzer with Gorinovitch, Gromyko, Abrassimov on 23 June, 11 and 20 October, 21 December 1971. 49. MfAA, C 368/78, ‘Factor Analysis’ (on the status of CSCE preparations), 25 September 1971. 50. BStU, ZAIG 4645, ‘Analysis of CSCE negotiations so far’, 15 July 1974, with a perceptive prediction about both the outcome of the conference and the consequences for the GDR. 51. O. Bange and S. Kieninger, Negotiating One’s Own Demise? The GDR’s Foreign Ministry and the CSCE Negotiations – Plans, Preparations, Tactics and Presumptions (Mannheim, 2008). The e-dossier is available at both the CWIHP webpage (http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index) and the CSCE-project webpage (http://www. CSCE-1975.net) for downloading. It contains a historiographical introduction by the authors, English excerpts of GDR diplomatic documents, and a commentary by Siegfried Bock, the head of the GDR’s delegation to the CSCE negotiations. Two additional e-dossiers are planned for 2008, containing material from the GDR’s leadership and its Ministry for State Security. 52. For comprehensive references to the literature, see R. Albert, ‘Das SowjetunionBild in der sozial-liberalen Ostpolitik 1969–1975’, Tel Aviver Jahrbuch für deutsche Geschichte, 24 (1995): 299–326; W. Link, ‘Die Entstehung des Moskauer Vertrages im Lichte neuer Archivalien’, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, 49 (2001): 295–315. See also B. Meissner, Die Sowjetunion und Deutschland von Jalta bis zur Wiedervereinigung: Ausgewählte Beiträge (Cologne, 1995); B. Lippert, Auswärtige Kulturpolitik im Zeichen der Ostpolitik: Verhandlungen mit Moskau 1969–1990 (Münster, 1996); I. Koza, Deutsch-sowjetische Kontakte in Politik, Wirtschaft, Wissenschaft und Kultur 1963–1967 (Münster, 2002). 53. H. P. Schwarz, ‘Die Regierung Kiesinger und die Krise in der CSSR 1968’, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, 47 (1999): 159–186; C. Cornelißen, ‘Eine “Quelle des Stolzes und des Ansporns”: Die westdeutsche Sozialdemokratie und der “Prager Frühling” im Jahr 1968’, in D. Neutatz and V. Zimmermann (eds.), Die Deutschen und das östliche Europa: Aspekte einer vielfältigen Beziehungsgeschichte, Festschrift für Detlef Brandes zum 65. Geburtstag (Essen, 2006), 297–313; J. Pauer, ‘1968: Der

Introduction | 21

“Prager Frühling” und die Deutschen’, in D. Brandes et al. (eds.), Wendepunkte in den Beziehungen zwischen Deutschen, Tschechen und Slowaken 1848–1989 (Essen, 2006), 263–285. 54. R. Brach, ‘Die Bedeutung des Prager Vertrags von 1973 für die deutsche Ostpolitik’, in H. Lemberg et al. (eds.), Im geteilten Europa: Tschechen, Slovaken und Deutsche und ihre Staaten 1948–1989 (Essen, 1998) 169–191; E. Ivanickova, ‘1973: Die Ostpolitik der Bundesrepublik und die Tschechoslowakei’, in Brandes et al., Wendepunkte, pp. 287–298. For a rough summary, see L. Roucek, Die Tschechoslowakei und die Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1949–1989: Bestimmungsfaktoren, Entwicklungen und Probleme ihrer Beziehungen (Munich, 1990). 55. For Hungary and Bulgaria, Csaba Békés und Jordan Baev – both authors of contributions to this volume – hold a historiographical monopoly. See, for example, C. Békés, Európából Európába: Magyarország konfliktusok kereszttüzében, 1945– 1990 [From Europe to Europe: Hungary in the Crossfire of Conflicts, 1945–1990] (Budapest, 2004); idem, ‘Magyar külpolitika a szovjet szövetségi rendszerben, 1968–1989’ [Hungarian Foreign Policy in the Soviet Alliance System, 1968–1989], in F. Gazdag and L. Kiss (eds.), Külpolitika és nemzeti érdek: A magyar külpolitika műhelyéből [Foreign Policy and National Interest: From the Workshop of Hungarian Foreign Policy] (Budapest, 2004). J. Baev, NATO in the Balkans 1949–1999 (Sofia, 2001); idem, Bulgaria and the Cold War: Documents from Todor Zhivkov’s Personal Records 1956–1989 (Sofia, 2002). 56. This is the programmatic title of a well-known series of publications edited by John L. Gaddis.

–1–

An Intricate Web Ostpolitik, the European Security System and German Unification

o

Oliver Bange

It is certainly true that the ‘thousand days’ – to adopt the famous term of Schles­inger’s account of the Kennedy administration1 – of the first Brandt government has defined the image of the man and his policies until today. Friend and foe alike, domestic and international, were taken by surprise by the mere speed, courage and eventual success of the Neue Ostpolitik pursued by the new SPD-FDP coalition after years of standstill. This was even more surprising in the light of the almost complete reshuffle in the Chancellor’s Office and still more evident in the Foreign Office, where the new minister, Walter Scheel, had initially looked rather unprepared for the new job.2 Nevertheless, the coalition’s new policy was greatly helped by two developments: both parties and their leadership knew that they were in complete agreement over the goals and means of their new policy towards Central and Eastern Europe, and, secondly, the key personnel for the pursuit of a new Ostpolitik followed Brandt and Bahr from the Auswärtiges Amt into the Kanzleramt. Even so, it was only the existence of a well-implemented and prepared concept that made the much-needed departure towards a new foreign policy – steered by Willy Brandt’s entourage in the Chancellor’s Office – possible. And, indeed, there existed a comprehensive concept, a Gesamtkonzept, detailed in various planning exercises, which ‘only’ needed to be put into practice.3

Notes for this chapter begin on page 35.

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In the course of these studies, initiated by Brandt’s closest confidant, Egon Bahr, it became more and more apparent that even an eventual collapse of communist ideology, of communist societies in Eastern Europe and of the entire Warsaw Pact would not guarantee the reunification of the two German states.4 And even Brandt’s most optimistic advisers did not expect the reunification to be achieved before a lapse of twenty years or more. Another prognosis that proved equally correct was the assumption that there would be a longish period of rather cool relations with the East after the euphoria at the beginning of détente and before the first signs of collapse within the Warsaw Pact. These would be the years when those in power in the Kremlin, in East Berlin or the Hradschin would come to realise that opening up to the West not only entailed economic advantage and strategic stability but would also prompt growing doubt and alienation among their peoples. In order that this temporary freeze in EastWest relations not endanger the process initiated by détente, Brandt and Bahr foresaw what they called the multilateralisation of Ostpolitik in an institutionalised framework including bilateral treaties, economic co-operation, cultural exchange and a European Security System – in itself initiated by a European Security Conference. Without binding Germany into these multiple political, economic and strategic frameworks, it was quite clear that even at the moment of the ultimate success of the West’s strategy of transformation – the moment of collapse of communism – German reunification would be impossible, even unthinkable. Both the good old allies and the new independent states in Central and Eastern Europe could not allow the creation of a Germany that would be so dominant, at least in European proportions. The realisation of this interrelation between size and effect was not an exclusive prerogative of the Social-Democrats. Kurt Georg Kiesinger, the CDU Chancellor of the Grand Coalition, publicly pointed to the ‘critical size’ of an eventually reunified Germany.5 The specific threat to the existing status quo in Europe and the effective pursuit of all-German goals encapsulated in Brandt’s Ostpolitik resulted only from the combination of both of these strategies – the ideological softening up and ‘disintegration’ of the Eastern bloc and the progressive development of a comprehensive security system in Europe. This analysis sets out to explore this ‘other’ side of Ostpolitik, namely, its security dimension and the key role reserved for an ESC/ESS within this long-term strategy, essentially drawn up during the Grand Coalition in the late 1960s.

Towards a European Security System: Brandt’s and Bahr’s Grand Design, 1966–1969 In March 1967 the planning staff of the Auswärtiges Amt – under the guidance of Günter Diehl (a confidant of CDU Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger) and

An Intricate Web | 25

Egon Bahr (equally close to SPD Foreign Minister Willy Brandt) delivered the first stepping stone of what would become the master plan for German Ostpolitik, the Fahrplan. During the early stages of this work it had become ever more apparent that the central element of a successful German policy had to be its inclusion in a wider policy of peace and détente.6 The plan foresaw that after establishing a co-operative co-existence with the GDR (and other East European states), Bonn could then propose a preliminary conference consisting of the Four Powers and the two German states to prepare for a final peace treaty and a European Security System. This was meant to supplement Bonn’s German policy with a security framework involving force reductions and treaties on the renunciation of force in international relations, or as Bahr wrote to Brandt: ‘After all, the continuation of our Ostpolitik ranks among the essential preconditions for the success of our German policy.’ Months later, Diehl would put it even more directly to Chancellor Kiesinger: a European Security System was simply ‘necessary’ to attain the principal German goal – unification.7 But when Brandt in an interview almost referred to the basic elements of the plan – a slow, step-by-step dissolution of the existing alliances and the creation of a European Security System comprising both superpowers – the result was public hysteria in the West German press and within the coalition.8 Under pressure from his own parliamentary party, Kiesinger repeatedly pressed on Brandt the importance of not overplaying his case.9 Nevertheless, this conflict within the Grand Coalition, partly played out in public, signalled that Brandt had already taken on board the recommendations of the study and that he would firmly base his future policy on this guidance. Further evidence for this can be found in Brandt’s remarks to the American Secretary of State, Dean Rusk, only a month later in Washington. As if he had never been warned by Kiesinger, Brandt ostentatiously referred ‘to the immense importance which would occur if the superpowers would consider after years [of inactivity …] the connection between the German question and that of European security’.10 And even Kiesinger seems to have been taken by this concept of phases – from bilateral treaties on the renunciation of force, to a European Security System, to a new order capable of delivering peace. Kiesinger did not refer to the issue of the ESS in his meetings with de Gaulle on 12/13 July 1967, as originally proposed by Bahr.11 However, he did mention it explicitly in his talk with Soviet ambassador Zarapkin one day earlier. On this occasion, the conservative German Chancellor even envisaged a possible renunciation of ‘the presence of American soldiers’ in Europe. The precondition of this was, of course, the creation of a ‘truly reliable security system’. Naturally, Zarapkin could only agree to the West German proposals on how to reach this situation – by nuclear free zones, troop reductions and a slow but continuous dissolution of the alliances. In his final reply Kiesinger once again echoed Bahr’s and Diehl’s

26 | Oliver Bange

plans: ‘Collective security can ideally be reached through arms reductions.’12 If only his CDU/CSU members of parliament could be kept in the dark.

Necessity and Essentials of a Comprehensive European Security System The recognition that ‘the solution of security issues was one precondition – probably the most important for the reconstruction of German unity’13 – was a quantum leap away from the kind of East-West trench warfare inherited by the Grand Coalition in December 1966 as the customary basis of West German policy towards the East.14 In early 1967 the traditionalists among Bonn’s diplomats still felt massively threatened by a Soviet initiative for an ESC and ESS. During their visits to London, Rome, Paris and Vienna, high-ranking Soviet representatives had succeeded in obtaining positive replies in the final communiqués issued on this topic. Analysts in Bonn observed a certain ‘softening-up’ of the British, and the Austrians – who back in 1965 had supported Moscow’s initiative for UN Resolution 129 for better relations across the Iron Curtain – were held to be generally unreliable.15 Because the mere idea of a European Security System smelt like Soviet-initiated trouble – Bonn remained on the defensive, at least officially. The only question still posed by the established experts in Bonn was whether the USSR was really committed to this conference or if it only wanted to use the proposal as a pretext to show up the West Germans and their campaign for unification as the only real trouble-makers in Europe, a threat that could only be stopped by a comprehensive definition of the territorial status quo. The former conservative-liberal government under Erhard and Schröder reacted on this assumption in 1966 and had declared the exclusion of the GDR and the objective of a just peace order to be – naturally unobtainable – preconditions for any such conference.16 No thought was given to seizing the opportunity of such a conference; instead the Erhard-Schröder line was to prevent the conference before the idea gained any impetus.17 This put Bonn on the defensive and thus rendered it almost helpless in the face of exactly the kind of attacks from the communist bloc that had been feared all along. Unlike the Adenauer and Erhard governments, the heads of the Grand Coalition did not intend to continue to be a mere object in East-West relations but sought actively to change the international framework. The planning staff was charged to work its way through what Diehl called a Drahtverhau (barbed wire) – over 200 plans and proposals for a security system in Europe submitted by all sides over the previous twenty years. Everything was collected and analysed18 – demilitarised or denuclearised zones, phased troop withdrawals and so on. Only one thing was never considered: ‘[T]he possibility that a unified Germany might remain a member of NATO was judged illusionary.’ Even

An Intricate Web | 27

after all this work, after taking account of the justified security interests of all concerned, there remained a fundamental tension between the German interest in changing the status quo and that of its neighbours in East and West who sought to solidify it. Three months after tabling its plan for a new German policy, the planning staff submitted its ideas for a European Security System, which basically fell into two options – one with and the other without effects on the existing alliances. However, the overriding criterion remained the long-term effect for German unification. It is therefore not surprising that the first option – with its focus on bilateral renunciation-of-force treaties, guarantees of human rights and military confidence building measures – was deemed to display ‘little more than indirect effects on reunification’. The opposite was true for option II, which foresaw a massive reduction in troops and armaments over various stages and zones of special military/nuclear status. The eventual withdrawal of all international troops would have brought momentous advantages for all Germans in East and West and would thus have constituted an important precondition for unification (though it would not have brought unification by itself).19 This was, however, ‘a high risk’ strategy because it would have left the Germans nearer to Soviet than to American troops; a risk further exacerbated by the fact that nuclear-free zones were only envisaged at the end of this process. From this, the paper drew logical conclusions: German unification and the continuation of both alliances could only be made possible by the practical neutralisation of Germany. If the Germans wanted to avoid becoming the plaything of their neighbours in this scenario, they had to try to extend their own ‘special status’ to as many neighbours as possible. This, however, was tantamount to the dissolution of the alliances, which in turn would have provided the unified Germans with a dominant position in Central and Western Europe, something that could only be out-balanced by a comprehensive policy of integration by the Germans and guarantees by the superpowers. The conclusions which Diehl would soon take with him to Kiesinger’s Chancellor’s Office were surprisingly radical: first, one should temporarily support the measures of option I; second, one should consider measures affecting the alliances if they furthered Bonn’s German policy; third, one should agree with a European Security System including the dissolution of alliances if this could be ‘connected with the reunification of Germany within an organised Europe’. When Bahr became Diehl’s successor as head of the planning staff in December 1967, he demanded that his team not shy away from any taboos in order to create this European Security System, which he regarded as the framework of an eventual German reunification. In his new capacity he attended the annual meetings of the allied planning staffs (APAG) in April 1968 in Bergen, Norway and in April 1969 in Washington with the implicit goal of effectively anchoring the German ideas for an ESS into allied thinking. The trilateral

28 | Oliver Bange

meetings with the American and British think tanks were of particular importance and frankness; and Bahr was more than pleased when he discovered a general ‘consensus’ on the elements necessary for a new ESS. He agreed with the general assumption that there should be no ESC at that moment because a great spectacle would merely hinder the evolutionary development of an ESS – in which there was ‘no place for winners and losers’.20 Bahr found support all-round – or at least so he reported to Brandt – for the central elements of Bonn’s ESS/ESC and Eastern policy: that the German questions would be solved ‘at the end of a long process’; that this could not be an imminent part of an ESS; that the German question should not block détente; that until its solution inner-German issues should not be treated as international relations; and, most important of all, that the GDR could not distance itself for long from the effects of détente on the Warsaw Pact, expected to result in domestic reforms and international co-operation. During the plenum discussions, the American delegate, Russell Fessenden, even enthusiastically promised ‘active support’ for the Ostpolitik/ESS plan explained by Bahr.21 While the various papers prepared by the diplomats of the Auswärtiges Amt still remained very much focused on the geo- and power-political realities of the late 1960s,22 Bahr’s own expositions to Brandt showed no respect for the status quo whatsoever. Instead, in an important paper written at the end of April 1968, Bahr found theoretical leverage in arms reductions to win over both the Americans and the Soviets for a comprehensive security system in Europe – only to use the following negotiations for the ‘weakening’ of the power structures in Eastern Europe.23 On the surface, measures such as the renunciation of force, declarations of non-aggression, the introduction of military observers and cuts in military budgets did not erode the existing structure of the alliances. Further measures following these would safely weaken the hegemony of the Soviets in their empire. This included large cuts in armament and troops, the withdrawal of troops and – Bahr added in handwriting – of nuclear weapons, which ‘would change the balance within the alliances and between them’. For this, one had to accept – at least in Bahr’s view – serious conflicts over the necessary controls and safeguards, a change to the status of Berlin, domestic destabilisation triggered by American withdrawal, rising isolationism in the United States and the end of the existing alliances. This could possibly be compensated for by intensified political and economic co-operation in Europe – first in the West and then with the East. Though this was itself radical, it took yet another phase of intensive planning to put on paper the idea of instrumentalising Soviet national interests for German unification through an ESS/ESC. The Kremlin, it was argued, might be tempted to agree to an institutionalisation of the ESS/ESC, because it would thus reach its ‘declared political goals in Europe: the legitimisation of the status quo, the dissolution of NATO, the withdrawal of the Americans, the obstruction

An Intricate Web | 29

of West European integration’. But by agreeing to the institutionalisation and codification of the ESC process, the Soviet Union ‘loses its opportunities for direct intervention in Central Europe … Despite having reached the recognition of the status quo, it [the Soviet Union] opens up the door for its overcoming … It could hardly argue against it’.24

In Search of the Ideal Security Frame for German Unification: ‘Model C’ Between April and June 1968, Bahr and his planning staff worked on a comprehensive paper on the future European Security System. Very early on, discussions centred on three options – A, B and C – and it became quite clear which option was to be preferred. Preparatory work soon focused on the participating states in the various phases foreseen in option C, considerations about the timing of when and how the SPD’s parliamentary party was to be informed and used as a platform for promoting the plan, and the call for expert opinions on the control of the political consequences of troop reductions within each phase. The aim was obviously to make ‘model C’ look as positive as possible and thus to ease its acceptance by the political and constitutional institutions.25 Whether these proceedings were meant to convince Foreign Minister Brandt – or if he already shared the preference for option C and agreed with the tactic of phoney option – remains an open question, as does the question of who knew about it in the SPD parliamentary party, the party leadership and the coalition. What was in ‘models’ A, B and C? Bahr’s cover letter to Brandt when submitting the paper at the end of June 1968 includes an excellent summary, according to which Western thinking about future security in Europe could be reduced to three models: Concept A: ‘is based on the existing pact systems, but wants to use arms reductions26 to reach as high a degree of détente as possible in order to allow for a peaceful cohabitation of the people of Europe and to make the existing alliance redundant’; Concept B: ‘wants to interconnect the pacts with the help of shared institutions, initially in the form of ad hoc control of arms reductions, but which should then develop into an institutional roof above the two pacts (permanent European Security Conference)’; Concept C: ‘replaces both existing pact systems with a security system of equal European states, whose existence is guaranteed by the superpowers without they themselves being members [of the ESS]’.27

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While B was bluntly rejected as a ‘perfect system of security against Germany’, the study saw in A little more than a preparatory phase for C. Already in the cover note, C was praised as the non plus ultra of a policy in pursuit of German national interests – working for reunification through ‘a fundamental re-organisation of European security’. For Bahr and probably also Brandt it was therefore necessary that model C would already determine West German policy even at times when the ‘dissolution of the alliances was not yet possible or desirable’. Bahr was obviously not the kind of neutraliser that contemporary media sensationalism portrayed him to be; but equally any display of Nibelungentreue to the Western alliance was alien to him when it came down to German interests. His final conclusion was as logical as it proved to be wrong in historical perspective: ‘We have to resist the all too obvious temptation to maintain the alliances while trying to build a European Security System; we would only accumulate disadvantages.’28 In mid-August 1968, on the day before the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, the undersecretary of state in Bonn’s foreign office, Georg Ferdinand von Duckwitz, came to the desired and expected conclusion that model C was to be ‘the guiding concept for a federal government with ambition’.29 Both Brandt and Bahr kept their colleagues in Washington, Paris and London informed throughout, the Americans probably more than the others. Throughout the Prague Spring, Brandt remained in the closest contact with Dean Rusk, and already in April 1968 Bahr had commented to his American colleagues on the European Security System: ‘The people should finally stop talking about reunification. Of course this remains the ultimate goal for the Germans.’30 The French and the British were informed a little later, and in more tentative language, during the quadripartite dinner on 23 June in Reykjavik. According to Brandt, the European Security System had, in Bonn’s perspective, one main purpose: ‘to create a link so that when the time comes a new relationship would have been reached between the two parts of Germany’.31

MBFR Negotiations as a Path to the European Security System? It is true that August 1968 became an important juncture in Brandt’s Ostpolitik, which from then on took still greater notice of the Kremlin’s gate-keeper function in Western relations with Eastern Europe.32 While the European Security System remained a key dimension in Brandt’s and Bahr’s Ostpolitik, August 1968 posed the question of how to get the Soviets interested in it. The ongoing negotiations between the two superpowers on conventional arms reductions, or at least on their limitation, remained intrinsically connected to questions of national status and egoism within each alliance. The trilateral discussions

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over the off-set question and the Anglo-American quarrels over the location of British troops only served as a case in point. These differing interests had to be focused and, if they were feasible, brought into a package deal, if one wanted to sell troop reductions as a serious offer to the Soviets. Already in the summer of 1967, the small circle of experts and politicians concerned with the reinvention of Bonn’s Eastern and German policy became convinced that mutual and balanced force reductions (MBFR) would constitute the most suitable starting point for a comprehensive security system in Europe, which in turn could serve as a road to unification. This specific effect of balanced force reductions on the territory of both German states had already been recognised by the planning staff around Diehl and Bahr in June 1967. The conclusions of the planning staff were confirmed by the third and final part of a military feasibility study by the so-called Heusinger Group one month later.33 Their summary to foreign minister Brandt maintained that even a partial withdrawal of troops ‘would improve the political climate in Central Europe and loosen up the status quo’.34 The West Germans were therefore extremely keen to see force reductions put ‘as quickly as possible’ onto the agenda of NATO’s Harmel exercise in 1967/68. If MBFR became part of NATO’s new policy of arms reductions with the East, the withdrawal of foreign troops on German soil could become a reality and could be followed by a ‘thinning’ of the two German armies.35 It was easy to imagine the effect on the psyche of the Germans under communist rule. In the decisive meetings in Brussels during March 1968, the West Germans proposed to enlarge MBFR step by step to the whole of Europe, while concentrating on land forces as this would have ‘the greatest effect on détente’.36 However, even before August 1968, the German aspirations associated with MBFR were dashed by ‘discriminatory’ British proposals and renewed US-Soviet conflict over Vietnam. Diplomats in the Auswärtiges Amt judged that ‘one of the central pieces of our policy in Europe’ had been put on hold.37 This did not keep Brandt, Bahr and their small think-tank from further refining their own MBFR concepts. The role attributed to MBFR in the entire concept of Ostpolitik was simply too important. It was no accident that the planning staff ’s famous paper of July 1968, on the three models for a future ESS, started with an extensive discussion of MBFR. The logical connection between MBFR, ESS and unification became a leitmotiv of Ostpolitik and the new Ostpoliticians in Bonn were determined ‘to play an important role in this [MBFR] discussion’. And this had to happen as quickly as possible, even in a preventive manner, because troop reductions foreshadowed important changes in the substance and structure of the alliances and therefore constituted irreversible junctures for a future security system from very early on. It was therefore important to keep the ‘picture of the final situation in mind’ in order to foresee and possibly guide the right sequence of steps. Troop reductions were understood primarily as a political instrument. There was no doubt

32 | Oliver Bange

about their purpose, these were ‘steps primarily in the military field to enhance political security in Europe, to defuse political antagonism, and thus to create a situation that would facilitate the solution of political problems in Europe’.38 It was only in the summer of 1969 that Moscow – ‘realising that it had to relax the reins’ after the invasion of the CSSR – returned to its old proposal for a conference on European security. For a while, the Ostpoliticians in Bonn remained puzzled as to ‘whether the Soviets really want the ESC or if they only want to talk about it’.39 Brandt and Bahr wanted it – and also signalled this to Moscow.40 Once again, Bonn’s closest allies in Washington and London saw little reason for a more forthcoming attitude. When Bahr forthrightly argued at the APAG meeting in September 1969 that (a) in the light of American tendencies for unilateral reductions the West should ‘make its offer for MBFRs more attractive’; and (b) the preparatory phase of the European security conference might be used ‘for an improvement in the relations between the two German states’; these ideas met with little response.41

The Legacy of the Planning Staff All of these plans, models, preparations and analyses, combined with the experiences of 1968, found their way into Bahr’s crowning paper, the ‘Foreign policy of a future Federal Government’, finalised a mere week before the general elections in September 1969.42 The credo of this paper was well-known: ‘For the pursuit of our interests’ the Germans had to continue with an active Ostpolitik, whose main instruments remained MBFR negotiations and an ESC, supplemented by a basic treaty (Rahmenvertrag) with the GDR. The ESC/ CSCE offered, Bahr argued, a unique opportunity – to put forward precisely those proposals for a security system in Europe that had been thought up by his staff in order to comply with what he had earlier labelled the ‘ultimate German goal’; for which both the ESC and MBFR should now serve as timely ‘leverage’. According to this rationale, Bonn should seek to focus MBFRs on East German territory, which would maximise the political gains to be made from a German perspective. Even though the paper contained a list of individual measures and instruments for détente and Ostpolitik, this was an interconnected construction. One realises that this is – as Egon Bahr and Per Fischer still stressed years later43 – a ‘Gesamt­ konzept’, a system of treaties and agreements in which one cannot be without the other. According to this concept, the basic treaty with the GDR constituted an important condition for the ‘conflict-free’ participation of both German states in an ESC, while Bonn’s readiness to participate could also be used as ‘leverage’ to bring about this inner-German treaty. In all this, the government in Bonn was to be guided solely by ‘the expectation of an irreversible political process’.

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After all this theory, the Budapest appeal of March 1969 was the signal to prepare for a very real ESC. Already on 11 June Brandt had established an ESCworking group, headed by Sahm. On 25 August 1969, the planning staff submitted a first ‘basic model’44 for the possible proceedings at an ESC that proved to be an astonishingly good forecast of the eventual course and results of the CSCE. Two basic assumptions of Bahr’s rather ideal plans were dismissed: Instead of standing at the end of a process, now the ESC was to be regarded as a catalyst ‘on the road to an intermediary solution’ for a security system in Europe. It was also deemed that under these circumstances a firm institutional link between the two alliances was no longer in German interests, which stood ‘against any consolidation and eternalisation of military alliances’. A considerable number of obstacles had to be overcome in order to realise the conference and to enable it to take the decisions that Bonn had long been planning. Above all, the paper noted: both German states could join in the negotiations of security issues as equal participants; both German states had ratified the Non-Proliferation Treaty; border issues like the Oder-Neisse line had been sorted out ‘de facto’; and Berlin’s status had been confirmed to be ‘essentially unchanged’. This soon resulted in the socialist-liberal coalition’s systematic linkage of Bonn’s Eastern treaties, its basic treaty with the GDR, the Quadripartite Agreement over Berlin, and their ratification. And even the preliminary ESS now envisaged, the planning staff paper hoped, could allow for a phased reduction of nuclear weapons in Europe parallel to reductions of up to 75 per cent of ‘stationed troops’ in Germany. This was a prophetic prediction of the future interrelation between MBFR and SALT negotiations (though not of their results). The intrinsic – because logical – tie between the inner-German treaty and the ESC led almost automatically to a certain timetable. What the Federal Government in Bonn subsumed under necessary preparations for the conference, East Berlin propagated – quite rightly – as ‘preconditions’. There was no way around these, as Bahr had realised some time ago: because only this could create the conditions in which the GDR – still not recognised by the West – could participate on an equal footing. Otherwise the discussion of the GDR problem during the conference could only distract from the real issues at stake in Bonn’s master plan, such as free exchange of information, free movement and the peaceful revision of borders. If not solved beforehand, the GDR issue might even have led to the failure of the entire conference – and all the hopes associated with it. Talking to Henry Kissinger shortly after the general elections of the fall of 1969, Bahr commented that the new Federal Government would rather not participate in an ESC if there had been no prior normalisation of its relations with the GDR.45 As a matter of principle, the Germans had to ‘avoid allowing the ESC to become a “conference on Germany”’. Nevertheless, the German question could not and should not be avoided. The FRG intended to put in a ‘reminder’ at the ESC that the German question was still open. In an

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apparent anticipation of what would later be called the CSCE’s Basket III, Bahr demanded in an internal paper of September 1969 that the results of an ESC should involve economic and cultural co-operation and social liberalisation ‘in the widest possible meaning’.46 On 2 December, Carl Werner Sanne – who had followed Brandt and Bahr to the Chancellor’s Office in the socialist-liberal coalition – submitted to Egon Bahr the same plans that he himself had initiated months earlier.47 The journey could begin.

Following the Blueprint: MBFR and CSCE in German Ostpolitik, 1970–1975 The security-political dimension of Ostpolitik – combining the Eastern Treaties, CSCE, MBFR and an eventual ESS in the service of German reunification – surfaced in the years preceding the Helsinki agreement of 1975 in a number of scenarios. During the early days of the new government in 1969/70, Bahr’s draft for a new Ostpolitik48 became so quickly and firmly established as the operational basis for Bonn’s foreign policy that, only five months later, the new head of the planning staff conceded that Bonn’s Eastern policy had been prepared so ‘comprehensively’ that there was nothing left to do for his new crew.49 This blueprint was frequently referred to during the various challenges to Bahr’s concept of Ostpolitik during 1970/71, which included the possibility of a blockade by Moscow or East Berlin as well as the prospect of ‘friendly fire’ from the Western allies, and even from within the coalition and the ministries in Bonn.50 The security dimension of the grand design appeared repeatedly during the laborious process of inserting German thinking into alliance planning, an objective which was realised through the instrument of linkages between the different negotiations which Bonn hoped would further provide for the necessary stepping stones towards reunification. This envisaged an increasing multilateralisation, from the bilateral Eastern Treaties, via progress in inner-German relations and an agreement over Berlin, to MBFR and a security conference in Europe.51 All this would result in an irreversible system – particularly apparent in Brandt’s consistent championing of the essential axis between MBFR and ESC/CSCE.52 Yet another aspect that necessitated regular reference to guiding principles was Bonn’s self-styled steering function for the multidimensional process of détente.53 All of this provides an indication of the impact of the original security planning on West German CSCE policy in the time before 1975. In May 1972, the Federal German Cabinet had agreed upon binding guidelines for Bonn’s participation in the CSCE. Apart from maintaining West German interests in Berlin and in the cohesion of the alliance, a European security

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conference should ultimately provide three things: (a) the introduction of principles for peaceful cohabitation in Europe, which was, in effect, the codification of Bahr’s credo that Ostpolitik needed an international environment of détente in order to be successful; (b) agreement on peaceful co-operation, including free movement of persons, information and goods – the precondition for Brandt’s transformation strategy; and (c) ‘a connection between military and political security’ – encapsulating the second strategy embedded in Ostpolitik, which aimed at the European Security System laid out in the planning staff papers. Now, on 9 July 1975, and with the final act in Helsinki in view, the cabinet deemed that CSCE had taken ‘full account’ of these German concerns.54

Notes Research for this chapter was enabled by the projects ‘Ostpolitik and Détente 1966– 1975’, funded by the Thyssen-Foundation, and ‘CSCE and the Transformation of Europe’, funded by the VolkswagenStiftung, both at the University of Mannheim (www.detente.de). 1. A. M. Schlesinger, A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House (New York, 1965). 2. A. Baring, Machtwechsel: Die Ära Brandt-Scheel (Stuttgart, 1982), 269. 3. On 27 September 1973, the German weekly Quick published Bahr’s plans for a European Security System under the heading ‘How Egon Bahr intends to neutralize Germany’. In 1991 Bahr edited this study in its entirety in his document edition: Sicherheit für und vor Deutschland: Vom Wandel durch Annäherung zur Europäischen Sicherheitsgemeinschaft (Munich, 1991), 60–82. In his 1996 dissertation, Egon Bahr und die deutsche Frage: Zur Entwicklung der sozialdemokratischen Ost- und Deutschlandpolitik (Bonn, 1996), A. Vogtmeier analysed a selection of key documents from the Bahr papers. And Bahr explained the context of the studies in his memoir, Zu meiner Zeit (Munich, 1996). 4. See O. Bange, ‘Ostpolitik as a Source of Intra-Bloc Tensions’, in Victor Papacosma and Anne Heiss (eds.), NATO and the Warsaw Pact: Intra-Bloc Conflicts (Athens, OH, forthcoming). 5. Philipp Gassert, Kurt Georg Kiesinger 1904–1988 – Kanzler zwischen den Zeiten (Munich, 2006), 563; Oliver Bange, ‘Kiesingers Ost- und Deutschlandpolitik von 1966–1969’, in Günter Buchstab, Philipp Gassert and Peter Thaddäus Lang (eds.), Kurt Georg Kiesinger 1904–1988 – Von Ebingen ins Kanzleramt (Freiburg, 2005), 455–498 (esp. 470). 6. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 400, notes by Bahr, ‘Summary of the Discussion on Germany’, ‘German Policy’, 7/13/17 March 1967. 7. PA AA, B 150/105, Diehl to Brandt and Kiesinger, ‘German Policy’, 20 June 1967.

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8. DzDP V/1 (1966–1967), p. 1406. 9. AdsD, WBA, BAM, Folder 17, handwritten notes by Brandt on phone call and conversation with Kiesinger, 10 and 15 hours on 15 July 1967. 10. Ibid., conversations between Brandt and Rusk, Washington, D.C., 15–16 August 1967. 11. AAPD 1967, doc. 250, memorandum by Bahr for the forthcoming talks with General de Gaulle, 7 July 1967. ACDP, NL-226 (Kiesinger papers), A292, conversations between Kiesinger and de Gaulle, 12/13 July 1967. AN, 5 AG 1/167 (de Gaulle papers), private conversations. 12. ACDP, NL-226 (Kiesinger papers), A288, conversation Kiesinger-Zarapkin, 11 July 1967. 13. G. Diehl, Zwischen Politik und Presse: Bonner Erinnerungen 1949–1969 (Frankfurt/M., 1994), 377–378. 14. NARA, Nixon, NSC, CF 682 (Germany), Embtel 15092, Bonn, 20 November 1969, from Rush. 15. PA AA, B 150/97, memorandum by Ref. IIA2 (Turnwald) of 20 February 1967. 16. PA AA, B 150/74, statements by Erhard on 28 April 1966, by the Federal Press Speaker on 11 July 1966, by Erhard in an interview with Neue Revue in late July, and by Schröder in September 1966 during parliamentary question time. Ref. IIB2, memo ‘ESK’, 3 March 1967. 17. Ibid. 18. PA AA, B 150/98, comparison of plans in a coloured chart by the planning staff, 7 March 1967. 19. This was later confirmed by a feasibility study by the so-called Heusinger Group. See below. 20. This was also the exact term used by Johnson’s foreign policy adviser Francis Bator in an interview with the author on 28 March 2004 in Boston. For an in-depth study on the interrelationship between the Neue Ostpolitik and Johnson’s ‘bridgebuilding’ concept, see O. Bange, Ostpolitik und Détente: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mannheim, 2004). 21. PA AA, B 150/124, memo by Bahr on the APAG spring meeting in Bergen (2–6 April 1968), 16 April 1968. NARA, RG59/2081, memo by Stoessel, ‘Views of Egon Bahr’, 9 April 1968. PRO, FCO 49/265, memo by Burroughs, ‘Tripartite Planning Talks’, 18 April 1968. 22. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 316, memo by Abt. I, ‘Policy of West European States for the mid-1970s’, 30 April 1968, summary by Sanne; memo on ‘Collective Security in Europe as a Precondition for a European Peace Order’, 29 April 1968. For Brandt’s early support of balanced troop reductions in the context of an ESS and inner-German relations, see G. McGhee, Botschafter in Deutschland 1963–1968 (Munich, 1989), 355–356. 23. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 316, memo on ‘Measures for Disarmament and the Relaxation of Tensions’, 23 April 1968. 24. Ibid., memo on ‘Model C – Soviet Union’, 30 May 1968. 25. There is only one preliminary study on model B (7 June 1968) to be found in the Bahr papers, but four on model C (6, 17, 27 May, 10 June 1968). See also ibid., Bahr to Hellmuth Roth, 20 June 1968; memo on ‘Troop reductions’, n.d. 26. In the copy for Brandt, Bahr replaced ‘measures for arms reductions and arms control’ in handwriting by ‘measures for arms reductions’.

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27. Ibid., Bahr to Brandt, 25/26 June 1968. 28. Ibid., Bahr to Roth, n.d. (before 20 June 1968). 29. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 399, Bahr to Brandt, 19 August 1968. 30. Memorandum by Stoessel, 9 April 1968; cit. above. 31. FRUS 1964–1968, vol. XV, doc. 279, pp. 708ff., memcon of the ‘Quadripartite Dinner’ on 23 June 1968 in Reykjavik. 32. See G. Niedhart, ‘Revisionistische Elemente und die Initiierung friedlichen Wandels in der neuen Ostpolitik 1967–1974’, Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 28/2 (2002): 241. 33. PA AA, B 150/77, memo by Diehl, ‘Constituting the Working Group Heusinger’, 5 July 1966. 34. It was only on explicit request by Diehl that Schnippenkötter provided the planning staff with Heusinger’s study from 12 July 1967. PA AA, B 150/112, memo by Lankes, ‘Study on the Reduction of Armed Forces’, 2 November 1967. 35. PA AA, B 150/117, memo by Landes (Ref. IIB2), ‘Mutual Troop Reduction in East and West’, 22 January 1968. 36. PA AA, B 150/121, German working paper for the expert meeting on arms control and reductions of the Harmel exercise, 5 March 1968; tel. 379, Brussels, 5 March 1968, from Dröge. 37. PA AA, B 150/122 and -/125, memo from Schnippenkötter to Duckwitz, 12 March 1968, on the connection between the Vietnam War and MBFR; memo by von Staden (Ref. IA1), ‘European Political Unification and European Security System’, 24 April 1968. 38. PA AA, B 150/129, memo by Bahr, ‘Perception of European Security’, 27 June 1968. 39. PA AA, B 150/157, von Alten to Ref. IIA3 on ‘Considerations about the Proposal for an ESC’, 24 July 1969. 40. PA AA, B 150/155, conversation Brandt-Zarapkin, 18 June 1969. 41. Ibid., memo by Bahr on the autumn meeting of APAG, 24 September 1969. The participants were Camps and Floyd, Bahr and Sanne, Craddock and Everett. 42. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 396, memo ‘Considerations on the Foreign Policy of a Future Federal Government’, 18 September 1969, with a cover note from Bahr to Brandt from 21 September 1969. The memorandum is also edited in AAPD 1969, doc. 296 (citing a different source: PA AA, Pl, VS-vol. 11577). 43. Author’s conversations with Per Fischer and Egon Bahr, August 1997 and November 1999. 44. PA AA, B 150/159, memo by the planning staff, ‘Basic Model – Political Framework of a European Security System’, 25 August 1969. 45. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 439, conversation between Bahr, Kissinger and later Hillenbrand, Washington, D.C., 14 October 1969. 46. AAPD 1969, doc. 301, memo by Bahr, ‘Draft – Proposal for a Western Position on ESC, Taking Account of the Ideas of the FRG’, 24 September 1969. 47. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 425, Sanne to Bahr, ‘Considerations on the Problem of Normalising the Inner-German Relations’, 2 December 1969. 48. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 436, Bahr to Brandt, foreign policy working paper for talks with the FDP, Bonn, 1 October 1969. 49. PA AA, B 150/199 and -/202, memos by Oncken, ‘Future Work of the Planning Staff ’, 16 March und 14 May 1970.

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50. This included outright opposition by influential officials against large troop reductions or convergence theories attributed to Bahr. PA AA, B 150/197, -/225, -/232, Natogerma 238, Brussels, 26 February 1970, from Grewe; memo by Oncken, ‘The Continuation of Our Foreign Policy’, 1 March 1971; memo on ‘MBFR’, 21 June 1971, for Scheel. For a summary of French doubts, see AMAE, Série Europe, Soussérie RFA, vol. 1547, memos on Ostpolitik from 13 April and 23 May 1970. 51. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 436, memo no. 4, ‘On Moscow’, from Bahr to Ehmke and Brandt, 14 January 1970. PA AA, B 150/199, memo by Ref. IIA3 ‘On CES’, 31 March 1970. 52. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vols. 441, 440, 444, 436, Brandt’s conversation with Henderson and Sauvagnargues, 21 May 1973; with Rush, 22 May 1973; with Rogers, 30 May 1972; and Bahr’s meeting with Julian Amery in London, 30 October 1973. 53. PA AA, B 150/244, note on departmental meeting on ESC in the Auswärtiges Amt, 1 December 1971; letter by Diesel, 7 December 1971. 54. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, vol. 445, cabinet decision of 16 May 1972, including list of the CSCE guidelines; cabinet papers of 7 July 1975; cabinet decision of 9 July 1975.

–2–

Peaceful Change of Frontiers as a Crucial Element in the West German Strategy of Transformation

o

Gottfried Niedhart

In February 1975, Brent Scowcroft, Deputy Assistant to the American President for National Security Affairs, wrote a status report on the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), pointing out that the German question had been uppermost in the Soviet mind when Moscow proposed a European security conference in 1954. The Soviet leadership ‘conceived of it as an ersatz peace conference to confirm the post-war boundaries of a divided Germany. In the Ostpolitik treaties, Willy Brandt accepted the German situation and conceded the Soviets much of what they desired from Bonn. Nevertheless, the Soviets still wanted broader West European and US endorsement of the existing European frontiers’. In Scowcroft’s view, the Soviet Union still saw ‘CSCE principally as a way to confirm … Western acceptance of the territorial and political status quo in Europe, including the division of Germany’. Up to this point, documents on a number of issues had been negotiated, among them a text on the inviolability of frontiers. For the rest of stage II of the CSCE in Geneva, and before the summit could gather in Helsinki, ‘several sensitive and … substantive issues’ remained to be resolved, ‘including the language on peaceful change of frontiers which we have agreed, at the request of the FRG, to try to work out with the Soviets’.1 Scowcroft’s report is a fairly accurate summary of the Soviet Union’s main goal, of the reaction of the FRG which had conceded ‘much of what the Soviets

Notes for this chapter begin on page 49.

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desired’, and finally of the role which the US played ‘at the request of the FRG’. Accordingly, this analysis will deal (a) with the West German-Soviet conflict of interest as far as the status quo in Europe was concerned; and (b) with the efforts of the FRG to persuade its adversaries in the East as well as its allies in the West to agree to a formula on peaceful change which could be accepted by the FRG.

The Conflict of Interests in West German-Soviet Relations and the Underlying Assumptions of Ostpolitik From the beginning the FRG and its allies who had pushed forward the foundation of a West German state were confronted by the Soviet Union with the reproach that the West was not prepared to accept the outcome of the war and was aiming at revisionism. The FRG regarded herself indeed as a temporary state. It was argued that the international arrangements of Potsdam (1945) and Paris (1954) must not rule out a peace treaty for Germany as a whole. Although Soviet propaganda overplayed the issue in a grotesque manner, it was not wrong in calling the FRG a revisionist state, which questioned the status quo. Hence the Soviet Union demanded the unambiguous acknowledgement of the post-war territorial order. The Soviet interest in a permanent recognition of the post-war borders, including the border between the FRG and the GDR, was at the heart of the Soviet wish to have an ESC. The revisionism of the Adenauer era differed quite significantly from the revisionism of the Brandt years. In substance, however, there was continuity in the demand for overcoming the division of Germany (and of Europe).2 Notably, the territorial revisionism put forward by the Western rollback strategy and Adenauer’s policy of strength had disappeared already from the agenda when Adenauer’s chancellorship came to its close. The Brandt government went a step further in 1969 when it recognised the post-war borders in Europe as de facto borders. Thereby, the post-war order was recognised but not fully acknowledged or legitimised. Rather than being an acknowledgement of the status quo, the Eastern treaties of the FRG amounted to an agreement on a modus vivendi. From the West German perspective it had to be avoided at all costs that the de facto recognition could be interpreted as a surrogate peace treaty. At the same time, although the Treaty of Moscow was by no means a peace treaty and was not regarded as such, in practical terms it was a substitute for a peace treaty.3 The difficult balance between the modus vivendi concept and the formulation of some kind of tacit peace treaty had also to be observed during the CSCE negotiations. The European frontiers were declared to be inviolable, which served Soviet interests. Clearly, the Soviet Union wanted the CSCE ‘as a substitute for a peace treaty’ as Henry Kissinger explained to the newly appointed President Gerald Ford. Kissinger added: ‘They more or less have

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that.’4 In other words, they did not have it entirely and, from the West German point of view, they would never have it. Therefore, the principle of peaceful change had to be inserted in the Helsinki Final Act which indicated that, with respect to the German question, the Final Act was a declaration on the modus vivendi, not binding legally and, as Chancellor Helmut Schmidt stressed, in terms of international law no ‘Ersatzfriedensvertrag’.5 In short, the ambiguity of détente as expressed in the Harmel formula of NATO in 1967 still existed when the Helsinki summit gathered in 1975. Indeed, it was the very condition for inducing gradual change in East-West relations. Neither side could achieve their maximum goals. Simultaneously, each side was able to save its face. Being shaped by the dialectics of status quo policy and revisionism, Ostpolitik took advantage of this reorganisation of the East-West relationship. The first phase of Ostpolitik started in late 1966 when the Grand Coalition government of Christian and Social Democrats was formed in Bonn. Détente was meant to be a dynamic process. In full agreement with Foreign Minister Brandt Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger was absolutely determined about this specifically Western notion of détente. East-West détente was to lead not only towards the de-escalation of the global conflict and towards co-operation between Western and Eastern Europe but also towards a solution of the German question.6 As a result, these two notions of détente conflicted with each other. The Soviet Union, who wanted a lessening of tensions, strongly demanded the preservation of the status quo. In the West, détente was regarded as an instrument for overcoming the status quo. In Bonn it was Egon Bahr, who, as chief of the Planning Staff in the Auswärtiges Amt, formulated the difference between the Eastern and the Western approach as succinctly as possible in September 1969: ‘The Soviet goal is to legalize the status quo. Our goal is to overcome it. It is a real conflict of interests.’7 It goes without saying that Bahr’s attitude towards the Soviet demand for an ESC was shaped by his definition of West German interests. The proposal tabled by the Warsaw Pact states in March 1969 should be used as a lever. The GDR could be forced ‘to consent to a rapprochement of the two German states’.8 If no progress on West German terms could be made in the German-German relationship (and in settling the Berlin question) the FRG would have to reject the idea of a conference on European security. In order to initiate the process of rapprochement the Social-Liberal government, with Brandt as Chancellor and Walter Scheel the leader of the Free Democrats (FDP) as Foreign Minister, started the second phase of the ‘new’ Ostpolitik, resulting in various treaties with the Soviet Union, Poland, the GDR and Czechoslovakia. For many observers it seemed as if the dynamic elements of Ostpolitik had receded. For instance, Helmut Sonnenfeldt, with a mixture of relief and disappointment, gave his assessment on West German concessions and Soviet gains on the eve of the CSCE: ‘Over the years, and especially in the last three years, the West has conceded most of the Soviet formula, mainly

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because West Germany, the potential revisionist power, has adopted a strategy that builds on rather than challenges the status quo.’9 Sonnenfeldt did not, as he should have done, differentiate between a West German status quo policy and a longer-term revisionist strategy. The latter was inextricably coupled with the former. Sonnenfeldt was aware of this long-term linkage but did not regard it as a realistic approach. Being deeply sceptical about a CSCE in general and without sharing the expectations of the Brandt government, he nevertheless realised that there was a close connection between the bilateral and the multilateral phases of Ostpolitik. He was absolutely right when he pointed out that the Germans had ‘no objection’ to the CSCE ‘since it is consistent with their general theory that the status quo must be confirmed if it is to be changed’.10 Clearly, the Federal Government in Bonn refrained from the Cold War philosophy with its liberation doctrine and psychological warfare. The Brezhnev doctrine was not challenged openly. But the central assumption was that change would not come overnight and could not be achieved with an adversary who felt insecure. If the acceptance of the status quo was regarded as a remedy, it was not seen by Brandt as an end in itself but as a starting point: ‘To accept the status quo would ultimately provide the means that would lead to changes in the existing situation.’11 Brandt’s reasoning was based on his definition of German interests but also on his perception of the Soviet Union. Right after the building of the wall in Berlin he began, in collaboration with Bahr, to reformulate his approach to the German question and to East-West relations. The old key notions of containment, deterrence and confrontation were substituted by communication and transformation. Brandt envisaged the ‘transformation of the other side’ and pleaded for a policy of communication with the communist East.12 For many years to come, the reality of communist regimes in Eastern Europe silenced any visionary hope that societies in Eastern Europe might move to liberalisation. In particular, the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia in 1968 seemed to prove that Brandt’s transformation approach was sheer illusion. On the other hand, the Soviet determination to crush the ‘Prague Spring’ could be seen as an act of despair with the defensive purpose to consolidate the Soviet empire. The status of the Soviet Union as a military superpower that had reached parity with the United States was only one facet of Soviet reality. The other one was the structural weakness of its society and economy. In particular, the ability of the Soviet Union to control the member states of the Warsaw Pact was apparently diminishing. The Soviet empire was perceived as being in a state of erosion.13 Given this assessment the West seemed well advised to take into consideration both the Soviet Union’s military strength and its weakness. After a short period of panic and disorientation after 21 August 1968, the Federal Government pointed out that there was no alternative to détente, not only from the Western point of view but also, as Brandt maintained, because the Soviets,

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for a number of reasons, were dependent on communication with the West.14 In conversation with British Prime Minister Edward Heath in April 1971 Brandt argued that the Soviet leadership ‘will try for a greater degree of communication with the West’. This appeared to be not only a success of German Ostpolitik and Western détente in general. It also stemmed from the Soviet need ‘for better contacts in trade and technology’. It seemed to Brandt ‘to be almost a law governing all modern industrial states, whatever their political systems, that the development of science, technology and so on leads to greater contacts’. For Brandt the Soviets were under an illusion if they believed ‘that they can combine greater political discipline with freer contacts with the Western countries’.15 Although the FRG was not a fully sovereign state and only a mid-sized power, it was of special importance for the Soviet Union and could, in turn, use its soft power for penetrating and transforming the East and for overcoming step by step the division of Germany and Europe. The most ambitious goal, which Bahr did not hide, was nothing less than the ‘disintegration of the Soviet bloc’. The ‘main aim was to put an end to the Soviet hold on Eastern Europe’.16 A less ambitious objective was the explicit recognition of the principle that borders might be changed by peaceful means. The FRG insisted that the possibility of unification had to be held open.17 The success of the CSCE depended on Soviet readiness to make concessions. As John Maresca, a member of the US delegation, recollects: ‘Although it was never mentioned publicly, and rarely discussed even in private, all of the delegates at the Conference realized that the CSCE was, in fact, about Germany, and that it would bear importantly on the status of that divided nation in the future.’18

The West German Position during the Multilateral Phase of Détente: Inviolability and Peaceful Change of Frontiers When the Soviet Union proposed a conference on European security, the question of the post-war borders in Europe was in the forefront. When the Multilateral Preparatory Talks of the CSCE started in Dipoli near Helsinki on 22 November 1972, the issue of security appeared in a wider context. The three Baskets indicated that the notion of security had changed considerably. The original Soviet understanding of security as a matter of the territorial order and of recognised borders was challenged by the Western approach, which strove for the permeability of borders by confidence-building measures, by economic exchange and by the free movement of people and ideas. In short, whereas the traditional concept of security maintained that the balance of power and the recognition of spheres of interest and influence could secure peace best, the wider definition of security covered also economic and human security. During the CSCE process the notion of peace as a liberal and democratic peace19

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emphasised the dynamic element of détente, which had always been in Willy Brandt’s mind when he spoke of communication with the East and of transforming the East. As far as Baskets II and III were concerned, the FRG endorsed the line taken by the EC and by NATO. Of special importance, however, was Basket I with the Declaration of Principles guiding the mutual relations of the participating states. The third principle referred to the inviolability of frontiers. As mentioned above, from the West German point of view it was of utmost importance that the outcome of the CSCE did not stand in contradiction to German national interests as defined by Bonn. Nothing could be accepted which implied that the German-German border was unalterable. According to the German-Soviet treaty of 12 August 1970 the FRG regarded all European borders as ‘inviolable’. In order to safeguard German interests the FRG maintained in a unilateral document that the German question was still open and that the wish for unification did not contradict the Treaty of Moscow. The Soviet Union did not reject the West German position, however the option of the peaceful change of borders was not explicitly mentioned in the text of the treaty. This was the precise aim of the FRG during the negotiations in Geneva. The CSCE provided the chance to agree on a text that contained both the assurance that frontiers were inviolable and the option that they might be changed by peaceful means. Consequently, to fix the principle of peaceful change in the Declaration of Principles was a key interest of the West German delegation to the CSCE. At the same time, the Soviet Union and the GDR, as the potential victim of peaceful change, wished to avoid it. No doubt, the pressure to formulate the principle of peaceful change came from Bonn. But it was also a general West European request because it was relevant with respect not only to the German question but also to European unity, which eventually might be achieved. Furthermore, the case of the Baltic states has to be mentioned. In a memorandum for the President on the eve of the signing of the Helsinki Final Act, Kissinger pointed out that the results of the CSCE ‘will not alter the status of the Baltic states, and your signature of the final CSCE documents will not inadvertently serve either to confirm or endorse permanent Soviet control’.20 During stage II of the CSCE in Geneva the issue of peaceful change was dealt with at various levels. First, the delegates of the participating states discussed it during their committee work or, often more importantly, on the occasion of informal talks. The second level was mostly outside Geneva when the superpowers touched upon the issue as part of their exchanges and negotiations on world politics. Third, the FRG raised the issue in bilateral contacts with the United States and the Soviet Union. Finally, it was a topic during the consultations of Western institutions, such as the Bonn group, the EC (the ‘Nine’) and NATO (the ‘Fifteen’). Neither the FRG nor the Soviet Union could achieve what they regarded as their maximum aims. The Soviet Union was successful in

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refusing a direct link between ‘inviolability of frontiers’ and ‘peaceful change of frontiers’ in the same principle of the Declaration of Principles. But Moscow did not succeed in dropping the peaceful change clause from the Declaration of Principles altogether.21 It took the conference roughly a year to find a solution that satisfied the Warsaw Pact states as well as the government in Bonn. Helmut Schmidt, Brandt’s successor as Federal Chancellor since May 1974, was determined to accept nothing in the Declaration of Principles that would be detrimental to the idea of a German unification.22 The FRG was in a key position. The success of the CSCE depended on a peaceful change formula, which, as Henry Kissinger has pointed out correctly in his memoirs, ‘in time would provide the legal and political authority for German unification’.23 Given the fact, however, that the existence of two German states was extremely convenient – to say the least – for the international community, the FRG was not only in a key position but also in a somewhat lonely position. According to Kissinger the FRG ‘was backed by its allies, especially the United States’.24 Although Kissinger’s recollection is correct as far as it goes, it does not provide the full story. While he officially supported the German cause, he also regarded it as a nuisance. Thus Kissinger told the Soviet leadership that the issues of peaceful change and of the interrelationship of the different principles in the Declaration of Principles were ‘essentially German questions. No one else is interested in them’.25 He felt bothered by the ‘nutty Germans’ and called the peaceful change argument ‘nuts’ and ‘absurd’. However, he was willing to ‘grasp it intellectually’ and found the German position ‘understandable’.26 Kissinger was always helpful when a decision had to be taken, but certainly not because of any sympathy for the Germans. Rather it was his wish to come to terms with the Soviets that shaped his attitude towards the CSCE in general and towards the German demand in particular. Kissinger held a highly ambivalent image of Germany and the Germans. He ‘had to take German interests into account, but laboured to keep them from straining the already difficult American-Soviet détente process’.27 There is an interesting similarity between his reaction towards Ostpolitik in 1970 and towards the German resolution to insist on the principle of peaceful change in 1974. In both cases Kissinger had profound reservations. But he did not block Ostpolitik. In 1974/75, the West German concern for peaceful change was regarded as oversensitive but was not dismissed. In both cases the FRG, although an embarrassment to the American superpower, was America’s ‘most important ally’.28 There is no need to go into all the details of the negotiations. For the purpose of this analysis it is sufficient to name (a) the stages of the proceedings in Geneva; (b) the East-West encounters and the differences of opinion within the Western camp; and (c) the actors who were of central importance in achieving the compromise solution which led to the summit of Helsinki.

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The first phase of stage II of the CSCE started in September 1973 and came to a close when, shortly before the Easter recess on 5 April 1974 at 10:30 pm the formulations on the ‘inviolability’ and the ‘peaceful change of frontiers’ could be registered, even if the FRG was not entirely happy with the procedure. As already mentioned, Bonn wished to include both elements which dealt with the inviolability of borders in the third principle of the Declaration of Principles. It was this principle to which the Soviet Union attached utmost importance. The Auswärtiges Amt in Bonn suspected that the Soviet Union was working on wording that could be interpreted as the definite establishment of the status quo in Europe.29 During the period of drafting the third principle the German delegation had to realise that neither the Nine nor the Fifteen were prepared to press the Soviet Union too hard. Given the strict Soviet attitude towards the issue of the inviolability of borders, it seemed pointless to insist on the West German position.30 Jacques Andréani of the French delegation recommended more flexibility on the part of the West Germans.31 On 20 March 1974 he told his EC colleagues that France had conveyed to the Soviet Union that the reference to peaceful change would not be included in the third principle, but that a formulation on peaceful change should be agreed upon and put in brackets.32 Already at this stage the issue of peaceful change was the highest concern. Kissinger was about to travel to Moscow in order to prepare the BrezhnevNixon summit at the end of June. Obviously, the Soviet leadership felt troubled by the Western wish to have the possibility of the peaceful change of borders acknowledged. Brezhnev sent letters to West European governments with the clear warning not to slow down the progress of the CSCE by unreasonable demands. In particular, Brezhnev insisted that the principle on the inviolability of borders must be ‘set forth with crystal clarity and purity’. Anything else ‘would mean leaving a loop-hole for those who still live by the spirit of revanchism’.33 On his way to Moscow Kissinger stopped in Bonn and discussed, among other things, the peaceful change problem with Foreign Minister Scheel. In a staff meeting before setting out for Bonn, Kissinger had proposed ‘to sneak in a reference to peaceful change in some other place [i.e. not with principle III] in a way acceptable to the Germans’. He added, not very gentlemanlike, ‘the problem is that horse’s ass Scheel now wants to get more out of the CSCE than he got in his treaty with the Soviets’.34 In Bonn, Kissinger found out that the German side did not agree on separating the peaceful change clause from principle III. Rather it should be left there but put in brackets until agreement was reached about where to place it. Kissinger coupled his agreement with the suggestion to put the formula on peaceful change on a separate piece of paper for further consideration of where it should be incorporated.35 In Moscow Kissinger presented this provisional solution to his host. A similar version was tabled by the Soviet delegation in Geneva on 26 March 1974. Provided that there was no reference to peaceful change in the principle on

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the inviolability of frontiers, the Soviet Union, drawing on an earlier French formulation, proposed that frontiers ‘can be changed only in accordance with international law through peaceful means and by agreement’. Further the USSR suggested placing the reference to peaceful change in the first principle of the Declaration of Principles, the principle on sovereign equality.36 On 2 April the Principles Subcommittee agreed on the formulation of the peaceful change clause. Hereafter, the Fifteen and the Soviet Union agreed to the registering of this text and of a text on the inviolability of frontiers on separate pieces of paper. The decision where the sentence on peaceful change would be placed would be taken later. When the texts37 were registered on 5 April 1974, the German delegation – which ‘was pressed from all sides to accept registration of the peaceful change language on a separate piece of paper simultaneously with registration of the inviolability principle itself ’38 – made a reservation in order to secure specific German interests.39 The FRG could not afford to be a stumbling block and accepted a compromise, which was not fully satisfactory but not a defeat either. At least the Soviet Union, for the first time, had agreed explicitly to a formula on peaceful change.40 As it turned out the text, which was registered on 5 April, was not regarded as the definite text, and the debate on where to place the peaceful change clause in the Declaration of Principles proved to be extremely difficult. But all in all a substantial breakthrough was achieved. In May the Germans and the Russians met for informal talks on peaceful change41 but nothing came of them. The Soviet attitude was regarded as ‘destructive’.42 With the roles reversed, the West Germans were confronted with the East German suspicion that the FRG wished to go beyond the Treaty of Moscow. From the GDR’s point of view Bonn’s policy gave cause for grave doubts.43 Additionally, the FRG was in a somewhat uncomfortable position because the EC and NATO partners wanted to leave the texts unchanged which had been were provisionally registered on 5 April, whereas the FRG insisted on more precise formulations.44 The issue was discussed several times by the Bonn group45 and also by Kissinger and Hans-Dietrich Genscher, the new West German Foreign Minister46 who, according to an FCO official, was seeking the support of the Three Powers ‘for a tougher line’.47 A decision on the future course of the West was taken on 18 June 1974, the eve of the NATO ministerial conference in Ottawa when the Foreign Ministers of the Three Powers and of the FRG met for their traditional talk on Germany. Genscher demanded a clear definition of peaceful change. In his opinion the Soviet Union had a different understanding of peaceful change and must not be allowed to block peaceful change, as defined by the FRG, in the future. First, Kissinger seemed unwilling to make any concessions and cautioned Genscher that it was a serious matter to reopen agreed language, thereby referring to the text registered provisionally on 5 April. In a verbal exchange Genscher reminded his colleagues of the German reservations to the text, whereupon

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Kissinger, who obviously wished to avoid obstacles to superpower détente, interjected that nobody had supported the German reservation. Genscher did not allow himself to be intimidated. He pointed out in great seriousness that no German government would sign a document without a satisfactory treatment of the peaceful change problem. Thereupon, the Foreign Ministers of the Three Powers gave way to Genscher’s position.48 Clearly, two different views of the CSCE became apparent. For Kissinger, apart from his principal rejection of a European security conference,49 the CSCE was a third-rate affair in the context of the superpower relationship, whereas the Europeans, and especially the West Germans, expected long-term effects.50 However strong the differences might have been, after the Ottawa meeting the Fifteen as well as the Nine backed the position of the FRG. Accordingly, at the last meeting of the Principles Subcommittee before the summer break on 26 July 1974, the US delegation tabled a revised formula on peaceful change for inclusion in the principle on sovereign equality: ‘In accordance with international law, the participating states consider that their frontiers can be changed through peaceful means and by agreement.’ The new text had been agreed upon in advance with the Germans. From their point of view it was to be preferred because it put the matter in a more positive way.51 The Germans had ‘called on the United States for assistance’,52 and Kissinger, for good reasons, was prepared to act as the leading power of the West. At the same time, however, he told the Soviets that it was a German proposal and that the United States and the Soviet Union were not really the main protagonists. 53 The Americans wanted to leave it to the Europeans to work out an acceptable arrangement with the Soviets.54 During a visit to Bonn in October 1974, Sonnenfeldt made this absolutely clear. When the German side expressed that they liked the ‘American formulation on peaceful change’, Sonnenfeldt ‘objected to references to the “American formula” noting that the US had only submitted it at the behest of the FRG. At best it was an American proxy formula’. Sonnenfeldt added ‘that the US was willing to accept whatever formulation the FRG and its European Allies might be able to work out with the Soviets. The US was not particularly interested in the subject because we did not consider that these principles had a binding legal effect’.55 At that time the West German delegation in Geneva was informed by the Soviets that Gromyko did not accept the ‘American formula’.56 When Schmidt and Genscher went to Moscow in late October 1974 the Federal Chancellor offered a deal. Schmidt was prepared to keep a low profile in the talks on Basket III. The FRG had ‘only one vital interest’. That was the adequate insertion of the peaceful change formula in the Declaration of Principles. Gromyko told his German colleague that the Soviet Union was not willing to move. As to peaceful change, one should cling to the wording of 5 April. Genscher’s reaction did not differ from his earlier reaction to Kissinger’s attempt to leave the peaceful change language unchanged.

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Genscher regarded this as unacceptable and placed the utmost importance on a satisfactory solution.57 During the Soviet-American summit in Vladivostok one month later, Gromyko complained about the Germans and suggested: ‘Let us jointly convince the FRG not to drag on this issue.’ Obviously, Kissinger was unwilling to go into any details. He promised that he would ‘try to convince the Germans to review their position’.58 However, when Schmidt and Genscher went to Washington shortly afterwards, they reaffirmed their position. The FRG would not consent to a Declaration of Principles, which could be interpreted as a surrogate peace treaty.59 Thereupon, Kissinger, in close co-operation with Bonn, worked out new proposals. In a message via the secret channel between the Chancellery and the Kremlin, Schmidt promised Brezhnev what the latter wanted most urgently, namely a speedy conclusion of stage II of the CSCE. At the same time he expected a positive Soviet reaction on the issue of peaceful change.60 A breakthrough was achieved after a meeting of Kissinger and Gromyko in Geneva on 16 and 17 February 1975. Both men were interested in a solution of the peaceful change issue. Kissinger took Schmidt’s position and the Soviet side finally agreed to a formula which was acceptable to Bonn.61 On 17 March 1975 the US delegation tabled the text in Geneva which was eventually approved: ‘The participating states consider that their frontiers can be changed, in accordance with international law, by peaceful means and by agreement.’ Only minor points still had to be cleared. A ‘sometimes bitter negotiation’ had come to its end.62 Klaus Blech, Head of the West German delegation, could feel confirmed in his long-standing view that a satisfactory result could be attainable.63 He did not fail to appreciate that the delegates had been able to overcome all of the difficulties.64

Notes 1. GFL, NSA, NSC Europe, Canada and Ocean Affairs Staff Files, box 44, Status report for the Vice President on the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, 14 February 1975. 2. For a fuller account, see G. Niedhart, ‘Revisionistische Elemente und die Initiierung friedlichen Wandels in der neuen Ostpolitik 1967–1974’, Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 28 (2002): 233–266; G. Niedhart and O. Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit” beseitigen: Ostpolitik in der zweiten außenpolitischen Formationsphase der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Übergang von den Sechziger- zu den Siebzigerjahren’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004): 415–448. 3. In his memoirs, Bahr calls it correctly a ‘Friedensvertragsersatz’. Egon Bahr, Zu meiner Zeit (Munich, 1996), 327.

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4. GFL, NSA, Memoranda of Conversations, Box 5, conversation between Ford and Kissinger, 15 August 1974. 5. AdsD, HSA, vol. 6655, memorandum ‘Wertung der bisherigen übersehbaren Ergebnisse der KSZE-Beratungen unter deutschland- und berlinpolitischen Aspekten’, n.d., with Schmidt’s handwritten marginalia, among them, ‘“Ersatzfriedensvertrag” ist vermieden’. 6. On Kiesinger, see P. Gassert, Kurt Georg Kiesinger: 1904–1988. Kanzler zwischen den Zeiten (Stuttgart, 2006). On the Grand Coalition government, see O. Bange, Ostpolitik and Détente in Europe: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mann­ heim, 2004). 7. AAPD 1969, p. 1040, memorandum by Bahr, 18 September 1969, ‘Rahmenvertrag mit der DDR’: ‘Das Hauptziel der sowjetischen Europapolitik ist die Legalisierung des Status quo. Das Hauptziel unserer Politik ist die Überwindung des Status quo. Es handelt sich hier um einen echten Gegensatz der Interessen.’ See also AAPD 1968, p. 1279, memorandum by Bahr, 1 October 1968, ‘Ostpolitik nach der Besetzung der CSSR’. 8. AAPD 1969, p. 1053, memorandum by Bahr, 18. September 1969, ‘Überlegungen zur Außenpolitik einer künftigen Bundesregierung’. 9. H. Giusto, M. Munteanu and C. Ostermann (eds.), The Road to Helsinki: The Early Steps to the CSCE. Selected Documents (Collection of Documents, distributed for the participants of the International Conference on the CSCE (Florence, 2003)). Memorandum by Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, undated [September 1972]. 10. Ibid., memorandum by Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, 5 September 1972. 11. AdsD, HSA, vol. 5814, draft of a speech, which was sent to Helmut Schmidt for approval, 7 September 1973. 12. DzDP IV/9, pp. 565–567, speech by Brandt in Tutzing, 15 July 1963. 13. AdsD, Dep. Bahr, 72, paper by Bahr for a conference at the University of Marburg/ Lahn, 27 October 1968. See also AAPD 1969, p. 1051, Bahr’s memorandum, 18 September 1969 (see note 7 above). 14. Willy Brandt, ‘Plädoyer für die Vernunft: Deutsche Außenpolitik nach dem 21. August’, Der Monat, 21/245 (1969): 20–26. 15. PRO, PREM 15/397. 16. PRO, FCO 49/265, Bahr during a meeting of the Atlantic Policy Advisory Group (APAG) in Washington, 18 April 1969. 17. AdsD, WBA, BKA, vol. 58, letters by Brandt to Olof Palme, 15 June 1970; and to Brezhnev, 24 April 1973. 18. J. J. Maresca, To Helsinki: The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe 1973–1975 (Durham, 1987), 81. 19. On this concept, which has been covered by an enormous amount of literature since the end of the East-West conflict, see e.g. M. W. Doyle, Ways of War and Peace: Realism, Liberalism, and Socialism (New York, 1997); M. F. Elman (ed.), Paths to Peace: Is Democracy the Answer? (Cambridge, MA, 1997); M. V. Rasmussen, The West, Civil Society and the Construction of Peace (Houndmills, 2003). 20. GFL, WHCF, box 13, Memorandum by Kissinger for President Ford: ‘Impact of European Security Conference on Baltic States’; undated. 21. PA AA, ZA 100005, reports by the West German delegation to the CSCE on the Soviet position, 17 and 19 January 1974.

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22. AAPD 1974, p. 678, conversation between Schmidt and Hillenbrand, US ambassador in Bonn, 6 June 1974; ibid., pp. 826–827, conversation between Schmidt and Tito, 25 June 1974. 23. Henry Kissinger, Years of Renewal (New York, 1999), 639. 24. Ibid. 25. NARA, RG 59, Records of Helmut Sonnenfeldt, box 8, meeting with Brezhnev, 24 October 1974. 26. NARA, RG 59, Kissinger’s Staff Meetings, 5 December 1974. 27. Holger Klitzing, The Nemesis of Stability: Henry A. Kissinger’s Ambivalent Relationship with Germany (Trier, 2007) 399. 28. GFL, NSA, Presidential Country Files for Europe and Canada, box 5, memorandum by Kissinger for Ford, 26 September 1974. 29. PA AA, ZA 111534, memorandum for the West German delegation by van Well, Political Director in the AA in Bonn, 29 March 1974. 30. PA AA, ZA 100006 and 111534, reports by the West German delegation, 18 and 19 March 1974. 31. Ibid., West German delegation to AA, 14 and 15 March 1974. For Andréani’s own account, see Jacques Andréani, Le Piège: Helsinki et la chute du communisme (Paris, 2005). 32. PA AA, ZA 100006, West German delegation to AA, 20 March 1974. See also Marie-Pierre Rey’s chapter in this volume. 33. DBPO III/2, p. 236, note 4, Brezhnev’s undated letter of January 1974. Brandt too received a letter and sent an answer on 7 February 1974, reminding Brezhnev of Gromyko’s assurance to Scheel on 29 July 1970 that inviolability and peaceful change of frontiers did not contradict each other. AAPD 1974, pp. 153–154. 34. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt records, box 8, staff meeting, 22 March 1974. 35. AAPD 1974, p. 438, memorandum of conversation, 24 March 1974. 36. PA AA, ZA 100006, West German delegation to AA, 26 March 1974. 37. AAPD 1974, p. 424, note 7, and pp. 604–605, note 4, CSCE/II/A/24 and 26. 38. Maresca, To Helsinki, 93. 39. AAPD 1974, p. 604, note 4. For the English version, see Maresca, To Helsinki, 3–94: ‘Before the FRG Delegation can give its consent to the final formulation of the principle of inviolability of frontiers … agreement must have been reached on the following questions: (1) on the principle to which the formulation concerning “peaceful change” will be attached; (2) on a precise formulation of “peaceful change” in this context; (3) on a precise formulation of the principle of “self-determination”; (4) on a formula concerning the connection between the principles; (5) furthermore, the German text of these principles must be satisfactory to the delegation of the FRG.’ 40. PA AA, ZA 111534, memorandum by von Groll (AA), 8 April 1974. 41. PA AA, ZA 100007, West German delegation to AA, 15 May 1974. PA AA, ZA 111534, survey given in a memorandum by von Groll, 2 July 1974. 42. PA AA, ZA 111531, AA memorandum, 4 June 1974. 43. PA AA, ZA 100007, Siegfried Bock, Head of the GDR delegation, during a lunch, 1 July 1974, to which he had invited his West German opposite number, Guido Brunner. Brunner to AA, 2 July 1974. 44. AAPD 1974, pp. 604–607 and 671–676, AA memoranda, 2 May and 4 June 1974.

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45. AAPD 1974, p. 730, note 15. 46. For their meeting on 11 June 1974, see AAPD 1974, pp. 726–734. 47. DBPO III/2, p. 296, minute by Fall for Tickell, 17 June 1974. 48. AAPD 1974, pp. 789–790. 49. On this, see the chapter by Stephan Kieninger in this volume. 50. PA AA, ZA 111532, memorandum by van Well, 23 July 1974. 51. PA AA, ZA 100008, reports No. 1138 and 1140 by the West German delegation to AA, 26 July 1974. 52. Kissinger, Renewal, 640. 53. Kissinger in conversation with Gromyko, 20 September 1974. Klitzing, Nemesis, 407. 54. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 3, memorandum by Sonnenfeldt on conversations with Vorontsov, 30 September 1974, and with Tickell, 9 October 1974. 55. Ibid., Sonnenfeldt in conversation with Blech and Moersch, 28 October 1974. 56. PA AA, ZA 100009, West German delegation to AA, 16 October 1974. 57. AAPD 1974, p. 1378 and 1399, conversation between Schmidt and Brezhnev, 29 October 1974; Genscher in conversation with Gromyko, 30 October 1974. 58. GFL, NSA, Kissinger reports on USSR, China, and Middle East discussions, box 1, meeting 24 November 1974. 59. AAPD 1974, p. 1594, conversation between Kissinger and Genscher, 6 December 1974. 60. Helmut Schmidt Privatarchiv, Hamburg, Ordner UdSSR 1974–1977, Schmidt to Brezhnev, 13 February 1975. 61. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 8, conversation between Kissinger and Gromyko, 16–17 February 1975. GFL, NSA, Presidential Country Files for Europe and Canada, box 16, telegram Kissinger to US Embassy Bonn, 18 February 1975. Maresca, To Helsinki, 115–116. 62. DBPO III/2, pp. 455–456, Foreign Secretary Callaghan in a guidance to British representatives overseas, 28 July 1975. 63. Dr Klaus Blech, Head of the FRG delegation in Geneva from 11 November 1974 onwards, and Dr Günter Joetze, member of his staff, in conversation with the author, 24 November 2005. 64. PA AA, ZA 100010, FRG German delegation to AA, 18 March 1975.

–3–

France and the German Question in the Context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1969–1974

o

Marie-Pierre Rey

Since a peaceful reunification cannot take place without Moscow’s agreement, either we remain in the present situation … which after all does not bother us, or little by little, if a détente and real transformation appear in Russia [italics added], we will be able to establish a European system, from the Atlantic to the Urals, where Germany will be reunified, under certain conditions, notably in the area of atomic weapons. The US would not participate in this Europe, but all of this would be done in agreement with them, and in their interest, of course.1

This assertion, expressed in 1965 by Charles de Gaulle in conversation with Hervé Alphand, then French Ambassador in Washington, shows that for the French President, by the mid-1960s, international détente was one of the essential preconditions for a possible pacific settlement of the German question – the other one being the ability of the USSR to evolve – and that any future settlement leading to German reunification would have to take place within an official European framework. However, three years after de Gaulle’s declaration, the Prague tragedy and the occupation of Czechoslovakia brought a serious setback to détente, and several months before he decided to resign, they ruined his dream of a pacific reconciliation between the two parts of the European continent. How did French perceptions of the German question evolve after de Gaulle’s resignation and during Georges Pompidou’s presidency? Did the international

Notes for this chapter begin on page 64.

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changes which took place at that time with the emergence of Ostpolitik and the relaunch of the renewed project of a European conference have any impact on these perceptions, and if so, to what diplomatic practises did these changing perceptions lead? To answer these questions, this analysis will be divided into two parts. The first part will study the general French approach to the European context and to the German question during Pompidou’s presidency; the second part will focus specifically on concrete French perceptions of the German question in the context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE and will analyse the diplomatic practises that resulted from these perceptions in the years 1969–1974.

The French Approach to the European Context and the German Question during Georges Pompidou’s Presidency When he succeeded de Gaulle in the spring of 1969, Georges Pompidou, de Gaulle’s former prime minister and his spiritual heir, remained attached to his predecessor’s main orientations. But due to new priorities, his perception of the European context and of the German question differed from de Gaulle’s in several ways.

Georges Pompidou and French Foreign Policy: The Main Orientations Like de Gaulle, Pompidou desired to strengthen France’s independence and to serve this aim by preserving both French membership in the Western community and dialogue with the East. For Pompidou, the Franco-Soviet privileged dialogue, which from 1965­– 66 led to a political rapprochement and to growing economic and cultural exchanges, had to be preserved and during his presidency this was notably developed, giving rise both to regular meetings between Ministers of Foreign Affairs and to summits and working visits between Pompidou and Brezhnev, then General Secretary of the CPSU.2 In the French president’s view, however, the process of dialogue with the East in general and with the USSR in particular, could not compete with the process of building the EEC, which was Pompidou’s true priority. Indeed, the construction of Europe, which for de Gaulle had been merely a possible instrument in the service of France, for Pompidou constituted much more than that: it was a crucial imperative. And within this united Europe just being built, vigilance regarding the East should prevail, while openness to the communist bloc should in no case signify a weakening of communitarian spirit and institutions. On the contrary, for the French president, openness

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to the East should be accompanied by a deepening of EEC structures and by an enlargement of the existing structures in other fields, including defence, which, in time, might lead to a European system of security.3 The necessity of constructing a ‘vigilant’ détente with the East while respecting the engagements born of European construction was much more important for the new French president than for de Gaulle because – unlike de Gaulle – he did not adhere to the dream of a Europe extending from the Atlantic to the Urals. In fact, in not one of the speeches that he gave between 1969 and 1974 did he adopt that famous formula as his own. On the other hand, he did believe in the thesis of the ‘convergence’ of socio-political and economic models and thought that the differences between these models would be effaced ‘due to the similarities born from technical and industrial revolutions and from the profound exigencies of a modern conception of civilisation’.4 And in due course, through contact with Western values and freedom, the communist idea could only waste away. The construction of the EEC was Pompidou’s priority, and like de Gaulle, he remained attached to the main pillar of this construction, that of French-West German reconciliation. But due to his personal convictions and the evolution of the international situation, Pompidou’s approach towards West Germany in general, and towards Ostpolitik and the German question more precisely, was in several respects different from de Gaulle’s.

Georges Pompidou, Ostpolitik and the German Question Crowned with success by the signing of the Elysée Treaty in 1963, the FrenchWest German rapprochement became a fundamental element in French foreign policy; for de Gaulle, the reconciliation with the FRG was the fruition of a deep and structural move; and in April 1969, when he was on the point of resigning, he clearly and publicly reconfirmed this orientation, asserting that it was impossible to think of a French foreign policy that was not ‘based on the irreversibility of French-German reconciliation’.5 However, at that time, despite its strength, this rapprochement did not keep all its promises. If bilateral rapprochement led to trust and confidence in the political field and to co-operation in economics, trade and culture, it nevertheless remained disappointing because, despite some common views on several key questions and common interests, the two countries also had divergent perceptions on sensitive matters. Regarding the German question, when Adenauer claimed the right of the FRG to represent all of the German people and reaffirmed the Hallstein doctrine, de Gaulle insisted, as early as 1959, on the necessity for the two German states to develop mutual contacts and to accept existing European borders,6 including the Oder-Neisse border – an approach which was close to the Soviet one. And regarding the future of French-German relations, while for de Gaulle

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this relationship could lead to the elaboration of a common foreign policy independent from that of the United States, for Adenauer, who remained attached to Atlanticism and loyal to the American ally, the French-German relationship should be only a supplement and not a substitute for NATO solidarity. Consequently, as early as July 1963, de Gaulle did not hide his disillusion with this bilateral rapprochement, declaring that ‘if the French-German treaty was not to be enforced, that would not be the first time in History’.7 Despite that disappointing turn of events, when Pompidou came to power, he remained attached to the privileged institutional framework and to the privileged relationship he had inherited from de Gaulle. In July 1969, in one of his first meetings with Brandt, the West German Foreign Minister and future Chancellor, he symptomatically declared: ‘If we signed with you a treaty of cooperation and if, besides, we are with you in the Community, it is awareness of the cause and because we think that the common interest of France and Germany predominates over all that could have divided us and that we have, on both sides, the same interests.’8 And one year later, in July 1970, Pompidou was again stressing the vital importance of the French-German privileged relationship: Neither France nor French policy are turned to the past nor do they wish in any way or another that Germany has less contact with the East, or that it could be considered with suspicion or that it remained divided. Absolutely not. This policy is out of date; it does not correspond to realities or to future possibilities. We do not want to keep rehearsing the old quarrels and the old rivalries. We stand all together. The interests of Germany and France concur on the future.9

For Pompidou as for de Gaulle, there was not any alternative to the FrenchGerman privileged relationship. In this context, and throughout the years 1969–1974, Brandt and Pompidou had frequent discussions in which both of them expressed their political views and in these talks, Ostpolitik and the German question occupied most of the agenda, as the predominant issue. In his meetings with Pompidou, Brandt often intended to explain to the French president the motives for Ostpolitik, that is to promote a realistic policy which, while agreeing to recognise the existence of East and West Germany as a given, also aimed to promote peaceful relations between them in order to guarantee the safety of Berlin, to facilitate family contacts and to improve, as much as possible, the lives of East Germans, without compromising forever the dream of a possible reunification of the two German states. And he frequently tried to reassure his French interlocutor about the nature of Ostpolitik and its possible positive consequences. In January 1970, he defended his realistic approach to international matters, focusing on the necessity ‘to start territorially from the existing status quo to go further … We have to admit the inviolability of borders and also the territorial integrity of GDR … Without accepting the recognition of the borders, we have nevertheless to start from the

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existing facts and to look for solutions for the future’.10 And again in December 1971, in Paris, he defended his Ostpolitik, stressing that this policy was clearly favourable to West European interests.11 The meaning of this policy and its aims were understood in Paris and favourably received by the French leadership, as stressed by Brandt himself in his memoirs12 and as expressed explicitly by Pompidou and French diplomats. According to the French leadership, Ostpolitik was advocating the end of the Cold War, as French diplomacy was, and so it was a valuable piece of détente, a factor favourable to the rapprochement of the two parts of Europe in the first instance, and which could eventually progress towards the elimination of the two blocs. However, Ostpolitik was also perceived in Paris with a certain anxiety. Indeed, French leaders feared that in the short term, Ostpolitik would bring the FRG to turn away from the construction of Europe and, in the longer term, that Germany would in time be susceptible to trading its own reunification for neutralisation and the US military withdrawal from Europe,13 which would unilaterally benefit the Soviets. In Paris in February 1972, Pompidou commented to Brandt: ‘[O]ne indeed senses that the Soviet Union, in appealing to nationalist aspirations fundamental to a Germany looking towards reunification, might tell itself sometime that a sort of neutralisation of Germany might resolve this problem of reunification.’14 For French diplomacy, the only solution to these potential risks was, on the one hand, to anchor West Germany to the EEC (as Pompidou said in confidential talks with André Fontaine, a famous journalist, it is crucial ‘to moor Germany to Europe, in such a way that it cannot detach itself ’15) and on the other hand, to keep on promoting a broad multilateral détente, which could serve as a general framework for future German reunification. In July 1969, alluding to de Gaulle’s policy of openness to the USSR and to the East in general, Pompidou told Brandt: ‘It is only in détente that will be found at last the solution to the German question and to peace in Europe.’16 Like de Gaulle in 1965, Pompidou was himself convinced that in the long term, the key to German reunification could only be found in the frame of a European system based on détente. This general approach to the European context and to the German question had a concrete impact on French diplomacy in the specific context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE.

French Diplomacy and the German Question in the Context of Ostpolitik and the CSCE During the years 1969–1974, the French diplomatic approach to the German question remained generally benevolent and with an understanding towards Western Germany and its interests. And if some divergences did appear and

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crises take place, nevertheless solidarity between France and the FRG prevailed, and this had a positive impact on the CSCE process.

French Support for the FRG and West German Interests Despite the CDU’s attempts to discredit Brandt’s Ostpolitik in Paris17 on the one hand, and repeated Soviet attempts to undermine the Western alliance and weaken Western solidarity during various negotiations on European issues on the other, French support for the FRG and for West German interests remained solid during the Pompidou years. As convincingly revealed by Mary Sarotte, who consulted SED archives, at least four bilateral conversations took place between Soviet and French Ambassadors during the Quadripartite Talks along with the SED Politburo, probably in accordance with the Soviet authorities. A foreign policy specialist, Hermann Axen, was sent to Paris in order ‘to flatter French Foreign Minister Maurice Schumann into agreeing to a French recognition of the GDR in advance of official West German recognition’.18 However, all these attempts failed, and despite the real French-Soviet rapprochement, Franco-German solidarity prevailed on these sensitive questions. This solidarity was frequently advanced by the French leadership in dealing with Chancellor Brandt. For example, during the preparation and the negotiation of the Quadripartite Agreement on Berlin, Pompidou frequently sent short notes and letters to Brandt in which the French leader stressed the need to preserve solidarity between the Western Powers19 and in particular called for consultation between France and West Germany. In return, this solidarity was greatly appreciated by Willy Brandt who frequently thanked the French president for his benevolence and his support for Ostpolitik, as shown in several letters exchanged by the two leaders in 1970–1971.20 And this led to systematic consultation on the key international problems of the period, which shows that the French-German relation, in the first half of the 1970s, had already entered a phase of maturity. However, at the same time, this solidarity did not mean that there were not any topics of divergence between the two sets of leaders. On the contrary, several sources of disagreement existed.

Sources of Divergence and Disagreement In 1969–1971, the quadripartite negotiation on Berlin first constituted a topic of divergence between the two countries. Indeed, at the very beginning of the negotiations, Brandt wanted success on the Berlin front at all costs in order to improve the situation in Berlin concretely, and in January 1971, he pledged publicly not to submit to the Moscow Treaty for ratification until an acceptable agreement on Berlin could be found.21 Meanwhile, Pompidou remained more cautious, and even suspicious, about Soviet motives, fearing that

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a disengagement of the Four Powers could, in time, only favour the GDR. So throughout the negotiations, the French president repeatedly asked for caution and for total respect of the Four Powers’ rights. Then, after the signing of the Berlin agreement in 1971, Pompidou tried to play the role of an arbiter and of a moderator, intending to convince West German leaders to respect the spirit of the Agreement and not to deform its meaning, asking for respect of the Four Powers’ rights on the one hand and for more caution from the West German side on the other. In September 1973, a note addressed to Pompidou’s Cabinet, which was favourably annotated by the French president,22 the Ambassador in Bonn, Jean Sauvagnargues clearly expressed this concern, calling for moderation and balance: The true problem for us is to make the Federal Authorities understand that such a development of links [between the FRG and West Berlin] must be conducted in a reasonable way. There can be no question, firstly, of literally stuffing West-Berlin with new organizations. But on the other hand, it would not be suitable for initiatives to be launched and decisions taken without our having said a word. The Three Powers are responsible vis-à-vis the USSR in this field, and they must be careful, also, that in its functioning, no Federal department might infringe the provisions of the Quadripartite Agreement.23

So the assertion was quite clear. A second small source of divergence appeared between the two countries regarding the CSCE project. Admittedly, Pompidou and Foreign Minister Maurice Schumann were strongly in favour of the CSCE. In October 1969, during Maurice Schumann’s trip to the USSR, the French gave frank support to the CSCE project, illustrated by the official communiqué.24 Several factors explain this firm support. Some were circumstantial: in the context of Ostpolitik, the French administration might have seen the conference as a way to ‘channel’, to enclose Ostpolitik within a larger framework.25 But other deeper factors played a role. Firstly, the French leaders saw in the CSCE a useful tool for the multipolar diplomacy they wanted to promote, and in addition – and this point is extremely important – the French leaders hoped that the CSCE would bring the Soviets to soften their hold on their satellite countries. This theme was key to French diplomatic strategy and was frequently mentioned by governmental authorities. For example, in March 1970 Maurice Schumann declared to the National Assembly: ‘If on the contrary, the goal of the European conference is to bring together countries and not blocs or governments that belong to existing blocs, and if, from the start or step by step, these countries find in the conference the opportunity to affirm their national personalities, then the project can lead to the consecration of détente.’26 In December 1971, when President Nixon was expressing serious doubts about the effects of the conference, Pompidou answered him:

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We are convinced that Communism per se, I mean its economic and social regime, is now illusory in a great number of allegedly Socialist countries. We think that Poland, Rumania, even Czechoslovakia and Hungary only ask for one thing: to shake off the hold that weighs on them. It is said that there is a divided Western bloc and that faced with a united bloc; therefore, we are going to lose. Personally I think that, on the one hand, there are free and independent countries, among whom France believes herself to belong; and on the other hand, there are countries aspiring to freedom and independence.27

The third objective of Pompidou diplomacy was to use the conference on security to achieve results on human rights and freedom of ideas and opinions. As early as July 1969, a few days after Pompidou’s election and before French support for the European conference became official, a long letter addressed to the Soviet government through the French Embassy in Moscow illustrated this objective: Such a meeting raises some problems which the French government is ready to discuss with the Soviet government … A useful method for a French-Soviet discussion could be to examine the various questions which might be submitted to the conference … in order to determine if some of them could be successfully examined by the conference. Besides the political issues involving European countries, we could examine questions concerning the development of commercial exchanges and economic cooperation, scientific and technical cooperation,… issues related to the protection of human rights, the free circulation of people, ideas and information, and the advancement of cultural exchanges.28

However, at the same time, Pompidou and Schumann were also aware that the conference could be problematic and dangerous for West Germany if it was to bring diplomatic advantages to the East – among them the recognition of the GDR – without any compensation to the FRG. Consequently the West had to be both cautious and flexible in its approach towards the next conference, as was expressed by Pompidou to Brandt in January 1970: This leads to the European Conference on Security. The Russians are telling us that the German question should not be the topic of talks at this conference. I think, in fact, that during such a conference, they want to simply ratify the status quo, without mentioning it. This situation will result from the presence at the conference of the two Germanys around the same table. We say that we are in favour of this conference, but that two general themes are not enough for it. Moreover maybe it would be better beforehand to create a climate that would permit progress on the solution of current problems that you are looking for.29

This last point is important. The French support for the CSCE project was not unconditional; for Georges Pompidou, the European conference had to

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be preceded by progress in the ongoing negotiations on the German question, in particular on Berlin. But in looking forward only to an improvement in the international climate, he was more flexible than Brandt and the other Western allies30 who wanted, if not to make signing a Berlin agreement a required precondition for the opening of the conference, then at least to fix a kind of ‘correlation’31 between the two processes. On the CSCE project, French diplomacy was more eager than West German to take into account the Soviet point of view. Finally, the last main source of disagreement was to be in 1972–73 over the MBFR project: when US diplomacy, supported by Brandt, began to ask for negotiations on MBFR as a prerequisite for entering the concrete phase of the CSCE process and as a topic to be included on the agenda of the European conference, French leaders expressed their strong disagreement32 regarding negotiations, which according to them, were liable to favour disarmament of Central Europe, the departure of US troops from the European continent and in time the neutralisation of the two Germanys. These divergent approaches and misunderstandings led to mutual irritation and sometimes to small crises. In September 1971, when it was known in Paris that Willy Brandt went to Oreanda to meet Brezhnev for bilateral talks without having first consulted the French leaders, Pompidou was furious about this breach in the spirit of the French-German relationship33 and two months later, receiving Walter Scheel, the West German Minister of Foreign Affairs, he was quite direct in his criticism: I must tell you that what bothers me these last months – I speak frankly to you and request you to say so to the Chancellor – is that basically we are nearly better informed about US, British and Russian intentions than about what the German government is thinking. This is in contradiction to our treaty and, above all, to our interests. By the nature of things, we are very closely linked to each other. This obliges us to shape together a certain idea of Europe and of the future of our peoples. We have to be very good friends or else be hostile. So we have to be very good friends, this is my strong conviction.34

In December 1971, responding implicitly to this criticism and showing that he was aware of the negative impact of the event on his French interlocutor, Willy Brandt did his best to clear up the misunderstanding, to justify his attitude and to reassure the French president of his loyalty to the French-German alliance: When the meeting in Crimea took place, it seems that there has been a lack of information and from my side, I learned some lessons. If I see the situation correctly, there is also a point of detail on which there was a Russian manoeuvre similar to what I had already seen once, on a smaller scale, in Berlin. The Russians told me that I had to play the game of an urgent invitation, then they told several of our

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partners, – told you or some of your collaborators – that they were responding to a German wish, a German proposal. This hampered me.35

But the French government was not alone in feeling disappointment and resentment and two years later, in July 1973, bitterness came this time from the FRG. Indeed, West German leaders and public opinion (as expressed in newspapers) voiced their common strong irritation at Michel Jobert’s speech in Vienna and his repeated refusal to take part in the MBFR, accusing the French foreign minister of defending a selfish and narrow-minded conception of Europe. However, despite these misunderstandings and crises, solidarity between France and West Germany prevailed, with positive effects on the CSCE process.

France, West Germany and the CSCE Process During all the CSCE negotiations, at first, with regard to the schedule to be observed, the French leadership chose to support the West German perspective, which consisted of getting concrete results on the quadripartite negotiation in Berlin before getting involved in the CSCE preparatory talks, and this, despite their own reluctance to this approach.36 This important point must be stressed. Secondly, with regard to the agenda, the procedure and the topics to be treated at the conference, West German and French leaders and diplomats had frequent discussions that led to common positions. On the format to give the CSCE, West German diplomats supported the French proposal ‘that was intended to partially satisfy the Soviet demand for a high-level opening’37 to organise the conference in three successive stages, the first one at the ministerial level in Helsinki, the second one at a working level in Geneva and the third one in Helsinki at a top level that would be decided during the conference talks. The West German diplomats were also in favour of a French proposal regarding the ‘agreed mandates to be given to the committees of the second stage of the CSCE to serve as instructions for the drafting of the final document’.38 In return, French diplomats shared the West German concern about not giving the Final Act the status of a Peace Treaty, which would freeze forever the frontiers,39 and about keeping the door open to reunification by peaceful means. They did their best to convince Soviet leaders of the necessity to accept this, and they succeeded in their attempt, as shown by the report on the March 1974 meeting between Pompidou and Brezhnev40 written by the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Pompidou pointed out that France adopted benevolent positions as regarding the principle of the inviolability of frontiers. At the same time, he stressed that it was essential to get the FRG agreement on the results which will be achieved by the panEuropean conference and he mentioned that it is difficult for France to take a stand

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which would not be acceptable to the FRG [italics added]. On our side, we showed ourselves to be insistent about this question. In the conclusion to the exchange of views, the French President declared that he was ready to look for an acceptable solution, having in mind that the mention of the possible peaceful change of frontiers could figure in another part of the document, without any link to the principle of the inviolability of frontiers.41

In due course, this would lead to the insertion in the Final Act of a specific sentence to counterbalance the assertion about the inviolability of frontiers.42 Finally, French diplomats also strongly supported West German diplomats when they insisted on the necessity of confirming the strict equality of the ten major principles adopted during the course of the conference.43 The two countries – in parallel with the other EEC members – had also common views regarding the necessity to promote human rights and freedom of ideas through the Third Basket and from this point of view the CSCE conference was both a great success for the EEC diplomacy in a whole44 and for the French in particular for as we mentioned above, French leaders had, earlier than many others, focused on this aspect. Finally, the two countries adopted common views regarding the follow-up to the conference. As early as July 1972 and again in January 1973, this question was debated by Brandt and Pompidou in their bilateral conversations.45 Immediately, the French president expressed his reluctance to answer positively the Soviet demand regarding the creation of a permanent institution and was more favourable to a less constraining formula, that is, to the organisation of regular meetings between ministers or representatives of the countries involved in the process. This approach was understood and fully supported by Brandt as well as by the other CEE members, and ultimately no permanent organisation was to be created during the CSCE conference. From this study, therefore, what can we conclude? The general approach to diplomatic questions as well as the concrete conduct of French foreign policy during Georges Pompidou’s presidency obviously attest to the fact that during the years 1969–1974, French leaders were strongly interested in the future of Europe and in the evolution of East-West European relations, and that they attached a crucial importance to the German question. On this sensitive issue, for Pompidou as for de Gaulle, the positive solution – that is the reunification of Germany – had to be solved and could only be solved within a general pan-European framework built through détente and dialogue with the East. Consequently, French leaders faithfully supported Brandt’s Ostpolitik, despite some anxieties about its possible consequences, and they adopted a favourable attitude to the CSCE project, hoping that the conference could not only further détente in general, but could also help the Eastern countries to become more independent from Moscow and bring concrete improvements on human rights and freedom.

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However, during the preparation and the process of the conference – which in many aspects was dealing with the German question – Georges Pompidou and the French diplomats largely took into account the interests of the FRG,46 supported them and were quite successful in their support. Therefore, despite some small sources of resentment and disagreement, during Georges Pompidou’s presidency, French leaders remained faithful to their West German ally and to the French-West German relationship, which, as a tool to deepen and strengthen the EEC, remained an indisputable priority.

Notes 1. Quoted by J. W. Friend, The Linchpin: French-German Relations, 1950–1990, Washington Papers/154 (New York and Westport, 1991), 47. 2. For the detailed history of these French-Soviet bilateral relations, see M. P. Rey, La tentation du rapprochement: France et URSS à l’heure de la détente, 1964–1974 (Paris, 1991). 3. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1022, meeting Pompidou-Nixon, 13 December 1971, on which occasion Pompidou insisted on the necessity of building European defence not with the aim of driving the United States out of Europe, but because in the long term the US would inevitably leave the European continent. 4. See G. Pompidou, Entretiens et Discours, ii. 175–176. Extract from an official declaration during the dinner at the Kremlin, 6 October 1970. 5. Quoted in Friend, The Linchpin, 50. 6. See, for example, de Gaulle’s famous press conference, 25 March 1959. His assertion is quoted in Jean Lacouture, de Gaulle: Le Souverain (Paris, 1986), iii. 311. 7. Quoted in Lacouture, De Gaulle, iii. 308. 8. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1010, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, Paris, 4 July 1969. 9. Ibid., private meeting, Brandt-Pompidou, tête-à-tête, Bonn, 3 July 1970. 10. Ibid., meeting Brandt-Pompidou, Paris, 30 January 1970. 11. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, 3 December 1971. 12. See Friend, The Linchpin, 50: ‘According to Willy Brandt, from the first day of Brandt’s chancellorship Pompidou left no doubt that he wished to help Brandt with Ostpolitik.’ See also Willy Brandt, People and Politics: The Years 1960–1975 (London, 1978), 261. 13. See Geir Lundestad, The United States and Western Europe since 1945: From ‘Empire’ by Invitation to Transatlantic Drift (Oxford, 2003), 173. 14. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, Paris, 10 February 1972. 15. Quoted in Friend, The Linchpin, 53. 16. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1010, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, 4 July 1969. 17. See Friend, The Linchpin, 53: ‘He [Pompidou] gave no encouragement to the senior CDU politicians dispatched to Paris to seek French support for their campaign against it.’

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18. Ibid. 19. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1010, letter from Pompidou to Brandt, drafted by presidential adviser Jean-Bernard Raimond, 13 March 1970: ‘Like you, I judge that it is essential to avoid any divergences between our positions during the current talks as during the next ones, and consequently I attach a great importance to close cooperation between the Four Governments.’ 20. Ibid. 21. See Mary Sarotte, Dealing with the Devil: East Germany, Détente and Ostpolitik, 1969–1973 (Durham, 2001), 97. 22. In the margin of the note. 23. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1009, telegram 4315-30 by Jean Sauvagnargues, Bonn, 25 September 1973. 24. ‘The two ministers consider that, carefully prepared, a European conference could be a good way to develop co-operation between all the European States and, thanks to their common efforts, to put an end to the division of Europe into blocs, and to reinforce security and peace. France and the Soviet Union are decided to go on exchanging their views on this question, both together and with other interested countries.’ French-Soviet communiqué, 13 October 1969, published in Les relations franco-soviétiques, 1965–1976, documents et matériaux, édition franco-russe, Politizdat, La Documentation française, 1976 (Russian version, 89). 25. Henry Kissinger perceived this objective acutely. See Henry Kissinger, A la Maison Blanche, 1968–1973 (Paris, 1982), i. 431. See also Lundestad, Empire by Invitation, 174: ‘[F]or Pompidou it (the CSCE project) gave Ostpolitik that wider setting which he wanted.’ 26. Maurice Schumman’s declaration to the National Assembly, quoted by J. de Broglie, Rapport d’information, compte rendu d’une mission en Union soviétique du 11 au 15 mars 1970, National Assembly, 4th legislature, second ordinary session, addition to the minutes of the 29 April 1970 session, 8. 27. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1019, report of the meeting between Georges Pompidou and Richard Nixon, 13 December 1971. 28. AMAE, Série Europe 1966–1970, ‘Organismes internationaux et grandes questions internationales, sécurité européenne’, vol. 2035, note from Hervé Alphand addressed to the Soviet government through the French Embassy in Moscow, 4 July 1969, no. 208. 29. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1010, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, 30 January 1970. 30. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1018, Pompidou’s confirmation of this position to Andrej Gromyko in Paris, 2 June 1970. 31. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1010, Brandt in a meeting with Pompidou, 30 January 1970. 32. Frequently repeated by Pompidou in his meetings with Brandt and the topic of numerous notes written by the President’s Cabinet and by the Quai d’Orsay services. See, for example, AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011 and 1012, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, 3 July 1972; note by the Quai d’Orsay in preparation for the coming meeting between Brandt and Pompidou, 22 November 1973. 33. See Friend, The Linchpin, 54–55. 34. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011, meeting Scheel-Pompidou, Paris, 19 November 1971. 35. Ibid., meeting Brandt-Pompidou, Paris, 4 December 1971.

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36. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011, note ‘on the CSCE’ by Sous-Direction d’Europe Centrale, Quai d’Orsay, 17 June 1971. 37. See J. van Oudenaren, Détente in Europe: The Soviet Union and the West since 1953 (Durham, 1991), 322. See also Jacques Andréani, Le Piège: Helsinki et la chute du communisme (Paris, 2005), passim. 38. Ibid. 39. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1012, note from the Quai d’Orsay in preparation for the forthcoming meeting between Brandt and Pompidou, 22 November 1973. 40. The meeting took place on 12–13 March 1974 in Pitsunda. This was to be the last meeting between Leonid Brezhnev and Georges Pompidou, who died on 2 April 1974. 41. Report on Brezhnev-Pompidou meeting, Pitsunda, 13 March 1974, from the Soviet Foreign Ministry (MID). The original document in Russian was sent to the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I am very grateful to Wanda Jarzabek who provided me with a copy of the Russian text from the archives of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 42. See Andréani, Le Piège, where he reports in detail the story of the phrase flottante. 43. Ibid., 72. 44. See Lundestad, ‘Empire’ by Invitation, 174: ‘To a large extent the EC countries acted as one unit in the CSCE negotiations, an early breakthrough for the European Political Cooperation. EPC had been established in 1969–70, again on FrenchGerman initiative, in an attempt to coordinate the foreign policy stances of the EC member countries … In the CSCE the EC countries pushed for the inclusion of human rights principles, somewhat to the consternation of a Nixon administration that did not think much could come out of this in relations with the Soviets.’ 45. AN, 5 AG 2, vol. 1011 and 1012, meeting Brandt-Pompidou, 3 July 1972; meeting, Brandt-Pompidou (tête-à-tête), 22 January 1973. 46. It is important to stress this point generally neglected by historiography so far. Several authors insisted on the allegedly bad personal relationship between Brandt and Pompidou and its impact. Cf. Lundestad, ‘Empire’ by Invitation, 173: ‘FrenchGerman relations were at their poorest under Brandt-Pompidou, which was one explanation why France under Pompidou became willing to let Britain enter the European Community.’ In my opinion, this alleged personal animosity should not be overestimated, for it did not prevent Pompidou from supporting loyally Brandt’s major foreign objectives with regard to the ‘German dimension’ of the CSCE. There is a noteworthy exception to this ‘neglect’: G. Niedhart, ‘Frankreich und die USA im Dialog über Détente und Ostpolitik 1969–1970’ in Francia, 31/3 (2004): 65–85.

–4–

Transformation or Status Quo The Conflict of Stratagems in Washington over the Meaning and Purpose of the CSCE and MBFR, 1969–1973

o

Stephan Kieninger

The Helsinki Final Act, signed on 1 August 1975, contained both elements recognising the status quo in Europe as well as elements implying its overcoming. On the one hand, by establishing the principle of inviolability of frontiers, the Soviet Union received multilateral recognition of her sphere of control in Central and Eastern Europe. On the other hand, with the support of the neutral and non-aligned countries (the so-called N+Ns), NATO’s member states succeeded in embodying the principle of peaceful change of frontiers in the Final Act’s catalogue of principles. Specifically, the Bonn government, against persistent Soviet resistance, insisted upon not precluding the long-term goal of eliminating ‘the border between the FRG and the GDR through a peaceful decision of the German people’.1 The Western concept, institutionalised in NATO and in the EC, was directed at opening up the Soviet-ruled sphere in an open-ended process, in order to transform it via freer movement of people, information and ideas.2 Western CSCE policy can be regarded as a multilateral extension of Bonn’s Ostpolitik, insofar as the Brandt government in its treaties with Moscow, Warsaw and East Berlin recognised European post-war borders; but at the same time in the long range, through an extension of communication between East and West, sought to undermine Soviet rule in Central and Eastern Europe.3 Brandt’s and Bahr’s strategic concept of transformation policy

Notes for this chapter begin on page 78.

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vis-à-vis the East – prominently coined as ‘change through rapprochement’ – was in line with de Gaulle’s pan-European vision of security,4 as well as with Lyndon B. Johnson’s and Dean Rusk’s also euphemistically labelled ‘bridge-building’5 policy, intending a softening up from within of communist rule via intensified ideological competition.6 The State Department continued pursuing Johnson’s and Rusk’s bridge-building policy, challenging Nixon’s and Kissinger’s status quo oriented approach in Europe.7 This conceptual dualism manifested itself particularly in the preparation for the ESC/CSCE.8 However the basic assumptions lying at the heart of both concepts can only be explained in the wider frame of examining the interdependences between ESC/CSCE, MBFR and Ostpolitik. At the core of all three issues was Europe’s security system, dealing with the German question as its nucleus. Both Kissinger’s National Security Council and the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs, in this respect, viewed ESC/ CSCE and MBFR as Siamese twins. Ostpolitik, until the inner-German modus vivendi in late 1972, set the pace for conceptualising both approaches and, at the same time, stimulated the State Department’s strategy of transformation. So far historiographical analysis – recently by Hanhimäki, Suri, Morgan and Gaddis – has failed to take sufficient account of this interconnection and was therefore unable to explain the breadth of American diplomacy over the ESC/ CSCE-MBFR package.9 This essay will comparatively analyse the attitude in the White House towards the projects of ESC/CSCE and MBFR and the State Department’s respective views, in order to give sufficient explanations for both the conceptual struggle and the eventual survival of the transformative aspects behind bridge building as well as for Kissinger’s policy in the CSCE negotiations from 1973 onwards.

Status Quo versus Bridge Building, 1969–1971: The Story of Two Conflicting Stratagems As early as 1969 Henry Kissinger’s basic approach towards the relatively vague project of an ESC was evident – ‘keep it from turning into a slippery slope’.10 The White House would put no obstacles to the conference in the Allies’ way. But the Europeans had to know what they wanted.11 In sharp contrast high members of the State Department, like Under Secretary of State Elliot Richardson, considered their role as in the centre for active intra-alliance preparations.12 Secretary Rogers emphasised that with regard to an ESC the United States would not just give in – recognising the status quo to the benefit of the Soviet Union.13 In his capacity as Kissinger’s key adviser in East-West relations and ‘his trusted man for the ESC’,14 Helmut Sonnenfeldt thought in contrary categories. He perceived the status quo in Europe as being ‘not all that bad right now for us, at least when compared to other status quos’,15 obviously

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hinting at the hopeless position of the United States in Vietnam. However, in the wake of the Soviet détente offensive through the Budapest Appeal, the White House even saw the status quo in Europe as endangered. According to the White House, Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik gave the Soviet Union leverage for pursuing ‘selective détente’16 by reducing tensions vis-à-vis the FRG and Western Europe, and at the same time being intransigent towards the US. In Kissinger’s view the Soviet Union could lead the Brandt government astray, gradually reducing its Western ties in order to open a window for the reunification of a single neutralised German state.17 From this standpoint Kissinger judged the implications of a future ESC as inherently including the danger of ‘disintegrating NATO’.18 The causal nexus between the perception of Ostpolitik and the judgement of an ESC is evident. In early 1970 Lawrence Eagleburger, one of Kissinger’s closest confidants, noted that ‘we have already slipped into a relatively dangerous position on the Soviet proposal for a European Security Conference (ESC)’ because ‘by focussing on the Soviet proposal, talking about it, and trying to shape it into something we might be able to live with we have already agreed to play in the Russian ball park’.19 Contrary to the White House concern about Bonn’s Ostpolitik, the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs, under the auspices of its Director Martin Hillenbrand, was convinced of the supremacy of the Western position, in an ever closer, and therefore ever tougher, ideological competition between East and West. Hillenbrand perceptively realised in particular that ‘the West Germans didn’t fear from [their] contacts to the East any more. Quite the contrary: By gradually undermining the fronts between East and West they would slowly establish the foundation for reunification’.20 Nevertheless the Bureau of European Affairs did not underestimate possible dangers for NATO resulting from a lower level of the perception of threat in the aftermath of the Soviet proposal for an ESC. In this sense James Sutterlin, the Bureau’s Country Director for German Affairs, pleaded for ‘U.S. support for a “small steps” ESC’, which ‘would afford the Eastern European countries a legitimized channel of contact with the West; it could lead to projects which would encourage a feeling in Eastern Europe of being part of a larger European community’.21 Sutterlin’s proposal was obviously aimed at persistently inducing liberalising change in the Soviet-ruled sphere. Based on these assessments, in 1970 the Bureau of European Affairs seized the initiative within NATO to push through in a future conference the idea of freer movement of people, ideas and information across the then ever-fading Iron Curtain.22 Nixon, on the other hand, still regarded Brandt’s Ostpolitik as a ‘dangerous affair’.23 He interpreted the Soviet initiative towards an ESC as aimed at slowly, and at first imperceptibly, taking the FRG out of NATO. Nixon considered this scenario to be a realistic one due to his self-perception that he was ‘presiding over the partial dissolution of the American empire’.24

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But whereas the US decline reflected itself in the periphery of Southeast Asia, the Soviet Union’s imperial weakness in Europe as the centre of the Cold War power struggle became repeatedly obvious in 1968 when the Soviet Union crushed down the Prague Spring. Immediately after the signing of the Moscow Treaty, revealingly, both William Cargo from the State Department’s Policy Planning Council and Brandt’s closest confidant, Egon Bahr, wanted to convince Henry Kissinger that the Soviet Union had every interest in maintaining the status quo in Europe in order to slow down the process of its eroding power in Eastern Europe.25 Cargo took the view that ‘the Russians see a European security conference as a “controlled reaction” vehicle to let the necessary and inevitable process of technological adaptation occur in Eastern Europe – with absolutely essential Western assistance but in such a manner that it will not assume a “critical mass” as Czechoslovakia did’. In this sense ‘detente and greater freedom of action in Eastern Europe go hand in hand’.26 But Nixon and Kissinger did nothing to revise their perception that ‘the Conference could do harm’27 because they saw their view confirmed in the spring of 1971 as different tactical options with regards to freer movement emerged within intra-alliance preparations. Supported by the Bureau of European Affairs, the US mission to NATO pleaded forcefully for taking an intransigent position vis-à-vis the Soviet Union with open demands for freer movement.28 Moscow’s interest in an ESC should be used for extracting Soviet concessions with regards to extending East-West communication. Even though Bonn, like the State Department, pursued détente as a long-term means for challenging the status quo and inducing transformation in Moscow and Eastern Europe, views differed about tactics in a future ESC. With respect to the process of gradually reducing the barriers between the two German states, Bonn intended to avoid immediate confrontations with the Soviet Union about the highly controversial freer movement issue.29 Nevertheless the State Department, in accordance with Paris and Bonn, shared the common pursuit of trying to transform Soviet-style communist rule. One may call it ‘peaceful rollback’30 like French Foreign Minister Schumann did, or ‘gradual bridging of the divisions of Europe’ reasserting ‘the Western interest in constructive, liberalizing change’31 as Ralph McGuire did in his capacity as Director of the Office of Regional Politico-Military Affairs (RPM) in the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs. Therefore NATO eventually proved to be a highly robust and efficient political consulting mechanism. In autumn of 1972, NATO’s permanent representatives found a compromise solution, taking a hard stance on the substance of the question of freer movement, but labelling it ‘human contacts’.32 Kissinger considered this policy of transformation towards the Soviet Union as absolutely illusory. It was beyond his imagination that one could induce liberalising change via freer movement. Thinking strictly in realist terms and viewing states as black boxes, in his dealings with

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the Soviets, Kissinger just hit the Soviet Union’s rock-hard external mantle.33 The State Department’s policy of trying to penetrate the Soviet system and change its weak internal sphere provoked Kissinger’s anger. He could not find an answer to his question of what it was ‘that suddenly possesses the West to believe that it can affect the domestic structure of the Soviet Union through a treaty signed in Geneva with peripheral significance’.34

The Conceptual Relevance of ESC/CSCE and MBFR: Preserving the Status Quo or Gradually Overcoming It Only after intra-NATO agreement about the alliance’s common negotiation stance in autumn of 1972, and NATO’s success in preserving its strategy over the Soviet concept of ‘Ersatzpeace’35 in the Multilateral Preparatory Talks (MPT) for the CSCE in spring of 1973, did the White House’s worries concerning a ‘Finlandization’36 of Western Europe slowly decrease. Until then Kissinger assumed that in an ESC, the Soviet Union, would be able to ‘solidify the status quo in Eastern Europe, while extending its own influence in the Western alliance’.37 But the White House realised that Multilateral Balanced Force Reductions (MBFRs) – always viewed in connection with an ESC – were ‘the real one substantive subject’38 in preserving the status quo or – in its view – changing it to the Soviet’s benefit. An ESC itself just meant carefully negotiating a multilateral modus vivendi in Europe and not creating a new European security structure like the Vienna Congress had done. In contrast the BrandtScheel government wanted to use MBFRs – via an ESC as an institutional provision – both as a lever and a core for establishing a European security system, enabling peaceful change in the Soviet sphere and a unification of the two German states in the end.39 In his MBFR approach Kissinger faced a real dilemma. Although he saw actual reductions of forces as synonymous with strong Soviet influence in Europe, he was forced to use the mere idea of MBFR as a means for preventing unilateral US withdrawals, which Senator Mike Mansfield had been demanding for years. Nixon and Kissinger were in agreement about not being able ‘to foresee an outcome for MBFR that is both manifestly negotiable and clearly in our security interest’. Therefore they were ‘not in a position to commit ourselves to reaching agreement in MBFR’. They wanted to use ‘the process of MBFR to hold the line against unilateral reductions on the Western side, and, if satisfactory reductions prove non-negotiable, to maintain public support for an adequate defence effort’.40 These objectives required that the President and his National Security Adviser permanently made visible efforts to get MBFR underway by demanding several MBFR studies from various departments and agencies, but at the same time they denied giving basic criteria, assumptions,

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or commitments for judging MBFR scenarios.41 This strategy necessitated Kissinger’s tight control over decision making with regards to the MBFR issue via the NSC. Nixon’s and Kissinger’s rationale reflected itself in Kissinger’s actions particularly in May 1971 when Mansfield’s success in Congress seemed to be in reach. Both Kissinger and Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird agreed that offering Congress an MBFR-proposal including US reductions of 50,000 soldiers would be too high a price for preventing a successful Mansfield resolution.42 Kissinger and Laird were in agreement that towards the NATO allies they ‘shouldn’t push for MBFR as if our life is dependent on it’.43 Brezhnev’s immediate reaction towards an impending unilateral US withdrawal did not fit in the White House’s expectations, for he signalled Soviet readiness towards MBFR negotiations.44 Brezhnev obviously viewed the United States as the only Western power able to preserve the status quo in the heart of Europe.45 Therefore, in the immediate wake of the MBFR crisis in May 1971, the Soviet Union was even ready to start MBFR negotiations in advance of ESC negotiations.46 Nevertheless, in the White House a completely different perception of Soviet motives with regards to MBFR prevailed – seen in context with an ESC. Sonnenfeldt assumed that although from the Soviet perspective the overall purpose of an ESC obviously lay in the recognition of the political and territorial status quo in Europe, ‘MBFR would detract from this concept, suggesting as it does some blurring of the line between East and West, and some aura of disengagement in the East. A deferred MBFR, however, might be manageable from the Soviet viewpoint if the political foundation had already been laid in the CSCE. In this scenario, subsequent MBFR negotiations would be directed at making West Germany a grey area for special consideration (this is the basic French fear about MBFR and it is a justified one)’.47 Both Sonnenfeldt and Haig (the latter, Kissinger’s Deputy, who was very close personally to Nixon), feared that the perceived power differential in Europe between France, Germany and Britain in the aftermath of Brandt’s Ostpolitik ‘will … tend to erode the fiber of the Western Alliance’48 and thus ‘may contribute to a fission of US and Western Europe and divisions within Western Europe’.49 From Sonnenfeldt’s view, the inherent dangers of an ESC and of MBFR talks could be accepted, as both were multilateral negotiations, which could on the other hand cushion the above mentioned impact of Brandt’s Ostpolitik.50 In the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs, ESC and MBFR as the Siamese twins of European security policy were seen from a completely different perspective. Warren Zimmermann51 identified two myths the White House’s policy towards Europe was based on: MBFR would lead to Finlandisation, something synonymous with an FRG drifting to the Eastern camp, as witnessed in the wake of Rapallo. Second, an increase in the quantity and quality of East-West relations would be inherently dangerous for the heterogeneous

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West and beneficial for the disciplined Soviet bloc. Zimmermann’s perceptive analysis resulted in contrary assessments. According to Zimmermann the latter myth was ‘of course not United States policy, but our deep mistrust of such things as a European Security Conference indicates that the myth is very much alive’. In Zimmermann’s view ‘the West has a far more solid unity than the East because its unity is based on free association and mutual interest rather than on force. The West – as well as the Eastern European regimes seeking more independence from Moscow – will be the principal gainers from East-West contacts’.52 He dismantled the Rapallo myth, arguing that, based on the success story of European integration after World War II, Western Europe in the aftermath of gradual US withdrawals would become conscious that it could face the Soviet threat. Based on the mere profitability of its Western ties, the FRG would not want to go along with a deal of neutralisation in exchange for reunification. Once in the Eastern orbit, the FRG would be the sole paymaster for the underdeveloped Soviet satellites, and the Soviet Union would fear the expansion of a non-communist Germany. Zimmermann’s memorandum for State Department Counselor Pederson revealed the bridge-building strategists’ growing aversion to putting the cards openly on the table, vis-à-vis the White House, in order to prevent sanctions either against their policy or their careers. Phil Farley, Deputy Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA), avoided confronting Kissinger’s conceptual hegemony openly in the National Security Council’s Senior Review Group. Instead Farley decided to write a letter to Kissinger challenging the latter’s basic MBFR assessments. Contrary to Kissinger’s leitmotif expectation that MBFRs would result in the FRG’s Finlandisation, Farley drew up a rationale using MBFR as a mechanism of gradually transforming Soviet rule in Eastern Europe and in the Soviet Union itself. He regarded MBFR as a lever for inducing change. Farley argued lucidly that Finlandisation was out of the question ‘as the weight of Soviet pressures would diminish as their forces shifted eastward’. He expected that in ‘Eastern Europe, the effect on declining Soviet force levels would also be positive and stabilizing’. If the peoples in Eastern Europe ‘see a process under way through which the Soviet presence will gradually be eroded and Soviet freedom to intervene massively in their affairs will gradually be constrained, then they are more likely to be patient and to hope and scheme to follow the Romanian rather than the Czech or Hungarian pattern’.53 In the long run Farley clearly did not intend to spread Ceauşescu-style despotism, but rather to induce liberalising change in the Soviet kraal. The key lay with Moscow. Farley saw MBFR as a means of strengthening the détenteminded elements in the Politburo by mutually recognising the legitimacy of concerns about troop levels. Therefore MBFR negotiations could ‘contribute to a transformation of attitudes’54 in Moscow as the essential precondition for change in the Soviet orbit. Kissinger’s answer to Farley’s letter was most

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revealing: ‘It should be easy for us to agree, however, our analytical work to date gives us reasons for proceeding cautiously, and that it demonstrates that we have only begun to grapple what is a most difficult subject.’55 Kissinger’s and Farley’s views with regards to MBFR were based on their contrary perceptions of the US and their inherently dependent perceptions of the Soviet Union. Self-perception, self-image and self-confidence constituted the gap between bridge building and Kissinger’s status quo-détente.

No End to Conceptual Dualism, 1971–1973: Implications for the Character of the Helsinki Final Act After having examined the roots of conceptual dualism, the analysis will now address the question of how the struggle between bridge building and status quo-détente found its expression at the level of political action. NATO linked the beginning of ESC negotiations to the ratification of a Four Power agreement regulating the latter’s rights in the Cold War trouble spot of Berlin.56 The Brandt government linked the ratification of its treaties with Moscow and Warsaw to Soviet ratification of a Four Power Berlin modus vivendi.57 Therefore the Berlin Four Power Protocol – signed on 3 September 1971 after almost eighteen months of negotiations – proved to be the decisive cornerstone of détente in Europe. Only then did the vague idea of an ESC solidify. As Brezhnev realised that, due to conservative opposition, Brandt could not guarantee the ratification of the Eastern treaties,58 the Soviet Union established a reverse linkage making Soviet ratification of the Four Power Protocol dependent upon Bonn’s ratification of the Eastern treaties.59 Thus, if détente was meant to be successful the sequence had to be the following: Ostpolitik – Berlin – ESC. The relevance of the Berlin Agreement on the road towards an ESC was reflected in the quick change of the conference label in late 1971. NATO’s turning away from the initial Soviet label ‘ESC’ was an obvious challenge to the Soviet view of the conference as a surrogate treaty for World War II. With the bridge-building strategy in mind, Richard F. Pederson proposed the title ‘Conference on European Cooperation’.60 In November 1971 the permanent NATO council opted for the name ‘Conference on European Security and Cooperation (CESC)’.61 However, in December 1971 the French finally succeeded in naming it ‘Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe’ (CSCE) because ‘CESC’ from the Paris viewpoint implied an immediate decrease of the US role in Europe’s affairs. In Foreign Minister’s Schumann’s words, France ‘could not conceive of a balanced situation in Europe without US participation’.62 In the wake of the Berlin Agreement there was consensus within NATO that the focus should lay on preparing an ESC instead of MBFR, although the latter was not linked to preconditions.63 After the intra-Western frictions on

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the tide of Brandt’s Ostpolitik, in the interest of NATO’s cohesion there was eagerness to prevent ‘a sharp revival of interest’,64 which would occur in MBFR negotiations. In the White House, in Paris and in London, extensive mutual force reductions were seen as erosive with regards to the Four Power rights in Germany and Berlin.65 However, the State Department and Bonn were ready to begin MBFR exploration talks, even before as well as after the ratification of the Berlin Protocol – which meant after beginning ESC preparations.66 The social-liberal Bonn government insisted that, in the second case, as the heart of an eventual European peace structure, MBFR-elements should be included within the wider ESC frame.67 This approach raised the negative effect of involving countries not directly affected from reductions in decision-making about superpower force levels. George Vest, Deputy Chief of the US Mission to NATO, proposed establishing a special MBFR group in the framework of preparatory talks for an ESC, as a mechanism for resolving this critical point.68 Although Haig and Sonnenfeldt both disliked negotiations per se, they did not turn down Vest’s special group idea since, from the White House perspective, it could be used as a vehicle for containing Congressional pressure for unilateral US reductions.69 But that was about all the White House accomplished with respect to European security in the autumn of 1971, for the beginning of ESC preparatory talks depended on the fate of Ostpolitik being on the agenda in mid-1972. Nixon and Kissinger completely ignored the permanent work of the US mission to NATO during the intra-alliance preparations for a conference. They considered it sufficient to start with NATO preparations after the success of Ostpolitik.70 Despite their common dislike for an ESC, both Nixon and Kissinger recognised that they couldn’t prevent a conference from taking place. Both men also considered the potential of MBFR to change the status quo – in their view solely to the West’s disadvantage – far superior to that of an ESC. Therefore in early October 1971, in the wake of the Berlin Protocol, Nixon decided not only to accept the conceptual dualism with regards to the ESC but to institutionalise it by letting the State Department pursue its bridge-building policy for the sake of the White House damage limiting strategy. Nixon and Kissinger played a ‘double track game’.71 As the President put it: ‘Dobrynin has word to handle it [the ESC] through channels and also preparations for the summit.’ But on the other hand, Nixon wanted to ‘give State things to do’. In essence, Nixon wanted ‘Dobrynin to understand that he can talk with Rogers but I will make the decisions’.72 The President wanted to focus on bilateral dealings with Moscow and Beijing, and he did not want to get involved in confrontations with the State Department’s bridge-building bureaucracy. Nixon’s guideline suited Kissinger well and the National Security Adviser complied with it meticulously. In keeping with their cautious rationale Nixon and Kissinger were holding their efforts until just before the Moscow summit in the spring of 1972 in order

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to, on the one hand, pull the Soviets into MBFR negotiations as a counter to Congressional pressure. On the other hand, the White House’s maximum goal was still ‘not to reduce or limit the size, character and activities of military forces in the heart of Europe’.73 The National Security Council considered the beginning of MBFR exploratory talks, prior to the start of actual CSCE negotiations, essential in preventing the Soviet Union – according to Sonnenfeldt’s view – from first preserving the status quo in a CSCE and then gradually undermining it via MBFR, intending the FRG’s Finlandisation.74 Having this rationale in mind – and keeping it secret from State and Pentagon – Kissinger approached the decisive National Security Council meeting on 29 March 1972, which dealt solely with European security. Under the assumption of Ostpolitik’s success, the NSC Senior Review Group agreed to establish a special MBFR group through CSCE preparatory talks, permitting the commencement of MBFR talks and restricting them to states directly involved, as proposed by Vest in the autumn of 1971. NSDM 162 reflected this broad consensus,75 which was clearly in the interest of the State Department. However, Nixon’s and Kissinger’s verdict against substantial MBFR exploratory talks within a ‘special MBFR group’ had been taken.76 NSDM 162 was useless paper. Rogers was already worried that Kissinger wanted to deal with the decisive MBFR issue in bilateral meetings between the superpowers.77 In his talks with Brezhnev during a top-secret trip to Moscow in April 1972, Kissinger tried to get definitive Soviet acceptance for starting MBFR preparatory talks, but he accomplished only a vague agreement.78 Only during the Moscow summit in late May 1972 could Nixon get Brezhnev’s consent to MBFR negotiations, since the Eastern Treaties had been ratified in the German Bundestag a few days prior. The road towards a CSCE was open. However, until the Moscow summit, the State Department as well as the Pentagon were convinced that the NSDM 162’s ‘special group approach’ still remained relevant.79 During the Moscow summit, Rogers realised that both Nixon and Brezhnev were already determined to prevent MBFR exploratory talks from taking place under the roof of CSCE preparations, but wanted to deal with MBFR strictly on a bilateral basis. Rogers’s open opposition against this MBFR superpower condominium forced Nixon to break off the summit talk to avoid a further escalation before the assembled Soviet leadership.80 Finally, in September 1972 Kissinger got definitive Soviet assent to begin MBFR exploratory talks in late January 1973.81 In summary, Nixon and Kissinger succeeded in keeping complete control over the MBFR issue. They fully implemented their MBFR blueprint into operative politics. Hence, Nixon and Kissinger could afford to accept the conceptual dualism with regards to an ESC in order to use the State Department’s bridgebuilding policy for the purpose of their damage limiting approach. Kissinger issued National Security Study Memorandum 138 in order to serve this goal.82 In October 1971, however, the State Department’s Bureau of European Affairs

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was unwilling to restrict its studies to damage limiting, but consequently stayed with its bridge-building concept.83 Rogers even transformed the recently established Interdepartmental Group for Europe into a permanent Interagency Task Force in order to support the search for a common position on freer movement in NATO.84 Although Rogers violated Nixon’s “out of touch with reality” guideline of postponing actual preparations until after the ratification of the Berlin Protocol,85 Nixon and Kissinger let Rogers have his way on account of their double track game rationale. Therefore, the Interagency Task Force under Hillenbrand’s auspices could draw up guidelines reflecting the State Department’s bridge-building approach until the start of the Multilateral Preparatory Talks (MPT) for the CSCE in November 1972.86 The US mission to NATO under the aegis of George Vest could thus contribute that NATO was able to find a common stance in the freer movement issue, basically reflecting the bridge-building blueprint.87 Whereas in NATO’s preparation for the conference Vest could take an intransigent position on the freer movement issue, as the head of the US delegation at the MPT he consciously decided to take a behind the scenes role in the negotiations between the thirty-five participants in order to avoid a superpower showdown.88 Nevertheless, in intra-NATO consultations during the MPT, Vest forcefully supported NATO’s stance continuing with the State Department’s bridge-building policy.89 Due to their united position on the issue of freer movement, NATO and the EC got Soviet concessions extending East-West communication. This was against Kissinger’s conviction. With NATO’s united front, Kissinger’s damage limiting approach was fully served. Kissinger planned to trade what he perceived as absolutely illusory – NATO’s ambitions for transforming Soviet rule – in exchange for Soviet concessions with respect to his common ceiling approach in MBFR, implying asymmetrical reductions to the disadvantage of the Soviet Union.90 As Kissinger, despite persistent efforts, was not able to persuade his NATO allies to give up their ambitious freer movement position, the Soviets refused accepting his common ceiling MBFR approach.91 Additionally, in account of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment’s definitive success in Congress in late 1974, the SALT II negotiations got stuck although Ford and Brezhnev had been able to create a framework for strategic arms control at their first meeting in Vladivostok in November 1974.92 Hence, Kissinger’s only option to save his détente policy lay in supporting the key elements of bridge building in the CSCE, namely, freer movement and peaceful change – despite his still disparaging views about these matters.93 Until his dismissal, William Rogers continued to pursue the State Department’s bridge-building policy, supporting the West German position on peaceful change94 and confronting Gromyko with demands for freer movement of people, ideas and information;95 as a result, he strengthened NATO’s intransigence – vis-à-vis both the Soviets and Kissinger’s linkage policy of trying to

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trade freer movement for a common ceiling. The State Department’s bridgebuilding policy in the Nixon era thus constituted the basis for the prevailing of the dynamic elements of liberalising change over the status quo factors within the Helsinki process: ‘In fact, the Final Act much more clearly reflects the Western Agenda in CSCE. It looks towards the peaceful reunification of Europe.’96 Kissinger did not share the French and German policy of trying to transform communist rule in the Soviet kraal, but still viewed the Helsinki Final Act from the perspective of his approach of preserving the status quo in Europe. Although he gave positive accounts before the US cabinet to justify the United States’ signing of the Final Act,97 Kissinger was worried about ‘communist inroads’98 in the future CSCE process.

Notes 1. NARA, RG 59, Subject Numeric Files, 1970–1973, box 2306, memcon RogersScheel/Bahr/Brunner, 1 May 1973. 2. J. Goodby, Europe Undivided: The New Logic of Peace in US-Russian Relations, (Washington D.C., 1998), 37–64. 3. G. Niedhart, ‘Revisionistische Elemente und die Initiierung friedlichen Wandels in der neuen Ostpolitik 1967–1974’, Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 28 (2002): 233–266; G. Niedhart and O. Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit beseitigen”: Ostpolitik in der zweiten außenpolitischen Formationsphase der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Übergang von den Sechziger- zu den Siebzigerjahren’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004): 415–448. 4. M. Vaїsse, La grandeur: Politique étrangère du général de Gaulle 1958–1969 (Paris, 1998). 5. T. A. Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe: In the Shadow of Vietnam (Cambridge, MA, 2003). 6. O. Bange, Ostpolitik und Détente: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mannheim, 2004). 7. Goodby, Europe Undivided, 51. 8. In labelling the conference I stick to the respectively changing contemporary name. 9. Hanhimäki in 2003 just gave a hint concerning the State Department’s ‘own policy with regards to the CSCE’. J. M. Hanhimäki, ‘“They can write it in Swahili”: Kissinger, the Soviets and the Helsinki Accords, 1973–1975’, Journal of Transatlantic Studies, 1 (2003): 40. 10. Kissinger, White House Years, 414. 11. AAPD 1969, 1117, memcon Kissinger-Bahr, 13 October 1969. 12. AAPD 1969, 1113, memcon Richardson-Pauls, 11 October 1969. 13. AAPD 1969, 1384, memcon Rogers-Brandt, 6 December 1969. 14. George Vest in an interview with Oliver Bange and the author, 25 April 2005.

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15. NARA, Nixon, NSC, President’s Trip Files, box 667, memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, 8 January 1970. Sonnenfeldt’s memorandum is printed in the documentation The Road to Helsinki: The Early Steps to the CSCE, compiled by H. Giusto, M. Munteanu and C. Ostermann under the aegis of the Cold War International History Project and the Machiavelli Center for Cold War Studies. 16. Kissinger, White House Years, 410. 17. Niedhart and Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit” beseitigen’, 438–445. 18. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 5, memcon Kissinger-Frank, 1 December 1971. 19. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 2, memorandum from Eagleburger for Kissinger, 26 January 1970. 20. Memcon Hillenbrand-Arnaud 6 April 1970, cited in G. Niedhart, ‘Frankreich und die USA im Dialog über Détente und Ostpolitik 1969–1970’, Francia, 31/3 (2004): 81. 21. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 2, memorandum from Sutterlin for Hillenbrand, 14 January 1970. 22. Goodby, Europe Undivided, 52. 23. Memcon Nixon-Heath 12 December 1970, cited in Niedhart and Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit” beseitigen’, 443. 24. Memorandum from Eagleburger for Kissinger, see note 19. 25. AAPD 1970, 1490-1491, memcon Kissinger-Bahr, 17 August 1970. 26. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 7/1970; NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-166, memorandum from Cargo for Kissinger, 17 August 1970. 27. Documents on British Policy Overseas, Series III, Vol. II, in Gill Bennett and Keith A. Hamilton (eds.), ‘The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, 1972–75’ (London, 1997), 56 (henceforward DBPO, Series III, Vol. II), memcon Brimelow-Kissinger, 10 August 1972. 28. George Vest and James Goodby in their interviews with Oliver Bange and the author, 25 April 2005 and 13 April 2005, respectively; PA AA, B 150/238, report from German NATO envoy Boss, 29 September 1971. 29. AAPD 1972, 242, memcon Irwin/Hillenbrand-Staden, 13 March 1972. 30. DBPO III/2, 41, memcon Schumann-Douglas Home, 11 November 1971. 31. Memorandum from McGuire for CSCE Task Force Working Group on Freer Movement, 19 November 1972, cited in Goodby, Europe Undivided, 61–62. 32. J. Goodby, ‘The Origins of the Human Rights Provision in the Helsinki Final Act’, revised version of a paper presented at the 85th Annual Meeting of the Organization of American Historians on 3 April 1992, 26–28 (unpublished manuscript). 33. G. Niedhart, ‘Deutsch-Amerikanische Beziehungen in der Anfangsphase der sozial-liberalen Ostpolitik und Differenzen in der Perzeption der Sowjetunion 1969/1970’, in M. Berg and P. Gassert (eds.), Deutschland und die USA in der Internationalen Geschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts (Stuttgart, 2004), 519–520. 34. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 56; NARA, RG 59, transcripts of Secretary of State, Henry A. Kissinger Staff Meetings, 1973–1977, memcon Kissinger-Springsteen, 29 October 1973. 35. J. J. Maresca, To Helsinki: The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe 1973–1975 (Durham, 1987), 211.

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36. ‘A situation where leaders would pause to consider the Soviet attitude before undertaking any course of action’; see note 26, memorandum from Cargo for Kissinger. 37. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 27; NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-32, memorandum from Kissinger for Nixon, 1 December 1971. 38. Memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, see note 15. 39. See O. Bange’s contribution to this volume. 40. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 33; NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Office Files, box 21, undated memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon, April 1972. Jonathan Dean in an interview with Oliver Bange and the author, 24 April 2005. 41. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-64, memorandum from Sonnenfeldt and Odeen for Kissinger, 28 June 1972. 42. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Telcons, box 10, telcon Kissinger-Laird, 1 June 1971. 43. Ibid. 44. L. Breschnew (Breshnev), Auf dem Wege Lenins: Reden und Aufsätze, vol. 3, May 1970 to March 1972 (East Berlin, 1973), 382. 45. AAPD 1972, 351, letter from Bahr for Kissinger. 46. NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, box 10, telcon Kissinger-Rogers, 16 June 1971. 47. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-61, memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, 29 March 1972. 48. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 13; NARA, Nixon, NSC, Country Files Europe (CF Europe), box 667, memorandum from Haig for Kissinger, 3 September 1971. 49. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, 18 November 1971. 50. Ibid. 51. Zimmermann served in the Bureau of European Affairs. His expertise was in Soviet and Eastern European Affairs. 52. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 15, memorandum from Zimmermann for Pederson, 11 June 1971. 53. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-61, letter from Farley for Kissinger, 31 March 1972. 54. Ibid. 55. Kissinger, undated answer to Farley’s letter, ibid. 56. See http://www.nato.int/docu/comm/49-95/c691204b.htm. 57. AAPD 1970, 1758, Brandt to Nixon, 14 October 1970. 58. AAPD 1971, 1419, memcon Brandt-Brezhnev, 18 September 1971. 59. NARA, RG 59, Subject Numeric Files, 1970–1973, box 2305, memcon RogersScheel, 3 October 1971. 60. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 15, memorandum from Pederson for Irwin, 29 September 1971. 61. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, telegram from Vest to the State Department (No. 4734), 12 November 1971. 62. NARA, RG 59, Executive Secretariat, Conference Files, 1966–1972, box 531, memcon Schumann-Irwin, 6 December 1971. 63. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, 20 September 1971. 64. Memorandum from Kissinger for Nixon. See note 37.

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65. NARA, Nixon, NSC, CF Europe, box 678, memcon Kissinger-Debré 7 July 1972; NARA, RG 59, Executive Secretariat, Conference Files, 1966–1972, box 532, memcon Douglas Home-Irwin, 20 July 1971. 66. NARA, RG 59, Subject Numeric Files, 1970–1973, box 2317, memcon Hillenbrand-Roth, 30 June 1971; letter from Bahr for Kissinger, 24 May 1971, AAPD 1971, 851–852. 67. PA AA, B 150/228, memorandum from Ruth for Roth, 30 April 1971; see Bange’s contribution to this volume. 68. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, telegram from Vest to State Department (No. 3721), 10 September 1971. 69. Ibid., memorandum from Haig for Nixon 21 October 1971; memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Haig, 21 October 1971. 70. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, National Security Decision Memorandum 142, 2 December 1971. 71. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Telcons, box 11, telcon Kissinger-Nixon, 2 October 1971. 72. Ibid. 73. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-65, undated NSC comments on a memorandum from Laird for Nixon, 7 September 1972. 74. Memorandum from Sonnenfeldt for Kissinger, see note 46. 75. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-233, NSDM 162, 5 April 1972. 76. Memorandum from Kissinger for Nixon. See note 40. 77. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Telcons, box 13, telcon Kissinger-Rogers 4 April 1972. 78. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Office Files, box 72, memcons Kissinger-Brezhnev, 21–22 April 1972. 79. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-233, memorandum from Laird for Nixon, 13 May 1972. 80. FRUS 1969–1976, Vol. XIV (Soviet Union October 1971–May 1972), 1023–1026, here 1034–1035, Moscow summit delegation memcon including Rogers and Hillenbrand, 24 May 1972. 81. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Office Files, box 74, memcon Kissinger-Brezhnev, 12 September 1972. 82. Telcon Kissinger-Nixon. See note 71. 83. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H-187, NSSM 138, 3 November 1971. 84. Memorandum from Rogers for Nixon, 22 December 1971, ibid. 85. NSDM 142. See note 70. 86. NARA, Nixon, NSC, Institutional Files, box H- 233, Interim Report of the InterAgency Task Force on CSCE, 20 March 1972. 87. See Goodby, The Origins of the Human Rights Provisions. 88. George Vest in an interview with Oliver Bange and the author, 25 April 2005. 89. DBPO III/2, 103, memorandum from the UK Embassy Helsinki, 12 March 1973. 90. NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Telcons, box 19, telcons Kissinger-Rush 15 March, 10 April and 18 April 1973. 91. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 8, memcon Kissinger-Gromyko, 20 September 1974. 92. For a meticulous documentation on the Vladivostok summit, see NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 6.

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93. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 105, 106; NARA, RG 59, transcripts of Secretary of State, HAK Staff Meetings, 1973–1977, Kissinger staff memcons, 5 December 1974, 9 December 1974. 94. NARA, Nixon, NSC, CF Europe, box 722, telegram from Rogers for Kissinger (No. 84507), 4 May 1973. 95. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 54; NARA, Nixon, NSC, HAK Office Files, box 68, memcon Rogers-Gromyko, 7 July 1973. 96. Hearing before the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, 99th Congress, Second Session, Vienna Follow-up Meeting of CSCE, by Ambassador Warren Zimmermann, 11 September 1986. US Government Printing Office (Washington, D.C., 1987), 11. 97. Giusto et al., ‘The Road to Helsinki’, doc. no. 138; NARA, RG 59, Entry No. 5403 box 15, talking points from Maresca for Kissinger, 6 August 1975. 98. NARA, RG 59, Sonnenfeldt Records, box 3, Memcon Kissinger-Tindemanns, 1 August 1975.

–5–

Britain, the German Question and the Transformation of Europe From Ostpolitik to the Helsinki Conference, 1963–1975

o

Luca Ratti

The aim of this chapter is to provide an evaluation of the British attitude towards West German Ostpolitik and calls for a European Security Conference (ESC). More specifically, the chapter will focus on the evolution of the British view of the German problem and proposals for a European Security Conference, from the beginning of West German economic Ostpolitik in 1963 to the signing on 1 August 1975 of the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) in Helsinki. British decision makers believed that both issues were closely connected. In the British view, the Soviet proposal for a European Security Conference was aimed at dealing with the German problem. While at the end of the 1960s, the advent of a new phase in West German Ostpolitik – a result of the initiatives of Willy Brandt – made sure that the ESC proposal was seen in a different light, concern was voiced in Britain that Ostpolitik might play into Soviet hands. The chapter will argue that Britain provided ‘firm but not necessarily uncritical’ support for Ostpolitik, viewing it as a contribution to the reduction of tension in East-West relations but at the same time being wary of Soviet aims and objectives.1 Although there was some concern in Britain that the Federal Republic’s decision makers might jeopardise Western rights in Germany and Berlin during the negotiations of the Ostverträge, the British perceived the Federal Republic’s recognition of the territorial status quo in Eastern

Notes for this chapter begin on page 94.

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Europe as overdue and largely a symbolic concession to the Soviet Union and its satellites. The chapter will conclude that, according to the British point of view, Moscow’s acceptance during the CSCE that the attitudes of governments towards their own citizens should be the subject of multilateral discussion was a much more onerous concession, which the West had been able to exact from the Soviet Union. Despite enduring hesitations from a part of the British political elite, by 1975 British decision makers had come to realise the full potential of these provisos and their disruptive impact on the Soviet bloc.

Britain, the German Question and the Early Stages of Ostpolitik (1963–1969) Unlike other Western European countries, before the advent of détente in East-West relations, the German question did not have a prominent position in the British foreign policy debate. This lack of interest stemmed from some specific features in Britain’s self-perceived international role. First, the overriding concern about maintaining the ‘special relationship’ with the United States, which demanded close co-ordination with Washington on the German question; secondly, Britain’s persisting political and economic interests outside Europe, particularly in Africa and Asia, and its close relationship with the members of the Commonwealth; thirdly, a weak conception of its ties with the states of Central and Eastern Europe, which were those most likely to be affected by developments on the German question. However, there was a basic British view of the German problem: Germany’s reunification and the German right to self-determination could be realised only within the framework of a reconciliation between East and West and the creation of a European peace order in which Germany would be no threat to other countries. In other words, according to the British viewpoint, the only feasible solution, which would overcome Germany’s division, rested in ending the division of Europe. By contrast, a path to German reunification that, as suggested by Stalin’s peace note of 1952, may lead to the creation of a unified and neutralised German state encountered firm opposition in Britain.2 British decision makers were also aware that, whenever possible, the West German authorities might try to open direct negotiations with the Soviet Union and the East European countries on the issue of reunification. Britain never tried to hinder the Federal Republic from entering negotiations with the East. By contrast, British decision makers encouraged this process, at least to a certain extent. As aptly noted by Frederick Hoyer Millar, the first British ambassador to the Federal Republic of Germany, it was in Britain’s interest to persuade the Germans that there would be numerous occasions on which Britain and the Federal Republic would both stand to gain from dealing with

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the Soviet bloc countries and the East German authorities on practical matters, provided that the Western allies were consulted about such action. However, Millar also warned that British decision makers should do nothing to encourage the Germans to make a deal with the Russians behind Britain’s back on the issue of reunification.3 There was also a cross-factional consensus among the British political elite that, on certain issues, such as recognition of the OderNeisse line as Germany’s frontier with Poland, the Federal Republic should eventually be prepared to compromise.4 However, it was widely acknowledged that Britain should avoid making concessions to the East on behalf of Germany until the Federal Republic was prepared to accept them, and the East showed no signs of making significant concessions to the West.5 For all these reasons Britain generally welcomed the advent of a more active West German Ostpolitik. According to the British political elite, this policy held out prospects of contributing in the longer term to a reduction of tension in Europe. However, British policymakers were also aware that the Federal Republic’s opening to the East would entail some dangers for Britain’s interests, as they were perceived in London. More specifically, it was feared that a more active West German policy towards the East, if not adequately co-ordinated within the alliance, might cause misunderstanding between the Federal Republic and the Western allies, weakening the cohesion of the Western bloc.6 These considerations influenced the British attitude to West German Ostpolitik from the early stages of the FRG’s opening to the East at the beginning of the 1960s, until the signing in the early 1970s of the Eastern treaties and the opening of multilateral preparatory talks for the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. Throughout this period, Britain supported Ostpolitik, although British decision makers did not always agree with the strategy and tactics of West German governments. During the phase of West German economic Ostpolitik, which is associated with the policy of West German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard between 1963 and 1966, and as carried on between December 1966 and September 1969 by the Grosse Koalition between the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats, the British authorities and, in particular, the British Labour governments gave moral support to the Federal Republic in Eastern European capitals, although British officials were not too optimistic about the prospect of success of a policy that was aimed at isolating the German Democratic Republic within the Soviet bloc.7 Britain’s concerns about West German economic Ostpolitik received a dramatic confirmation when Warsaw Pact forces invaded Czechoslovakia on the night of 20–21 August 1968. According to the British viewpoint, while demonstrating that negotiations between the Federal Republic and its Eastern neighbours would succeed only if the West German authorities were prepared to recognise the loss of the Eastern territories of the Reich and come to terms with the existence of the GDR, the Warsaw Pact’s intervention in Prague

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also made it clear that, in negotiations with the Soviet bloc states, the Federal Republic would badly need the support of its Western allies. This support would be especially needed to protect West Berlin’s position, as the situation which appeared most likely to involve the danger of a military confrontation in Europe.8 As a result, following the invasion of Czechoslovakia, the British Labour government strongly endeavoured to convince its West German counterpart to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as a first sign of goodwill towards the Soviet Union and Germany’s Eastern neighbours.9 As early as October 1968, British Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart told the then West German Foreign Minister Willy Brandt that the Federal Republic should sign the treaty ‘as soon as possible’. According to the British viewpoint, accession to the treaty would deprive the Soviet Union of an important instrument of propaganda against the West, while not weakening the security of the Federal Republic.10 In the aftermath of the Czechoslovakian crisis, while urging the Federal Republic to avoid giving the impression of seeking to drive a wedge between the Soviet Union and its allies, Britain also sought to consolidate relations with Bonn through an increase in British troops deployment in West Germany, support for the Federal Government’s decision to hold the Presidential election in West Berlin, the establishment of technological arrangements for uranium enrichment and a common Anglo-German declaration in February 1969, which affirmed the two countries’ determination to ‘go forward in partnership’ and pledged both governments to further the aim of Britain’s joining the European Economic Community. This policy demonstrated that Britain regarded close relations between the FRG and its Western allies as essential for the success of Ostpolitik and revealed the British ambition to replace France as the Federal Republic’s main partner and interlocutor in Western Europe. Within this context, British decision makers hoped that a policy of seeking détente and reconciliation between East and West through the alliances, unlike their perception of France’s policy of pursuing détente and advantages for France outside the alliances, was likely to correspond better to West German interests and thinking, while preserving the Western alliance’s unity and cohesion.

Britain, Europe and Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik (1969–1972) Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik coincided with a period of structural change in Britain’s international role. During the 1960s Britain’s influence on the international stage continued to decline steadily. The failure of negotiations for accession to the European Communities in 1963 and 1967, formal announcement in 1968 of the retreat from East of Suez by the end of 1971, together with a major sterling crisis, culminating in the devaluation of the pound in November 1967, had significantly reduced Britain’s influence on the international stage.11 Britain’s

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gradual relinquishment of its role as a superpower and its intensifying search for EEC membership undoubtedly benefited Anglo-German relations, while increasing the Federal Republic’s importance for Britain.12 Following the formation in October 1969 of a coalition government in Bonn between the Social Democrats and the Free Democrats, under the leadership of former West Berlin mayor Willy Brandt, and the opening of talks in Moscow in December 1969 between the Federal Republic and the Soviet Union, the main concern of British decision makers remained that West German policy was adequately co-ordinated with that of the NATO allies and, more specifically, with the three Western powers. A brief prepared by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for Prime Minister Harold Wilson on 7 January 1970, while suggesting that the British government should confirm its general support for Ostpolitik, emphasised the need for close and continuing tripartite and quadripartite coordination ‘in setting a course through the uncharted waters ahead and their possible hazards’.13 As negotiations between the Federal Republic and the Soviet Union progressed, British decision makers showed some concern about the tactics employed by West German negotiators and what was perceived in London as the lack of adequate consultation with the Federal Republic, which in turn inspired the feeling that allied rights and responsibilities in regard to Germany might not be ‘sufficiently’ acknowledged.14 Even the British ambassador to Bonn Roger Jackling, who had a fundamental role in ensuring continuing British support for Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik, remarked in his correspondence with the FCO that British decision makers ‘could do with more, better and earlier information’ from the West German government about the moves it intended to make.15 More specifically, the British political elite feared that the West German government might endanger the rights of the Western powers in Germany and Berlin for the sake of some early progress in negotiations with the Soviet Union. On 13 February 1970, in a letter to Britain’s ambassador to Moscow, Sir Duncan Wilson, Deputy Undersecretary of State Thomas Brimelow clearly expressed the concern that ‘the Eastern policy of the new Federal German government may put at risk at some time in the future both our interests in the German question and also our position in Berlin’.16 The main source of concern for the British government was the conduct of Brandt’s special envoy in negotiations with Moscow, Egon Bahr. More specifically, the British political establishment feared that while dealing with the Soviets, Bahr might either say too much or make excessive concessions to Moscow. In a minute dated 2 March 1970, John Kenneth Drinkall, of the FCO’s Western European Department, complained that it was evident that Bahr, in his talks with Soviet officials, had said a great deal about Berlin ‘without prior Four Power agreement’.17 In his correspondence with the cabinet secretary Sir Burke Trend, John Thomson, who was then minister with the United

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Kingdom’s delegation to NATO, described Bahr as a ‘sinister figure’ who was personally overcommitted to the success of a thorough-going Ostpolitik.18 However, in spite of the concerns about the tactics of West German negotiators and the strategy of Egon Bahr, the general British attitude towards Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik remained one of encouragement and support. Britain’s forward-looking calculation was that while Ostpolitik entailed some elements of danger, as a consequence of the greater political and economic dynamism of the West, East-West contact would undoubtedly be to the West’s long-term benefit. For this reason, recognition of Soviet hegemony in Eastern Europe might be safely conceded in the short term, provided it was subject to certain basic conditions: the maintenance of the US nuclear commitment, progress towards West European integration and a satisfactory arrangement on Berlin.19 Within this context, FCO officials believed that although Bahr might have urged Brandt to go slightly further than Britain may have wished on some given occasions, the West German Chancellor was also likely to pay heed to the views of his allies on all matters of importance, while domestic opposition from the Christian Democrats would act as a powerful brake against any adventurous Ostpolitik.20 The change of government in London, following the conservative party’s victory in the general election of June 1970, neither had any impact on AngloGerman relations nor did it change the general British attitude towards Ostpolitik and a European Security Conference. FCO officials strongly advised the new conservative cabinet led by Edward Heath to maintain the ‘present excellent Anglo-German relations’.21 Ambassador to Bonn Jackling also continued to recommend the government’s confirmed support for the Federal Republic’s opening to the East, ‘because it appears to coincide with our own aim of reducing tensions in Europe, and because we need close bilateral relations with the Federal Republic’.22 However, although the general British attitude towards Ostpolitik remained unchanged, the new cabinet, unlike the previous government, was more inclined to perceive the risk of an agreement between Moscow and Bonn at the expense of the West.23 Speaking to his ministers on 3 September 1970, following the signing of the treaty of Moscow in the previous month, Heath complained that ‘close relations between Germany and the Soviet Union had seldom been to our advantage in the past’. For this reason, every effort had to be made to ensure that the state of German-Soviet relations remain compatible with the Federal Republic’s obligations as a member of the Western bloc.24 Britain’s new Foreign Secretary Sir Douglas-Home also had a cautious approach to Ostpolitik and shared only in part the optimism of his predecessor Michael Stewart. Douglas-Home did not rule out that Brandt’s Eastern policy could eventually achieve positive results. However, according to his viewpoint, the West should remain wary of Soviet objectives, as Moscow clearly hoped ‘to manipulate the European scene’ and there was always ‘the danger with Brandt

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that he will not use a long-enough spoon with the Russians’.25 More specifically, it remained to be seen whether the Soviet leaders really wanted a relaxation of tension with the West.26 This caution was also shared by Brimelow, who in a letter sent on 14 August 1970 to a colleague in Moscow noted that it was an open question, ‘whether the long-term advantages for which Herr Brandt hopes will ever be achieved’.27 As a result of these concerns, Britain regarded the conclusion of a satisfactory agreement between the Four Powers on Berlin as the basic precondition for maintaining support for Ostpolitik and assenting to a European Security Conference. Within this context, the British were suspicious that while with the signing of the Moscow treaty the Soviet Union had secured West German acceptance of its basic requirements, it remained unclear what concessions the Soviet leadership might be prepared to make on Berlin. Although the West German government, conscious of Western concern and faced with the criticism of Christian Democratic opposition, had made the ratification of the Moscow treaty conditional upon the satisfactory conclusion of a quadripartite agreement on Berlin, the British government feared that the Federal Republic might be tempted to neglect this commitment and ‘embark on courses which would prejudice Western interests, in particular the maintenance of the quadripartite status of Berlin’.28 As emphasised by Brimelow, ‘if, for internal political reasons, the Federal German Government wish to proceed to ratification of the Soviet-German treaty, they may urge the Americans, the French, and ourselves to accept as satisfactory an outcome of the Berlin talks which in reality might be less than satisfactory’.29 The lack of progress made in negotiations upon Berlin undoubtedly contributed to increase the Heath cabinet’s uncertainties about the overall achievements of Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik and the Soviet proposal for a European Security Conference. The British government was particularly concerned that the Federal Republic might be tempted to discuss questions affecting access to Berlin and inner-Berlin improvements in anticipation of quadripartite agreements, in order to maintain the impetus of Ostpolitik. Reporting on 29 October to the cabinet about a conversation with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko two days earlier, Douglas-Home commented that ‘it remained the long-term aim of the Soviet Government to make the position of West Berlin still more anomalous and to weaken still further the position of the Western powers in the city’.30 The suspicions from part of the British political elite were only removed in some measure by the successful conclusion of the quadripartite negotiations on Berlin in the summer of 1971. While Douglas-Home acknowledged that, although not perfect, the agreement was rather better than the result the British government had hoped for when the talks began in March 1970, strong doubts persisted in London about its implications on British and Western interests.31 Douglas-Home also expressed the concern that

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the agreement on Berlin may ‘encourage Western complacency and increase the pressure for hasty movement in East-West relations in particular towards a Security Conference and force reductions, with the dangers that this might entail’, while in a minute of 1 September 1971 to his Foreign Secretary, Heath commented: ‘I do not accept that the Agreement with its ancillary documents in any way represents a fair bargain for the Three Powers … The Soviet Union, having de facto removed the rights to which we and our allies are entitled de jure has now succeeded in securing considerable benefits for itself and the GDR … The most that we can say is that we have made the best of a bad bargain, not that we have got a fair deal.’32

Britain, the Helsinki Process and the Transformation of Europe Although remaining wary of Soviet objectives and fearing that Moscow might be reluctant to make significant concessions in return for the Federal Republic’s recognition of the loss of the Eastern territories, the British political elite believed that formal acceptance of the post-war European borders was a trend that predated and would probably outlast Ostpolitik. In other words, according to the British view, by formally renouncing the Eastern territories of the Reich, Brandt had given nothing of major substance away that had not been already conceded de facto by his Christian Democratic predecessors. Acceptance of the Oder-Neisse line as Poland’s Western border, formal recognition of the German Democratic Republic through the signing of the inner-German Basic Treaty in December 1972 and cancellation of Munich as a result of the treaty of Prague with Czechoslovakia in December 1973 were perceived in London as political concessions largely of symbolic importance and carrying no real risk to the West, as they did not call into question the Federal Republic’s commitment to NATO and Western European integration.33 Indeed, the British were aware that the main risks would lie on the side of the Russians. As aptly noted by Thomson: ‘[W]ith the German bogey more or less officially laid to rest it may be harder for them to command obedience in Eastern Europe.’34 However, although regarding West Germany’s formal acceptance of the loss of the Eastern territories as the mere diplomatic recognition of a settlement which had already been implicitly consented to by the West, the British political elite did not react enthusiastically to the Soviet proposal for an ESC. As a result of the perceived ‘special relationship’ with the United States, British decision makers feared that such a conference might have negative implications on relations between the United States and its European partners. More specifically, Britain expected the Soviet Union to use the conference to earn the West’s multilateral recognition of its sphere of influence in the East and

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legitimisation of the Brezhnev doctrine of ‘limited sovereignty’, while weakening, through its ideological propaganda, the cohesion of the Transatlantic Alliance and the US commitment to the defence of Western Europe.35 This concern put Britain slightly at odds with the preferences of the Federal Republic and France. While the French government had agreed to a European Security Conference immediately after Willy Brand had announced his Ostpolitik in 1969, Britain initially displayed a more cautious, if not reluctant, approach, fearing that such a conference might represent a trap rather than an opportunity.36 There was a concern not to endanger relations with its European partners, particularly with the Federal Republic, alongside the evolution in the American position that, following the conclusion of the Eastern treaties, forced Britain not to assume an openly negative attitude towards the conference. Although believing that a European Security Conference was ‘unlikely to do any good’, British decision makers also thought that it was ‘probably inevitable’ and ‘need not be particularly harmful’.37 For this reason, while refraining from opposing a European Security Conference, the British endeavoured to maintain Western unity and exact maximum concessions from the Soviet Union, insisting on the establishment of a specific link between a Berlin settlement and the opening of multilateral preparatory talks.38 Within this context, the British political elite’s general calculation was that while a European Security Conference would entail elements of danger, East-West contact would be to the West’s long-term benefit as a consequence of the greater political and economic dynamism of the United States and Western Europe and of the striving for autonomy from the Soviet Union’s Eastern European satellites. Undoubtedly, the successful conclusion of the Eastern treaties in part contributed to allay Britain’s initial diffidence and reluctance. As acknowledged by Heath during a conversation with National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger at Camp David in February 1973, although the CSCE had probably been originally envisaged by the Soviets ‘as a means of dealing with the German problem’, this intent had been bypassed by the success of Willy Brandt’s Neue Ostpolitik.39 As a result of West Germany’s special interest in most of the main issues dealt with by the conference and of the Federal Republic’s importance for the advancement of British interests in the European Community, during the first formal sessions of the negotiations the British government and the FCO sought to co-ordinate their action with that of Bonn.40 As suggested by the superintending Under-Secretary of the FCO’s Western Organisations Department Charles Wiggin, it would be wise for Britain ‘to continue with our traditional policy of seeking to go no faster and no slower than the Federal German Government’.41 This attitude meant that on many issues, particularly on that of frontiers, Britain should maintain the line of going along with ‘anything the Germans accept’.42 However, although being aware of the Federal Republic’s special interest in a number of the political and humanitarian questions which were central to the

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conference, on some occasions the British continued to manifest apprehension about the tactics of West German negotiators and their implications on the cohesion of the Western bloc. More specifically, the British were irritated by the conduct of the West German delegation, which they viewed as threatening the unity of the West in order to suit special German interests vis-à-vis the East and German domestic political contingencies.43 Britain’s main concern was that the tactics of the West German negotiators and their eagerness at reaching an agreement might make it more difficult for the West to be granted significant concessions from the Soviet leadership. On 9 November 1973 in a minute sent to deputy Under-Secretary of State Wright, Crispin Tickell, head of the FCO’s Western Organisations Department, noted that on the issue of the new consultative machinery to be established at the end of the Helsinki conference, the West Germans were ‘ready to indicate their agreement to the East too early’ rather than trying to exact more concessions from the Soviets.44 Thirteen months later, in a letter to Britain’s new ambassador to the Soviet Union Sir John Killick, Sir David Hildyard, head of the British delegation in Geneva, complained that the West Germans ‘have not kept their allies fully informed of their thinking … They so often play their own game as well as change their minds frequently’.45 British irritation about the conduct of the West German delegates was also fuelled by the perception that it may be difficult for the West to obtain tangible advantages from the conference. In December 1973, the United Kingdom’s ambassador to Helsinki Anthony Elliot wrote that the successful conclusion to the conference according to Western criteria might not be possible and that the West may have eventually to choose ‘between accepting an unsatisfactory result and assuming responsibility for declaring the conference a failure’.46 Optimism gradually replaced doubts in the British camp only during the course of 1974, as a result of four main developments: firstly, the West’s ability to win Moscow’s assent to the principle of the peaceful change of frontiers; secondly, the East’s commitment to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms; thirdly, the return of Wilson to the government in February 1974; finally, the British public’s growing enthusiasm for détente.47 On 29 July 1974, in a letter to Callaghan, Elliot reviewed the judgment expressed in the previous year in part, concluding that the conference was ‘worth understanding and worth taking seriously’.48 The separate listing in Basket III of the peaceful settlements of disputes – respect for human rights, and fundamental freedoms, among the principles dealt with by the conference – was regarded at least by part of the British political elite as a major setback for the Russians, who had been forced to pay a heavy price for the West’s recognition of the inviolability of the European borders. Even the mere discussion of these issues provided the West with an opportunity to penetrate the Soviet system with liberal and democratic values, thus eroding the Brezhnev doctrine and Soviet domination on Eastern Europe.49 Without a progressive relaxation of this kind it would

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have been hard to see how détente would have had any real meaning or been able to last. As envisaged in September 1975 by the new British ambassador to Moscow Sir Terence Garvey: ‘[I]n the longer perspective the practice of détente may foster developments in Soviet policies which ultimately make the USSR a less intractable, even a more reliable partner.’50

Conclusions Unlike other Western European countries, Britain realised fairly late the agenda behind Ostpolitik and Bonn’s long-term aim of transforming the East-West confrontation from a political and military one into an ideological and social one. However, by 1974 at least part of the British political elite had come to realise that, although unlikely to bring about a new ‘golden age’, Ostpolitik and the CSCE would not seal a static settlement of the German question but provide an element of dynamism and transformation in East-West relations. By 1975 this transformation policy had become London’s official strategy in Helsinki. Those British experts who had followed more closely the evolution of Ostpolitik and the climax of this policy in the CSCE negotiations shared Brandt’s belief that the conference, while not affecting vital Western interests, had also provided opportunities, as ‘only through patient effort to promote détente would it be possible to change the present situation in Europe for the better’.51 More specifically, the East’s agreement to the separate listing, among the principles to be considered by the conference, of the peaceful settlements of disputes, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms was regarded in Britain as a fundamental achievement for the West. However, the British were also aware that the Soviet Union would try to delay any change in Eastern Europe, while upholding the principles of non-interference in internal affairs and individual sovereignty. As Killick aptly put it, the Soviet government would try ‘to demonstrate beyond doubts in deeds as well as words … that relaxation of tension on the international plane need not and will not be accompanied by relaxation at home or by ideological détente’.52 According to a paper prepared by the FCO in November 1974, the results of the conference were expected to fall short of original Western requirements, and the Soviet Union was likely to maintain controls in the fields of human contacts and information that were ‘far more strict than those which are considered in the West to be compatible with the rights of the individual’. However, what had been achieved during the negotiations was well beyond Britain’s initial expectations and ‘should provide a basis on which to build in the future’. While texts on family reunification and marriage were unlikely to change the power balance in Eastern Europe, they could provide a useful instrument of leverage for Western governments in order to exert pressure on Moscow.53 Furthermore, the results of the CSCE would allow the West to give encouragement to

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opposition groups in Eastern Europe.54 For this reason, despite initial hesitations, the British eventually favoured the establishment of a follow-up machinery to the conference, as they perceived that such machinery would provide an instrument for maintaining pressure on the Soviet Union and the Eastern European countries to promote effect to their commitments in Basket III. More specifically, the British hoped that the implementation of the human contacts and information provisions would place new strains on relations between the Soviet Union and some of its more liberal allies, weakening the cohesion of the Eastern bloc. For Britain this was one of the major achievements of the conference and, indirectly, of Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik, which had paved the way for the CSCE: for the first time the Soviet bloc states had been forced to accept that the attitudes of governments towards their own citizens should be the subject of multilateral discussion.55 As aptly noted by Hildyard, the conference had taken ‘a very different course from that which the Soviet Union had originally expected … The Soviet authorities were thankful when at last they could extricate themselves from it’.56

Notes 1. PRO, FCO 14/1069, draft steering brief prepared by the FCO’s Western European Department for Heath’s talks with Brandt on 20–21 April 1972. 2. R. Morgan, ‘The British View’, in E. Moreton (ed.), Germany between East and West (Cambridge, 1987), 85–86. 3. More specifically, there were numerous issues, such as travel and other practical questions, on which the British would have ‘gladly let the West Germans take the burden of dealing with the Russians’ off their shoulders, even if such cases fell technically within the reserved rights and responsibilities of the Four Powers. PRO, FO 371/118455, Millar to Kirkpatrick, 15 October 1955. 4. Robert Hughes has argued that British policy on boundaries in Eastern Europe after 1945 was inspired not by a ‘pragmatic’ consolidation of the status quo but by a real desire to institutionalise a system that was seen as the best possible option for Britain, given the harsh reality of its relative decline after 1945. R. Hughes, ‘“Possession is Nine Tenths of the Law”: Britain and the Boundaries of Eastern Europe since 1945’, in Diplomacy & Statecraft, 16/4 (2005): 723–747. 5. In 1956, only two years following the Federal Republic’s entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the publication in London of Elizabeth Wiskemann’s book Germany’s Eastern Neighbours, under the auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, triggered strong criticism in Bonn as a result of what was perceived as the author’s open disregard for West German claims on the Eastern territories. PRO, FCO 408/81, Allen to Selwyn Lloyd, 11 August 1956. 6. PRO, PREM 15/1579, background note prepared by the FCO on the most important points to be made by Britain’s representatives in conversations with the Federal Republic’s ministers and officials, 1 February 1971.

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7. G. Niedhart, ‘The British Reaction towards West German Ostpolitik: AngloGerman Relations in the Era of Détente 1967–1971’, in C. Haase (ed.), Debating Foreign Affairs: The Public and British Foreign Policy since 1867 (Berlin, 2003), 130–153; here 138f. 8. DBPO III/1, doc. no. 31, 146, Stewart to Sir Duncan Wilson, 15 May 1969. See also DBPO III/1, doc. no. 36, 181, Sir Duncan Wilson to Stewart, 14 July 1969. 9. PRO, PREM 13/2674, conversation between Stewart and Wilson, 10 February 1969; cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 139. See also O. Bange, ‘NATO and the Non-Proliferation Treaty: Triangulations between Bonn, Washington, and Moscow’, in A. Wenger, C. Nuenlist and A. Locher (eds.), NATO in the 1960s: Challenges beyond Deterrence (London, 2006), 162–180. 10. PRO, FCO 33/573, conversation between Brandt and Stewart, 10 October 1968. The Federal Republic finally adhered to the NPT in November 1969; cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 139. 11. A. Deighton, ‘Ostpolitik or Westpolitik? British Foreign Policy, 1968–1975’, International Affairs, 74/4 (1998): 893. For a critical response to Deighton’s claim that British foreign policy was leading the way to détente, see O. Bange, ‘Ostpolitik as a Source of Intra-Bloc Tensions’, paper presented at the Lemnitzer Centre for NATO Studies, Ohio State University, http://www.ostpolitik. net/ostpolitik/publications/download/article11. 12. During negotiations on the Eastern treaties, Britain tried to establish an implicit relationship between the EEC enlargement talks and progress in West German Ostpolitik, even envisioning the adoption of a ‘tougher line with the Germans at a later stage’ should negotiations in Brussels not have come to a successful conclusion. PRO, FCO 33/1416, Cradock to Bendall, 25 January 1971. 13. PRO, FCO 7/1819, brief by the FCO for Wilson, 7 January 1970; cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 151, fn. 66. 14. Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 140. 15. DBPO III/1, doc. no. 46, 233, record of the Seventh Meeting of the Conference of HM Representatives in Eastern Europe, 8 May 1970. 16. DBPO III/1, Brimelow to Wilson, 13 February 1970, 243, fn. 2. Briefly after the formation of the government between the Social Democrats and the Free Democrats, Brimelow, who between 1966 and 1969 had been Britain’s ambassador to Warsaw, had complained that Brandt had a tendency to go ahead with Ostpolitik without consulting the Federal Republic’s Western allies. PRO, FCO 33/476, minute by Brimelow, 19 November 1969, cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 140. 17. PRO, PREM 13/3221. See also DBPO III/1, doc. no. 46, 229–238. 18. PRO, PREM 15/1579, Thomson to Sir Burk Trend, 22 December 1970. 19. PRO, CAB 170/111, Cradock to Bendall, 15 July 1970. 20. PRO, PREM 15/1579, ‘Herr Brandt’s Ostpolitik’, summary. 21. PRO, PREM 15/64, memorandum by Greenhill to Douglas-Home, June 1970 (no exact date); cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 135. 22. DBPO III/1, despatch by Jackling to FCO, 25 June 1970, 243, fn. 1. 23. In June 1970, in a dispatch to Bonn, the West German ambassador to London von Hase suggested that Britain’s approval for West German Ostpolitik, rather than being a function of the good status of Anglo-West German relations, was much more a consequence of a cold evaluation of British interests and was obviously

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confined to the immediate present. More specifically, according to Hase, it would have been in harmony with Britain’s interests had the Federal Republic come to realise that, at least for the foreseeable future, the reunification of Germany was not a realistic possibility, while East-West confrontation was reduced to the limit of what was possible. By contrast, the British were keeping a certain reservation as far as the form and future developments of Ostpolitik were concerned. However, in the opinion of the West German ambassador, they would not hesitate to pronounce themselves against developments that, according to their viewpoint, might be in contrast with the preservation of their rights. AAPD 1970, 979–983. 24. PRO, CAB 128/47. Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 144. 25. PRO, PREM 15/1575, 25 November 1971. See also DBPO III/1, 15 July 1970, 246, fn. 9. 26. PRO, CAB 128/47, Douglas-Home in Cabinet, 3 September 1970. See also PRO, FCO 7/1836, record of a conversation between Douglas-Home and US Secretary of State Rogers, 23 September 1970. 27. Edmonds was minister at the British embassy in Moscow. Although remaining diffident about Soviet objectives, Brimelow excluded the possibility that Brandt’s Eastern policy would have a weakening effect on the Federal Republic’s commitment to the West among its immediate consequences. DBPO III/1, doc. no. 50, 253–256, Brimelow to Edmonds, 14 August 1970. 28. PRO, CAB 128/47, Douglas-Home in Cabinet, 16 July 1970; cited in Niedhart, ‘British Reaction’, 146. 29. DBPO III/1, doc. no. 50, 251, Brimelow to Edmonds, 14 August 1970. 30. DBPO III/1, 273, fn. 8, record of conversation between Douglas-Home and Gromyko at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 27 October 1970. Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko had visited London from 26–29 October 1970. 31. DBPO III/1, 377. 32. Ibid., Heath to Douglas-Home, 1 September 1971. On 24 September, 105 Soviet officials were expelled from Britain over spying accusations in an intelligence manoeuvre known as ‘Operation Foot’, signalling a stiffening of British policy towards the Soviet Union. M. F. Hopkins, ‘Britain’s Policy to the Soviet Union in the Era of Détente, 1968–1976’, in Contemporary British History, 18/1 (2004): 132–142. 33. In a conversation in Rome with Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti on 3 October 1972, Heath had stated that while the Federal Republic was firmly associated with the Western allies, there was a general concern in Britain that the FRG might became neutralist, although such a possibility was never discussed in public. PRO, PREM 15/1522. 34. PRO, PREM 15/1579, Thomson to Trend, 22 December 1970. 35. DBPO III/1, Appendix, Report by Joint Intelligence Committee (A) on the Soviet Threat, 14 September 1972, 513–516; cited in Hopkins, ‘Britain’s Policy’, 135. 36. An exception to this generally sceptical attitude was that of the British ambassador to Moscow, Sir Duncan Wilson, who, being more sensitive to Soviet concerns about Germany, had favoured a European Security Conference as early as 1969. 37. DBPO III/1, 315. 38. PRO, FCO 33/1416, Bendall to Cradock, 27 January 1971. This condition had been clearly established by Douglas-Home in his speech in the foreign affairs debate on 9 December 1970.

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39. DBPO III/2, 99, fn. 3. 40. According to Douglas-Home, London intentionally sought a trade off between support for Ostpolitik and a European Security Conference and its desire for West German backing for the British position on regional policies within the EEC, thus confirming an implicit link, which had first been established during Britain’s entry negotiations. PRO, FCO 33/1807, Douglas-Home to Rippon, 19 April 1972. 41. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 3, 20, Wiggin to Brimelow, 14 March 1972. 42. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 27, 107, minute from Brown on CSCE: Principles, 20 March 1973. 43. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 94, 322–323, Elliot to Callaghan, 29 July 1974. 44. DBPO III/2, 201, fn. 3. 45. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 107, 365, Hildyard to Sir J. Killick, 24 December 1974. Killick had replaced Duncan Wilson as ambassador to Moscow in September 1971. 46. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 57, 221, Elliot to Douglas-Home, 15 December 1973. 47. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 104, 357, paper by the FCO on the CSCE, 27 November 1974. See also Hopkins, ‘British Policy’, 135. 48. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 94, 326, Elliot to Callaghan, 29 July 1974. 49. These opportunities had been foreseen by Jackling as early as 1970, when he noted that rather than providing a straitjacket, Ostpolitik would contribute to the establishment of a framework for the accommodation of resultant change in East-West relations, removing long-standing obstacles to the development of more normal relations and favouring contacts in the cultural, economic and technical fields between the two halves of the continent. PRO, FCO 33/1547, Jackling to DouglasHome, 29 June 1970. 50. Garvey had replaced Killick as Britain’s ambassador to the Soviet Union in 1973. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 141, 479, Garvey to Callaghan, 9 September 1975. 51. PRO, FCO 41/1782. This passage of Willy Brandt’s speech during the debate at the Bundestag on the CSCE on 25 July 1975 is quoted in ‘CSCE: Attitude of Federal Republic of Germany’. 52. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 45, 177, Killick to Douglas-Home, 5 September 1973. 53. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 104, 356–357, paper by the FCO on the CSCE, 27 November 1974. 54. However, although hoping that exposure to Western values was going to have a long-term impact upon Eastern Europe, and indeed the Soviet Union itself, some officials within the FCO believed that during CSCE negotiations Britain had just been fighting the Cold War by ‘other, more subtle means’. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 37, 137, fn. 3, Walden to Fall, 5 June 1973. Both Walden and Fall belonged to the FCO’s Eastern European and Soviet Department. Quoted in Deighton, ‘Ostpolitik or Westpolitik’, 899. 55. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 94, 324, Elliot to Callaghan, 29 July 1974. 56. DBPO III/2, doc. no. 136, 449, Hildyard to Callaghan, 25 July 1975.

–6–

Finlandisation in Reverse The CSCE and the Rise and Fall of Economic Détente, 1968–1975

o

Juhana Aunesluoma

Why should foreign states give us capital? Why should they feed this giant, as yet unaroused, but whose fist they already feel at every step? Why should they themselves create an ever more formidable rival?1

– Sergei Witte, 1899 Admittedly we have gained little but we have lost nothing.2



– J. C. Cloake, 1974 The East-West conflict somehow withered away.3



– Johan Galtung, 1975

Boom and Bust in East-West Trade The turn of the 1970s saw a boom in East-West economic interaction. Trade figures rose to new heights as a result of the twin effect of the Cold War détente and economic modernisation and reforms in the East. In 1960, total East-West trade turnover had only been $6 billion, but by the end of the decade the figure had risen to $16 billion, an increase of nearly 200 per cent. From there on the volume of trade grew to $31 billion in 1973 and $44 billion in 1974.4

Notes for this chapter begin on page 110.

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Political breakthroughs, epitomised by West Germany’s Ostpolitik,5 France’s overtures to the East and US-Soviet dialogue, facilitated better economic relations. Indeed, the origins and the first tangible results of détente were at first seen in the economic sphere, where ‘economic warfare’ gave way to a general softening of foreign trade policies and trade regimes vis-à-vis the opposing system.6 The socialist countries sought Western technology and investment goods to modernise their production facilities and infrastructure, and in particular, to increase productivity, the sore spot of the socialist economies. New outlets were sought for their export trade. Earlier policies, which had focused on selfsufficiency and the domestic economy, gave way to new approaches, which highlighted the importance of foreign trade, specialisation and international division of labour, all of which pointed the socialist economies towards the global economic system.7 Western companies, European in particular, sought to take advantage of the openings in the East. With a recession hitting the Western markets after 1973, the Eastern markets were a necessary and a valuable asset for the manufacturers of capital investment goods as well as consumer goods producers, who found an insatiable appetite, although a less than adequate purchasing power, for their products in the East. The East-West trade boom was a markedly European phenomenon. In 1974 the United States accounted for no more than 7.6 per cent of the total trade. The biggest player on the Western side, by a wide margin, was West Germany. Of the trade in manufactured goods with East Germany, the Federal Republic’s share was well above 60 per cent throughout 1969–1974. Of the total EastWest trade in these goods its share was 39.2 per cent in 1974. Other countries, such as Italy (9.5 per cent), France (8.5 per cent), United Kingdom (5.5 per cent) and outside Europe, Japan (9.9 per cent), trailed far behind. The share of the United States in the trade in manufactures (3.6 per cent) was roughly on the same level as that of Sweden (3.9 per cent), Switzerland (3.7 per cent) and the Netherlands (3.2 per cent).8 On the Eastern side the biggest trader was naturally the Soviet Union, but taken together, the smaller socialist countries9 accounted for a bigger share in Western Europe’s Eastern trade. In 1973 trade with the Soviet Union amounted to just over $8 billion, whereas the trade with the smaller socialist countries was almost $15 billion.10 In contrast, the United States tended to trade more with the Soviet Union ($1.4 billion in 1973) than with the smaller countries ($910 million in 1973). The bulk of US exports to the Soviet Union consisted of agricultural produce, such as grain, which largely explains the relatively weaker US position in the trade in manufactures. Western goods, capital and technologies spread eastward to an extent that had only been seen before the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939.11 Besides providing a market for Western industrially processed goods, the East

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provided the West mostly with raw materials, certain industrially processed goods in basic industries and agricultural produce. The traditional, complementary pattern of East-West economic exchange that had prevailed prior to the Cold War was restored, albeit leaving room for further growth. The Iron Curtain seemed to have been penetrated and largely made irrelevant under the weight of massive economic forces. As the 1970s progressed, expectations were set high so that the rapid expansion of economic relations would continue and slowly pull together the two halves of a continent that had been torn apart by the political and strategic forces of the Cold War. However, soon after the boom, came disillusionment. Earlier hopes attached to the expansion of East-West trade were not realised, as its growth slackened towards the end of the decade and finally came to a standstill in the 1980s. In 1971–75 the smaller socialist countries’ exports to the West increased annually by 15 per cent, in 1976–80 by 14 per cent, and in 1981–82 it shrank by 1.3 per cent per year. The decline was steeper in Eastern imports from the West, which grew by 23 per cent per year in 1971–75, by 7 per cent in 1976–80, and shrank by 11.3 per cent per year in 1981–82.12 The main problem was the socialist countries’ inability to develop and produce industrially manufactured goods of sufficient quality and quantity with which to reach Western markets and consumers. With the exception of the Soviet Union itself, the East European countries accumulated massive debt balances. Poland, for example, increased its debts from $0.76 billion in 1971 to $24.73 billion in 1981. By then its interest payments to Western financiers alone were a staggering 87.6 per cent of all Poland’s export earnings from the OECD countries. Besides having a plethora of older problems on their hands waiting for a solution, the East-West trade boom had left them with a set of entirely new ones as well.13 To make matters worse, economic reforms in the East ran into trouble after the first hopeful years. The challenges of decentralisation and internationalisation together with declining and shrinking growth and productivity proved insurmountable for the centrally planned economies.14 As the financial means to sustain the reforms and the increased consumption levels disappeared, the East-West trade boom evaporated. By the beginning of the 1980s, when the boom had faded away, Eastern exporters had learned how hard it was to gain access to Western markets in recessionary times.15 Western exporters also experienced the practical limitations, rules and regulations, shortages of information and poor facilities that stood in the way of increased interaction between two fundamentally different economic systems. The political climate turned sour as well, symbolised by the debacle of the US-Soviet trade agreement in early 1975. Détente became a dirty word in US domestic politics, failed and waned away, and the beginning of the 1980s saw the

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renewal of economic warfare, sanctions and yet again a tightening of the US strategic embargo and technology export controls against the socialist countries.16 Deeper economic integration with the West was possible only with a wholesale transformation of the political and economic systems in the East. After the revolutions of 1989 the train that was set in motion in the 1960s moved ahead again, this time bringing the post-socialist countries towards the European Union.

Trade, Transformation and Economic Détente Before events ran their full course, sights were set for further and immediate progress.17 Détente opened the prospect to end the economic Cold War and to normalise economic relations over the East-West divide. What was particularly significant were the prospects the economic breakthroughs opened to the wider political field. Could trade and economic relations be used to bring about desirable changes in the socialist regimes? Would the normalisation and intensification of economic relations pave the way to the end of the Cold War itself? Or would Western trade, credits and technical assistance only give a new lease of life to the otherwise defunct planned economies and assist their regimes to stay in power indefinitely? What is discussed in this contribution are the ways in which the expansion of economic relations fitted into the context of the détente and its long-term goals, and how these issues were dealt with in the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE).18 What forms of economic détente were the signatories of the CSCE Final Act willing and able to follow? What were their aims regarding the economic aspects of the conference, and how did they define the means with which to achieve them? Trade, finance and industrial co-operation was probably the most concrete and tangible aspect of 1960s and 1970s détente, and also the spearhead of Western transformation strategies. In the East, economic interaction with the rest of the world was not just a policy option, but a necessity for further growth, which Western policy-makers could take advantage of. Besides serving their own immediate economic and business interests, in the West, this economic interaction was also intended to serve as a tool to cause long-term changes in the socialist regimes. As the issue was put in a British FCO briefing paper in 1966: We are interested in East/West trade not only for commercial reasons but also because we believe that it can bring substantial political benefits. Growing affluence does not change Marxist/Leninist doctrine but it does in time change the environment and the reflexes of the men who administer that doctrine. Rich Communists see the world with different eyes from poor Communists, not merely in terms of their appetites but in terms of their interests. They ask for more from their national

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economies by way of personal satisfactions and, as welfare increases, they have an increasing stake in peace. As their economies develop and become complex Communist states become less and less able to maintain a detailed centralised control. They are obliged increasingly to decentralise with social as well as economic consequences; and in some cases they are even beginning to show tendencies towards a market economy: so that in the end Marxist/Leninist doctrine itself becomes eroded … So, subject to certain limitations of prudence, we in the West, who must live with Communist Eastern Europe, have a basic interest in assisting these countries in their search for affluence, or at the very least in not appearing to hinder them … [In] trading with East Europe, the West is even now making a small contribution to the process of economic and social change.19

What was particularly important was how internal reforms in the East were seen as both a driver and a consequence of their economies’ increasing interdependence on the world economy. The more they were in contact with economies outside the socialist system, the argument went, the higher the likelihood was for either maintaining a peaceful order with them or, with the passage of time, to achieve fundamental social and economic, and even political change. As G. E. Millard, the British ambassador to Budapest, put it in May 1968, the Hungarian communist leadership ‘had a vested interest in the economic reforms, and this would accelerate the process of liberalisation’.20 The economic reforms and decentralisation of decision-making was a difficult process, as the Eastern experts of the FCO noted, and suggested that it was in the Western powers’ interest to ‘help the process in any way we could, by extending points of economic contact, especially through technical and scientific agreements’.21 The CSCE on the other hand, proved an unwieldy instrument in maintaining the momentum achieved in East-West economic relations before 1975. Neither could the conference nor the process that followed it – nor for that matter, any other external negotiation process – influence the internal dynamics of the socialist economies deeply and quickly enough towards further growth, reforms and internationalisation. The conference, none the less, highlighted the fundamental willingness on the Eastern side to carry on developing economic ties with the West. It also highlighted the practical difficulties that stood on the way of progress and how the Western side wanted their opposite numbers to address them. Despite the failure of the first wave of reforms and internationalisation in the East, which also cut down the utility and direct impact of the CSCE’s economic Basket, there still was something useful to come out of the exercise. In the end, the shared experience of drafting the economic and commercial principles of the CSCE Final Act, highlighted the need and pointed the way towards further reforms in the East, which eventually came, but with a force and consequence no one could foresee.

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The weight given to the usefulness of economic instruments, varied from actor to actor and also in different phases and situations during détente. Many British policy-makers were sceptical about the feasibility of the long-term aims of détente as long as the process did not effectively touch upon the fundamental question of Soviet military presence and conventional military strength in Europe. As the FCO Planning staff put it in November 1976: ‘[D]étente cannot be stable if it is not carried into the armaments field and there is a strong case for making MBFR the proving ground for détente.’22 At the same time it was acknowledged that within the Soviet Union, ‘the emergence of a middle class’ with higher expectations circumscribed ‘the range of political options for the Soviet leadership. Expectations can be deferred and belts tightened in a dictatorship, but not with complete immunity as can be seen by the events in a number of satellite countries … There is a case to be made that growing Soviet dependence on western technology and on western [sic] products to meet the rising expectations of the Soviet people is in itself a kind of Finlandisation in reverse’.23 Overall, Western economic relations with the East were seen as a promising and worthwhile opening. The Nixon-Kissinger team was a steadfast proponent of economic tools in their overall détente strategies, where widely different issues were linked to one another. The US Export Administration Act of 1969 strongly advocated the expansion of peaceful trade with the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. In the early 1970s also the CoCom’s strategic embargo became less effective, as Michael Mastanduno has shown in his pioneering synthesis of the embargo system.24 Despite the relatively limited US role in the actual EastWest trade, the policy signals emanating from Washington were important for the allies as well. The prime mover in Europe was West Germany. In Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik economic agreements were concrete steps towards restoring Germany’s old position as the economic powerhouse of central and eastern Europe as well as a symbol of his government’s ability to achieve real results through negotiations. The natural gas deal of 1970 and the simultaneous race of West German companies for the eastern markets were concrete outcomes of the turnaround in the Federal Republic’s foreign policy. As Willy Brandt himself later explained, Ostpolitik brought tangible benefits beyond political issues: ‘Even as Foreign Minister I told the Bundestag that our policy must be focused on the problems of existence in an immediate sense as well; we had to safeguard employment and open up new fields of economic opportunity.’25 The Brandt government hoped that a conducive economic climate with the Soviet Union would eventually lead to progress in the more controversial political issues as well.26 The open questions were on what time scale, in which Eastern regimes and in what particular issues or processes this change would take place.

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Economic exchanges could also be used to test how far the socialist countries could be coaxed to go in their reformist policies and carefully pulled towards the West. As it proved, the policy had different effects in different parts of the Soviet alliance system, which corroded its internal unity. This was a welcome prospect irrespective of what views one held over the desirability to expand trade and economic contacts or their usefulness to fulfil other political goals.

Economic Issues in the CSCE On the Western side the trail-blazers in the expansion of East-West economic relations had been European governments and companies, who found keen partners on the other side. With the United States relaxing sanctions against socialist countries, such as communist China from 1972 onwards, and negotiating a new trade agreement with the Soviet Union in 1971–73, the climate seemed promising for further openings. Reflecting on this encouraging spirit, and the interests and preferences of all involved in East-West trade, economic issues found their way into the CSCE as well. The negotiation process leading into the signature of the Final Act in Helsinki in August 1975 coincided with the last phase of the East-West trade boom, but also witnessed – and in the end, reflected – the first signs of its eventual failure. The Final Act’s Second Basket, Co-operation in the Field of Economics, of Science and Technology and of the Environment27 consisted of six issue areas of co-operation: commercial exchanges, industrial co-operation and projects of common interests, provisions concerning trade and industrial co-operation, science and technology, environment and a final subheading containing references for co-operation in other areas. In conceptual terms the inclusion of environmental questions into the Basket was its most novel feature, but in terms of interest and importance the economic issues dominated the Second Basket. As in the CSCE as a whole, the Eastern side looked for principles whereas the West sought for practicalities and concrete measures. The original Soviet and Warsaw Pact initiatives for the security conference contained the idea of including the economic questions in it.28 Once brought up, and accepted on the conference’s agenda in Helsinki in 1973,29 they simply could not be shelved without opening the danger of other issues being shelved too. When considering the relationship between universal principles, suggested by the East, and practicalities, put forward by the West, a general pattern of demands and concessions of the CSCE process as a whole becomes observable within the Second Basket. If the Soviet Union sought certain principles in the First Basket, it had to pay a price for them in the Third Basket. A parallel can be drawn within the Second Basket, which contained certain, rather weakly

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formulated principles, and more specifically formulated practicalities relating to the everyday level of economic and commercial exchanges across the Iron Curtain. If the Soviet Union was looking for something in the economic sphere, the Western negotiators would extract a price for it. In the end, and what apparently surprised the Western negotiators, the Soviet Union and its allies ultimately backed away from many of their claims, and accepted Western demands for better access to relevant economic information in the East and better facilities (offices, etc.) to actually conduct their business transactions. The Second Basket was the longest in terms of text and paper used, but in the end the most meagre in terms of actual impact and substance. What little had been agreed to help to ease the conditions for further economic exchanges in Helsinki was difficult to put into practice. This highlighted the inherent shortcomings of the CSCE process on economic issues, but was also shaped by external developments the negotiators were in no position to influence or control. Better hotel facilities, explicitly mentioned in the Final Act, may have been at the disposal of Western businessmen in Moscow, but when direct dialling in and out of the Soviet Union was discontinued in 1982, many similar events symbolised the beginning of the end of the Soviet economic system as it was before perestroika, and the all-round failure to live up to the optimistic expectations and the spirit of Helsinki.30 For those who wished to see an end to the economic Cold War and a relaxation of controls and restrictions in East-West trade, real progress in the economic aspects of the CSCE would have been a step in the right direction. This was more or less the original Soviet bloc position. On the other hand, anyone who entertained scepticism about the political or strategic usefulness of deepening East-West economic interaction – or the positive linkage between economics and security in the first place – would have had the same reservations towards progress in the CSCE context as well. The conference was not and did not become an actual economic negotiation process. Nor is there any evidence that any of the negotiators really sought it to become one, or pressed this direction even if there may have been some advantages to do so, especially on the Eastern side. Initially, it seems that the non-Soviet bloc countries anticipated the Soviet Union and its allies pressing harder for progress in the economic questions as well, and Western negotiators prepared for a prolonged defensive to counter Soviet insistence to accept measures inimical to Western economic Cold War aims. In the end, the Soviet position was less stringent than anticipated. In the first stage talks in Dipoli, the British noted how the Second Basket discussions had been ‘considerably less dramatic and “confrontational” than those for Baskets I and III’.31 John Maresca has assumed that the Eastern tactics and the limited goals were probably due to a decision in Moscow not to complicate the all-important First Basket negotiations by secondary demands elsewhere, which in any case in all

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likelihood would have had limited actual impact.32 Eastern passivity none the less came as a surprise to the other negotiators, who expected them to act as demandeurs, but failed to do so. The limits of the CSCE to deliver in the economic sphere were also found in the ways in which the conference took the economic questions on its agenda in the first place. What the negotiators did was take ideas and issues already dealt with in other economic negotiations in the CSCE process. On the one hand this meant that the original Eastern proposals for the inclusion of these items were accepted and subsequently modified by the Western side into a less ambitious programme for the conference, and hence the process paid lip service to issues that just had to be dealt with, whether everybody wanted this or not. To drop the economic issues from the agenda was not possible for the simple reason that once they were on the agenda they had to be there until the very end, as a reformulation of the agenda risked the abandonment of other items as well. For example, Western insistence on limiting the Second Basket might have led to similar moves from the Eastern side regarding the Third Basket. As it happened, the conference simply took up the work and a readily available agenda of East-West economic talks that had been prepared in the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (ECE). ECE documents not only provided the agenda for the CSCE but also had a direct influence in the ways in which the final documents were drafted and what issue areas (notably the environment) were included.33 The ECE had been founded in 1947 with the hope of easing the Cold War in the economic realm.34 This had not been achieved, and instead of grander objectives the ECE had undertaken the role of an expert body to maintain a link between economic experts across the Iron Curtain. It provided information and a channel for a modest exchange of views on a fairly general level. The close link between the ECE and CSCE was not only formal, but also personal, as ECE diplomacy seems to have been conducted to a large extent by the same personnel who were involved in the CSCE negotiations in Geneva as well. The economic experts, who knew each other from other occasions, seem to have been also personally less prone to confrontational negotiation tactics than negotiators in other Baskets.35 As the CSCE consisted of practically the same nations that already took part in the work of ECE, prospects to achieve more were limited. Progress in the CSCE would undoubtedly have meant progress in the ECE as well, but what was more important was that the relationship worked the other way around. Lack of progress in the ECE meant lack of progress in the CSCE as well, and as the political will to change the situation was lacking on all sides, the institutional frame did not change. In the end the CSCE, as it explicitly mentioned the ECE in the economic context, gave some additional impetus to the work of the ECE, as the latter

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organisation was tasked to organise the follow-up work.36 But as long as there was no fundamental change in the position and the role of the ECE, the CSCE’s economic relevance remained limited. Another difficulty was that the CSCE dealt with issues that were more conveniently handled in bilateral negotiations, or between the European Communities and Comecon countries. The EC had by 1975 achieved full competence to handle trade negotiations with third partners, but its role in East-West economic negotiations remained limited after 1975. Negotiations between the EC’s Commission and the Eastern countries were slow to start and for various reasons did not break new ground or could counter the dissipater tendencies in the East-West trade regime.37 The issue that mattered the most to the Soviet Union, although primarily for political and not for economic reasons, was the issue of most-favoured-nation treatment, but the Western side was determined from the beginning not to let the CSCE negotiations break any new ground here. In the document prepared in Dipoli in 1972–73 the Western side agreed to wording that the committee in charge of drafting the final document ‘could discuss general problems relating to most favoured nation treatment’, and no more than that.38 The question of how to phrase the reference to MFN-treatment, however, remained open until the very end, but the Soviet Union eventually backed down from its earlier claims.39 Apart from bilateral trade negotiations this issue involved the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade (GATT) of which the Soviet Union was not a member. Progress was not achieved there either.40 Despite its modest overall impact, the CSCE did have some importance over particular issues especially with the relations of the smaller East European countries and the West. If the Soviet Union had not lived up to the promises made in Helsinki in 1975 to ease the practical conditions and facilities for Western businessmen and companies, and the availability of relevant economic information etc., some of its East European satellites would have followed a different path. To an extent, economic information and facilities became more easily attainable for the West in Hungary and Poland in particular. Looking back to the developments following Helsinki, American observers pointed out that in Hungary ‘business and commercial information, while not usually available in forms such as Western-style annual reports, is disseminated fairly freely in newspapers, journals and specialized economic publications’.41 Hungarian co-operation with the IMF and the World Bank was mentioned as especially significant in this respect. In Poland ‘the Western business community has full access to organizational information, although the accounting methodology is different from that used in the West and as such, is sometimes of little use to the business visitors. The government publishes regular economic statistics, which include foreign trade and industrial production data’.42

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Whether all this reflected the Polish and Hungarian needs to obtain further credits from Western financial institutions than the pledges made in the Final Act is an open issue. It is probable that the CSCE did play some role here, but the need to open the books for Western inspection in exchange of credits and further possibilities of Eastern exports into the Western markets, was a much more useful leverage than the words on paper in the Final Act. Outside Poland and Hungary, however, the situation was far less satisfactory. Not even the need to attract Western companies to joint ventures and commercial relations, or loans from the West, was enough for the Soviet Union or Bulgaria to fulfil the pledges made in the Final Act. Bulgarian restrictions to economic data were probably an attempt to mask the full extent of the difficulties its important agricultural sector was experiencing, and the country’s external payments position was considered a ‘state secret’ in any case.43 In the Soviet Union similar motives led into a more restrictive attitude towards commercial information. The situation in fact was better before the signature of the Helsinki Final Act than after it. For example, in 1979, according to an American analysis, ‘availability of useful commercial information, which declined during the last two review periods, was reduced further by a decision not to publish monthly production statistics. In the future Ekonomicheskaya Gazeta will publish only aggregated quarterly figures’.44 The Soviet Union was heading towards an economic breakdown, and they themselves knew it, but they did not want to share their knowledge with the rest of the world.

Conclusion If we consider one of the CSCE’s goals to have been to sustain and give new impetus to the East-West trade boom, which was in fact what the Soviet Union with its allies initially wanted from the CSCE, this would have meant a considerable relaxation in the economic Cold War. Maybe the CSCE would later have been celebrated not only for its First and Third Baskets, but also as an end, or as a beginning of an end, to the economic Cold War. As we know, this was not the way events turned out. Even the initial optimists, such as the pioneer of peace research, Johan Galtung, were sceptical about the end result achieved in 1975. According to Galtung, the foundations of peace were in an order, where fundamental sources of conflict would be removed.45 To solve fundamental economic problems in the contemporary world order was high on the peace activists’ agenda. Sources of conflict and grievances should be removed one by one, but in Galtung’s eyes, the CSCE did not live up to this task.46

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The fortunes of the Second Basket reflected the decline and fall of economic détente, and could not influence the course of events and other, fundamental processes influencing East-West trade and commercial exchanges. The Second Basket’s agenda was limited due to internal and external factors, and in the end, no party was willing to enlarge the significance of the CSCE in this field. Internally, it was left in the shadow of the higher priorities that were set for the First and Third Baskets. Externally, it remained conditional for progress in other forms of East-West economic negotiations. The CSCE quite simply did not provide adequate instruments to remove the political and practical obstacles for more extensive economic contacts. Commitment to principles alone does not make profitable business. This was not the case with the Third Basket issues. Human rights groups in the East did not need competitive products in the Western markets to ensure their survival; a competitive idea for Eastern consumption was enough. The Second Basket reflected realities and progress, or the lack of it, in other arenas of East-West economic negotiations, and it did not and could not to any sufficient degree influence those realities as the Third Basket arguably did. According to the critics of détente and the development of East-West trade in general, any help from the West to the Eastern economies, in the form of expanded trade, finance, technology transfer and economic exchange in general, sustained these economies and compensated for their own failures. According to this view, the sooner their economic collapse would bring about political reforms, and perhaps maybe even the disappearance of the whole Soviet system, the better for all concerned. And even falling short of complete collapse, the maintenance of strict controls in East-West trade would hamper economic development in the East, war-making capabilities and the capacity to exert economic pressure and leverage within the Soviet bloc and outside of it. Of course, the effects and mechanisms of East-West trade were not at all this clear cut, as it could also be argued that it was precisely the expansion of trade that increased Western security and helped to bring about favourable changes in the East. The economic reform process, which also had the potential to upset the political stability of the socialist countries, was linked to their involvement in international trade. It could also be argued that Western companies managed to trade with the Soviet bloc countries with such favourable terms, that East-West trade in fact hampered and slowed down economic and technological development in the East. Furthermore, it could be said that the fact that the smaller Soviet bloc countries became very quickly dependent on Western markets and finance as a result of the changes taking place from the 1960s onwards, created a counter-balance for Soviet influence and in the end fostered their ultimate collapse. In any case, East-West trade gave the Eastern countries a lever by which to influence their behaviour and directly or indirectly press for changes already before 1989.

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And if perestroika was in any way a child of the détente, and not of the second Cold War, then its parents most certainly were the experience of boom and bust in East-West trade in the 1970s, the deficiencies it showed in the planned economies, their fundamental incompatibility with the emerging global economic order and how the road to prosperity and peace in Europe went through reforms and not status quo policies.

Notes 1. Quoted in G. Sokoloff, The Economy of Détente: The Soviet Union and Western Capital (Leamington Spa, 1987). Witte was Russia’s finance minister from 1892 to 1903. 2. DBPO III/2, 301–304, J. C. Cloake minute to Mr Marshall, 3 July 1974. Cloake was an official in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. 3. J. Galtung, ‘European Security and Cooperation: A Skeptical Contribution’, Journal of Peace Research, 12/3 (1975): 165–178. Galtung was a pioneer in peace research. 4. Figures are from The United States Role in East-West Trade: Problems and Prospects. An Assessment by Rogers Morton, Secretary of Commerce, August 1975 (Washington D.C., 1975), 4. 5. The economic aspects of Ostpolitik are covered in A. Stent, From Embargo to Ostpolitik: The Political Economy of West German-Soviet Relations 1955–1980 (Cambridge, 1981). Long-term continuities in Germany’s easterly economic relations are extensively discussed in R. M. Spaulding, Osthandel and Ostpolitik: German Foreign Trade Policies in Eastern Europe from Bismarck to Adenauer (Oxford, 1997). Volker R. Berghahn has discussed the big business interests and continuities in Osthandel as well in ‘Lowering Soviet Expectations: West German Industry and Osthandel during the Brandt Era’, in idem (ed.), Quest for Economic Empire: European Strategies of German Big Business in the Twentieth Century (Providence, 1996), 145–158. 6. Michael Mastanduno, Economic Containment: CoCom and the Politics of EastWest Trade (Ithaca, 1992), 140–142, 143–144. A succinct discussion over the pros and cons of economic warfare/détente is in P. Hanson, Western Economic Statecraft in East-West Relations: Embargoes, Sanctions, Linkage, Economic Warfare, and Détente (London, 1988), 53–60. 7. M. C. Kaser (ed.), The Economic History of Eastern Europe 1919–1975. Vol. 3: Institutional Change within a Planned Economy (Oxford, 1986), passim; A. Burzig, ‘Inter-Systemic Economic Relations and Détente in Europe’, Co-existence, 14 (Special issue): 148–158; Z. M. Fallebuchl, ‘International Economic Relations in the Communist Policy of Economic Development’, in P. E. Uren (ed.), East-West Trade: A Symposium (Toronto, 1966), 67–86. 8. Figures in this and the following paragraph are from The United States Role in East-West Trade, tables 1, 2 and 3; chart 1; appendix B. 9. Bulgaria, the GDR, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary and Romania. 10. The figures include also Japan’s and Canada’s trade.

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11. Long-term developments in East-West trade up to the CSCE process are dealt with, for example, in J. Wilczynski, The Economics and Politics of East-West Trade (New York, 1969); The United States Role in East-West Trade, appendix A; and G. AdlerKarlsson, Handeln mellan öst och vast: En allmän översikt (Oskarshamn, 1969). 12. J. Bethkenhagen, ‘Economic Relations: Interdependence or Marginal Factor?’ in R. Rode and H. D. Jacobsen (eds.), Economic Warfare or Détente: An Assessment of East-West Relations in the 1980s (Boulder, 1985), 20. 13. Ibid., 32. On the balance of payments problems, see F. D. Holzman, The Economics of Soviet Bloc Trade and Finance (Boulder, 1987). Another exception was Bulgaria. Because Bulgaria’s modest Western trade shares oscillated between 10–20 per cent of its total foreign trade and because of its relatively closed economy, the importexport balance remained reasonably good throughout the period discussed here. 14. For Eastern definitions and descriptions of the reform process, see, for example, the article by the Hungarian economist J. Bognár, ‘East-West Trade and the Process of Détente’, in F. A. M. Alting von Geusau (ed.), Uncertain Détente (Alphen aan den Rijn, 1979), 172–191. For an outline of the socialist economies as they were at the end of the 1960s, see M. Lavigne, The Socialist Economies of the Soviet Union and Europe (New York, 1974). 15. J. Pinder, ‘Economic Integration and East-West Trade: Conflict of Interests or Comedy of Errors’, in Alting von Geusau, Uncertain Détente, 192–212. 16. G. K. Bertsch (ed.), Controlling East-West Trade and Technology Transfer: Power, Politics, and Policies (Durham, 1988); P. Hanson, Trade and Technology in SovietWestern Relations (Basingstoke, 1981); and the OECD studies in E. Zaleski and H. Wienert, Technology Transfer between East and West (Paris, 1980). 17. For a contemporary assessment of the potential in East-West trade, see I. Moravcik, ‘Prospects for East-West Trade’, in Uren, East-West Trade, 127–134. 18. Previous scholarship has paid scant attention to the economic and related issues of the CSCE. For example, J. J. Maresca, To Helsinki: The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe 1973–1975 (Durham, 1985), 175–180. An important exception in the literature is V. Y. Ghebali, La Diplomatie de la Détente: La CSCE, d’Helsinki à Vienne (1973–1989) (Brussels, 1989), 225–263. Ghebali’s extensive discussion and overall assessment of the significance of the Second Basket is among the more positive ones. The most informative account is Z. M. Fallenbuchl, ‘Economic Questions’, in R. Spencer (ed.), Canada and the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (Toronto, 1984), 233–242. 19. PRO, FO 371/189676, UE 10415/7, briefing paper (talking points) for Ditchely conference on East-West trade, 11–14 March 1966. 20. DBPO III/1, 42–48, ‘Record of the Ninth Meeting of the Conference of Her Majesty’s Representatives in Eastern Europe’, 10 May 1968. 21. Ibid. 22. DBPO III/3, 461–465, planning paper on ‘Détente and the Future Management of East/West Relations’ by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 23 November 1976. 23. DBPO III/3, 402–405, minute from McNally to Cartledge, 11 November 1975. 24. Mastanduno, Economic Containment, 140–142, 143–144. 25. Willy Brandt, People and Politics: The Years 1960–1975 (London, 1978), 169. 26. Stent, From Embargo to Ostpolitik, 176.

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27. Conference for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Helsinki Final Act, 1 August 1975. See http://www.osce.org/documents/chronological.php. 28. Economic and scientific co-operation was mentioned already in the Soviet security conference proposal of 1958 and repeated in the subsequent declarations as well. 29. Final Recommendations of the Helsinki Consultations (Helsinki, 1973). See http:// www.osce.org/documents/chronological.php. 30. P. Hanson, ‘Economic Aspects of Helsinki’, International Affairs, 61/4 (1985): 619– 629; here 628. 31. DBPO III/2, 133–136, minute from J. K. Gordon to M. J. E. Fretwell, 24 May 1973. 32. Maresca, To Helsinki, 176. 33. I. Bailey and P. J. Bailey, ‘ECE und KSZE-Folgekonferenz in Belgrad’, Aussenpolitik, 28/3 (1977): 256–272; N. Scott, ‘La diplomatie économique multilatérale Est-Ouest: La Conference sur la Sécurité et la Coopération en Europe et la Commission économique pour l’Europe des Nations Unies’, Relations Internationales, 40 (Winter 1984): 413–419. 34. On the tasks taken up by the ECE in 1947–1967 and explained in sympathetic terms, see E. M. Chossudovsky, ‘The Role of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe in the Co-existence Process: Some Notes on a Possible Case Study’, Co-existence, 4 (1967): 151–177. 35. DBPO III/2, 133–136, minute from J. K. Gordon to M. J. E. Fretwell, 24 May 1973. 36. On the relationship between CSCE and ECE (in suitably optimistic terms), see E. M. Chossudovsky, ‘The Role of International Institutions in All-European “ExtraPolitical” Cooperation: ECE and CSCE’, Co-existence, 14/1 (1977): 50–59. 37. On the negotiation difficulties between EC and COMECON countries, see further Pinder, ‘Economic Integration and East-West Trade’. 38. Final Recommendations of the Helsinki Consultations (Helsinki, 1973), cited above. 39. DBPO III/2, 444–445, Dr Fielder of the UK mission in Geneva explained the final, rather muddled stages of the MFN-discussions in a letter to T. Alexander, 21 July 1975. 40. On aspects of GATT and East-West trade, see M. Kostecki, East-West Trade and the GATT System (Basingstoke, 1978). The author pointed out the limited usefulness of the GATT mechanism in furthering East-West trade in general. 41. Seventeenth Semiannual Report by the President to the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe on the Implementation of the Helsinki Final Act. April 1, 1984–October 1, 1984 (Washington, D.C.: United States Department of State, Bureau of Public Affairs, Special Report, No. 119), 18. Quoted in Ghebali, La Diplomatie de la Détente, 249. 42. Ibid. 43. Ghebali, La Diplomatie de la Détente, 250. 44. Sixth Semi-annual Report by the President to the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe on the Implementation of the Helsinki Final Act. December 1 1978–May 1, 1979 (Washington, D.C.: United States Department of State, Bureau of Public Affairs, Special Report, No. 119), 18. Quoted in Ghebali, La Diplomatie de la Détente, 250, note 1. 45. J. Galtung, ‘Europe: Bipolar, Bicentric or Cooperative’, Journal of Peace Research, 9/1 (1972): 1–26. 46. Galtung, ‘European Security and Cooperation’, 165–178.

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The Warsaw Pact, the German Question and the Birth of the CSCE Process, 1961–1970

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Small Steps towards Big Changes The 1960s gave rise to many radical worldwide changes, not least the spectacular transformation of East-West relations. The overture to this era, however, was determined by one of the gravest international crises of the Cold War period. The history of the Berlin crisis resulting in the construction of the Berlin Wall became a well-studied symbol of the Cold War. What is much less known, however, is the fact that the Eastern bloc misinterpreted many of the implications the conflict entailed. While the members of the Warsaw Pact were not worried about a direct military conflict with the West, they believed that the Berlin crisis would lead to the development of enduring tension in international politics and, moreover, to an East-West ‘economic war’ which would encumber the development of the Soviet bloc’s key Western economic relations. It was also expected that the greatest loss would be suffered in trade with the FRG and that it would be especially difficult to find substitutes. This was a gloomy prospect especially for Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania – those Warsaw Pact countries that had no serious unsettled issues with the FRG. By this time the Soviet bloc was clearly divided into two sub-blocs as far as the German question was concerned: the first one included those states for whom security

Notes for this chapter begin on page 125.

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was the priority (the GDR, Czechoslovakia and Poland), while in the second one were the countries mentioned above who had a serious interest in economic co-operation, increasing trade and acquiring the latest technologies. Therefore, the latter were the primary victims of the lack of diplomatic relations with West Germany, and they found it increasingly difficult to support the line taken by the ‘security-concerned’ sub-bloc. In these countries it was more and more difficult to explain to the public why their governments could not establish diplomatic relations with their most important Western economic partner.1 This dilemma was addressed by János Kádár at the HSWP CC session on 1 August 1961, where he stated that approximately 30 per cent of the country’s foreign trade was conducted with Western countries, and one quarter of that percentage represented trade with the FRG.2 Indeed, Kádár had already remarked on the importance of this trade relation two months earlier: ‘This is what the German issue means to us.’3 As is well known, no such ‘economic war’, not even a general Western embargo followed the construction of the Berlin Wall. On the contrary, the economic relations of the WP members with the FRG even gained significance in the following years. This was mainly due to a slowly changing attitude in West Germany’s leadership. The first step on the road to a new Ostpolitik was the exchange of commercial missions with Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria in the fall of 1963, resulting in a noticeable improvement in economic relations in the following years.4

The Beginning of the CSCE Process, 1964–1966 The German question remained a crucial element during the process that led to the summoning of a conference on European security. Thus, the idea to campaign for an all-European security conference re-emerged just a decade after the aborted initiative of Khrushchev and Molotov in 1954. This time it began as a project of the Polish leadership, who had addressed the issue at the end of 1964. On 14 December 1964, Poland’s foreign minister Adam Rapacki asked the UN General Assembly to convene a European security conference that included the United States. The proposal was officially put forward at the Warsaw session of the Political Consultative Committee of the Warsaw Pact in January 1965 without any special preparation or previous consultation with the member states. Although the issue was not originally on the meeting’s agenda, the participants supported the improvised proposal unanimously. However, this call for a conference5 – although it may be considered as the starting point of the process eventually leading up to the signing of the Helsinki Final Act – was underrepresented in the document. This was due to the chaotic nature of the PCC session held just a few months after the fall of Khrushchev – incidentally the

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first PCC meeting in the history of the alliance where real debates took place among the representatives of the member states. At the meeting, numerous issues, considered important at the time, were discussed, most notably the Eastern bloc’s reaction to Western plans for a multilateral nuclear force.6 Consequently, the declaration – besides stating that in this case the Warsaw Pact ‘would be forced to carry out the necessary defense measures’7 – put forward a series of confidence-building proposals, such as the establishment of a nuclear free zone in Central Europe, signing a non-aggression pact with the NATO countries, a proposal to keep the two Germanys nuclear free, etc.8 Later in 1965, Soviet diplomacy claimed the prerogative over an eventual ESC, and from thereon the issue – in close correlation with Moscow’s endeavours to settle the German question – became the central problem of the period lasting until the mid-1970s. Consequently, the next session of the Warsaw Pact PCC, held in Bucharest in July 1966, was fully devoted to the issue of the security conference. The session was prepared by an unusually intense process of multilateral co-ordination, including the longest foreign ministers’ session in the history of the alliance, which lasted for two weeks.9 The Soviets had an ambitious plan for the PCC meeting: on the one hand they wanted to carry out the organisational transformation of the alliance that had been proposed by several member states like Poland and Hungary for a long time, and at the same time they wanted to issue a powerful declaration on the security conference itself. Moscow’s priority was the latter, however, and this was clearly shown by a last-minute deal with Romania. Because Bucharest opposed any reforms, its support for an ESC had to be bought by taking political and military reforms off the agenda.10 The unanimous declaration called upon the continental leaders to start preparatory talks for a conference on European security. At the same time, the demands of the Eastern bloc were also spelt out: the West should accept the existence of the two German states, and the FRG should not only give up its claim that it solely represented the German people but also accept its Eastern borders. In addition, the document – due to political pressure from Romania – demanded the withdrawal of foreign troops from the territory of the European states, the elimination of foreign military bases and called for the simultaneous dissolution of the two military-political alliances. This resolution of the Bucharest session of the WP PCC constituted the Eastern bloc’s first serious initiative concerning the institutional settlement of East-West relations, and, at the same time, it also represented the first important step on the road to the Helsinki Final Act of 1975. Western reactions to the declaration were not entirely unfavourable. However, the conditions for convening the conference could not yet be accepted by most of the states concerned. Nevertheless, these demands were basically of a defensive nature, and they were far from irrational. This was clearly illustrated by the fact that just a few years later, between 1970 and 1973, during the final

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settlement of the German question, the FRG and the West generally accepted the conditions established in Bucharest. At the same time, the Bucharest declaration had very harsh anti-American and anti-West German overtones, and the text quite overtly called upon Western European countries to stem US influence.11 However, in reality, acquiring the co-operation of these two states constituted the key factor for a successful realisation of a European security conference. The Bucharest declaration proved to be somewhat premature as it did not lead to the immediate preparation of the conference. After considering the positive or at least neutral responses from Western countries, the Soviets came to the conclusion that a grand and comprehensive political campaign would have to be launched to convince Western European societies and governments of the merits of the undertaking. In influencing the Western public, Moscow primarily relied on the assistance of communist parties in Western Europe. However, following de-Stalinisation, the rise of Maoism and the rise of Euro-communist tendencies, unity in the old sense was already a thing of the past as far as the Western European communist parties were concerned. Eventually, all participants attending the conference of the European Communist and Workers’ Parties held in April 1967 in Karlovy Vary in Czechoslovakia accepted the Soviet proposal, and the declaration issued after the conference unanimously endorsed the call for a pan-European security conference. From this moment until March 1969, the Bucharest appeal and the Karlovy Vary declaration formed the basis of Eastern endeavours to popularise the necessity for the security conference. In order to influence political and governmental circles in Western Europe, the Soviets resorted to a decentralised policy. After the Bucharest appeal, Moscow started to urge other members of the alliance to engage in bilateral negotiations with Western European countries to communicate the significance of the new initiative for the future of East-West relations. The main goal of the campaign launched by the Soviet bloc was to promote the Soviet’s most important strategic goal: that is, to convene the European security conference, thereby ratifying the European status quo that had been established after the Second World War. An important by-product of this strategy was that the Eastern and Central European states had a chance to strengthen their Western relations ‘legally’. While these states were widely perceived as ‘Soviet satellites’ up to the early 1960s, by the end of the decade – with the exception of the GDR – they were able to present themselves as equal partners in international politics. This was not simply a result of the unfolding détente process but a qualitatively new status acquired by these countries in their own right that was made possible by a series of bilateral negotiations with Western states with the aim of paving the way for the European security conference. Earlier contacts with Western states had been bilateral contacts in the classical sense, focusing primarily on economic relations, while the representation

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of the Eastern bloc had remained the prerogative of the Soviet Union. But from now on, as the Soviet leadership tried to advance the role of their allies in world politics, Moscow itself had come to regard them as partners, albeit only in a limited sense. This development resulted in unprecedented international activities of some of the East-Central European countries – especially Poland, Hungary and Romania – which in turn promoted their emancipation both within their own alliance and in East-West relations in general. These ESC-related negotiations contributed to easing international tension, gradually augmented the mutual trust between the representatives of the two sides, and promoted the development of a common European conscience in the long run. They prepared these countries for the role they would later play in the process initiated by the WP PCC’s Budapest declaration of March 1969. As a result, the European allies of the Soviet Union participated in the preparatory negotiations of the Helsinki conference not simply as mere proxies of Soviet policy but in several cases – and in many areas – they acted as independent entities, often playing an important role in shaping the overall process.

The Soviet Bloc, European Security and the German Question, 1966–1969 The first spectacular step of the slowly but permanently changing West German Ostpolitik was the issuance of a so-called peace memorandum in March 1966 in which the government declared its intent to renounce the use of force in international relations and expressed its constructive attitude concerning the development of East-West relations. At the summit meeting of the leaders of WP’s member parties held in Moscow from 16–22 October 1966, Gomułka proposed a meeting among the WP’s foreign ministers in order to negotiate about a common standpoint on the West German initiative.12 Romania, however, did not support the idea of such talks, while the Soviet leadership had no intention of convening the meeting without the Romanians in order to maintain the appearance of unity at any cost. However, within a few months WP member states – unprepared as they were – had to deal with a new and far more serious Ostpolitik from Bonn. The new West German Grand Coalition formed in 1966 – in which the SPD acquired a governing position for the first time – initiated secret preliminary talks with four countries, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria, in the fall of 1966 in order to establish diplomatic relations with these states. This step indicated a radical turning point in the foreign policy of the FRG since it would clearly have meant giving up the Hallstein doctrine. In return for this significant concession, Bonn asked these governments to consider the ‘Moscow model’ as the basis for opening official relations without any preconditions.13 In this way,

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Eastern European partner states were expected to tacitly accept Bonn’s longtime claims concerning the German question. A consultative meeting was urgently required, but Romanian opposition prevented it. Thus, the countries concerned – after consultations with Moscow – made their decisions independently. Hungary informed all other WP member states – not only Moscow – about its negotiations with Bonn, receiving ambiguous responses, if any at all. No objections were raised and available evidence also indicates that the Soviet leadership itself was prepared to consent to the establishment of diplomatic relations between the FRG and the four WP member states concerned. The Hungarian leadership considered this as an act of approval and therefore the HSWP PC session on 10 January 1967 accepted a resolution to commence official negotiations with the FRG. Rolf Lahr, the Under-Secretary of the Auswärtiges Amt visited Budapest from 23–26 January 1967 as a result of which the Hungarian leadership was ready to establish diplomatic relations. However, without any prior consultations with other WP members, it was suddenly announced on 31 January that Romania and the FRG were to open diplomatic relations. At this time, an extraordinary meeting of WP foreign ministers was summoned to negotiate the developing crisis. The Hungarian foreign minister took part in the conference with the mandate that an agreement had to be reached on how other member states might open diplomatic relations later on. Instead, under pressure from the GDR and Poland, assisted by the Soviets, without any prior information, and presented with an ultimatum, the participants had to accept a secret protocol. The protocol stated that the conditions were not ripe yet for establishing relations with the FRG. In addition, East Germany and Poland insisted that the FRG should be forced to recognise the German Democratic Republic as soon as possible, to renounce the claim that it solely represented the German people and to recognise the European borders settled after the Second World War.14 The Hungarian leadership was shocked that it had been compelled to walk into this trap. During the HSWP PC session of 13 February 1967, a vehement debate developed about what could be done about this humiliating situation.15 It is no exaggeration to state that this represented the most serious falling-out between the Hungarian leadership and the alliance since 1956. Eventually the HSWP PC decided that in order to maintain the unity of the WP, the parties concerned should be informed about the special Hungarian position: while the HSWP did not agree with the main thesis of the protocol and while they maintained that further consultations on the issue were required, they would loyally carry out the joint resolution accepted in Warsaw. As a result of this, Hungary became the last country of the Eastern bloc to establish official relations with the FRG in 1973 – following the general settlement of the German question in the previous years.

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In a paradoxical way, however, we can conclude that in this case the rigid and persistent standpoint of the GDR and Poland was eventually justified by the course of history as the results they had been hoping for were achieved in what turned out to be a relatively short period of time. If the FRG had opened relations with these three countries along the lines described, it is more than likely that such a development would have significantly affected the budding process of the general settlement of the German question. Even the very outcome of the West German elections in September 1969 – that is the victory of the SPD – could have been called into question; indeed, it could have rightly been argued that if it had been possible to achieve such an important diplomatic victory in the field of Ostpolitik by applying a flexible policy but without making basic concessions, this could have been a model for a successful FRG strategy in the future as well. This in turn might well have influenced the entire process of détente.

Conflict and Unity: The Victory of the Unconditional Doctrine at the WP PCC Meeting in Budapest, March 1969 Regarding the considerations which made the Soviet leadership issue a call for a European security conference at the Budapest meeting, accessible evidence remains inconclusive. Several important developments had taken place since the beginning of 1969 – especially prior to the meeting of the PCC ­– each of which might have contributed to the decision. Richard Nixon, the newly elected president of the United States, took office in January 1969. During the election campaign, Nixon had already indicated that he wanted to improve SovietAmerican relations,16 and in February a ‘confidential channel’ was established between the two governments during yet another crisis over Berlin.17 Since the Americans were willing to add European affairs to the agenda of bilateral negotiations, chances for a conference on European security seemed to improve. Only two weeks before the Budapest meeting, on 2 March 1969, an armed incident at the Ussuri River posed the danger of open military conflict between the Soviet Union and China. With its Eastern borders severely threatened, it was only logical that Moscow wished to secure its Western frontiers by codifying the status quo reached after the Second World War. The main stumbling block to this endeavour had up to that time been the West German government. However, on 5 March 1969 the Social-Democrat Gustav Heinemann was elected president of the FRG. Although his post was not comparable to that of the American or the French president, the fact that he was elected half a year before the general elections in September 1969 created a good opportunity for Willy Brandt to form a government in anticipation of an SPD-FDP majority in the elections. As foreign minister of the Grand Coalition government that

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took office in 1966, Brandt had already given ample evidence of his will to improve relations with the East-Central European states. Thus, in March 1969, the Soviets were faced with immediate pressure in the East and opportunity in the West. These factors may have strengthened the belief of the Soviet leaders that the upcoming conference of the WP PCC in Budapest provided a good opportunity to test the ground for a European security conference. Of course this approach also required the approval of the other allies, who could be persuaded by representing this idea in terms of their own national interests. The Romanians were to be flattered by a repetition of the Bucharest declaration, this time calling for a security conference without any conditions, which was also welcomed by the Hungarian hosts. Thus, the Poles and the East Germans supported the project (and concessions to the Romanians) in order to maintain unity within the Warsaw Pact, because for them a unified Soviet bloc remained the best prospect for successfully forcing the FRG to accept their position as the solution of the German question. After all this preparation, the merely two-hour long meeting of the Political Consultative Committee ran according to plan. The session was chaired by Alexander Dubček, and only two comments were made on the speech delivered by Marshall Ivan Jakubovskii, one by János Kádár and one by Leonid Brezhnev. Then the five military documents were signed. The short communiqué and the text dealing with the call for a European Security Conference were unanimously accepted by all the parties without comment as had been agreed previously. The co-operative and civilised tone of the call was primarily due to the efforts of the Romanian leaders who had made several motions for editorial amendments. Indeed, it was none other than Nicolae Ceauşescu who had persuaded Władysław Gomułka to accept a more conciliatory evaluation of the FRG.18 Thus, the visible and rather spectacular outcome of the meeting ­– executing the first reform in the military structure of the Warsaw Pact and issuing a promising call for convening a conference on European security – was effectively a Soviet-Hungarian-Romanian accomplishment.19 The main achievement of the meeting was the acceptance by all parties of the Soviet-Hungarian proposal that there should be no preconditions for the convening of an ESC. The inclusion of this in the Budapest appeal would prove to be a crucial factor in bringing about the CSCE process. The Budapest appeal also included the obligatory paragraph (an amended version from the Bucharest declaration) on the German question and the issue of frontiers. It claimed that a basic prerequisite of European security was the inviolability of existing borders – including the Oder-Neisse line and the border between the FRG and the GDR – the recognition of two German states, the cessation of FRG attempts to monopolise the representation of the German people, the renunciation of nuclear weapons and the recognition that West Berlin held a special status and did not belong to the FRG. While in reality this

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package remained the main strategic goal of the Soviet bloc, these demands were no longer presented as preconditions for the staging of a European security conference but as political goals for it to reach eventually.

Towards Creating a Co-ordinated WP Agenda for the CSCE Following the WP PCC meeting in Budapest in late March 1969, Moscow initiated an extensive campaign to exploit the favourable situation for a security conference. In this campaign the Hungarians became the closest collaborators of Soviet diplomacy as their interests basically coincided with Soviet ones in fostering a radical rapprochement in East-West relations. The Hungarian leaders had no preconditions for a European settlement – unlike Poland, Czechoslovakia and the GDR – and could only gain from a successful process. By now, they had developed good contacts with Western Europe and a certain prestige as promoters of détente. On the other hand they were much more loyal, flexible and obedient partners for Moscow in this exercise than the less manageable and considerably more rigid East Germans and Poles, not to mention the Romanians. At the end of September 1969, the Soviets indicated to their allies that they were to hold a conference of the WP foreign ministers in October, to reach a co-ordinated position for an eventual ESC. To prepare for this meeting, several Soviet deputy foreign ministers paid simultaneous visits to the member states, and on 26 September Leonid Ilichev had talks with Hungarian Foreign Minister János Péter in Budapest. Moscow suggested that the two main items on the agenda were to be the renunciation of force and a declaration urging the development of economic, trade and scientific co-operation between the European states.20 However, in the course of this Soviet ‘testing campaign’ it became obvious that achieving unity at the upcoming meeting of foreign ministers would be a very difficult task indeed. Therefore, on 17 October, Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimir Semenov urgently asked for personal consultations with the Hungarians, and on the following day Deputy Foreign Minister Károly Erdélyi flew to Moscow.21 During their talks the Soviet representatives voiced serious concern that excessive Polish, Romanian and East German demands might prevent reaching a consensus within the bloc, thus resulting in the Warsaw Pact losing control over its own initiative in spite of otherwise favourable international circumstances. Therefore, the Soviets asked the Hungarian leadership to act as moderators to mitigate the Polish, East German and Romanian proposals at the meeting of the WP foreign ministers in Prague on 30–31 October 1969,22 a meeting that had originally been convened to reconsider the Warsaw Pact’s policy in light of the recent SPD-victory in West Germany. At this moment, the Polish proposals were aiming at the final recognition of European borders; the Romanians

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wanted to see the inclusion of an appeal for the dissolution of the military blocs, the withdrawal of foreign troops, the elimination of foreign military bases and the renunciation of the threat of using force in the final document; while the East Germans desired the international recognition of the GDR through the ESC. To fulfil this role, the Soviets asked the Hungarians not to present any ideas of their own at the meeting. Instead, they should resubmit their proposals at a later point in the preparatory process. These included the establishment of an European Security Council, concluding agreements on regional co-operation, summoning a meeting of the mayors of European capitals in Budapest, and establishing a system of European economic co-operation over electricity, gas and oil, post and telecommunication, the linking of transportation networks, the promotion of industrial co-operation, the harmonisation of industrial standards, the abolition of trade barriers, and the encouragement of tourism.23 These Hungarian proposals represented ambitious, long-term plans for European co-operation, some of which would only be realised after the political transition of 1989–90, while others will only be fully implemented after Hungary’s accession to the European Union. Another noteworthy point is that while the Polish, Romanian and East German proposals all aimed at strengthening European security, the Hungarian proposals focused on co-operation. Thus, Hungarian diplomacy – while in formal accord with Soviet intentions – essentially echoed Western ideas about intensified co-operation. Following this ‘friendly request’, the Hungarian delegation played a constructive role during the foreign ministers’ meeting in Prague. As a reward, some important Hungarian proposals were accepted which were to form crucial elements in the Warsaw Pact’s strategy towards the CSCE. Thus, the Prague meeting accepted the idea that there should be a series of security conferences24 and that a permanent organ should be set up to co-ordinate the required preparatory work. It was also agreed that a group of experts dealing with European economic co-operation should be established within the WP, and this group’s work should be co-ordinated by the Hungarian foreign ministry. Two documents were ratified at the Prague conference: a public declaration and a memorandum that was handed over to Western European governments. The latter also contained a draft for the final document of the planned security conference, displaying great optimism – and in retrospect a good deal of naivety. This draft contained only two pages – as compared to the one hundred pages of the Helsinki Final Act signed on 1 August 1975. Eastern leaders displayed a similar dose of excessive optimism regarding the eventual date of the conference, which they – as in following conferences – deemed to be possible within six months or a year at most. The main result of the foreign ministers’ meeting was the declaration that the WP states planned to discuss two important topics at the security conference: European security and the renunciation of force between states as well

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as the strengthening of trade, economic and technological relations based on equality and contributing to political co-operation among European states. Another important result of the Prague meeting was that a new series of bilateral negotiations was initiated between East and West with the active participation of the East-Central European states. By the end of 1969, most WP member states realised that the changes in the FRG were opening the door to the realisation of the security conference. The radical transformation of the West German position and the announcement of a new Ostpolitik by the Brandt government heralded new possibilities for the solution of the German question, which was so central for European security. On 8 December 1969, negotiations on the conclusion of a Soviet-West German treaty began and similar talks with Poland were initiated promising the recognition of the Oder-Neisse border.25 Thus, a summit meeting was held in Moscow on 3–4 December at the initiative of a rather confused GDR leadership to co-ordinate the Warsaw Pact’s policy vis-à-vis the FRG. The East German leaders were rather sceptical about the FRG’s intentions, and they were strongly against the idea of direct Polish-FRG talks. However, at the meeting a Polish-Hungarian-Romanian ‘axis’ – supported by the Soviets – emerged, arguing for a real turn in the FRG’s policy that created a historical chance to settle the German question according to the interests of the Eastern bloc. The most surprising aspect in this was the radical change in the Polish position, obviously triggered by the prospect of Bonn’s recognition of the Oder-Neisse border.26 The result of the meeting was a compromise: the WP member states were encouraged to enter into negotiations with West Germany but they could establish diplomatic relations with the FRG only after Bonn had recognised the GDR. This was an important break with the principles adopted at the Warsaw meeting in early 1967 as only one of the numerous preconditions for establishing diplomatic relations with the FRG remained. Thus, the way to direct negotiations with the FRG was reopened by the Moscow conference of December 1969. From the end of 1969 further favourable events indicated that the chances for the convening of a conference on European security had improved substantially. The declaration of the NATO Council meeting held in Brussels on 4–5 December, almost exactly at the time of the Soviet bloc summit in Moscow, ended with a chapter titled ‘Perspectives for Negotiations’. In this, NATO cautiously envisaged that bilateral and multilateral talks with the Soviet Union and other Eastern European countries might eventually lead to the staging of a conference on European security.27 In his speech to the US Congress on 18 February 1970, President Nixon declared that the United States recognised the Soviet Union’s legitimate security interests in Eastern Europe, and he emphasised the American government’s readiness for talks in order to reduce international tension and to promote détente.

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The Rome session of the NATO Council on 26–27 May 1970 was the first meeting of the alliance that was dominated by the question of how to respond to the ESC-initiative of the Soviet bloc.28 The communiqué of the meeting contained several new and positive elements, such as stating that the aim of permanent East-West contacts was to ‘explore when [emphasis added] it will be possible to convene a conference or a series of conferences on European security and co-operation’. It was also stated that under certain conditions, the NATO countries considered it possible to start multilateral talks on this topic, and that the convening of the conference was not linked to negotiations on troop reductions in Europe.

The Breakthrough: The Cradle of Basket III With this, the ball was back in the court of the Warsaw Pact countries. What was needed now was a stock-taking exercise, summarising the results of the bilateral talks and preparing for a flexible response to Western overtures. This was to be the task of the conference of WP foreign ministers held in Budapest in July 197029 that proved to be a turning point in CSCE history. Both the preliminary meeting of deputy foreign ministers and the conference itself were characterised by intensive debates between the representatives. In pursuit of a compromise, the Hungarian hosts once again played a crucial role. The success of the conference came about through close co-operation between Soviet and Hungarian diplomats, often supported by the Romanians. In this way it was possible to reject initiatives by the GDR and Polish leaders aimed at making the settlement of the German question a precondition for the security conference. Thus, the Budapest principle was maintained by declaring once more that there should be no preconditions for the convening of the conference.30 At the meeting of the foreign ministers, two elements were accepted with the intention of facilitating Western participation: in return for Western acceptance of the participation of the GDR, it was declared that the United States and Canada could also take part in the meeting. Another important Western precondition was also agreed on: besides the issues of political and economic co-operation, cultural co-operation could also be added to the agenda of the conference. The Soviets and the WP member states had known from the beginning that the conference could not be held without the participation of the United States and Canada, but for tactical reasons this possibility was deliberately floated so that in return they could ensure the participation of the GDR. The field of cultural relations was accepted at the behest of the Hungarian delegation. Later this proved to be a reason for disintegration in the Eastern bloc, and was to be labelled ‘Basket III’ in the multilateral preparatory phase of the conference. However, at this point this concession opened up the way to accept the Western idea

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of talking about the ‘freer movement of people, ideas and information between the countries of East and West’.31 The Third Basket eventually provided the basis for developing the human rights campaign in the period after Helsinki, and especially during the successor conferences that eventually played a significant role in the disintegration of the communist system of East-Central Europe at the end of the 1980s. Therefore, the importance of the acceptance of the cultural field as part of the agenda by the Soviet bloc can hardly be overestimated. The WP foreign ministers also decided on the establishment of a permanent organ dealing with the issues of European security and co-operation. By this time Moscow, to facilitate the issue of the security conference, agreed to the Western demand that prior to, or at least coinciding with preliminary talks on European security, negotiations on the reduction of armed forces in Europe should be initiated and that this body was to create a framework for such negotiations. It was also officially accepted that the venue of the conference should be Helsinki, and the Finnish proposal to start multilateral talks via the ambassadors in Helsinki was also agreed on at this meeting. After the conference a draft document on economic, technological and cultural co-operation was forwarded to Western European governments. There was a long road from Budapest to Helsinki, where, in November 1972, official multilateral preparatory talks started on the European security conference, but the foundations were laid down at the WP foreign ministers’ meeting in Budapest. Thus, the way was open to conducting concrete negotiations on crucial issues such as the Soviet-West German and Polish-West German treaties, the Four Power agreement on Berlin and the treaty between the FRG and the GDR – all important elements of the settlement of the German question that was in fact the main precondition for a successful European security conference.

Notes Research for this article was supported by the OSZK–MTA 1956-os Dokumentációs és Kutatóhely [Research Group for the History and Documentation of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, National Széchényi Library–Hungarian Academy of Sciences]. 1. It seems likely that this intra-bloc conflict led to the failure of a Soviet initiative urging other communist states to establish official relations with the FRG based on the example of Moscow in 1955. The HWP Politburo did indeed take a decision to that effect in July 1955. 2. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 4/42. ő. e., account of János Kádár at the HSWP CC session on 10 August 1961.

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3. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 4/41. ő. e., account of János Kádár at the HSWP CC session on 10 June 1961. 4. On the talks between the FRG and Hungary in 1962–1963, see M. Ruff, ‘A magyar–NSZK kapcsolatok, 1960–1963: Útkeresés a doktrínák útvesztőjében’ [Hungarian-FRG Relations, 1960–1963: Search for the Way Out of the Labyrinth of Doctrines], Múltunk, 44/3 (1999): 3–40. 5. J. P. Jain (ed.), Documentary Study of the Warsaw Pact (New York, 1973), 409. 6. On the meeting, see V. Mastny, editorial note on the seventh meeting of the PCC, 19–20 January 1965, Warsaw (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/php). See also C. Békés, ‘Titkos válságkezeléstől a politikai koordinációig: Politikai egyeztetési mechanizmus a Varsói Szerződésben, 1954–1967’ [From Secret Crisis Management to Political Coordination: Political Co-ordinating Mechanisms in the Warsaw Pact, 1954–1967], in János M. Rainer (ed.), Múlt századi hétköznapok: Tanulmányok a Kádár rendszer kialakulásának időszakáról [Everyday Life in the Past Century: Essays on the Period of the Emerging of the Kádár Regime] (Budapest: 1956), 9–54, here 37–38. 7. Jain, Documentary Study, 408. 8. C. Békés, Hungary and the Warsaw Pact, 1954–1989: Documents on the Impact of a Small State within the Eastern Bloc, Parallel History Project on NATO and the Warsaw Pact, 2003 (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/php). 9. For the records of the conference, see Records of the Committee of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, 2002 (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/php). See also the introduction to the document collection by A. Locher, Shaping the Policies of the Alliance: The Committee of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Warsaw Pact, 1976–1990 (Zurich, 2002). 10. On the meeting, see V. Mastny, editorial note to the eighth meeting of the PCC, 4–6 July 1966, Bucharest (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/php). See also Békés, ‘Titkos válságkezeléstől’, 42–43. 11. V. Mastny, eighth meeting of the PCC, 4–6 July 1966, Bucharest (http://www.isn. ethz.ch/php). 12. The resolution made at the HSWP PC session on 27 October 1966 agreed to this proposal. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 5/ 408. ő. e. 13. In late 1966, the Kremlin also asked Warsaw Pact member states to base their resumption of diplomatic relations with Bonn on the ‘Moscow model’ – which caused considerable fury in East Berlin and Warsaw, at least. A complete file on this ‘error’ can be found in the Ulbricht files from January 1967. SAPMO, Büro Ulbricht, DY30/3520 and -/3519, conversation Ulbricht-Semenov, 17 January 1967; and memorandum on the ‘Moscow model’ on Ulbricht’s order, 19/20 January 1967. AAN, KC PZPR, XIA/83, conversation Gomułka-Andropow and Ponomarew, 28 December 1966 in Moscow. Both cited in O. Bange, Ostpolitik und Détente: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mannheim, 2004) (publication forthcoming), 73–78, 136, 257. 14. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 5/417. ő. e., minutes of the HSWP PC session on 13 February 1967. 15. Ibid. 16. For the unsuccessful attempts to organise a Soviet-American summit in late 1968, see C. Békés, Európából Európába: Magyarország konfliktusok kereszttüzében, 1945– 1990 [From Europe to Europe: Hungary in the Crossfire of Conflicts, 1945–1990]

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(Budapest, 2004), 236; and A. Dobrynin, In Confidence: Moscow’s Ambassador to Six Cold War Presidents (New York, 1995), 189–195. 17. As shown by G. Niedhart and O. Bange, ‘Die “Relikte der Nachkriegszeit” beseitigen: Ostpolitik in der zweiten außenpolitischen Formationsphase der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Übergang von den Sechziger- zu den Siebzigerjahren’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004): 415–448, here 434–438 (http://www.detente. de); and O. Bange, ‘Kiesingers Ost- und Deutschlandpolitik von 1966–1969, in G. Buchstab, P. Gassert and P. T. Lang (eds.), Kurt Georg Kiesinger 1904–1988: Von Ebingen ins Kanzleramt (Freiburg, 2005), 455–500, here 476–479. 18. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 5/486. ő. e., memorandum by Deputy foreign Minister Károly Erdélyi for János Kádár on the WP PCC meeting in Budapest on 17 March 1969 (19 March 1969). 19. Stenographic transcript of the meeting of the Executive Committee of the CC of the Romanian Communist Party, 18 March 1969. V. Masnty, C. Nuenlist and A. Locher eds., Records of the Political Consultative Committee, Tenth Meeting of the PCC, Budapest, 17 March 1969 (http://www.isn.ethz.ch/php). For a detailed presentation of the fierce internal debates preceding the official session of the WP PCC, see Csaba Békés, ‘The Warsaw Pact and the Helsinki Process, 1965–1970’, in Wilfried Loth and Georges-Henri Soutou (eds.), The Making of Détente: Eastern and Western Europe in the Cold War, 1965–75 (London and New York, 2008), 201–220, here 207–210. 20. MOL-XIX-J-1-j-Szu-1-00358-20/1969, 85. d., notes on the discussion with Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister L. F. Iljichev, 27 September 1969. 21. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 5/501. ő e., notes by Károly Erdélyi for the HSWP PC, 18 October 1969. The document is published in Békés, Hungary and the Warsaw Pact. 22. MOL-M-KS 288. F. 5/501 ő. e., memorandum of conversation between Erdélyi and Semenov on 17 October 1969 in Moscow (18 October 1969). 23. Foreign Ministry memorandum for the HSWP Political Committee on the European security conference. MOL-M-KS-288. F. 5/ 501. ő. e. 24. The proposal was originally made by the Soviets, brought up by Deputy Foreign Minister Semenov to Hungarian Foreign Minister János Péter at a meeting in Budapest on 24 September 1969. It became a ‘Hungarian’ initiative as a result of the Soviet–Hungarian game played at the conference of foreign ministers in Prague. 25. The Soviet-West German treaty was signed on 12 August 1970, and the Polish-West German treaty on 7 December 1970. The result was a de facto recognition of the Oder-Neisse border by Bonn – not precluding eventual claims of a reunified German state. The issue was only finally settled by the ‘Two-plus-Four’ negotiations in Paris on 17 July 1990 and the German-Polish Border Treaty of 14 November 1990. 26. On Polish policy concerning the German question, see D. Selvage, ‘The Treaty of Warsaw: The Warsaw Pact Context’, in D. C. Geyer (ed.), American Détente and German Ostpolitik, 1969–1972 (Washington, D.C., 2004), 67–79; Wanda Jarząbek, ‘Władze PRL wobec normalizacji stosunków z FRN latach 1970–1975’ [The PPR Authorities’ Attitude towards the Normalisation of Relations with the FRG 1970–1975], in Rocznik Polsko–Niemiecki 12/2004 (Warsaw, 2005); idem, ‘“Ulbricht–Doktrin” oder “Gomułka Doctrine”? Das Bemühen der Volksrepublik Polen um eine geschlossene Politik des kommunistischen Blocks gegenüber der westdeutschen Ostpolitik 1966/1967’, Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung,

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55/1 (2006): 79–114; O. Bange and T. Geiger, ‘Die kirchlichen Initiativen und die Reaktionen der deutschen Volksparteien’, in F. Boll, W. Wysocki and K. Ziemer (eds.), Kirchliche Versöhnungsinitiativen und deutsch-polnische Verständigung (Bonn, 2008) (forthcoming). 27. NATO final communiqués 1949–1974, NATO Information Service, Brussels, 231–232. 28. In the communiqué, fourteen out of twenty-one paragraphs dealt with East-West relations in general and three specifically with the issue of a conference on European security. NATO final communiqués 1949–1974, 233–237. 29. MOL-XIX-J-1-j-Szu-00949-1/1970, report on the visit of Foreign Minister János Péter to Moscow on 22–29 December 1969 (6 January 1970). The conference was convened at Hungarian initiative. 30. MOL-XIX-J-1-j-EU-208-00482/20/1970, 93. d., report to the government on the meeting of the Warsaw Pact’s foreign ministers in Budapest on 21–22 June 1970 (29 June 1970). 31. 4–5 December 1969, Brussels. NATO final communiqués 1949–1974, 231.

–8–

Romania, Ostpolitik and the CSCE, 1967–1975

o

Mihail E. Ionescu

This chapter is organised into four main sections. The first presents the way Bucharest perceived the new policy of West Germany and how the Romanian communist regime interpreted, evaluated and reacted to it. The second refers to the economic sector, seen by Bucharest as a priority in its relations with West Germany. The third section – the largest – presents the interactions between Romania and West Germany in preparing the CSCE. Finally, the fourth section presents some preliminary conclusions on an episode of recent history, research on which has only just begun.

The Perception of Ostpolitik in Bucharest Bucharest could not have missed this new direction in West German foreign policy. Romanian initiatives for a rapprochement with West Germany received a decisive boost after the government change in Bonn at the end of 1966. The message transmitted by the Romanian authorities emphasised the wish to establish diplomatic relations ‘as soon as possible in a bilateral and secret manner’.1 Bonn was quick to spot the prospective advantages and encouraged the new political orientation of Bucharest. With the establishment of formal diplomatic relations Bonn would have finally had the chance of ‘directly representing’ its interests in Romania; other communist capitals – it was hoped – would

Notes for this chapter begin on page 141.

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soon follow the Romanian example; and the entire process might facilitate the search for a solution to the ‘German problem’.2 For Ceauşescu, the fact that Romania had become the only state from the Warsaw Pact, along with the USSR, with official diplomatic relations with West Germany was tantamount to the recognition of his international aspirations. This became particularly obvious when the ‘father’ of Ostpolitik, Willy Brandt, visited Bucharest from 3–7 August 1967 – a famous event both at home and abroad.3 The issues discussed comprised every ingredient of Ostpolitik: troop reductions, European security, borders, inner-German relations, negotiations on the renunciation of force, even the situation in Vietnam and the Near East. The Romanians took due notice of the new orientation in West Germany’s foreign policy. Their post-visit analysis drew particular attention to the fact that Brandt had pointed repeatedly to the ‘renunciation of force’ negotiations with the ‘USSR and its allies’, which would ‘directly imply the recognition of GDR and of the borders established after the Second World War’.4 Another post-visit note from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs detected ‘signs for a progressive change away from the immobility that has long characterized West German diplomacy especially in its relations with the socialist states’.5 The new course steered by Willy Brandt and its ultimate rationale were accurately grasped by Bucharest, with the cited note even drawing attention to Brandt’s statement on 8 January 1967 in which he conveyed that Bonn’s détente policy aimed at including a ‘solution of the German problem’. The Bucharest analysis rightly concluded that ‘the solution of the German problem is no longer considered a precondition for détente in Europe’.6 Perhaps the most lasting effect of the bilateral rapprochement of 1967 was the establishment of a regular and reciprocal exchange of political information. In February 1972 the Romanian Foreign Ministry looked over the previous five years of bilateral relations, identifying tendencies in Bonn to differentiate between its relations with each socialist country. The Romanians felt that the FRG’s search for a general solution with all socialist countries had led to a certain lapse in their own bilateral relations, particularly noticeable in questions related to preferential customs duties and trade liberalisations.7 But only one year later, in March 1973, a similar review stated that the subjects of talks had diversified and extended not only at the governmental level, but also at the level of political parties, organisations, unions, various institutions and associations. With long-term agreements on trade and technical and economic co-operation (signed in December 1969 for a five-year period), prospects for West German-Romanian relations appeared bright. One of the annexes of the bilateral trade agreement was particularly delicate – and as such gives evidence to the value attached to the bilateral relations by both sides. It defined the applicability of the agreement as ‘the monetary area of the Romanian leu and West German mark (including West Berlin)’. This clause

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had a confidential character8 because with it Romania, as the only communist state (at least, until the Four Power Agreement), indirectly acknowledged West Berlin’s ties with the FRG. When the trade agreement expired at the end of 1969, the leadership of the Romanian Communist Party (RPC) discussed the delicate situation in April 1969: ‘As the signing of an agreement with the FRG containing this clause could harm our relations with the GDR – a clause that the West German part will not give up – our embassy in Cologne opines it would be best not to undertake any actions regarding the resuming of talks for a new long-term agreement with the FRG, but rather to tacitly prolong the present agreement which expires on 31 December 1969.’9 It was only well after the signing of the Four Power Agreement on Berlin that the Romanian government considered replacing this secret clause with an open one in its agreements with the FRG. According to a decision taken in early 1973, these should now contain the formula: ‘[T]he present agreement also extends to West Berlin, according to the Quadripartite Agreement of 3 September 1971, in conformity with established procedures.’10 Before the visit of the Romanian head of state to the FRG (26–30 June 1973), Bonn suggested that Romania might establish a consular office in West Berlin to represent the interests of Romanian citizens, while the FRG would do the same for West Berliners in Romania.11 This agreement was finalised during Nicolae Ceauşescu’s visit to the FRG at the end of June 1973. Once again, the confidential character of the agreement was strongly emphasised.12 Soon after Ceauşescu’s visit to the FRG the Romanian ambassador to East Berlin was summoned to the GDR’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. There he was informed that the East German government considered ‘that extending the validity of all the agreements recently signed by Romania with the FRG undermines the position adopted by the GDR and other friendly socialist countries’ and that Romania’s attitude ‘strengthened the position of the West German government, which seeks to include the “Berlin clause” in any international agreement in order to prove that Berlin is still a “land” of the FRG, although the Quadripartite Agreement stipulates that this part of the city does not belong and could not be governed by Federal Germany’.13 Furthermore, the East Germans demanded talks between the two foreign ministries on the issue of Berlin, which eventually took place in Bucharest on 10–13 September 1973. On this occasion, the East German delegates stated that the extension of the RomanianWest German agreements to West Berlin ‘would harm … the sovereignty of the GDR’ as the surrounding territory represented ‘the terrestrial, aquatic and air space of the GDR’. The response from Romania was that it did not consider West Berlin a Land of the FRG, that this issue had been solved by the Four Powers, and that Romania could not do anything but obey their agreements.14 The GDR government raised this issue to a higher level in its attempt to force a common position on all communist countries. On 30–31 October 1973, talks

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among the deputy ministers of foreign affairs of Bulgaria, the GDR, Mongolia, Poland, Romania, Hungary and the USSR took place in East Berlin. The outcome was indecisive – no consultation mechanism was agreed upon and as a result Romania even hastened the implementation of measures such as the establishing of a general consulate in West Berlin, along with the extension of direct relations with this city.15 The Romanians had noticed that other treaties signed by the FRG with communist states also contained the ‘West Berlin clause’ (the USSR had signed three such agreements, Poland and China one each). Bucharest therefore pursued a policy of accomplished facts in order to maintain its beneficial relations with the FRG – without suffering from a more restrictive bloc-position. All of this contributed to a high level of confidence in the political relations between Bonn and Bucharest during the first years of Ostpolitik. There were even direct consultations on sensitive international matters, sometimes in the attempt to find a common position. In a conversation with a Romanian diplomat on 21 August 1973, Helmut Kohl even described Paris, Warsaw and Bucharest as ‘“this triangle” representing a stabilizing factor’. In Kohl’s opinion – and not only Kohl’s – Romania played a pioneering role in issues regarding European security.16

Economic Relations: A Priority for Bucharest The economic relationship between Romania and Western Germany had not existed long when diplomatic relations were first established in 1967. For example, in 1966, exports grew by 17.2 per cent, while imports were 34.1 per cent higher than in 1965. At the end of 1966, the level of payment commitments for 1968 and the following years totalled $260 million (US). The available documentation, however fragmentary, shows that Romanian priorities in relation to the FRG were economic ones. Thus, the development of economic relations were at the top of the agenda during Nicolae Ceauşescu’s visit to the FRG in June 1973, followed by other agreements of collaboration, with ‘contacts at government level’ a distant third. In fourth place came the socalled unsolved problems, which included important issues for Germany, such as family reunions, the compensation of Romanian citizens persecuted by the Nazis, German graveyards, etc. International problems like the ESC or MBFR were at the very bottom of this list of priorities.17 Another issue constantly present on the Romanian side was the desire to gain advantageous credits from the FRG (with low interest rates over the long term). The pressure in this direction finally paid off, with the FRG granting a credit of 100 million DM in 1970, representing the first payment from a 500 million DM credit on a twelve year term with an interest rate of 7.5 per cent in the first year. Romania was also granted credits totalling 262 million DM in two payments, with an interest rate of 4 per cent and reimbursement plan in the period of 1974–1979.18

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Humanitarian issues like family reunions or consular relations remained a delicate subject in Romanian-West German relations. In August 1967, Willy Brandt assured his hosts that family reunions were not linked with political considerations and had nothing to do with a ‘rebuilding of Germanism’. Nevertheless, he expressed hope that an increasing number of such cases would be dealt with in a satisfactory manner, particularly if ‘having this action politicized’ was avoided. The Romanian side displayed its good will over the question, pointing at the exclusive responsibility of its authorities and the traditionally beneficial relations between Romanians and the Transylvanian Saxon minorities and drawing attention to its educational investment in individuals now bound to leave the country.19 The relations in this field recorded a positive and fast evolution, although it did not exactly meet German expectations. Between 1967 and 1971, for example, 8,535 Romanian citizens of German origin left Romania for West Germany, and 30,767 were allowed to pay a visit to their relatives there.20 Another source points out that between 1968 and 1972, 12,034 Romanian citizens of German origin left for Germany, and the requests of another 24,144 were rejected. And in spring 1972 consulates were opened in Hamburg and Sibiu with the explicit purpose of facilitating the ‘reunion of families’.21 Two other issues on the bilateral agenda, partly in order to determine a positive reaction of the West German authorities, were the payment of damages to Romanian citizens persecuted by Nazis and the taking care of the graves of German soldiers in Romania. The initial answer from Bonn on persecution claims amounting to 180 million DM was negative, and so Bucharest began to link the two issues. The financial sums involved were anything but negligible: For the identification and burial of 65,000 Germans in Romania,22 Bonn was prepared to pay between 60–100 DM each, plus 6 million DM per year for the maintenance of the graveyards. To this pension payments for potentially 40,000 former Wehrmacht or SS members living in Romania had to be added – and in April 1972, an overall sum of 285,000 DM was already being divided every month among 10,527 individuals with approved claims.23 To enhance Romania’s negotiating position, the foreign and interior ministries insinuated that the issue of ethnic Germans leaving the country ‘could be better solved within the framework of the positive development of relations in all the fields’24 – compensation payments, pensions and human issues were to be treated as one single package deal.

Romania and the FRG as Pacemakers for CSCE The positive trend in relations between Bucharest and Bonn also led to close cooperation during the preparatory phase of the conference, where Bonn’s interest in mitigating Bucharest’s anti-bloc ‘excesses’ was particularly obvious. German

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delegates repeatedly praised the ‘concordance’ between Romanian and West German efforts in early 1972,25 and in November of the same year the political director of the Auswärtiges Amt, Günther van Well, even told his hosts during a visit to Bucharest how very much the foreign ministers of the EC had come to appreciate Romanian initiatives in the CSCE negotiations. But he also warned against Romania’s sometimes illusory ‘anti-bloc’ ideas which ‘could put Romania in a delicate situation’. Instead, the Germans pointed to the ongoing dialogue of the superpowers over the CSCE as a positive development in European affairs, which had at least partially been brought about by Bonn’s Ostpolitik. According to van Well’s analysis the two superpowers now wanted ‘to remove the hotbed of tensions from the continent’ in order to concentrate on other regions, especially Asia, ‘where they have both common and opposite interests’.26

Romania’s Interest in the CSCE The most vital interest of Romania’s communist leadership was the inclusion of some generally recognised rules into the CSCE list of principles (the decalogue), which could shelter the country from Soviet hegemony.27 Thus, when Vasile Pungan, the influential adviser to the Romanian President, prepared for a visit to Washington, the ‘European Security Team’ – a group of experts formed by the foreign ministry to co-ordinate CSCE preparations – advised him to make a statement on the envisaged CSCE catalogue of principles as binding to every participating government – with no exception.28 The reference to the ‘Brezhnev doctrine’ was more than obvious. Romania’s aim was identified as bringing about ‘the adoption of an assembly of measures’ in order to prevent the use of force or threatening with it. Instruments to this end – later to be known as Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) – should be ‘as wide as possible’: notification of manoeuvres and troop deployment should comprise all of Europe, go down to divisionary strength and be done at least thirty days in advance. Further Romanian goals associated with the CSCE comprised the development of economic co-operation, the construction of a ‘new economic order’ and the mentioning within the CSCE documents about some developing countries in Europe; the development and diversification of cultural exchanges and the ‘widening of human contact and information exchanges’ and some kind of institutionalisation of the CSCE process in order to help to monitor and implement CSCE decisions.29 This list of Bucharest’s objectives connected with the conference clearly highlighted Romanian aspirations: gaining an independent status within the international arena, overcoming a position as the USSR’s ‘satellite’, preventing coercive actions from the ‘big brother’ through organising a permanent European conclave, providing economic development and modernisation through co-operation, thereby gaining legitimacy for not being subordinated to COMECON.

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A summary of Bucharest’s view of the results achieved through the CSCE was comprised in a memorandum sent on 2 April 1975, by Minister George Macovescu to the heads of diplomatic missions. Progress in the list of principles was highlighted, as was the final agreement on the text regarding the possibility of a peaceful change of borders (to which the FRG – ‘supported by the USA and the USSR’ repeatedly drew attention) and the clause on the special responsibility of the ‘great powers’ (a French proposal). Regarding the peaceful revision of borders, the Romanian delegation to the CSCE was instructed to support an ‘unambiguous formula, on the basis of the principles of International Law’.30 Regarding the French proposal, Romania was to support a declaration on the principle of pacta sunt servanda. Therefore, it is obvious that with the CSCE Romania aspired to the codification of its status as a sovereign and independent actor within the international arena, protected against hegemonic interferences, with an international status affected by the specific characteristics of a bipolar era. While it is not the task of this study to describe the practical pursuit of this strategy, it has to be mentioned that Romania actively co-operated with the US in this respect.31 Nevertheless, there existed distinct limits to which Bucharest was prepared to go in the preparation of the conference. Its communist leadership would never agree to anything that might jeopardise domestic stability and thus the existence of its regime. From this perspective, the decree signed by Romania’s president in early 1975, which prohibited the accommodation of foreign citizens in private houses, affecting especially the German minority in Romania, was very revealing. In Washington, John Kornblum, member of the State Department’s Political Planning Committee, informed a Romanian diplomat at the beginning of March 1975 about the intention of the West German delegation to address this issue during the conference, because the decree ‘is making the family visits more difficult’.32 This episode might illustrate how Bucharest started to act against provisions of the eventual CSCE document which it saw as endangering the stability of its domestic regime. Instead, Romania’s leadership and diplomats actively worked for an outcome of the conference, which was believed to perpetuate the existing rule.

Bucharest’s Perception of FRG’s Interests in the CSCE In order to reconstruct Bucharest’s view of Bonn’s role in the CSCE, the analysis tried to identify and interpret documents that informed Romanian high officials about the issue. One such document was the telegram sent by the head of the Romanian delegation in Helsinki, Valentin Lipatti, to the Romanian foreign ministry on 22 May 1975. The telegram contained a summary of the FRG position on CSCE intended to be used by Ştefan Andrei, secretary of the Central Committee of the Romanian Communist Party, during his meeting with West German Foreign Minister Genscher. As a general rule, the paper pointed

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out that Bonn wanted CSCE decisions ‘not to affect its position regarding the German issue and, especially, regarding the idea of German reunification’.33 Therefore, Bonn wanted to avoid the CSCE assuming the significance of a peace conference with legally binding decisions about German division. At the same time, Bonn was perceived as trying to maintain the already recognised rights for West Berlin, especially the right of transit through East Germany. In the Romanian view, the FRG was developing relations with GDR, avoiding confrontation with the latter and trying to reach agreement with the big powers over potentially sensitive issues, imposing them on the other states thereafter. The Romanian analysis deemed this behaviour as that of a ‘big power’. In Bucharest’s view, Bonn actively attempted to reconcile the eventual provisions of CSCE-documents with German national objectives. Thus, the FRG tried to ‘link’ the principle of the ‘inviolability of frontiers’ with that of the ‘renunciation of force’, so that force and force alone would be prohibited in modifying frontiers. For this reason, the West German delegation insisted on the insertion of a clause on the possibility for peaceful change, ‘not as an exception, but as a rule’, without invoking the provisions of international law.34 Bucharest also perceived the West Germans as very active within CSCE on all matters relating to ‘inter-German relations’, such as economic co-operation, travel opportunities, family reunions, etc. The co-operation between the Romanian and West German delegations was considered as ‘good’, with ‘consultations and exchanges of points of view [taking place] on all levels’. Periodical meetings between Valentin Lipatti and Guido Brunner, the first head of the West German delegation, and Klaus Blech, his successor, took place in order to solve issues through taking into consideration ‘the positions and interests of both countries’.35 On 18 February 1975 Bucharest received what was seen as essential evidence of Bonn’s strategy within CSCE. The Romanian embassy in Washington reported that Bonn had ‘asked the allied delegations to block the drafting process of the principles until the Soviet delegation agrees on drafting and inserting the paragraph regarding peaceful change of frontiers and human contacts’.36 According to the telegram, Washington was not keen on blocking the negotiations but agreed to slow them down and to seek a solution through negotiations with the USSR. For Bucharest, two things were obvious: (a) facilitating German reunification represented the main objective of Bonn’s involvement in CSCE, as of Ostpolitik in general; and (b) the co-ordination of allied bloc positions (within NATO and the EEC) was the strategy used by the West Germans in order to pursue their own goals.

Bilateral Co-operation for a Successful Outcome of the CSCE Co-operation between the two delegations remained productive throughout the negotiations leading up to the Helsinki Final Act of 1 August 1975. Bonn’s

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main concern was to obtain Romanian agreement on the formula of a peaceful modification of frontiers, thereby considering borders as ‘inviolable’ but not ‘intangible’ (as the Soviets requested). Obviously, Bonn tried to settle this issue within a great power context – as eventually happened – but Bucharest’s position on this issue had its own importance. Because the Romanian leadership sought an independent profile in international relations, its reactions were somewhat unpredictable, as it did not automatically obey the hegemonic power. On the contrary, Bucharest was very sensitive to great power pressures, irrespective of which side. Thus, starting with September 1974, Götz von Groll, the head of the European Security subdivision within the Auswärtiges Amt, repeatedly discussed Romanian caveats concerning the formula on the peaceful change of frontiers.37 In April 1975, von Groll openly ‘expressed his doubts regarding the possibility of negotiating a Soviet-American version on the issue of the peaceful modification of frontiers’.38 He also stated that ‘at most … the inclusion of this text in the first principle is still open for discussion’. What had caused this sudden bout of depression was that text relevant to the issue had been recorded by consensus on 5 April 1975. This formula did however relate the modification of frontiers to International Law, thereby classifying it as an exception. Bonn convinced the American delegation – after consultations with its Soviet counterpart – to issue a new proposal at the beginning of July 1975. This did not contain any references to International Law regarding modification of frontiers and presented this idea ‘as a rule, not as an exception’.39 This new text was about to be included within the sovereign equality principle. On 5 July 1975, the Romanian delegation asked ‘why a new text is necessary, what new elements are brought along with this and which would be the connections with other elements belonging to the sovereign equality principle?’40 It requested that the new text should either be modified or that it should be included in a context making clear that the frontiers modification could only take place in accordance with International Law – thus upholding the principle of state sovereignty. Romanian insistence on this issue provoked something of a mini-crisis in bilateral relations, which featured in various articles in the West German media. However, this mini-crisis was also a product of the domestic situation in Bonn, where the CDU/CSU opposition claim that CSCE results were jeopardising an eventual German reunification. The Romanian diplomatic mission in Cologne reported, on 4 July 1975, that ‘the Bavarian government decided to issue a resolution within the Bundesrat requesting the federal government to make a declaration, at the final document signing, stating that the existence of Germany, as it was defined by the Four Powers agreements and decisions, will not be affected by the conference results, and that the FRG, in view of the treaty signed with the GDR, considers it its obligation to take the necessary peaceful steps in order to achieve a reunified Germany’.41 There were also other proposals for the FRG not

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to sign the final documents ‘if a satisfactory solution for the Berlin issue will not be achieved, and even taking a pause to reconsider, if necessary’.42 It seems that the West German-Romanian mini-crisis was solved through American intervention. On 7 June 1975, Arthur Hartman, Assistant Secretary for European Affairs, called Corneliu Bogdan, the Romanian ambassador to Washington, to discuss ‘a troubling communication from Geneva’.43 It was about the Romanian amendments to the American text regarding the peaceful modification of the borders, and Hartman said: ‘[I]f Romania insists on further debating the formula and its place in the final papers,… then ending the Conference this summer will not be possible.’ Alluding to the debate on the Romanian-American trade agreement, due to take place in the US Senate on the following day, Hartman emphasised that ‘this should not be taken as a means of putting pressure on Bucharest’.44 The mini-crisis continued in the following days. According to Romanian information, it was on Genscher’s explicit request that the Auswärtiges Amt issued a communiqué to radio stations, stating that the foreign minister had found out ‘with surprise that the Romanian delegation has complicated the course of the negotiations’ by trying to renegotiate important issues for West Germany which had already been agreed to by other states.45 The same afternoon, the Romanian delegation withdrew its objections in Geneva and ‘the mini-crisis’ was closed. Behind these Romanian objections was the apprehension that some peaceful modifications of borders could be made through violating the sovereignty of states. At the present state of the declassification process in Romania, one can only assume that this reticence was triggered by the historical example of the Soviet ultimatum from 26 July 1940, according to which Romania had to cede Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina. The selection of arguments from the opposition in the report on the CSCE debates in the West German Bundestag might be taken as indirect evidence for this assumption. The relevant telegram from the mission in Cologne from 25 July 1975 cited the CDU/CSU opposition as accusing the government of ‘welcoming the requests of the USSR, who does not sincerely seek political relaxation’. Particular attention was drawn to the critique from the CDU/CSU on the ‘ambiguity of some formulations that leaves the door open for a different interpretation and gives the Soviet Union a free hand, comparable with the former occupation of Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and a part of Poland’.46 It is the inclusion of this latter passage in an official document that lends credibility to the aforementioned hypothesis, as the subject of the occupation of Bessarabia by the USSR in 1940 was generally considered to be too sensitive for the Romanian political environment of that time to be openly and expressly mentioned, even by quoting others.47 Regardless of the mini-crisis, the West German government found – as van Well told Romanian diplomat Ion Morega later in July 1975 – ‘the constructive

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position of the Romanian delegation in Geneva, extremely positive’ and the bilateral collaboration there ‘friendly and fruitful’.48 Flattering as these remarks were certainly meant to be, Bonn was certainly well content with the results of Ostpolitik in the Romanian case, including the unfolding of the CSCE.

Conclusions These conclusions are preliminary; the research of the documentation from the years 1967–1975 is only in an incipient stage. The first tentative conclusion – as document-based research on the years 1967–1975 is still in an early stage – is that following the establishment of official contacts in 1967 bilateral relations underwent a rapid development, leading to political relations of a special character. This statement seems justified on grounds that signed confidential agreements between the two states acknowledged West Berlin ties with the FRG in exchange for economic advantages. While such secret agreements might be considered routine in the relations among states, they were quite exceptional for states belonging to opposite political-military blocs of the bipolar era. Through these special relations and through its implicit link to the German issue, the Romanian leadership sought international recognition of its autonomy within the Soviet bloc. On the other hand, West German political leaders aimed to show other communist states the advantages of a positive answer to Ostpolitik. For a variety of reasons Romania seemed to represent – from Bonn’s view – an ideal test-case: no serious bilateral problems were to be encountered (as was the case with Poland, the CSSR, USSR and the GDR); Romania was not too obedient towards Moscow (like Hungary and Bulgaria were) even though it remained a member of the Warsaw Pact (unlike Yugoslavia). Willy Brandt’s visit to Romania in August 1967 played a significant role in paving the way towards these special relations. Bucharest was delighted to learn about growing bipartisan support in the FRG for the development of special bilateral relations. Furthermore, in 1968 it shared with Bonn the assumption that extending bilateral relations represented the best answer to Moscow’s claim for control in its own ‘sphere of influence’ (the so-called Brezhnev doctrine). Fears in Bucharest were obviously driven by a kind of ‘Yalta syndrome’, namely, the assumption that once Soviet hegemony in Eastern Europe gained momentum, the fate of Ceauşescu’s team would be sealed. Therefore, Bucharest’s association with Ostpolitik was considered as a guarantee should ‘Yalta’ be reconfirmed.49 The ‘Yalta syndrome’ continued to dominate the thinking of Romania’s ruling communists in those years up to the Helsinki Final Act. The efforts put in preparing the CSCE mainly aimed to ensure that the Final Act included clauses effectively devaluing the agreement of Yalta from 1945 with its alleged

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limitations to sovereign action at domestic and international levels. This objective led Romanian diplomacy repeatedly into conflict with its own allies in the Warsaw Pact and sometimes even into partnership-like relations with the other side or the N+N countries. Recently available Romanian documents confirm the assumption that the leadership in Bucharest did not only pursue privileged political relations with Bonn, but that it was also after important economic advantages. Therefore, Ostpolitik’s impact moved from the foreign policy field – a unique relationship with a NATO member state – to the domestic level in order to speed up economic development in its own country. The ‘Yalta syndrome’ did not only help to improve Bucharest’s relations with the FRG, but, after the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the troops of the ‘brotherly’ states, it also made for certain actions which alarmed Western capitals in their unusual nature. One example of this was Bucharest’s initiative in the CSCE negotiations to replace the ‘bloc-to-bloc approach’ with relations between participating states based on sovereignty and equality. Bonn advised moderation at this moment and – an indication of Ostpolitik’s impact on Romanian foreign policy – Bucharest accepted the international state of affairs. Warnings from Bonn eased Bucharest’s return to realism and helped its acceptance of the results. At the same time, the communist leadership in Bucharest ‘valued’ its association with Ostpolitik by strictly controlling any related actions at the highest level. This went well beyond the usual centralisation practised by communist regimes. Bucharest feared domestic destabilisation through Ostpolitik and détente, since it realised that increasing numbers of émigrés might trigger both economic difficulties (through the loss of highly qualified people) and ideological ones (through the influence of FRG-tourists on local people). Looking at the control exercised by the Ministry of the Interior over family reunions, the domination of its own society by communist regimes by means of terror becomes utterly apparent. Therefore, during its first years of existence, Ostpolitik certainly exercised considerable influence – the exact dimension of which is still unknown – on Romania’s foreign and domestic policy. The collaboration of Romanian and West German diplomats in preparing the CSCE highlighted contradictory aspects. On one hand, the targets of the two parts collided sometimes, which led, at least once, to a mini-crisis in bilateral relations. This was due to the fact that the Federal Republic of Germany intended to facilitate the reunification of the two German states, preparing for the eventual demise of an international actor – this was exactly what Romanian diplomacy was out to prevent with the help of the Final Act. On the other hand, positive bilateral relations developed during the late 1960s and the parallelism between Romania’s interest in creating a counter-weight to Soviet hegemony and West German interest in creating divisions within the Soviet camp greatly facilitated co-operation within CSCE.

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This leaves one open question, namely, whether the two states really found themselves in fundamental concurrence over the CSCE. More precisely, whether both Romania and the Federal Republic of Germany or only the latter were interested in the CSCE not acquiring the characteristics of a new, post–Second World War Conference for Peace. From a theoretical perspective, at least, but still not entirely supported by documents, one can assert that while Germany acted against turning CSCE into such a peace conference, Romanian requests targeted the replacement of the agreements signed just after the end of the war that settled a status quo in Europe, to provide a framework with a different meaning according to which ‘Yalta’ was to be replaced.

Notes 1. O. Bange, Ostpolitik und Détente in Europa: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, Habil. MS (Mannheim, 2004) (publication forthcoming), 37–64. 2. PA AA, B 150/90, ‘Establishing diplomatic relations with East European States – Romania and Yugoslavia’, 23 December 1966 (also in AAPD 1966, doc. 412); letter from Schütz to Knieper, 27 December 1966; ‘Note on the internal discussion [in the Auswärtiges Amt]’, 28 December 1966. 3. Parts 1 and 2 draw on the author’s article ‘Ostpolitik and Its Implications on Romania’s Domestic and Foreign Policy (1967–1974)’, Magazin Istoric 467/2 (2006): 33–38 and 468/3 (2006): 42–46. 4. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1967, Direction III, ‘Report on the visit of W. Brandt in RSR’, 19 August 1967, F.1–12. 5. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1967, Direction III, ‘Note regarding FRG’, 12 August 1967, F.32–34. 6. Ibid. 7. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1972, Direction III Relations, ‘Note on Romanian-FRG relations’, 28 February 1972, F.6. 8. CHNA, Fond CC of the RCP, Chancellery Section, 59/1969, ‘Note on economic relations with FRG’, 21 April 1969, F.13–15. 9. Ibid. 10. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction III, ‘Note on Romanian-West-German agreements on West Berlin’, 16 February 1973, F.12–13. 11. CHNA, Fond CC of RCP, Chancellery Section, 109/1973, ‘Note regarding the interests of Romanian citizens in West Berlin’, 15 June 1973, F.24. 12. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Judicial and International Organizations Direction, ‘Note related to West Berlin issue’, 22 October 1973, F.84. 13. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction I, ‘Telegram from Berlin’, 20.07.1973, F.12. 14. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Judicial and International Organizations Direction, ‘Romanian-FRG talks regarding Quadripartite Agreement’s implementation’, 26 September 1973, F.66–67.

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15. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction I, ‘Note regarding the West Berlin issue’, 5 November 1973, F.112. 16. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction III, ‘Telegram from Cologne to V. Gliga’, 21 August 1973, F.5. 17. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction III, ‘Telegram from C. Oancea to MFA’, Cologne, 23 February 1973, F.32–37. 18. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1972, Direction III, ‘Note on the talks with W. Scheel’, 2 October 1972, F.36. 19. AMFA, Problem 220/FFG-1967, Direction III, ‘Report on W. Brandt’s visit in RSR’, 19 August 1967, F.7–8. 20. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1972, Direction III, ‘Note on Romanian-West-German relations’, 28 February 1972, F.8. 21. AMFA, Problem 220/FRG-1973, Direction III, ‘Note on Romanian-West-German relations’, 19 March 1973, F.10. 22. See K. Schönherr, Luptele Wehrmachtului in Romania, 1944 [The Wehrmacht’s Battles in Romania, 1944] (Bucharest, 2004). 23. CHNA, Fond CC of RCP, Chancellery Section, 35/1972, ‘Note to N. Ceauşescu from C. Manescu’, 26 April 1972, F.163–167. 24. Ibid., F.167 (the German minority in Romania was estimated at around 400,000 persons at the time). 25. AMFA, Problem 220/European Security-1972, Direction III, ‘Telegram from C. Oancea to MFA’, Cologne, 16 February 1972, F.11. 26. AMFA, Problem 220/European Security-1972, Direction III, ‘Telegram from C. Oancea to MFA’, Cologne, 22 November 1972, F.102–104. 27. At the time, ‘Yalta’ was seen in Bucharest as the expression of the Soviet-American agreement for dividing Europe into spheres of influence, Romania being included within the Soviet one. (See the US State Department memorandum of conversation between Emil Bodnaras, Vice-President, Romanian Council of State, and Harry G. Barnes, American Ambassador to Romania, US Embassy, Bucharest, 24 May 1974, in . E. Ionescu and D. Deletant (eds.), Romania and the Warsaw Pact, 1955–1989: Selected Documents (Bucharest, 2004), 262–271. 28. AMFA, Problem 241/1974, no. 5995, ‘Telegram from V. Lipatti to Washington’, 25 August 1974, F.143. 29. Ibid. 30. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Telegram from. G. Macovescu to V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 1 April 1975, F.48–49. 31. See AMFA, Problem 241/1974, no. 5993, ‘Telegram from Washington to MFA’, 15 January 1974, F.1–3; Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Telegram from Direction I (CES) V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 7 February 1975, F.4; Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Circular letter from G. Macovescu’, 27 February 1975, F.14–17. 32. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Telegram from O. Ionescu to V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 6 March 1975, F.23. 33. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no.5959, Direction I, ‘Telegram from V. Lipatti to G. Macovescu’, Geneva, 22 May 1975, F.57. 34. Ibid., F.58. In exchange, the FRG delegation agreed on the French proposal to recognise the responsibilities of the ‘great powers in Europe, since they [the West Germans] cannot oppose that’.

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35. Ibid. 36. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Telegram from A. Coroianu to V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 18 February 1975, F.10. 37. AMFA, Problem 241/1974, no. 5995, ‘Telegram from O. Ionescu to V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 17 September 1974, F.147. The West German diplomat expressed his ‘concern’ about these reticences. 38. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5955, ‘Telegram from R. Neagu to V. Lipatti’, Geneva, 7 April 1975, F.55. 39. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5959, ‘Telegram from V. Lipatti to G. Macovescu’, Geneva, 7 July 1975, F.142. 40. Ibid. 41. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5960, ‘Telegram from I. Morega to I. Dobroiu’, Cologne, 4 July 1975, F.82. 42. Ibid. 43. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5960, ‘Telegram from C. Bogdan to G. Macovescu’, Washington, 8 July 1975, F.103. 44. Ibid., F.104. 45. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5961, ‘Telegram from I. Morega to MFA’, Cologne, 18 July 1975, F.83–84. 46. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5962, ‘Telegram from C. Bogdan to V. Gliga’, Cologne, 25 July 1975, F.26. 47. This rule of silence is highlighted by the conversation between Maurer and Khrushchev on 18 March 1964. Maurer, then the President of the Council of Ministers of the SRR, later reported: ‘At a certain time, Khrushchev brought into discussion the moment when the Chinese said that the Soviets took Bessarabia away from us. I was silent. Khrushchev asked me: What did you say about it? My answer was: What could I say to them? meaning that: Yes, you did take it away from us.’ See L. Betea, Maurer si lumea de ieri: Marturii de spre destalinizarea Romaniei [Maurer and Yesterday’s World: Testimonies on Romania’s De-Stalinisation] (Arad, 1995), 146. 48. AMFA, Problem 241/1975, no. 5962, ‘Telegram from I. Morega to G. Macovescu’, Cologne, 28 July 1975, F.44. 49. M. E. Ionescu, Communist Romania’s Course within the Warsaw Treaty: Introduction, in Ionescu and Deletant, Romania and the Warsaw Pact, 85–86.

–9–

Preserving the Status Quo or Promoting Change The Role of the CSCE in the Perception of Polish Authorities

o

Wanda Jarząbek

Beginning with the issuance of the Bucharest declaration of the Warsaw Pact countries in 1966, a European Security Conference became one of the main political aims of the Soviet bloc countries. However, the hopes set on the conference were contingent on those countries’ individual needs, as well as prejudices rooted in their historical experiences. The main aim of this chapter is to analyse the way in which the conference was treated by the then Polish government, while social responses to the conference as such – however important to the later course of events – were not the subject of research. While there exists an extensive body of literature in Poland on the CSCE process, many of these publications are not based on primary sources.1 However, it is this newly available documentary material which sheds important new light on Poland’s official attitude towards the CSCE at the time. In dealing with new material, one constantly needs to take into consideration the communist character of the ruling group in Poland and the fact that Poland de facto was not a sovereign state at the time. Nevertheless, this does not mean that the policy pursued by the Polish government was in accordance with Soviet objectives in every situation.

Notes for this chapter begin on page 157.

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Poland and the Birth of the CSCE Idea In Polish literature, the statement of the Polish Foreign Minister Adam Rapacki at the United Nations General Assembly in December 1964 used to be presented as the moment when the idea to hold a conference was announced for the first time. Rapacki stated then that ‘now is probably the right time to consider the questions of European security in all their aspects. The possibility should be consulted of covering a conference of all European states, of course with the participation of the USSR and the United States to examine these questions’.2 Some Soviet historians have argued that the other member states of the Warsaw Pact had been consulted about Rapacki’s proposal beforehand.3 Polish archival sources do not provide any background for this thesis, one way or another. One year later a Polish delegate during the UN General Assembly suggested adding questions of economic collaboration to the agenda of a prospective European conference. Subsequently, Polish diplomats began to seek the support of Western countries for the conference idea, including Austria, Belgium, France and the Scandinavian countries.4 Polish preliminary studies on the CSCE intensified with the beginnings of West Germany’s new Ostpolitik in 1966. In March of that year the Erhard-government in its ‘peace note’ to the bloc countries (with the notable exception of the GDR) proposed to conclude bilateral treaties on a mutual renunciation of force. This offer was not satisfactory to Poland as it did not include a formal recognition of existing borders. The lack of legal (de iure) recognition of the OderNeisse line was a determining factor in post-war Polish foreign and domestic policy as well as for Polish relations with the Soviet Union.5 Polish policymakers became increasingly anxious about the easing of the conflict between the Soviet Union and the Federal Republic of Germany, which in their view could lead to German reunification in the future.6 It was anticipated in Warsaw that Bonn’s international position could only become stronger due to its new Eastern policy – and thus inhibit Poland from obtaining the kind of guarantees for its western borders that it had sought for so long. The fears of a possible German-Soviet rapprochement – commonly referred to as the ‘Rapallo policy’ – were constantly present in Polish political thought. In the second half of the 1960s, studies by Polish experts concentrated on political and military aspects of the European conference agenda such as the freezing of armaments and the proposal of a pan-European convention on the renunciation of force, which would include the recognition of the existing territorial status quo. This would both guarantee the Oder-Neisse border and the existence of the GDR. The latter was seen by Warsaw as an additional warranty with regard to Poland’s border to the West and a way to forestall a possible German reunification.7 Since it seemed that it would be impossible to resolve the borderline problem through a bilateral agreement with Bonn, Warsaw wanted to proceed with the issue within the European

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‘framework’.8 The Polish intentions could be described as an attempt to ‘close’ many aspects of the German question during the conference while the FRG wanted to keep them open to facilitate future national unification. The Polish leadership did not want the conference to be limited to political matters and hoped that it would create trade rules that could contribute to an inter-bloc exchange. This issue was considered extensively in Polish internal studies from the late 1960s. As the Soviet Union habitually used to treat its economic relations with other bloc countries as a sub-function of its politics, economic and trade ties with the West also remained intrinsically linked to wider political questions. In high-level talks with Moscow, Polish Politburo members and diplomats were indeed informed that such a link existed.9 On the other hand, each COMECON country had to fulfil its assigned role within the overall economic organisation of the bloc (the Polish role being predominantly that of a supplier nation of raw materials) and it was not easy to change this. It is possible that the Kremlin was not interested in helping Poland to modernise for reasons of control. Moreover, Moscow was not able to meet Polish demands because of the USSR’s limited industrial capacity, fixed trade obligations and general technological underdevelopment. Therefore, European integration constituted a significant factor in Polish planning. In the late 1960s the EEC countries started to implement their common agricultural and tax policies, and Poland met with increasing problems when trying to conclude new agreements and renew old ones. In addition, the countries interested in joining the Common Market, such as Great Britain, avoided commitments that could be seen as being contradictory to those plans.10 All this caused serious problems for Polish exports, especially in the area of agricultural products, which represented the majority of exported goods.11 Furthermore, due to CoCOM (Coordinating Committee for Export to Communist Areas) regulations, many products were excluded from inter-bloc trade and it was not possible to buy them in Western countries. While both the Soviet Union and other satellite countries shared the general interest in a wider opening to the West, Polish experts working on these economic aspects held the opinion that the ideas of the other bloc countries remained too traditional. It seems that Poland also expected the conference to be a forum for discussing some political and economic questions outside the framework provided by the blocs and superpower domination. In this way, Poland hoped that the small countries would have better possibilities to be active in international relations, implying a certain weakening of Soviet hegemony. If the Polish plans came true, the ties within the bloc would be partially relaxed and there would also be a change in the European political status quo. It was not expected that this prospective change would affect the ruling ideology in Poland and in the East, while it was expected that it would thus become possible to influence the West. This attitude was particularly noticeable at the beginning of the 1970s.

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Discussion on the Conference Agenda Polish efforts intensified in 1969 after overcoming internal disturbances and the Soviet bloc’s international isolation following the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. The ministerial experts thought that the time was ripe to propagate the concept of the conference, especially since the idea began to become more popular among small and medium-sized West European countries which were afraid that they would be eliminated from the international debate as a consequence of the development of the US-Soviet dialogue.12 Nevertheless, the decision taken by the Warsaw Pact countries in Budapest in March 1969, announced in the ‘Appeal for a European Security Conference’, was disappointing for Poland. The question of inviolability (not recognition, as the Poles desired) of the Oder-Neisse line and the GDR-FRG borderline was described as a ‘fundamental requisite for Europe’s security’, but not for the convening of the European conference.13 The results of the Budapest conference prompted the Polish leadership to intensify diplomatic pressure on the Soviet Union, the bloc countries and Western Europe.14 The bilateral Polish-Soviet consultations, which began in April 1969, were rocked by disputes. The reluctance of the Soviets to discuss the agenda of the future conference, especially the borderline problems, only helped to increase Polish anxieties. Moreover, the leadership in Warsaw was not informed about the details of the Soviet-German negotiations, but they knew about the Soviet eagerness to progress in their talks with the FRG. This – in Polish eyes – led to the apparent lack of Soviet interest in speaking about preconditions for the prospective European conference, with the question of the recognition of the borderline being especially inconvenient for the Soviets at that moment as it spelt trouble with the West.15 Warsaw did not want the Soviet Union to make a unilateral decision regarding the questions perceived as crucial for Polish national interests. Therefore, Władysław Gomułka decided on a shift in Polish security policy. This was announced in his public speech on 17 May 1969.16 Here, the First Secretary of the PUWP spelled out his expectations on the future security conference, namely, that – among the many problems of European security – the Oder-Neisse line and the recognition of the GDR would definitely be solved. Furthermore, he proposed that the Federal Republic begin talks with Warsaw over the recognition of Poland’s western borders. The official reply from Bonn was cast along traditional lines and was not as helpful to Polish plans as might have been anticipated.17 Polish authorities began to postulate the co-ordination of Soviet bloc activity for the convening of the conference, the standardisation of the Budapest Appeal’s interpretation and the expansion of the conference agenda beyond the topics suggested by the Soviets. They evaluated the Soviet intention as one focused on warming the international climate and creating a better negotiating

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position for the USSR as a global power. Poland wanted the conference to finish with concluding documents of significant importance for the shaping of a new European order. This led to the preparation of a Polish draft for a ‘Treaty on Collective Security and Cooperation in Europe’.18 An important part of the proposal was made up of articles on the mutual renunciation of force and the recognition of existing borderlines and on respecting other nations’ sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence. After concluding the treaty, signatory states would be committed not to aid any aggressor. Some long-term goals were suggested, such as discussing the possibility of resolving the military alliances in Europe and replacing them with a system of collective security. The signatory countries would also be obliged to develop economic co-operation. At the end of September 1969, Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Zygfryd Wolniak met with his Soviet counter-part Vladimir S. Semenov in Warsaw.19 Semenov said that Western countries would prefer to agree on two or three non-controversial questions as the topics for discussion before the actual conference began. According to Soviet knowledge, the question of recognising post-war borders or the existence of the GDR was not among them. A treaty or declaration on the renunciation of force or against the threat of using force20 and on the development of economic, cultural and scientific relations – which would also improve the atmosphere of political relations – would have the best chances of success. Wolniak repeated that the main questions of European security, which were also pointed out in the Budapest Appeal, remained the recognition of the territorial status quo that would thus be abandoned, and that Poland was against accepting a minimum plan as a bloc programme. The Polish minister was of the opinion that a Treaty on European Security and Cooperation elaborated by the whole bloc should be submitted to all European countries as a most desirable maximum programme. For the Polish side it was difficult to imagine that the recognition of frontiers could not be considered – especially as Polish diplomacy had formed a different impression about the attitude of Western countries on this question. For example, French diplomats had told a Polish official that Paris did not want to recognise the inner-German borderline as a state frontier, but had no reservations about the formula on the non-violation of existing borders. Not content with the Soviet stance, Warsaw decided to present its ideas in written form. The Polish ‘memorandum’ passed to the Soviets stressed interest in consultations with the other bloc countries and expressed the need to deal with the full scope of questions concerning European security.21 The Poles underlined that any agreement on the renunciation of force in which the FRG would participate without the recognition of borderlines would not increase European security. The Soviet proposal of an agreement on economic collaboration was deemed too general, and some additional points were suggested, such as the realisation of European projects in the fields of energy, transport and

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water systems, financial collaboration throughout Europe, establishing formal contacts between the existing economic organisations in Europe (something which would ‘secure the interests of all countries by accepting principles of non-discrimination and mutual benefits’) and the liquidation of barriers in economic exchange between European countries, thus revitalising the European Economic Committee of the United Nations. In October 1969, the Soviets agreed to include some of the issues proposed by the Poles in the documents agreed upon by the meeting of the Warsaw Pact Foreign Ministers in Prague. This included a passage on the recognition of frontiers although this did not exactly meet Polish expectations. All the same, the suggested CSCE agenda was very limited, and some Polish documents justify the assumption that Poland wanted to persuade its Western interlocutors that further discussions on the CSCE programme were still possible. Polish diplomats also indicated that Western support for the idea of the conference and the readiness to start talks was necessary to continue preparations. The Prague declaration was issued before the NATO summit planned for December 1969 in Brussels. It seems that at that time Warsaw decided to inform Western countries about its project of a Treaty on Security and Cooperation in Europe, and that it attempted to convince the US of a need to convene a conference.22 From the beginning of 1970, when it became clear that a quick gathering of the conference was not realistic, Polish diplomats renewed their attempts to convince Moscow to work on broader plans for the conference as the narrow approach displayed so far had held few attractions for the West. Among topics indicated as worth elaborating were regional disarmament and a series of follow-up conferences. They also stressed the need to prepare an elaborate draftdocument on collective security and economic collaboration in co-ordination with the entire bloc, and to present this to the West.23 Polish diplomats did not want the Soviets to be the only authors of the Warsaw Pact documents as the Kremlin’s interests were different from other bloc countries’ expectations. The question of economic collaboration became one of the main topics of talks with the Soviets and also within the bloc.

The Helsinki Conference It seems that Polish politicians pursuit a more independent course once the idea of the conference was born and discussions on the agenda began. This can be explained by a different stance in the way they approached their work, changes in the international situation and a distinctly different definition of state and ruling group interests by the new Polish government which had come to power in December 1970. Nevertheless, during the Multilateral Preparatory Talks the Polish delegates pursued specific Polish interests and decided to concentrate

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on the Basket I issues (among them, of course, the territorial status quo) and refrain from addressing Basket II. The first phase of the conference started in 1973, when the bilateral treaty between the FRG and Poland was signed and at least some political aims were achieved. Polish authorities then wanted to strengthen border guarantees by grounding them in the CSCE principles of international relations, thus preventing them from being weakened by the wording in the catalogue of principles. In the negotiations on Basket III, the Poles – in agreement with their assigned role within the bloc – presented a paper on cultural collaboration that had originated in Moscow. Warsaw itself was especially interested in avoiding discussions about a right to emigrate during the CSCE. After the end of the conference, the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs prepared a formal interpretation of the CSCE Final Act.24 The wording of the principle of sovereign equality, the renunciation of force, the inviolability of frontiers, territorial integrity and non-intervention (understood in Poland, as in the Soviet Union, as non-interference in internal affairs) was interpreted as a way of securing the Polish state, thus meeting essential Polish interests. Polish diplomats showed themselves rather satisfied with the stipulations concerning the territorial status quo, because – as they interpreted it – the formula concerning the peaceful transformation of borders was now subordinate to the principle of sovereign equality and not to the principle of the inviolability of frontiers as had been suggested during the talks. Therefore, it was anticipated that in the case of a German unification it would be much more difficult or even impossible to change the Oder-Neisse border. The documents do not indicate whether questions concerning the status quo were analysed in the broader context of the other nations’ (or states’) interests, such as the Baltic nations. Due to the fact that the Basket III recommendations were subordinated to the Ten Principles of International Relations, among them non-intervention, the recommendations were presented as being dependent on the Principles and on the ‘stage of détente’, as mentioned in the Final Act. Furthermore, the Helsinki Final Act contained both a mini-preamble to the decisions concerning the flow of information and a formula that spreading information (including radio broadcasts) should be subordinated to the mutual understanding of nations and the general aims agreed upon. Warsaw saw both as an opportunity to limit the activities of Radio Free Europe. In the case of the free flow of people, it was underlined that the stipulations did not possess obligatory character and that bilateral commitments were to be treated as primary. So it was believed, for example, that the emigration to West Germany could continue to take place according to bilateral agreements. The human rights issue was sometimes presented as a Trojan horse for the communist governments. The stance of the Polish authorities was everything but unanimous and the attitude within the ruling party towards the results

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and effects of the conference also differed significantly. Many were afraid that communist ideology would be threatened if the stipulations of the Final Act were applied.25 The Polish government from the early 1970s saw the most imminent danger in a possible ‘ideological infiltration’. However, other perceptions held that some stipulations would make it easier to propagate communist ideas in the West. All the same, from the Polish, as well as the Soviet perspective, the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms was an unwelcome addition to the CSCE.26 One must remember, however, that in comparison to the USSR and other bloc countries, Poland still enjoyed a somewhat more ‘liberal’ policy in terms of access to foreign publications and printed opinion in its own press. The amendments introduced in 1976 to the Polish constitution were a means to increase the Communist Party’s role in political life and its control over youth education as well as to make for closer ties with the Kremlin. ‘The strengthening of the friendship and collaboration with the Soviet Union’ became a constitutional principle. In the opinion of the author, these amendments should also be interpreted in the context of the CSCE and the process of détente as an attempt to safeguard the political status quo and to prevent future liberalisation in domestic politics.

The Follow-Up to the Conference Poland was deeply interested in continuing the CSCE process and in furthering talks on collaboration over energy, communication and ecology, as well as the institutionalisation of the process, but the Soviets withdrew their support for the latter idea.27 In the mid-1970s, the domestic situation in Poland changed. First of all, symptoms of economic crisis became increasingly apparent and the country became dependent on Western credits and technologies. The Polish authorities were aware of the growing importance of human rights matters and the link between respecting the Final Act stipulations and particularly the willingness of the United States to meet the economic needs of the Polish government.28 Beginning in 1975, political opposition groups began to refer to the Helsinki Final Act and demanded fulfilment of the obligations arising from it and from the Polish Constitution. The growing importance of Basket III issues in international relations had a great influence on dissident movements in Poland. Many groups were no longer clandestine and their members’ names were widely known, something that caused increasing concern to the party. As a reaction, the government conducted a specific PR campaign. And it is quite likely that the amnesty for political prisoners announced before the Belgrade meeting in the spring of 1977 was also aimed at improving Poland’s image as a

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‘liberal’ country – after the prosecution of participants involved in the strikes of June 1976 and KOR (Workers’ Defence Committee) members.29 The role of the Polish delegation was planned according to co-ordinative decisions made during a meeting of the Warsaw Treaty countries in Moscow in May 1977.30 The Poles were to prepare a draft on cultural collaboration, including education (school books, common scientific groups), especially since Poland had some experiences in the area, such as regular exchanges with West German historians on the historical curricula in both countries. Realising the growing importance of human rights issues in international relations, the Poles were unpleasantly surprised by the atmosphere of the Belgrade conference. According to Polish diplomats, while the West European countries had been the main partners for the Eastern bloc in Helsinki, in Belgrade Washington was able to impose on them political priorities concerning human rights, thus making the conference talks much more strenuous. The chief of the Polish delegation, Marian Dobrosielski, observed that the anticipated ‘deep exchange of views appeared to be rather a confrontation’.31 The Poles presented their project on cultural co-operation. Probably some elements went beyond Soviets expectations, such as those which suggested the return of works of art to the countries of origin. This project also gained great approval among neutral and NATO countries but was not included in the final documents.32 After the Belgrade conference, the Soviet bloc countries began to focus on a new conference planned for 1980 in Madrid. Soviet politicians were of the opinion that the conference should deal first of all with the implementation of previous decisions, especially from Basket I. They wanted the ‘purely military’ questions, such as disarmament, to remain the big powers’ traditional prerogatives.33 Nevertheless, acknowledging the importance of strategic issues in the Declaration of the Political Advisory Committee of the Warsaw Pact from November 1978, the Soviet Union proposed to start talks regarding a conference on military détente and to hold it before the Madrid conference. The Poles treated the idea as part of their ‘share of duties within the bloc’, while of course the initiative seemed to correspond to former Polish proposals such as the Rapacki plan or the Gomułka plan.34 A general outline of such a conference was supported by France as Paris itself had proposed to organise a conference on disarmament earlier on, albeit in a different framework than the bloc. The Poles started to think about Warsaw as a place were the conference could take place. But the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan complicated the talks. Nevertheless, in Madrid the CSCE encompassed military issues and a mandate for the Stockholm conference was agreed on. Since the Belgrade conference, human rights could no longer be treated as a purely domestic matter and thus remained an increasingly embarrassing problem for the Polish government, especially when it became one of the most discussed topics in Madrid. This conference took place at a very difficult time

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for Poland’s ruling communists, as in August 1980 Solidarność (Solidarity) was created and the situation in Poland and around Poland intensified, especially after the introduction of martial law. The Polish government was interested in continuing the follow-up talks and meetings, because it was also a way of avoiding isolation in international relations. The decisions taken in Madrid to organise future meetings for experts were seen in Warsaw as a stabilising factor in East-West relations.35 On the other hand, the experts’ meetings proved to be particularly difficult for the Polish participants, because they found themselves accused of violating individual freedoms. The demonstrations of the Polish émigrés demanding respect for human rights organised in front of the sites of international institutions and Polish missions in foreign countries were the source of deep governmental concerns.36 Usually the Polish delegates used Principle 6 (non-intervention) to defend themselves. But they also tried to show positive examples of Poland’s willingness to implement human rights principles, drawing attention to the improved status of religious freedom in Poland or possibilities for private ownership, particularly in the field of agriculture. Even in the early 1980s some historians estimated Poland’s attitude towards human rights to be more forthcoming than other Warsaw Pact states.37 In the second half of the 1980s, the political situation in the bloc began to change due to Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms in the Soviet Union, attempts to improve East-West relations and the growing activity of dissident movements in the bloc. In the Polish case, the difficult economic situation played a crucial role. New external and internal conditions influenced Polish foreign policy, including the government’s attitude towards the CSCE. Poland was also interested in stressing its role in the bloc and wanted to be more active in international politics. According to some analysts from the Foreign Ministry, the new Polish plan, named after the PUWP’s First Secretary General Wojciech Jaruzelski, was treated as a reaction to the ongoing transformation in the European equilibrium of power and an attempt to attract attention to Central Europe.38 This plan discussed, among other things, a gradual withdrawal of nuclear forces from the territories of participating countries, reductions in conventional arms, screening military doctrines and converting them to defensive ones, discussing new measures of confidence and security building, soon to be known as ‘third generation measures’. The Polish side wanted countries like Hungary and Denmark to belong to the states included in this force reduction plan, but from the bloc countries only Hungary supported the concept, while the USSR and other countries opposed it. After the opening of the negotiation between twenty-three NATO and WTO countries on military forces and conventional armaments reductions and the conference of thirty-five CSCE countries on confidence building measures, the Polish side wanted some elements of the plan to be included.39 The transformations in East-West relations influenced the approach of the communist countries to the Vienna conference. Some of them even ceased to

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question the significance of the human dimension and were ready to discuss Basket III issues and accept an enhanced role of non-governmental institutions in the realisation of CSCE stipulations.40 Poland was especially interested in introducing recommendations regarding the reduction of limitations in freedom of travel, especially the liberalisation of visa policies, to be included in concluding documents. The Polish delegates accused Western countries that for them this freedom to travel was reduced to freedom of emigration. The Poles also became an object of criticism from some bloc countries for ‘selling the interests of socialism’ because since early 1988 they were more open to questions of passport policy, the free flow of information and provisions for national minorities.41 Earlier Polish diplomats had avoided talking about the rights of national minorities, because in their opinion this would only play into the hands of the FRG. Only shortly before the Vienna conference, the Federal Republic agreed not to put this question under discussion while Poland abandoned the idea of raising the issue of individual compensation for the Polish victims of National-Socialist occupation policy in Poland.42 The Vienna conference ended with the acceptance of documents vital for a speedy transformation of Eastern Europe. Most notably, the partners agreed to cease jamming foreign broadcasts, reaffirmed the secrecy of the post and vowed to accept regulations regarding the humanitarian treatment of prisoners. In February 1989 the Polish government adopted a plan of amendments to Polish law that followed the Vienna recommendations. Among them were limitations on censorship, freedom of travelling and wider access to foreign publications. These changes happened parallel to the ongoing Round Table talks between opposition members, mainly from Solidarność, and the ruling party. The economic questions were very important throughout the whole period under consideration. Western countries treated them as contingent on Basket I and Basket III issues. In Vienna, the Soviet bloc countries tried once again to gain further access to markets outside their own bloc and to facilitate their trade with Western countries, especially concerning the purchase of the latest technologies. Helped by the fundamental changes in East-West relations initiated by Gorbachev as well as by domestic changes in the bloc countries (such as talks with the opposition in Poland), these efforts met with considerable success.

Conclusions Polish authorities placed many hopes in the CSCE, some remained unchanged while others changed between the mid-1960s and the end of the 1980s. Both elements indicated in the title were observed in the official attitude towards the conference. The conference also brought about many changes that most certainly went beyond the original expectations of the Polish authorities.

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When the idea was born in the 1960s, Polish interests focused primarily on preserving the territorial status quo (especially gaining de iure recognition for the Polish western borders). The conference was treated as a quasi peace conference ending the Second World War and thus confirming the political status quo in Europe. However, in the initial stages of preparations one can observe some elements indicating the will for change. These elements show up in Polish ideas for economic collaboration, according to which the new economic order established by the conference would result in a comprehensive opening to the West, the modernisation of the Polish economy and, as a consequence, a noticeable increase in the standard of living. This would be beneficial for Polish society but also for the regime. At least some sources of dissatisfaction threatening the political stability in Poland would be eliminated. The facilitation of inter-bloc trade and the flow of technologies would also decrease Polish dependence on the Soviet Union, which used to treat economic collaboration as an additional element of its control over Poland (and the bloc). So in effect some political changes within the bloc could also be brought about, thereby diminishing Soviet hegemony and gaining more room for manoeuvre – not only within the bloc but also in international politics. In the late 1960s, the Polish preparatory works for the conference, especially the Polish draft for a ‘Treaty on Security and Cooperation in Europe’, included many ideas directed at broadening the capacity for change. First of all, Polish experts wanted the conference to continue and not to limit it to one meeting as proposed by the USSR. They expected the scope of the follow-up meetings to deal with more detailed problems and were interested in institutionalising the CSCE process, expecting that the role of the small and dependent countries would increase because of it. Because the USSR was mainly interested in gaining acceptance for the post-war status quo in Europe and its sphere of influence, Polish-Soviet disputes over CSCE-related issues remained a common feature. Recognising the potential danger of opening to the West as a consequence of détente, Moscow wanted to integrate the bloc and subordinate it to its superpower interests. When the conference began, some Polish dilemmas were regulated by the Warsaw Treaty with the FRG even though Poland was interested in obtaining additional guarantees to strengthen the territorial status quo at a multilateral level. Also, the relations between the superpowers changed and in Poland a new group seized power. At that time ideological questions gained importance due to Western pressure on the issues included in Basket III. The Polish government wanted to secure the regime’s interests and wanted to exclude from the discussion and from any future conference document those topics deemed critical for ideological and political reasons, such as creating joint venture companies with Western capitals, facilitating the work of foreign correspondents

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and the access to international publications and promoting the protection of human rights. The results of the conference were seen as an acceptance of the political system in the Eastern countries and of the communist ideology dominating the region. In time Polish authorities came to a better understanding of the role of Basket III and as a result changed their attitude to human rights issues, although only reluctantly. The results of Basket II were disappointing in comparison to the original Polish plans; on the other hand, the climate of détente opened new possibilities for economic collaboration with Western countries. The conference widened the opportunity for the Polish to manoeuvre at both bilateral and multilateral levels, as the authorities had hoped. During the Helsinki conference Polish diplomats could meet in a ‘natural way’ with Western politicians. The Polish-West German talks provide a good example of how Poland profited from this situation. Two times in 1973 and on a grander scale in 1975 during the private talks between Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and Secretary Edward Gierek, deadlocks in ongoing bilateral negotiations had to be overcome during CSCE-meetings, as it had not been possible to organise high-level Polish-German meetings in one of the countries in question because of procedural difficulties.43 The forum offered by the CSCE was especially important in the 1980s when Polish relations with Western countries deteriorated. It is not clear whether Polish diplomacy was able to take advantage of all the chances offered by the CSCE as in many situations it was restrained by both ideology and bloc politics, often ruled by the objectives of the Soviet policy of the day.44 Sometimes, Polish delegates were seen by certain Western colleagues as less dogmatic in comparison to the representatives of some other socialist states. It seems that Polish activity in the area of promoting individual ideas was relatively prominent in the late 1960s, when the shape of the conference was discussed, and diminished thereafter, although the Poles once more prepared documents presenting their particular ideas for the Belgrade conference. At the beginning of the 1980s, Polish opportunities were very limited due to domestic problems and changes in the international situation. The relaxation of tensions in East-West relations in the second half of the 1980s created better possibilities for Polish activities, which could also be noticed during CSCE meetings. The CSCE process had an important impact on the domestic situation, provoking changes unwanted by the government. Effects became increasingly visible in the Polish society’s attitude towards individual freedom as well as in growing dissident activities, thus facilitating a democratic transition.

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Notes 1. Former Polish participants of CSCE conferences are the authors of the majority of publications. See S. Dąbrowa, ‘Zasady nienaruszalności granic i integralnosci terytorialnej państw na KBWE’, Sprawy Międzynarodwe, 11 (1975): 7ff.; M. Dobrosielski, Belgrad 1977 (Warsaw, 1978); J. Nowak, Poland and the OSCE: In Search of More Comprehensive European Security (Warsaw, 1997); A. D. Rotfeld, From Helsinki to Madrid: CSCE 1973–1983 (Warsaw, 1983); idem, Europejski system bezpieczeństwa in statu nascendi (Warsaw, 1990); idem (ed.), Polska a realizacja uchwał KBWE [Poland and the Implementation of the CSCE Decisions], 2 vols. (Warsaw, 1988). 2. Cit. in Rotfeld, From Helsinki to Madrid, 16. 3. Ibid. 4. W. Jarząbek, Polska wobec Konferencji Bezpieczeństwa i Współpracy w Europie: Plany i rzeczywistość 1964–1975 [Poland and the CSCE: Plans and Reality, 1964– 1975] (Warsaw, 2008), 23ff. 5. W. Jarząbek, ‘“Ulbricht-Doktrin” oder “Gomułka-Doctrine”? Das Bemühen der Volksrepublik Polen um eine geschlossene Politik des kommunistischen Blocks gegenüber der westdeutschen Ostpolitik 1966/1967’, Zeitschrift für Ostmittel­ europa-Forschung, 55/1 (2006): 79–114. I use the term ‘Gomułka doctrine’ to describe a clear line in Polish foreign policy between 1956 and 1970, according to which Poland was seeking to influence decisively the formulation of the bloc’s German policy. Gaining recognition of the Oder-Neisse line and avoiding a situation in which this recognition would be a mere playing card in superpower diplomacy was one of the main political goals. Władysław Gomułka was a figurehead of this policy, ready to dispute with the Soviet Union and to limit the other bloc countries’ room for manoeuvring. 6. AAN, PZPR XIA/64, protocol of the unofficial visit by Władysław Gomułka and Józef Cyrankiewicz to Hungary, Budapest, 8–9 March 1967. 7. AMSZ, DSiP, C. (collection) 60/77, V. (volume) 1, project of eventual diplomatic action, 13 February 1969; ibid., note by Foreign Minister Stefan Jędrychowski, 5 April 1969. 8. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 3/82, V. 2, note on present role of CSCE, 13 November 1974. 9. A. Paczkowski (ed.), Tajne dokumenty Biura Politycznego PRL–ZSRR, 1956–1970 (London, 1998), Notatka z rozmów przeprowadzonych w dniu 24 i 25 maja 1957 między delegacją partyjno-rządową PRL i delegacją partyjno-rządową ZSRR (Note on Polish-Soviet talks, 24–25 May 1957), 66–68; Notatka z rozmów polsko– ­radzieckich w Moskwie w dniach 13–15 kwietnia 1964 (Note on Polish-Soviet talks, 13–15 April 1964), 182–186. 10. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C. 23/76, V. 10, note on Polish trade interests, 6 February 1969. 11. J. Kaliński and Z. Landau, Gospodarka Polski w XX wieku (Warsaw, 1998), 268–272. 12. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 60/77, V. 1, draft project of our attitude to the conference agenda, 13 February 1969. 13. ‘Appeal for a European Security Conference’, 17 March 1969, in V. Mastny and M. Byrne (eds.), A Cardboard Castle? An Inside History of the Warsaw Pact 1955–1991

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(Washington, D.C., 2005), 330. T. Garton Ash, W imieniu Europy: Niemcy i pod­ zielony kontynent (London, 1996), 76. 14. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 60/77, V. 1, note by S. Jędrychowski, 4 April 1969. 15. Jarząbek, ‘Ulbricht-Doktrin’, 90–91. 16. ‘Zgodnie z najbardziej żywotnymi interesami narodu polskiego’, Z przemówienia na spotkaniu z wyborcami w Warszawie, wygłoszonego 17 maja 1969 [Gomułka’s speech from 17 May 1969], in W. Gomułka, O problemie niemieckim: Artykuły i przemówienia (Warsaw, 1984), 76. 17. D. Bingen, Polityka Republiki Bońskiej wobec Polski: Od Adenauera do Kohla 1949– 1991 (Kraków, 1997), 108ff.; G. Niedhart, ‘Ostpolitik, Short-Term Objectives, and Grand Design’, in D. C. Geyer and B. Schäfer (eds.), American Détente and Ger­ man Ostpolitik 1969–1972 (Washington, D.C., 2004), 118. 18. AAN, KC PZPR, XIA/105, note, further action on European security conference, by Jędrychowski, 13 September 1969. 19. AAN, KC PZPR, XIA/87, summary of conversation, 30 September 1969. 20. The Soviet draft of the declaration given to the Polish side did not include either the recognition of or respect for existing borders. 21. AAN, KC PZPR, XIA/87, note by Jędrychowski, 7 October, 1969, attached: memorandum and proposal of the Treaty on Security and Collaboration. 22. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 60/77, V. 1, Western reactions to the conference proposal, 5 December 1969. 23. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C. 28/76, V. 14, note on consultations in Moscow by Deputy Minister Józef Winiewicz, 5 April 1970. 24. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 3/82, V. 5, interpretation of the CSCE decisions, 2 August 1975. 25. Nowak, Poland and the OSCE, 4. 26. D. C. Thomas, The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism (Princeton, 2001), 71. 27. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C. 31/82, V. 4, dispatch from Helsinki, 6 April 1976. 28. Z. Brzeziński, Power and Principle: Memoirs of the National Security Advisor, 1977–1981 (New York, 1983), 300. 29. On dissident movements in Poland, see R. Zuzowski, Political Dissent and Oppo­ sition in Poland: The Workers’ Defence Committee ‘KOR’ (Westport, 1992), 6. On American policy, see W. Korey, The Promises We Keep: Human Rights, the Helsinki Process, and American Foreign Policy (New York, 1993). 30. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 5/82, V. 7, note on preparation for Belgrade, 20 September1977. 31. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 5/82, V. 7, Belgrade 1977, estimate of results by Marian Dobrosielski, 28 March 1978. 32. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C.2/83, V. 6, dispatch from Belgrade, 7 December 1977. Some countries (France, Great Britain, Sweden) were – for obvious reasons – against the idea of handing back objects of art not obtained through proper purchase from their country of origin. 33. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C. 4/84, V. 8, note from bilateral consultations, 2 May 1979. 34. Some ideas included in this plan were contradictory to Moscow’s expectations, as can be deduced from the memoranda of conversations. 35. Rotfeld, From Helsinki to Madrid, 47. 36. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 3/80, V. 2, note on Ottawa meeting, 21 June 1985.

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37. V. Mastny, Helsinki, Human Rights and European Security: Analysis and Documen­ tation (Durham, 1986), 14. 38. AMSZ DSiP, C. 9/90, V. 1, note on a new Polish initiative, 19 November 1986. At the same time, the other bloc countries also presented their plans, which could indicate that this action was co-ordinated by Moscow. 39. AMSZ, DSiP, C. 34/91, V. 1, note on prospects of the Jaruzelski plan, 28 December 1988. 40. A. D. Rotfeld, The Vienna CSCE Meeting: A Search for a New European Security System (Warsaw, 1989), 11. 41. Nowak, Poland and the OSCE, 5. 42. W. Jarząbek, ‘The Authorities of the Polish People’s Republic and the Problem of Reparations and Compensation from the Federal Republic of Germany 1953– 1989’, Polish Foreign Affairs Digest, 17/4 (2005): 177. 43. W. Jarząbek, ‘Władze PRL wobec normalizacji stosunków z FRN latach 1970–1975’ [The PPR Authorities’ Attitude towards the Normalisation of Relations with the FRG, 1970–1975], in Rocznik Polsko–Niemiecki 12/2004 (Warsaw, 2005), 52, 65. 44. AMSZ, Dep. IV, C. 1/82, V. 2, note on the second phase of MPT, 1973.

– 10 –

Bulgaria, Balkan Diplomacy and the Road to Helsinki

o

Kostadin Grozev and Jordan Baev

The Cold War Roots: Balkan Diplomacy on the Intricate Road of the Helsinki Process The 1960s and the early 1970s were quite dramatic years in the general dynamics of the Cold War era. A period that began with the greatest post-war military and political confrontation (symbolised by the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961 and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962) ended a decade and a half later with the gathering at the Helsinki Summit in 1975 of the representatives of thirty-five nation states on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The signing of the Helsinki Final Act with its ‘three Baskets’ was a display of the mutual political will of all signatories to compromise and to reach understanding in the name of European security and stability. How did the general dynamics of the Cold War leave its imprints on Balkan diplomacy? One of the most important trends of the period was the internal fragmentation and conflict within the two military and political alliances in the Balkan area – e.g. the deviation of Moscow from Romania in the late 1960s, similar to the deviation from Yugoslavia and Albania in years prior, as well as strained Greek-Turkish relations due to the Cyprus problem. Thus, the analysis of these issues is relevant to the outlining of regional trends in the Cold War confrontation and its impact on the Helsinki process.

Notes for this chapter begin on page 173.

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As far as Bulgaria is concerned, it should be pointed out that in the mid1960s its foreign policy experienced a few significant shifts in its relations with the Western world. A rather interesting new trend was the establishment of direct official contacts with the Federal Republic of Germany, through the opening of trade missions in Bonn and Sofia in 1964, and the initiation of negotiations between the foreign ministries to establish official diplomatic relations in 1967. While the final agreement was only signed in 1973, the negotiations themselves had an invigorating effect on bilateral relations. Scientific and cultural exchanges between the two countries intensified significantly, especially in the field of Balkan and Bulgarian studies, as well as in the visible increase of Alexander von Humboldt and other foundations’ grants and fellowships for research and study in West Germany. By the early 1970s the FRG had replaced France as Bulgaria’s most important partner in Western Europe. A new important element in the Balkan policy of Bulgaria, closely following the pattern dictated by Moscow, was the series of diplomatic initiatives for nuclear disarmament in the region. The propaganda slogan ‘The Balkans Free of Nuclear Weapons!’ first appeared in the late 1950s, soon after the first thaw in post-war European relations. It was in harmony with other similar Soviet bloc initiatives of the time like the Molotov plan and the Rapacki plan for a nuclear-free zone in Central Europe. The initiative was linked to the deployment of a squadron of the ‘Jupiter’ IRBMs to the Incirlic military base near Adana, Turkey. The deployment of these missiles had been proposed at the meeting in December 1957 of the North Atlantic Council and included in the special US-Turkish agreement of 1959, but they were not operational until the fall of 1961. The two other US/NATO bases in the area (Suda Bay in Crete and Nea Macri near Athens) were equipped only with the ‘Nike’ and ‘Honest John’ missiles. In the mid-1960s most of the traditional and important Cold War obstacles to the normalisation of the bilateral relations between NATO and Warsaw Pact members in the Balkans area were overcome. First signs of this can be detected from a protocol from 4 October 1966 in which Ivan Bashev – the Bulgarian Foreign Minister – reported to the Politburo of the Bulgarian Communist Party’s Central Committee about the meeting with his Turkish counterpart, Ihsan Sabri Chaglayangil. The Turkish minister stated that ‘Turkey’s participation in NATO was in no way an obstacle for the development of certain relations of Turkey with other countries beyond the pacts, in which Turkey participates … It desires to improve its relations with neighbouring countries’. Further he agreed, that ‘the Bulgarian proposal for turning the Balkan and the Adriatic area into a nuclear weapons-free zone will be a positive fact’, judging it ‘a good thing’. At the same time he pointed out that according to the Turkish side such an idea was ‘not realistic, as in the present circumstances of highly developed technology the questions of peace will not be solved through turning a small

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zone into a nuclear-free one while many possibilities remain for Moscow to fire missiles directly at Washington that will destroy it’.1 During these years, however, some new bilateral problems developed causing tension inside the two blocs. The slow but definitely escalating political discord between the Soviet Union and Romania after 1963 and the strong reactions in both Yugoslavia and Romania against the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 fed Moscow’s suspicions and motivated its firm stance against the realisation of any common initiatives on the Balkans, especially when they were being proposed and pursued without prior consultation with Moscow. Any such initiatives were viewed as efforts in pursuit of an anti-Soviet ‘regional bloc’. In these circumstances it turned out that the most important issue that kept alive the spirit of discussions and talks between the two military blocs in Europe (as well as among the states of the different European sub-regions) was the question of an all-European security arrangement based on the existing status quo. To a considerable extent the original inducement for initiating such a process was the experience accumulated during the second Berlin Crisis (1958–1962). Therefore, the fact that the government of East Germany was one of the most active initiators of a European Security Conference was not accidental. In late December 1965 the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of the GDR, Oskar Fischer, was sent to Bulgaria with a special mission. He asked the Bulgarian leadership to act as a mediator and inform the Swedish government of the East German proposals for European Security.2 The Warsaw Pact countries came forward for the first time with a special declaration ‘on strengthening peace and security in Europe’ at the Political Consultative Committee meeting in Bucharest in July 1966. The content of the document had already been discussed during the meetings in Moscow between the deputy foreign ministers (3–4 June) and the foreign ministers (6–17 June). It was at the first of these preliminary meetings that the Bulgarian representatives made three concrete proposals for redrafting the declaration proposed by the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They proposed the text on ‘inviolability of borders in Europe’ to be transferred to a more prominent place in paragraph one; the idea about creating ‘nuclear-free zones’ was to be made more explicit by referring to Central Europe, the Balkans and the Adriatic area, as well as Northern Europe. The third Bulgarian proposal envisaged the explicit enumeration of the role of the ‘neutral states’ (Switzerland, Austria and Sweden) in respect to European security.3 During the foreign ministers meeting in Moscow certain differences appeared in the positions of Romania and those of the other allies. The Romanian delegation proposed its own text of the draft declaration. The main differences in the Soviet and Romanian drafts were as follows: the Romanians regarded the document mainly as an appeal to the people of Europe while the Russians characterised it as a ‘platform for political action’. Secondly, the Romanians were against

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categorically criticising the government of West Germany, and with regard to the ‘German question’ they proposed a clause on ‘the unification of Germany’, which the Soviet side regarded as an unrealistic and un-timely goal. Moreover, the Romanians insisted on bluntly opposing the issue of military bases and the presence of foreign troops on the territory of other states, underlining that ‘the inviolability of borders is a base for achieving permanent peace’, as well as including a special reference to the ‘requirement of safeguarding state sovereignty and the equal positioning’ of the European states. In the end it turned out that some of the Romanian proposals found their way into the final text of the joint declaration of the Warsaw Pact’s Permanent Consultative Committee (PCC) meeting, although they did not change the major points in the Soviet draft.4 The theme of European peace and security was discussed very thoroughly in April 1967 during talks in Bucharest between Nicolae Ceauşescu and Todor Zhivkov. Ceauşescu put forward arguments for the Romanian position for establishing diplomatic relations with the FRG, as well as those against the ‘presupposed and preliminary conditions’ in the German question. At the same time he insisted on a statement on the ‘liquidation of the foreign military bases’ on European soil, which, in his words, was directed not against the USSR, but at ‘weakening the American influence in Europe’. Todor Zhivkov pointed out that ‘the German question’ stood at the centre of the discussion of European security issues and that no advance in substance could be achieved in the talks on European security without treating both German states on an equal basis.5 The Bulgarian government remained highly active during the preliminary consultations for organising a conference for European security in the period between 1969 and 1970. In the course of a few months the Politburo of the CC of the BCP alone received four information reports by Foreign Minister Ivan Bashev and agreed on a special resolution on this matter. In the foreign minister’s reports the existence of definite differences in the positions of the leading NATO members and those of some smaller NATO countries was analysed. On 20–21 May 1969, the Warsaw Pact’s foreign ministers met in Berlin to discuss issues related to European security. They agreed to answer in a positive manner the initiative of the Finish government to convene a preparatory meeting for setting up the framework and the agenda for an all-European conference on security and co-operation. During the discussions in Berlin several arguments were tabled in favour of such a meeting: the ‘policy of NATO of building bridges, an example of which was the New Eastern Policy of the Federal Republic of Germany’; the move of the US ‘from a line of confrontation with the USSR and the other socialist countries to a line of negotiation’. According to some information arriving in Sofia from diplomatic and intelligence channels there were significant differences between the allies at NATO’s twentieth anniversary conference over several

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issues relating to the proposed all-European conference – i.e. Great Britain insisted on a settlement of the German problem before convening the conference; France opposed the conference, saying that there were only grounds for bilateral talks; the FRG was for bilateral negotiations between NATO and the Warsaw Pact; while the most eloquent supporter of the conference was Italy, supported by Denmark, Iceland, Belgium and the Netherlands. The United States held behind-the-scenes negotiations. The Warsaw Pact ministers were of the opinion that NATO, as a whole, had decided on a ‘small steps approach’, which actually ‘meant prolonging the realisation of the conference’. Romania alone insisted on putting the European security issues up for discussion in the United Nations but that proposal was voted down.6 Later in the same year, at the end of October in Prague, a meeting was held for the foreign ministers of the Warsaw Pact countries. There the ministers discussed the preparation for the all-European conference. They approved the documents put in front of them – which had been drafted in Moscow during the previous weeks. According to the report from the Bulgarian foreign minister the convening of the conference was not considered as ‘quite sure – because some Western countries were making behind-the scenes moves for bringing about failure or at least prolonging the start of the conference … i.e., putting forward the German question as a matter of compromise on the part of the Soviet Union’. Regarding the conference’s agenda the Eastern leaders thought that it might be appropriate ‘to agree with some Western desires and put aside the discussions of some basic questions [such] as the German one, because otherwise there were no chances for a positive outcome of the conference’. An important point in the decisions taken was the acceptance of the Soviet proposal ‘not to object to the participation of the United States and Canada in the all-European conference … as well as to that of the GDR on the same basis as the FRG’. The Romanian proposal of having a direct reference in the declaration to ‘regard the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity and independence of all states and non-intervention in their internal affairs’ was not accepted. Not discussed in substance remained some far reaching Polish proposals for the signing of a draft document on the ‘basic principles for the collective security and co-operation in the Europe treaty which were to become the starting point for a creation in the more distant future of an overall security system and dismantling of military pacts alongside certain obligations for regional disarmament’.7 Considering the different points of view within NATO as well as within the Warsaw Pact, the report to the PB of the BCP’s CC on the Prague meeting, done by Bashev on 9 November 1969, concluded that the European conference would be an ‘initial stage of a long-term process’, i.e. its ‘institutionalisation’ would most probably be achieved by means of a ‘certain regularity’ in the negotiations held.8 On 2 October 1971 the Politburo approved Todor Zhivkov’s report on ‘the international situation’ with a special

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reference to ‘our peace offensive in Europe in connection with the preparation of the all-European conference’.9 These trends in the bilateral and multilateral contacts of Bulgarian diplomacy coincided with a very visible and important new element in the foreign policy implementation mechanism. It dealt with the initiation in the late 1960s of some direct political contacts with influential Western Social-Democratic, Radical, Liberal, and Christian-Democratic Parties via the Bulgarian Agrarian People’s Union (BAPU) – the small party which served as a partner of the BCP. However, this kind of political contact from a Soviet bloc country remained an exception within Eastern Europe in its policy towards the Western world in those years. With regard to its international contacts, BAPU was far more active than similar parties and organisations in other Eastern European countries. Throughout the last two decades of the East-West conflict, BAPU remained a prominent organiser of international meetings and conferences for ‘détente, peace and international dialogue’. This course clearly supplemented the more limited possibilities for political contact on the part of the communist parties. On the other hand, quite a few parties in Western Europe, Asia and the Americas found it much more acceptable to maintain official relations with an agrarian than with a communist party in Eastern Europe. At its meetings with like-minded people of Western countries the leaders of the BCP often discussed matters not meant for the wider public. The shorthand minutes of most of those talks, kept in the Communist Party archives, probably accidentally, remained unclassified, and now contribute a great deal to our understanding of the intricate dimensions of Balkan and European diplomacy from the period. The conversation between Todor Zhivkov and the Chairman of the Norwegian Communist Party Reydar Larsen, held in June 1970, was rather revealing in this respect. The Bulgarian party and state leader confidentially informed Larsen of his differences with Ceauşescu and other Romanian leaders on a number of foreign policy matters, such as the evaluation of the situation in the Middle East or the 1968 intervention in Czechoslovakia. Concerning bilateral relations, he stated: ‘As a government we maintain with Norway normal relations. As “normal” I mean that we are a socialist country, a member of the Warsaw Pact while Norway is a capitalist country, a member of NATO.’ On his part the Norwegian communist leader informed him about the nature of the division in the leadership of his party. He characterised the appointment of a new Norwegian foreign minister as a ‘turn to the right in the foreign policy’ of his country.10 In summary, it should be acknowledged that the Bulgarian and Balkan perspectives to the process that led to the Helsinki Final Act and the so-called Helsinki process was a unique phase in the history of the East-West conflict that reflected the deep changes in the structure of international relations as a result of the global trends and dynamics leading to the era of détente. Factors

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such as the end of European hegemony in world affairs, decolonisation, and the emergence of the Third World, oil diplomacy and the rising awareness of terrorism as a new trans-border phenomenon became substantial elements of East-West realities and their complex dynamics, but at the same time they had an impact of their own on the relations between the superpowers. Thus, détente in itself can be studied as a logical phase in the transformation of the international system that became a reality in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is especially interesting to see how the issue of European security was permanently entangled in the European balance of power centred on the German question and the borders in Central Europe. Similar dynamics can be traced in the evolving Bulgarian foreign policy. An important aspect in the early 1970s was the radical improvement of Bulgaria’s relations with its neighbouring countries and the bilateral discussions on the multilateral Balkan co-operation initiative. This initiative had survived the many twists and turns of the Cold War era, the military coups in Greece and Turkey, the invasion in Czechoslovakia, the Cyprus conflict and the Middle East war and the superpowers’ strong obstructions to such ideas.11 In his speech at the Warsaw Pact PCC meeting in Prague on 25 January 1972 Todor Zhivkov drew special attention to the ‘evolution in NATO’ concerning the convening of a European Security Conference, specifying the existence of three lines of approach in the North Atlantic Treaty: ‘Countries like France with positions close to or coinciding with ours’; the group of small Western European countries with ‘hesitant’ attitudes and the position of London and Washington wanting to exercise pressure on the smaller associates. At the same time Zhivkov characterised as ‘ideologically subversive the idea of free movement of people, ideas and information’.12 In his information on the progress of the European Security Conference in Helsinki, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Petar Mladenov often particularly acknowledged the role of Denmark in reaching compromise and mutually acceptable terms of expression during the working out of the main documents. Summing up the planned next phases of negotiations after the June 1973 talks in Helsinki (first round in Helsinki, next in Geneva and the final one again in Helsinki) Mladenov stressed the achieved agreement on the agenda based on mutual compromise. At the same time his forecast for the future was that ‘the talks in Geneva will be the most complex ones’.13 A special Politburo meeting on 24 June 1973 discussed the preparation of the conference and declared success for the first phase of the CSCE preparatory work. The BCP’s leadership focused on the particular difference of opinions displayed between the Eastern and Western European delegations on the military dimensions of security. The Western experts backed by the Romanian and Yugoslav delegation had insisted on the military aspects of security – directly linking the negotiations in Helsinki with the MBFR talks in Vienna. Particular successes in the Socialist camp

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were seen in the avoidance of Malta’s proposal to invite Tunisia and Algeria to the conference (backed by France and Spain) and the proposal by Canada, Denmark and the Netherlands of allowing a representative of Israel to speak at the conference. A serious disagreement that was not yet settled was the level of representation at the final conference – the Soviet bloc countries insisted on the highest level of representation. The Bulgarian delegation reported that it was working ‘in the closest co-operation with the Soviet comrades’ – on ‘their suggestion Bulgaria proposed the proposal of Malta to be studied in a special working group’. That suggestion was backed by Greece, Turkey, Yugoslavia, Cyprus and Sweden and thus accepted.14 The negotiations in Geneva and Helsinki put additional strain on the realisation of the multilateral Balkan initiative. These efforts increased the superpowers’ suspicions of the real motives and goals of the different Balkan countries and the eventual development of secret diplomacy in the area, which could get beyond their monitoring and control. Paradoxically, this happened at a time when the superpowers themselves were engaged in secret diplomacy on a global scale, which made possible the setting up of new diplomatic priorities in the triangle Washington-Moscow-Beijing. Symptomatic for these suspicions were the confidential talks of Leonid Brezhnev with Zhivkov in September 1973 in Bulgaria. They focused in much detail on that particular issue. The Soviet leader expressed his strong opinion against a multilateral initiative in the Balkans, inspired by Romania and Yugoslavia, which could have ‘an anti-Soviet context’.15 Brezhnev also proposed that Zhivkov was welcome to request from all Soviet foreign policy agencies any actual information on those complicated issues. Following this proposal, three high-ranking Soviet diplomats provided ‘detailed consultations’ to Zhivkov on the sensitive points in Soviet-Romanian relations before his meeting with Nicolae Ceauşescu in June 1975. One of the Soviet experts’ recommendations was directed to the specific Romanian view of multilateral co-operation that differed substantially from the Kremlin’s goals and vision: ‘It is essential that NATO’s influence in the region be curbed. Maybe we will be able to achieve the removal of foreign military bases on the territory of Cyprus, Greece, and Turkey. However, our Romanian comrades do not seek such co-operation. They have obviously set other goals and objectives.’16 In a similar fashion, Washington was worried about the anti-American feeling that had increased in Turkey and Greece during the climax of the Cyprus crisis.17 The insistent appeals from influential Greek politicians for leaving NATO and for the closure of the American military bases on Greek territory after the fall of the military junta from power in 1974 also troubled the US government. In a 1975 National Security Decision Memorandum regarding ‘US Security Policy Toward Greece’ it was strongly noted: ‘The principal US

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objective in the negotiations is to preserve to the extent possible the existing US security arrangements with Greece while encouraging Greece’s return to full participation in NATO. The United States should seek to regain full effective use of those US facilities considered most important to US security interests.’18

The Repercussions: Balkan Diplomacy between Détente and Regional Security in the Aftermath of the Helsinki Final Act The process of détente, inspired by the Helsinki Summit in 1975, produced some favourable circumstances for improving and developing bilateral and regional relations in Europe. An impetus was given to more intensive bilateral and multilateral contacts in the economic and political field, as well as to new initiatives in the different regions of Europe – between countries with different political systems (i.e. Hungary-Austria or Bulgaria-Greece). However, the superpowers’ views often dominated its smaller allies’ intentions, motivated by ‘bloc rivalry’ and ‘spheres of influence’ thinking and psychology. Central Europe remained the main battleground of this conflict, but this principal confrontation was accompanied by not so clear-cut tensions and drifts in the periphery of the bloc. Sometimes even hesitant and shy efforts for regional cooperation were deliberately impeded and subordinated to the Kremlin’s and the White House’s ‘strategic security interests’ and the current development of the relations between the Soviet Union and the United States. Thus, the Cold War philosophy and policy contributed, in addition to some traditional historical, cultural, ethnic and religious conflicts, to a postponement of many old and newly created inter-state and intra-state problems in the region. At the same time in regions such as the Balkans there existed serious discord not only between the blocs but also within them. Sometimes the contradictions among some allied states were more serious than the traditional differences between states with opposing social systems. The Greek-Turkish and the Soviet-Romanian relations are typical examples (actually there were moments of tension in the relations of Romania with its other Warsaw Pact neighbours as well). The situation in the region – a small micro-universe of Europe – was complicated additionally by the ambitious, independent policy of Yugoslavia as a leader of the movement of the non-aligned states and by the specific course of Albania, hostile to both blocs (and from the beginning of the 1980s, hostile also to its former great ally China). However, a unique model of good neighbour relations in the Balkans was established during the 1980s between states belonging to opposing military alliances but having similar foreign political aims and interests (i.e. Bulgaria and Greece). During the Helsinki process the significance of the neutral and non-aligned European countries in settling down controversies and finding common language

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on matters of dispute increased very much. This tendency caused a growing interest towards them, and was a subject of discussion in the Bulgarian diplomatic and political analyses. In a report about the results of the Helsinki summit and related problems in the on-going discussion of European security and co-operation after Helsinki the Bulgarian ministry of foreign affairs acknowledged the consultations and discussions of the Bulgarian representatives with several Western countries. They were grouped in three categories: (a) the neutral countries (Finland, Austria and Sweden) which played a positive role and displayed a considerable interest in regulating the process of European co-operation; (b) countries which did not display much interest in the realisation of the Helsinki Final Act (Turkey, Greece, Spain, Ireland, Cyprus and Portugal); (c) countries which displayed considerable energy in specific fields (e.g. the so-called Third Basket) of the Final Act aiming at stimulating the ‘ideological erosion’ of the socialist system (West Germany, Great Britain, France, USA, the Netherlands).19 An information report from the Foreign Minister, Petar Mladenov for the Politburo of the CC of the BCP of 20 December 1976, on the execution of the Helsinki Final Act and the preparation of the Belgrade meeting, pointed out the ‘conscientious’ attitude of the neutral countries towards overcoming the confrontation between Moscow and Washington. The document explicitly stated: ‘For the sake of clarifying the intentions and points of view of the other participating countries, our country had bilateral consultations with Sweden.’ In another report to the Politburo from 14 July 1978 with information on the results of the CSCE meeting in Belgrade, Mladenov examined the position of each separate group of countries, and concluded: ‘Since the meeting took place under the shadow of confrontation between the East and the West, the possibilities of the neutral countries … to play the role of an intermediary in finding compromises were limited.’ In November 1978 the Foreign Ministry received a detailed analysis on the role of the neutral countries (Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Finland, Yugoslavia) in the European security process.20 A particular point of interest in the events analysed, is the development of US policy towards the Eastern European states during the Carter administration that was motivated by the concept of ‘differentiation’. It was described in detail in Carter’s Presidential Directive NSC-21 of September 1977. Since the argument of ‘an internal liberalisation’ was not applicable both for the Zhivkov and Ceauşescu regimes, the criterion of ‘international independence’ was used for Romania and Bulgaria. This criterion was defined in the following way: ‘Relative independence from the Soviet Union in the conduct of foreign policy as manifested in the degree to which Eastern European states resist associating themselves with Soviet foreign policy initiatives.’21 Unlike Ceauşescu, Zhivkov based his policy on close relations with the Soviet Union seeking economic profits and stability for political loyalty, and frequently used in his dealings

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with Brezhnev the tactic and slogans of ‘a comprehensive rapprochement’ between Bulgaria and the USSR. The superpowers’ attitudes had a direct impact on the behaviour of their Balkan allies. The promotion of the idea for a multilateral Balkan co-operation by Romania and Greece intensified in the mid-1970s. Yet it was silently sabotaged at the time by Turkey and Bulgaria – the closest allies in the region with respect to Washington and Moscow. This became obvious just a month after the signing of the Final Act. A BCP’s Politburo meeting of 2 September 1975 discussed the proposal made by Constantine Karamanlis during meetings at the Helsinki Summit with Zhivkov, Tito and Ceauşescu for holding a conference of the deputy-foreign ministers of all Balkan countries. Karamanlis sent a message to Zhivkov repeating the general opinion reached in Helsinki on holding an all-Balkan meeting. According to the Bulgarian side by this diplomatic initiative the Greek government acted ‘within the framework of the strategic goals of the Western countries to weaken and then to break the links of the Balkan socialist countries with the socialist community, especially of Romania and Bulgaria with the USSR and the Warsaw Pact’. Moreover, this proposal had an ‘anti-Turkish direction’. In the opinion of the BCP, Romania would give ‘a quick and positive answer’, Yugoslavia – with some reserves – would ‘also agree, especially if Turkey is also present’, Albania would show some interest, but would ‘hardly be able to react with certain flexibility’, while Turkey ‘in view of its sharp conflict with Greece would have great difficulties to accept an initiative coming from Athens, thus it will make every effort to make the meeting a failure’. In these circumstances Bulgaria should be careful and insist on bilateral relations, ‘in concurrence with Soviet diplomacy’, because ‘there are no objective conditions for multilateral political initiatives’.22 In view of all the arguments cited, it was understandable why, during the talks between Todor Zhivkov and Suleyman Demirel in December 1975, both statesmen agreed that existing conditions were favourable for carrying out only bilateral, not multilateral co-operation. If a multilateral regional co-operation could be reached it should ‘start at a less than political level and cover only definite coordinated fields’.23 Anyway, during the meeting with the Greek prime minister in April 1976, the Bulgarian leader listened carefully to the arguments of Karamanlis who supported the initiative for multilateral Balkan co-operation.24 A month later, in a letter to Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko, the Bulgarian leader cautiously suggested the necessity for regional co-operation in the Balkans ‘in some fields’. Otherwise, wrote Zhivkov, ‘Bulgaria could remain isolated in the region’.25 The Soviet attitude remained unchanged. During the preparation of the Warsaw Pact PCC meeting in November 1976 in Bucharest, the Romanian representatives insisted on the inclusion of a specific passage for Balkan co-operation in the paragraph of the joint declaration, dealing with the regional co-operation in Europe. After

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a categorical objection by the Soviet side, the Romanians were compelled to withdraw their proposal.26 A detailed discussion on the same issue took place during the talks between Brezhnev and Zhivkov in Yalta on 14 August 1978. Leonid Ilich was especially close to his Balkan ally, having developed special cordial relations during the past decade: I know, Todor, that many times you had the opportunity to speak frankly with Ceauşescu. It is obvious that the necessity of such an influence now becomes especially important, moreover having in mind that the Romanians create diplomatic complications for Bulgaria with their policy regarding the Balkan co-operation. When they make a fuss on the question of the establishment of a Balkan co-operation, they do not do this merely like that. In the regional co-operation development in the Balkans, the Romanians, as well as the Yugoslavs and the Greeks, see a way to decrease the influence of the Warsaw Pact states in the zone. This is the essence of their approach … We should decisively counter-act all the projects for creation of an autonomous Balkan group with its own ‘particular interests’.

Brezhnev’s words contain the quintessence of the USSR’s firm attitude on that issue. As was his custom, Zhivkov tried carefully to manoeuvre during the conversation to reach some compromise concessions without having his powerful protector (through whom he obtained considerable financial and economic support for improving the Bulgarian economy) lose his temper: Regarding our policy in the Balkans, I would like to state that we coordinate all our steps with the Soviet Union … The situation on our peninsula is extremely complicated … The steps, which we undertake here, are aimed at keeping Bulgaria from isolation. In the Balkans there are some common problems in the settlement of which Bulgaria should also participate. Otherwise we shall isolate ourselves from the other Balkan states … We would like to be understood well. If we approach these questions with prejudice and we strictly support the concepts of some people not to participate in any common Balkan initiatives, we shall become isolated from the other Balkan states. And this will not be in our common favour.27

At a meeting with the Greek prime minister on the island of Corfu in April 1979, several months after he had carefully stated his opinion before the Soviet leader, Zhivkov agreed with Karamanlis to start preparations for a multilateral Balkan meeting at the expert level. In executing their agreement, Karamanlis again raised in letters to the leaders of Yugoslavia, Romania and Turkey the idea for multilateral Balkan co-operation in the ‘spirit of Helsinki’. As expected by the Bulgarian side, Tito and Ceauşescu immediately supported the initiative but there was no concrete response on behalf of Turkey.28 The US attitude was as expected. In a secret intelligence report on the existing contradictions between the United States and Greece, sent to Zhivkov by Bulgarian Minister

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of the Interior Stoyanov on 8 September 1979, it was explicitly stated: ‘The USA considers the Karamanlis initiative for multilateral co-operation as a negative factor to Greek-American relations.’29

Some Conclusions The Helsinki process and its aftermath, which finally led to the establishment of a permanent mechanism for guaranteeing European security in the form of the CSCE and eventually the OSCE, was a long, painful and difficult process of reconciling hostile attitudes accumulated through the Cold War years. The very fact that the CSCE/OSCE framework managed to survive and even outlive the East-West confrontation of this period is very indicative of its vitality and the fact that it filled a certain vacuum in the functioning of the international system. Having been envisaged as a mechanism of finding security in the everevolving multipolar world of the first half of the 1970s these mechanisms and frameworks of common understanding are now in the fourth decade of their evolution. Turning our attention back to the initial phase of an obviously quite long historical process and its corresponding institutions and practices we can today say that in the power-politics of the period the periphery sometimes played an equal part to that of the centre, while regions such as Scandinavia and the Balkans had some important role to play in the unfolding and occasionally dramatic diplomatic play. This analysis leads to three general conclusions. The first one deals with the shifts of Bulgarian foreign policy in the second half of the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s. Following closely Moscow’s course in international affairs, Bulgaria took certain inroads into reshaping, at least on the surface, its policy to the Western world – here came the establishment of direct official contacts with the Federal Republic of Germany (1973) and the rising to embassy level of the Bulgarian representation to the United States (1967). The second quite important change was the radical improvement of Bulgaria’s relations with its neighbouring countries and the discussion of a multi­ lateral Balkan co-operation initiative. Here the analysis was able to show the many sharp turns and failures of the initiative on the background of the superpowers’ strong obstructions to such an idea. And the third visible change in Bulgarian foreign policy aimed at a serious rapprochement with Western Europe was the establishment of direct political contacts with influential Centre-Right Radical, Liberal, and Christian-Democratic Parties through the BAPU – a unique example of an Eastern European policy position towards the Western world in those years.

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Notes 1. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 6, File 6409, 6–7, CC BCP Politburo Records, Information from Bashev to Politburo, 4 October 1966. 2. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 6, File 6118, 77–83, Politburo Protocol, 11 January 1966. 3. DA, Record 32-P, File 12, 42–44, Record of the Warsaw Pact meetings, 1955–1969. 4. DA, Record 32-P, File 16, 97–99; CDA, Fond 1, Record 34, File 39. 5. TsDA, Fond 1, Record 34, File 53, 21–38, Stenographic Protocol of ZhivkovCeauşescu talks, 17 April 1967. 6. TsDA, Politburo Protocol, 24 June 1969, Fond 1-B, Record 35, File 736, 3–14. Also, DA, Record 20-P, File 805, 175–177. 7. TsDA, Politburo Protocol, 16 December 1969, Fond 1-B, Record 35, File 1048, 6–14. 8. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 24 June 1969, File 736, 3–14; Politburo Protocol, 16 December 1969, File 1048, 6–18; Politburo Protocol, 15 January 1970, File 1171, 2–3. 9. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 2 October 1971, File 2499, 3–111. 10. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 60, File 46, 1–32, Stenographic Protocol of ZhivkovLarsen talks, 11 June 1970. 11. Since the Turkish and Greek archives are still closed for the period of the 1960s to the 1980s, most of the documentary evidence relevant for the Balkan dimension of the Helsinki process is to be found in the Bulgarian diplomatic, political and security archives. 12. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 28 June 1972, File 2828, 134–136. 13. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 26 June 1973, File 4204, 2–6. 14. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 24 July 1973, File 4243, 8–16. 15. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 360, 36, Zhivkov-Brezhnev talks, 20 September 1973. 16. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 414, 12, Information on the situation in Romania, 11 June 1975. 17. NARA, RG 59, Central Foreign Policy Files 1967–1969, boxes 1637, 2157, 2551. 18. NSA, Washington, D. C., Presidential Directives Collection, box 9, NSDM 291. 19. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1165, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Information ‘People’s Republic of Bulgaria and Some Problems of European Détente after the CSCE Conference’, Sofia, 1 August 1976. 20. Ministry of Foreign Affairs Department, ‘Political Research, Planning and Information’, for official use only. Positions of the Neutral and Non-aligned European states in regard to the European Security and Cooperation matters and their influence on the policy of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria. Sofia, 20 November 1978. 21. NARA, PD/NSC 21, NSSD 5–82. 22. TsDA, Fond 1-B, Record 35, Politburo Protocol, 2 September 1975, File 5442, 4–16. 23. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1152, 5–7, Information on Zhivkov-Demirel talks, 9 December 1976. 24. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1163, 7–8, Information on Zhivkov-Karamanlis talks, 11 April 1976.

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25. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1163, 14, Letter from Zhivkov to Gromyko, 20 May 1976. 26. DA, Record 28-P, File 281, 226, Record of Warsaw Pact Foreign Ministers meeting, Sofia, 24–25 April 1976. 27. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 495, Stenographic Protocol of Zhivkov-Brezhnev talks, 14 August 1978. 28. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1190, Folder 11, 13 and 15, Letter from Karamanlis to Zhivkov, 11 May 1979. 29. TsDA, Fond 378-B, Todor Zhivkov Personal Records, File 1190, Folder 4, 8, Intelligence Information on US-Greek Relations, 8 September 1979.

– 11 –

Unintended Consequences Soviet Interests, Expectations and Reactions to the Helsinki Final Act

o

Svetlana Savranskaya

This chapter will analyse Soviet interests and expectations in the process leading up to the signing of the Helsinki Final Act, and the reaction by the Soviet authorities to the domestic consequences of the signing – the emergence of powerful human rights movements. The first part of the analysis will trace the evolution of the Soviet position on the CSCE, and will make an attempt to outline some internal disagreements within the Soviet government regarding the negotiations. The second part will look at the development of human rights movements throughout the Soviet Union and the KGB efforts to suppress them. Obviously, the most interesting questions deal with the Soviet internal struggle for the formulation of the Helsinki position. Why did the Soviet Union make a concerted effort in the late 1960s to convene the European conference? What Soviet interests and priorities was it supposed to serve? Were there any differing positions within the Central Committee?1 What role did Brezhnev himself play in the process? Did the Soviet authorities anticipate the strengthening of the human rights movement after 1975? Did the Helsinki Final Act make a dent in the KGB tactics or did it treat the new movement as ‘business as usual’? Was Western pressure a factor in the Soviet authorities’ treatment of the dissidents after the Final Act? All these questions are directly relevant to a larger and more important question of the Helsinki

Notes for this chapter begin on page 189.

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effect – whether and how the human rights movements of the late 1970s prepared the ground for the transformation of the Soviet Union and the international system in the 1980s. Even though the documentary base is far from complete,2 what emerges is an interesting story of unintended consequences, high hopes and bitter disappointments on the Soviet side, which provides a link between the high détente of the early 1970s and the end of the Cold War.

Early Soviet Position on the CSCE: Interests and Expectations, 1965–1972 In the mid-1960s, the Soviet Union entered a new stage in its development, which could be called the age of parity. The Soviet Union was trying to achieve strategic parity with the United States by all means, even if it meant serious sacrifices in terms of diverting resources away from civilian needs. To parity were attributed several desirable qualities. It was believed that parity would grant the Soviet Union its desired status as a superpower and enable it to pursue the socialist vision globally, just as the United States was spreading its capitalist ideology worldwide.3 One can argue that the perception of parity made it possible for the Soviet leadership to seriously enter into the CSCE negotiations and to make the concessions on the issues belonging to Basket III. In the early 1970s, after parity was confirmed by the SALT-I and ABM treaties and by US-Soviet summits, the overriding goal of the Brezhnev regime became an international confirmation of the newly achieved status quo. In the domestic political struggle, Leonid Brezhnev gradually took control of foreign policy issues, which allowed him to place himself ahead of Alexei Kosygin and, by the early 1970s, be recognised domestically and internationally as head of the Soviet state. The European security conference idea and the beginning of the arms control process were the two issues closest to his heart and his carefully cultivated image of peacemaker. The earliest signs of détente developed in Soviet-French relations in 1965– 1966, which corresponded to De Gaulle’s new vision of a more Europeancentred Europe.4 In July 1966 the Warsaw Pact countries issued the Bucharest Declaration, which called for the convening of a pan-European Security Conference and proposed a seven-point agenda for the discussions on European security. Two important aspects of that programme were its focus on Europe while excluding the United States, and the call for a simultaneous dissolution of both NATO and the Warsaw Pact. According to Georgy Kornienko, at the time head of the US desk at the USSR Foreign Ministry, the Soviet leadership understood very well that the idea of the European conference was not realistic if the United States was barred from participation, but that the decision was

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made to appeal to the Europeans first and then invite the US later, presenting this as a Soviet concession.5 The idea of a simultaneous dissolution of the two military blocs was at the heart of the Soviet vision of what a European conference could bring – a new security structure in Europe, which would make it more Europe-centred and render the US less influential on the continent. This idea survived the end of détente, the new era of tensions in the early 1980s, and was ultimately developed by Gorbachev in his vision for a common European house, and in the Paris Charter of November 1990. In March 1969, at its meeting in Budapest, the Political Consultative Committee of the Warsaw Pact adopted a further declaration calling for an early meeting of all interested states to determine the procedure and agenda for a European conference. The text of the latter Budapest Declaration differed from the former Bucharest Declaration of 1966 quite significantly in its tone, which was less ideological, and in that it did not focus on the threat of US imperialism to world peace. It did not present the idea of the conference as an exclusively European affair either. The change was quickly noticed in the United States.6 While the Soviet active pursuit of the idea of the European Security Conference was made possible by the anticipation of the attainment of strategic parity with the United States, as noted above, the overriding Soviet goal was to finalise the post-war borders in Europe. As the preliminary negotiations on opening the conference were entering their final stage, the Soviet Union launched a Peace Programme at the 24th Congress of the CPSU in the opening report by the General Secretary. Arms control and the idea of European security were the two keystones of the Programme. A secondary goal of the Soviet Union was to expand trade relations and achieve some degree of integration in the European economy. Initial Soviet proposals did not include humanitarian issues, which later were commonly referred to as Basket III. Once the negotiations began in Dipoli in November 1972, the Soviet Union actively engaged its domestic intellectual potential to formulate the position and employed all its leverage within the Warsaw Pact to make the position of the socialist countries more or less unified. Internally, several research institutes of the Soviet Academy of sciences were charged with drafting proposals for further discussion at the Foreign Ministry and the Central Committee. Most active conceptual work was conducted by the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO), which at the time was headed by academician Nikolai N. Inozemtsev. The initial drafts of the Soviet position focused on the creation of a permanent organ, which would be the outcome of the conference and would become the cornerstone of a new security structure in Europe. Soviet experts understood that the proposal to create such an organ would be seen as controversial by the United States, and confirm US suspicions that such a permanent

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structure could be directed at weakening American influence in Europe. A memo prepared by IMEMO stated the positive consequences for the Soviet Union from the creation of a permanent organ: ‘Positions of non-European powers (USA, Canada), would be somewhat weakened, and those of Western European countries pursuing the policies of détente and co-operation with the socialist commonwealth strengthened. One should not exclude the expectation of stimulating centrifugal tendencies within NATO.’7 The Soviet position envisioned three stages of development of the system of European security, based on the Peace Programme formulated by the 24th Party Congress: First Stage: Europe after the Conference. The bloc structure would remain the same. However, under the impact of the détente process, through the implementation of security principles by all European states, and by developing cooperation, gradually conditions for a certain relaxation of the confrontation between the blocs would emerge. Second Stage: Curtailment of Military Functions of the Blocs. The process of weakening bloc structures would unfold in this phase. It would encompass the gradual reduction of the military functions of the blocs, leading to a lessening of the military-political confrontation and the initiation of military détente. Third Stage: European Security System. The ESS would further this trend towards future liquidation of the bloc structure. The ESS would lead to substantial reduction of the military functions of the blocs, creating both the conditions and the framework for a bloc-free Europe.8 The proposal also called for further institutionalisation of the collective security system in Europe, including the creation of international European armed forces for conflict resolution. During Nixon’s visit to Moscow in May 1972, Brezhnev raised the issue of the European conference and his desire for a rapid conclusion. In his personal notes of the meeting, Brezhnev specially noted Nixon’s promise to help bring the conference to conclusion as early as 1973, as well as Nixon’s complaint that it was easier for the Soviet Union to speak for their allies on this issue than it was for the United States.9

Domestic Politics and Differences in Formulating the Soviet Position There is a well-known Soviet veterans’ anecdote about the internal clash between the proponents and opponents of the Helsinki agreements, expressed

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succinctly by Yuri Kashlev: ‘A funny situation developed: for Geneva and Helsinki, Brezhnev and Gromyko presented us, members of the delegation, with awards, and then Suslov put the head of the delegation, Anatoly Kovalev, on a black list.’10 His reminiscences provide evidence that Yuri Dubinin, the head of the group entrusted with negotiating Basket III issues in the preparatory talks, represented the hard-line position of anti-Brezhnevite forces, and in doing so often disregarded the instructions of the delegation leader, Kovalev.11 Kovalev himself talks about two groups of people in the Soviet government, the ‘people of détente’ and the ‘people of the Cold War’.12 His unpublished memoirs show that Kovalev was acutely aware of the institutional stakes involved and of the consequences that could and would result from a successful conclusion of the CSCE. While there was no internal disagreement on the importance of the security elements and the confirmation of post-war borders in Europe, some issues of Basket II and particularly Basked III provoked sharp differences of opinion among the Soviet leadership. All available evidence points to Brezhnev being personally committed to the idea of the conference. In the end that was what mattered in the internal Soviet debate. To date Brezhnev’s role as the moving force for détente has been under appreciated in traditional accounts of Soviet foreign policy. However, as Anatoly Chernyaev, who worked in the CC CPSU International Department under Brezhnev before he became Mikhail Gorbachev’s chief foreign policy assistant, points out, once Brezhnev took full command of Soviet foreign policy in 1972–1973, he became the driving force for détente. According to Chernyaev, Brezhnev ‘believed in the possibility of “peacemaking with imperialism” … He differed from his colleagues in that, as General Secretary, he was less dependent on ideological stereotypes … and it was permissible for him, unlike the others, to ignore sacred cows, when necessary’.13 In the Soviet discourse of the early 1970s, détente remained linked with the success of the CSCE negotiations. The Soviet leaders were welcoming Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik, détente with France and the start of arms control negotiations as integral parts of one general tendency ultimately culminating in the negotiations on the European security framework – and they saw the Soviet Union as assuming leadership in this process. Brezhnev called the opening of the preliminary negotiations a ‘big victory’ for the Soviet Union and emphasised that ‘in the struggle for peace we are the instigators and organisers of this policy in Europe’.14 Claiming to be the leader of the European nations, of course, also suited and enhanced Brezhnev’s image of his role in history. The attention the CSCE negotiations received at the highest level became evident in the fact that the Plena of April 1973 and April 1975 – the only ones from 1973 to 1980 that dealt specifically with foreign policy matters – discussed the CSCE negotiations. Each time Gromyko gave reports on the progress of

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the negotiations. Several Politburo sessions discussed various issues related to CSCE, and at least one – on 7 January 1974 – focused on it specifically.15 While some Russian authors claim that Brezhnev did not read the Final Act and so did not comprehend its full potential in terms of the human rights movement, I would argue that the reality was more complex and intriguing. Brezhnev was very personally involved in the formulation of the Soviet position, especially at the beginning while his health still allowed it. In various statements, beginning notably with his report to the 24th Party Congress, his conversations with leaders of socialist countries, his discussions with Nixon and Kissinger, and in the Politburo sessions, Brezhnev emerges as the most powerful and committed advocate of the CSCE, who was willing to make serious concessions in order to bring the negotiations to a conclusion and to sign the accords at the highest level, in the most representative pan-European gathering since the Treaty of Versailles. However, his interactions with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger led him to believe (with substantial assurances from the US) that the West would abide first and foremost by the principle of non-interference in internal affairs and so pay less attention to the human rights provisions. In a statement on humanitarian issues in the CSCE negotiations made in December 1972, the Soviet General Secretary explicitly outlined his position as the following: ‘One often hears that the West attaches importance to cooperation in the cultural domain and especially to the exchange of ideas, border information and contacts between nations. Permit us to declare here in all honesty: we too are in favor of this if, of course, such co-operation is conducted with due respect for the sovereignty of each country.’ He proceeded to mention that such co-operation should be conducted ‘in the spirit of mutual respect and non-interference in each other’s affairs, and not in a Cold War spirit’.16 On 18 March 1975, just three months after his debilitating stroke, Brezhnev met with leaders of fraternal countries in Budapest to make one final push towards the conclusion of the conference. In the meeting, he described the conference as his highest priority and declared that a successful outcome ‘would be a great political victory’. He mentioned that the Soviet Union had to ‘show flexibility’ and make concessions, and even agreed to cancel the military parade in Red Square on Victory Day because ‘there is no need to rattle the tanks and the missiles along the square during the period of the intensive struggle for peace, which we have started in the international arena’. Brezhnev also proposed to postpone the Conference of European Communist Parties until after the signing of the Helsinki Accords.17 Opposition to Helsinki, or, more specifically, to the inclusion of the humanitarian provisions into the final agreements, was demonstrated by the powerful Ideology Secretary of the Central Committee and full member of the Politburo, Mikhail Suslov, and less prominently by the head of the International Department of the Central Committee, Boris Ponomarev. In fact, Kovalev

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confirmed the rumour that Suslov put him on the black list and removed his name from the list of members of the Revision Commission of the Communist Party, which should have been ‘elected’ by the 25th Congress of the Communist Party in 1976.18 Ironically, at the Congress, General Secretary Brezhnev lavished praise on the Helsinki Final Act as being a major foreign policy achievement for the Soviet Union. The position of the Foreign Ministry was formulated in outline by Anatoly Kovalev and presented to the Politburo by Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, who generally supported Kovalev, but was extremely apprehensive about the human rights provisions of the agreements. Kovalev later remembered Gromyko repeatedly using a sharp phrase, which was to become a commonplace in his ministry: ‘It would be good to cut out the bottom from under this Third Basket.’19 Clearly, Kovalev’s advocacy would not have been possible without strong support from Gromyko. Gromyko monitored negotiations very closely, and in addition to official reports, received personal letters from Kovalev about his efforts to resolve most controversial issues during the negotiations.20 With Gromyko’s approval, Kovalev met directly with Defence Minister Grechko and KGB chairman Andropov to reach compromises on the most complex issues. If Brezhnev and his closest Politburo colleagues did not anticipate the effect of Helsinki, there is some evidence that the foresight of the head of the KGB was more realistic. According to Kovalev, who had to clear every concession on Basket III with Andropov personally, during one such meeting Andropov expressed his view of the Helsinki Accords in the following way: ‘The principle of inviolability of borders – this is of course good, very good. But I am concerned about something else: the borders will be inviolable in the military sense, but in all other respects, as a result of the expansion of contacts, of the flow of information, they will become transparent … So far, the game is being played on one side of the field – the MFA is gaining the points, and the KGB is losing them.’21 According to his biographer, a prominent dissident himself, Roy Medvedev, Andropov saw the need for an agreement like Helsinki, with its humanitarian provisions, but thought it would only be appropriate for the Soviet Union in ten or fifteen years, after a substantial improvement in the economic situation.22

Early Protest Movements in the USSR and the KGB’s Success in Suppressing the First Wave of Dissidents To start with a definition of terms, it would be useful to look at the KGB’s understanding of the term ‘dissident’, which was usually used either in quotation marks or with the phrase ‘so-called’ preceding the word ‘dissident’, suggesting that it was a foreign concept, alien both to the Russian language and reality. According to Andropov, ‘one has to say that the term “dissident” as

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such represents a cunning propaganda manoeuvre, intended to confuse the public … By coining it, the bourgeois propaganda hopes to create an impression that the Soviet society does not tolerate any independent thinking on the part of its citizens, and persecutes anybody who thinks differently’.23 Yuri Andropov became head of the KGB in May 1967, after the removal of Vladimir Semichastny. His appointment was seen as a positive change by the Soviet intelligentsia, and his initial approach to dealing with dissent seemed less harsh than that of his predecessor, but also more systematic. Andropov was not a professional intelligence officer, but a head of the Department of the Central Committee in charge of relations with communist and workers’ parties of socialist countries. He was seen, and saw himself, as an intellectual and maintained extensive contacts with the Soviet intelligentsia. Very soon after becoming the head of the KGB, Andropov introduced three major innovations to the KGB’s policy on dissent. On 3 July 1967, in a letter to the Central Committee, he proposed creating a new Directorate – Directorate V – for handling the political opposition, ‘to carry out tasks of struggle against acts of ideological subversion on the territory of the country’.24 The directorate was set up at the end of July. The first two cases handled by Directorate V concerned Andrei Sakharov and Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and from thereon all Soviet dissidents became case files of the same directorate. In April 1969, Andropov proposed expanding the use of forced psychiatric treatment and creating a network of psychiatric hospitals, both of which soon came to be accepted in a secret resolution by the USSR’s Council of Ministers.25 The use of psychiatry for political purposes was not new, but it was expanded substantially under Andropov and became the method of choice especially in situations where outright arrests were seen as potentially problematic. In November 1972, the KGB introduced yet another innovation, called ‘prophylactics’ or preventive warning, in their fight against internal dissidents. In such cases, the KGB would summon a person and issue a special written warning about the impermissibility of his actions and order him to cease and desist. If the person did stop the actions in question, the warning would be transferred to the Procuracy, where it would become a dormant part of that person’s file. The proposal was approved by the Politburo on 16 November 1972. The number of persons tried and sentenced for anti-Soviet propaganda grew with each year in the late 1970s, and substantially picked up after Andropov came to power: 20 people in 1965, 48 in 1966, 103 in 1967, 129 in 1968, 195 in 1969 and 204 in 1970. As a comparison, between 1976 and 1980, 347 people were sentenced for political crimes in total, and 540 between 1981 and 1985.26 The period after the Helsinki Accords looks unusually calm. Using this combination of methods, the authorities were quite successful in suppressing the first wave of the dissident movement. The Soviet government had every reason to expect only a minimal effect of the Final Act on the dissident

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movement due not only to Andropov’s successes, but also to an understanding reached on this issue between the superpowers, and specifically between the Soviet government, on one side, and Henry Kissinger, on the other.

Reaction to the Publication of the Final Act in the Soviet Union and the Emergence of the Helsinki Watch Groups In August 1975, the publication of the text of the Final Act in the Soviet press was followed instantaneously by the first samizdat materials linking the Final Act with the human rights situation in the USSR. Also in August, a US congressional delegation visited the Soviet Union. One member of the delegation, Representative Millicent Fenwick (described by Brezhnev as ‘obsessive’) from New Jersey, was especially interested in the human rights situation in the Soviet Union and began meeting with refuseniks in Moscow and Leningrad. In one of her meetings at the home of Valentin Turchin, the head of the Moscow chapter of Amnesty International, Fenwick met with a long-time dissident (who was kept under house arrest during Nixon’s visit to Moscow in June 1974) and future founder of the Moscow Helsinki Group, Yuri Orlov. Orlov urged the Congresswoman to use the Final Act as a means of putting pressure on the Soviet government. He argued that the Final Act could be used as leverage against the regime. Soon after that, on Ms Fenwick’s initiative, a Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (the Helsinki Commission) was established by the US Congress.27 On 12 May 1976, at an impromptu press conference at the apartment of Andrei Sakharov, Yuri Orlov announced the creation of the Public Group to Assist the Implementation of the Helsinki Accords in the USSR. Very quickly, similar groups began organising in other republics of the Soviet Union: on 9 November 1976 in Ukraine, on 25 November 1976 in Lithuania, in January 1977 in Georgia and so on. The groups networked with other organisations, such as already-existing religious and nationalist groups throughout the USSR. The Soviet authorities had not anticipated that human rights activists would take the government’s pledges seriously. In the fall of 1975, faced with the growing number of appeals to the Helsinki provisions, the regime quickly mounted an ideological counteroffensive to ‘clarify’ how they read the Accords. In a programmatic article published in Izvestia in early September 1975, the director of the Institute of US and Canada, Georgy Arbatov, explained the main points of what was to become a propaganda campaign on the part of the Soviet government to control or ‘frame’ the meaning of the Helsinki accords. These themes were then to be repeated in official statements, public speeches and instructions to ambassadors for the next three years. These guidelines stated that (1) détente did not mean that the Soviet Union had pledged itself to accept

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the social status quo in the world. The ideological struggle continued to define international relations; (2) it was wrong for the West to think that the Soviet Union ‘owed’ them anything in return for accepting the present European borders, particularly in regard to the implementation of Basket III; and (3) the Soviet Union had far outstripped the West in terms of concrete fulfilment of the Helsinki agreement. In the fall of 1975, the Soviet government, demonstrating its implementation of the Helsinki Accords, introduced some minimal but well-publicised improvements concerning travel for Western journalists, sales of Western newspapers in hotels and lowering the visa fees for exiting the country. In a very unusual step, some prominent political prisoners – Leonid Plyushch and Vladimir Bukovsky – were released. The regime used explanation and persuasion in its attempts to define the Helsinki principles for its citizens and for the outside world. On 12 November 1975, First Deputy Foreign Minister Georgy Kornienko met with US attaché Jack Matlock and proclaimed that ‘the Soviet Union always observed these principles’ and that therefore no special implementation measures were needed. Instead, he insisted that it was the RFE/Freedom and the Voice of America who violated the principles.28 Creating a unified position of communist countries and parties was another concern. The Conference of Secretaries of the CCs of socialist countries, which took place on 27–28 January 1976 in Warsaw, successfully rallied the bloc countries. But when the French communists showed themselves critical of Soviet human practices during their party-congress soon after, the head of the International Department, Boris Ponomarev ordered his officials to draft an article about Soviet democracy. According to Ponomarev, Marchais, the French Communist Party leader, was becoming ‘our dissidents’ messiah’. The article was intended to warn Marchais and others abroad who supported Soviet dissidents that ‘we will defend our regime with all possible means’, and to warn the internal dissidents ‘so that we don’t have to jail them later, which is undesirable’.29 The article was published in Pravda on 20 February 1976 under Ponomarev’s name with the title ‘Freedoms Real and Imaginary’. Chernyaev, who was one of those who drafted it, summarised it in his diary as ‘one more clarification that we are not going to change our rules (norms) because of Helsinki, and we had never intended to do so’.30 Another method tried by the Soviet government in their attempt to frame the meaning of the Final Act, was more proactive – to accuse the West of violations of the agreement, specifically of interference in the internal affairs of other countries.31 An example of this was a list of border violations against Czechoslovakia compiled by the Foreign Ministry’s Fourth European Department in 1976.32 According to the memorandum a characteristic feature of Western interference was the use of dissidents as representatives of the internal opposition. The

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paper concluded that the subversive activity of the West had intensified since Helsinki, particularly concerning the ‘distribution of anti-socialist and anti-Soviet literature by Western tourists’.33 Prague subsequently protested against these actions to the governments of Sweden, the FRG and Austria. Throughout 1975 and 1976 Moscow’s ‘explanatory’ activity followed one overriding theme: that Washington was to blame for the ‘noisy’ anti-Soviet campaign aimed at destabilising Soviet society and was misusing the Helsinki Accords for its own purposes.

KGB Efforts to Deal with a New Wave of the Human Rights Movement, 1975–1980 During 1975 and 1976 the KGB increasingly realised that after the signing of the Helsinki Final Act the human rights movement was turning into an ever more serious problem. On 29 December 1975 at a Politburo meeting, Andropov presented a long memorandum about dissidents in the USSR.34 According to Chernyaev, Andropov believed that ‘in the Soviet Union, there are hundreds of thousands of people who are either currently acting, or are ready to act (under certain circumstances) against the Soviet regime’.35 The numbers presented to the Politburo were quite impressive, even for its members. By late 1975, there were 850 political prisoners in the country, 261 of them for anti-Soviet propaganda. Eighteen hundred anti-Soviet groups and organisations had been ‘prevented and uncovered through penetration’, and 68,000 people were ‘prophylacted’, i.e. brought to the KGB and warned to stop their ‘unacceptable’ activities. According to Chernyaev, Andropov’s note had an almost apologetic tone, in that it was saying to the Politburo that in this situation one simply had to continue jailing dissidents, in spite of the continuing objections and protests of other détente-minded governments in Europe. The memo did not contain any suggestions on how to deal with the situation however.36 The annual reports on anti-Soviet writings by KGB Directorate V show that the number of such documents decreased in 1975, but then grew substantially in 1976 and more so in 1977. In 1976, all categories of anti-Soviet materials increased: anonymous documents, leaflets and graffiti. In 1979, both the number of documents and the number of detected authors increased substantially. An interesting trend emerges in the authors’ punishments. In 1975, 76 people were tried in criminal courts, 69 in 1976, 48 in 1977 (the overall increase in the number of authors and the number of documents distributed notwithstanding), 55 in 1978 and 56 in 1979 (the report emphasised that it was only 3.9 per cent of the total number). As the number of criminal cases proportionately decreased, the number of people, who were ‘prophylacted’ and subjected to psychiatric treatment increased.37

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Roy Medvedev presents statistics on overall sentencing of dissidents in the 1970s. He notes that 178 dissidents were jailed in 1974, 96 in 1975 and only 60 in 1976 – despite the fact that with the emergence of the Helsinki Watch Group dissident activity had intensified quite notably.38 The KGB was aware of the plans to create the Helsinki Watch Group all along. Orlov was apprehended on the same day as the group’s establishment was announced and warned not to proceed, but remained undeterred. Three days later, on 15 May 1976, he was apprehended again, and this time the authorities demanded that the group be disbanded immediately, and declared its actions illegal. Still, Orlov was immediately released, and the group continued its activities. Every member of the group remained under close observation. This constant monitoring, however, was very mild treatment by Soviet standards.39 The group became a special concern to the KGB. A memorandum from Andropov to the CC CPSU from 15 November 1976 provided a detailed outline of the emergence of the dissident movement, dating the origins back to Krasin’s and Yakir’s activities in the late 1960s, but focusing especially on the programme and actions of the Moscow Helsinki Group. The memo outlined the efforts of the Group’s members to establish international contacts and to provide information on the ‘alleged’ Soviet human rights violations for the West, especially the United States. It stated that the KGB ‘was taking measures to discredit the group, and to put an end to the hostile activities of the group members’.40 As a result of Andropov’s expanded use of psychiatric measures against dissidents and the Helsinki effect, Soviet authorities now felt the pressure to present a fully legitimate picture of Soviet psychiatry to the world. An active campaign to defend Soviet psychiatric practices was started a year before the conference of the World Psychiatric Association in Honolulu in August 1977. Soviet efforts in recruiting prominent Western psychiatrists did not succeed, resulting in the Soviet delegation’s not attending.

Emergence of the International Support Network and the Carter Administration The first three months of 1977 became the first turning point for the human rights movement in the USSR. The inauguration of President Carter in the United States, his emotional and consistent emphasis on human rights in foreign policy, his correspondence with Sakharov and his meeting with Bukovsky persuaded the Soviet government that this US president could not be expected to close his eyes to Soviet violations of Basket III of the Helsinki agreement, as the Soviets had expected Nixon to do. At the same time, reacting to a terrorist act in Moscow’s Metro, Andrei Sakharov made a statement accusing the KGB

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of staging the act with the purpose of blaming it on the dissidents and using the public outrage to conduct a series of arrests.41 With the upcoming Secretary of State’s visit to the Soviet Union in late March 1977, and the Belgrade CSCE conference scheduled to begin in the fall of 1977, the Soviet authorities increased the intensity of their propaganda campaign, accusing the West of using human rights issues as part of their antiSoviet campaign to undermine Soviet society.42 The decision to smash the Moscow Helsinki group was probably made in the first half of 1977 in direct connection to the events described. In February 1977, the authorities arrested Yuri Orlov and Alexander Ginzburg, who were given uncharacteristically harsh sentences. During the rest of that year, Anatoly Scharansky was arrested, and several other members of the Helsinki group were forced into exile. The Belgrade conference, which began in October 1977 and ended in March 1978, was concluded without an official document due to disagreements among participants and reflected the hardening of both Western and Soviet positions on the issue of observation of human rights provisions. A sign that Washington was intending to take an especially harsh position on the Soviet human rights violations was the appointment of Arthur Goldberg as head of the US delegation to the conference. Soviet diplomats saw Goldberg as a ‘dangerous, powerful opponent, a polemicist inclined to aggravating situations, to sharp fights’. His nomination meant that the ‘United States in Belgrade will make a big turn to … human rights in their bourgeois interpretation’.43 As soon as the conference ended, a new wave of arrests began in the Soviet Union, in which many prominent members of the human rights movement from Russia and the republics were sent to jail.

Conclusion: Unintended Consequences and the Continuity of Ideas The Soviet government pursued a number of goals in the negotiations leading to the Conference of Security and Cooperation in Europe. The top priority for the Soviet leadership was the confirmation of the status quo in Europe and of the inviolability of post-war borders. Beyond that, the Soviet leadership saw the purpose of the Conference as that of establishing principles of relations among European powers based on the norm of non-interference in internal affairs. A longer-term perspective seemed to open the possibility of the joint dissolution of NATO and the Warsaw Pact and of establishing a collective security organisation, which would have diminished US influence in Europe. The initial reaction to the signing of the Final Accords was that a major victory had been achieved.

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Very soon, however, the fruits of the perceived victory began to wither, and as the head of the Foreign Intelligence Department of the KGB, Nikolai Leonov perceptively pointed out in his memoirs, ‘the Soviet Union lost on all the points – the borders were altered (unification of Germany) due to a small exception to the norm of inviolability included in the text of Accords, the hopes for trade expansion did not bring the expected fruits (the Jackson-Vanik amendment persisted), and the only true result of the Helsinki agreement for the USSR was the expansive growth of human rights movements in all the socialist countries’, which eventually undermined the regimes and directly contributed to their collapse.44 For a substantial period of time, the KGB avoided arresting the Helsinki activists, monitoring their activities and exploring various methods of dealing with them, but not banning their activities outright. After some hesitation, and seeing that the damage to the regime could be greater than the expected benefits of the quickly deteriorating détente, the authorities began arresting and harassing the most vocal dissidents in 1977. However, large-scale arrests did not start until the conclusion of the Belgrade conference, when the Soviet Union found itself under fire for human rights violations documented by those very dissidents who were allowed to carry out their activities in the period after the signing of the Accords and before the Belgrade meeting. The most serious and systematic wave of arrests began after the invasion of Afghanistan and in preparation for the Moscow Summer Olympics of 1980, which culminated in 1982 with the official closure of the Moscow Helsinki Watch Group. However, the emergence of the network of the human rights movements at home, and of their support-network abroad, opened a period of political reality in the Soviet Union and the socialist bloc, something that the KGB’s repression in the late 1970s and early 1980s was unable to prevent. The ideas of the dissidents of the 1970s were shared by the people who later became Gorbachev’s closest advisers in his attempt to open up the Soviet Union – people like Alexander Yakovlev, Anatoly Chernyaev and Georgy Shakhnazarov. Even though they were not part of the movement, and at times were even critical of it, they sympathised with its goals and principles. Many of the former dissidents became active participants in the reform movement in the last years of the Soviet Union’s existence, and – like Andrei Sakharov – even became members of the first democratically elected Supreme Soviet. The ideas developed by the Helsinki network and the international coalition for reform prepared the ground for the transformation of the Soviet Union and for the eventual collapse of communism.

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Notes 1. For a discussion of differences, see Y. Kashlev, Helsinski protsess v sovetskoi/rossiiskoi vneshnei politike: 1975–2000 (Moscow, 2000), 14–17. 2. This analysis is based on KGB materials from the Volkogonov collection, fond 89 of the former Central Committee archive, documents from the Bukovsky Archive and the Gorbachev Foundation, but not, however, on hitherto unobtainable internal KGB analyses. Two especially valuable sources are the unpublished memoirs of Anatoly Kovalev (Iskusstvo Vozmozhnogo? (Diplomaticheskie Etyudy), unpublished manuscript), the head of the Foreign Ministry’s First European Department, and the personal diary of the deputy head of the CC CPSU International Department (and later Gorbachev’s foreign policy adviser) Anatoly Chernyaev (Diary, unpublished manuscript). 3. Interview with Georgy Kornienko, 18 May 1996. 4. See Y. V. Dubinin, Diplomaticheskaya Byl (Moscow, 1997), 165–180. 5. Interview with G. M. Kornienko, 26 June 2003, Moscow. 6. H. Giusto, M. Munteanu and C. Ostermann (eds.), The Road to Helsinki: The Early Steps to the CSCE. Selected Documents (Collection of Documents, distributed for the participants of the International Conference on the CSCE (Florence, 2003)), doc. 4, undated memorandum (1969). 7. AVP RF, fond 733, opis 5, perechen 4, delo 1, 29, Nikolai N. Inozemtsev’s memo to Kovalev, ‘O sozdanii organa po voprosam bezopasnosti I sotrudnichestva v Evrope’. 8. Ibid., 14–15. 9. NSA, READD-RADD/Volkogonov Collection, Reel 18, Brezhnev’s personal notes on meeting with Richard Nixon, May 1972 (no exact date). 10. Kashlev, Helsinski protsess v sovetskoi/rossiiskoi vneshnei politike, 17. 11. Y. Kashlev, Helsinksi protsess, 1975–2005: Svet I teni glazami uchastnika (Moscow, 2005), 39. 12. Kovalev, Iskusstvo Vozmozhnogo? 31. 13. A. S. Chernyaev, Moia zhizn’ i moe vremia [My Life and My Times] (Moscow, 1995), 292. 14. NSA, Volkogonov Collection, Reel 16, Container 24, p. 2, Zasedanie Sekretariata TsK KPSS 20 noyabrya 1972 goda. 15. NSA, READD-RADD/Volkogonov Collection, Reel 18, Zasedanie Politburo TsK KPSS 7 yanvarya 1974 goda. 16. Y. Nalin and A. Nikolayev, The Soviet Union and European Security (Moscow, 1973), 108. 17. NSA, READD-RADD Collection, pp. 5–6, Record of conversation of Cde. L. I. Brezhnev with Leaders of Fraternal Parties of Socialist Countries in Budapest, 18 March 1975. 18. Kovalev, Iskusstvo Vozmozhnogo? 29, 31. 19. Ibid., 37. 20. Ibid., 39. 21. Novoe Vremya, 38 (1993): 43. 22. Roy Medvedev, Neizvestnyi Andropov: Politicheskaya biografiya Yuria Andropova (Moscow, 1999), 187.

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23. Y. V. Andropov, Izbrannye rechi I statii (Moscow, n.d.), 145. 24. Svobodnaya Mysl, 2 (1998): 123. 25. Cited in Medvedev, Neizvestnyi Andropov, 121. 26. The figures are taken from annual KGB reports to the CC CPSU in NSA, READDRADD, Volkogonov Collection. 27. J. J. Maresca, To Helsinki: The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, 1973–1975 (Durham, 1975), 160. 28. AVP RF, fond 733, op. 6, per. 4, delo 2, 2–3, Zapis besedy s vremennym poverennym v delakh S.Sh.A. v SSSR Dzh. Metlokom, 12 noyabrya 1975 goda. 29. Diary of Anatoly Sergeevich Chernyaev, 10 February 1976 (MS). 30. Pravda, 20 February 1976, p. 1. Diary of A. S. Chernayev, 22 February 1976. 31. For a powerful argument about efforts to redefine the meaning of the Helsinki Final Act, see D. C. Thomas, The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism (Princeton, 2001), 91–110. 32. AVP RF, fond 733, op. 6, per. 4, delo 1, 144–145, ‘O faktakh vmeshatelstva Zapada vo vnutrennie dela ChSSR posle obsheevropeiskogo soveshaniya’, No. 352/IV EO. 33. Ibid., 147. 34. NSA, READD-RADD/Volkogonov Collection, Reel 16, container 24, memo by Andropov to the CC CPSU on 29 December 1975, ‘Regarding the Anti-Soviet Campaign Abroad and Measures against Anti-Soviet Elements and Anti-Soviet Views in the USSR’. 35. Diary of A. S. Chernyaev, 3 January 1976. 36. Andropov’s memorandum from 29 December 1975. 37. Numbers compiled from annual KGB reports ‘On the results of work on search for authors of anti-Soviet anonymous documents’. The NSA has reports for 1975 until 1981 in its READD-RADD collection. 38. R. Medvedev, Yuri Andropov: Neizvestnoe ob izvestnom (Moscow, 2004), 147. 39. L. Alexeeva and P. Goldberg, The Thaw Generation: Coming of Age in the Post-Stalin Era (Pittsburgh, 1993), 282. 40. NSA, READD-RADD/Volkogonov Collection, Reel 18, KGB Report to the CC CPSU from 15 November 1976, ‘About the Hostile Activity of the So-Called Group to Assist Implementation of the Helsinki Agreements in the Soviet Union’. 41. KhronikaTekushchih Sobytii, 4 (1977): 39. 42. RGANI, fond 89, per. 25, delo 44, extract from the Politburo Protocol No. 46 from 18 February 1977, ‘About instructions to the Soviet Ambassador in Washington for conversation with Vance on the question of “human rights”’. 43. AVP RF, fond 733, opis 7, per. 4, delo 1, 10–11, ‘K naznacheniyu Artura Goldberga glavoi delegatsii S.Sh.A. na Belgradskoi vstreche gosudarstv-uchastnits Soveshaniya po bezopasnosti I sotrudnichestvu v Evrope’. 44. Nikolai Leonov, Likholetie (Moscow, 2003), 131–132.

Archival Sources

o Bulgaria Tsentralen Darzhaven Arhiv – Central State Archive, Sofia (TsDA) Diplomaticheski Arhiv - Diplomatic Archive, Sofia (DA) France Archives Nationales, Paris (AN), Archives de la présidence de la République – Président de Gaulle (5 AG 1) – Président Pompidou (5 AG 2) Archives de Ministère des Affaires Étrangères, Paris – Quai d’Orsay (MAE) – Série Europe, Sous-Série République Fédérale d’Allemagne (RFA) – Série Europe, Sous-Série Organismes internationaux Germany Archiv für christlich-demokratische Politik, St. Augustin (ACDP) – Papers of Kurt Georg Kiesinger (NL 226) Archiv der sozialen Demokratie, Bonn (AdsD) – Willy Brandt Archiv (WBA): Bundesaußenminister (BAM), Bundeskanzleramt (BKA) – Helmut Schmidt Archiv (HSA) – Depositum Egon Bahr (Dep. Bahr) Beauftragte für die Unterlagen des Staatssicherheitsdienstes der DDR, Berlin (BStU), Stasi archives Bundesarchiv, Stiftung Archiv und Massenorganisationen der DDR, Berlin-Lichterfelde (SAPMO), SED party archive Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amtes, Berlin (PA AA) – Declassified documents (B 150) – Zwischenarchiv (ZA) – Archiv des Ministeriums für Auswärtige Angelegenheiten der DDR (MfAA) Privatarchiv Helmut Schmidt, Hamburg

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Hungary Magyar Országos Levéltár - Hungarian National Archives, Budapest (MOL) Poland Archiwum Akt Nowych – Archive of Modern Acts, Warsaw (AAN) – Komitet Centralny Polskiej Zjednoczonej Partii Robotniczej (Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party - KC PZPR), Office of Gomułka (XIA) Archiwum Ministerstwa Spraw Zagranicznych – Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (AMSZ) Romania Central Historical National Archives, Bucharest (CHNA) – Fond CC of the RCP Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (AMFA) UK Public Record Office – now the British National Archives, Kew/London (PRO) – Prime Minister’s Office files: Harold Wilson (PREM 13) – Prime Minister’s Office files: Edward Heath (PREM 15) – Cabinet conclusions and memoranda (CAB) – Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) US National Archives and Record Administration, College Park/Washington (NARA) Department of State (Record Group 59 – RG 59) – Transcripts of Kissinger’s Staff Meetings – Country Files (CF) – Subject Numeric Files – Sonnenfeldt Records Nixon Presidential Material Project (Nixon) – National Security Council (NSC) – National Security Council (NSC), Henry A. Kissinger Office Files (HAK) – Kissinger Telephone Conversation Transcripts (HAK Telcons) National Security Archive, Washington (NSA) Gerald Ford Library, Ann Arbor (GFL) – National Security Adviser (NSA) – White House Central Files (WHCF) USSR Arkhiv vneshnei politiki Rossiskoi Federatsii – Archive for Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation, Moscow (AVP RF) Russian State Archive of Contemporary History – Former Central Committee Archive, Moscow (RGANI)

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Contributors

o Juhana Aunesluoma, D. Phil, is Lecturer in Contemporary History at the University of Helsinki, Finland. His publications include Britain, Sweden and the Cold War: Understanding Neutrality, 1945–1954 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), From War to Cold War: Anglo-Finnish Relations in the 20th Century, ed. (Finnish Literature Society, 2005) and, edited with Susanna Fellman, Från olika till jämlika: Finland’s och Sveriges ekonomier på 1900-talet (Svenska Litteratursällskapet, 2006) Jordan Baev is a Senior Research Fellow at the G. S. Rakovsky Defence and Staff College in Sofia. He is also a Visiting Professor in International Relations and Conflict Studies at the New Bulgarian University and the Diplomatic Institute of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Sofia. Dr. Baev serves as Vice-President of the Bulgarian Association of Military History and has been the co-ordinator of the Bulgarian Cold War Research Group since 1998. His numerous publications include Civil-Military Relations Teaching Guide and Curriculum (Austrian Military Academy, 2004). Oliver Bange is a Senior Researcher and Lecturer at the University of Mannheim and the co-ordinator of the project ‘CSCE and the Transformation of Europe’, funded by the VolkswagenStiftung. He holds a Ph.D. in international history from the London School of Economics (1997) and is the author of The EEC Crisis of 1963: Kennedy, Macmillan, de Gaulle and Adenauer in Conflict (Palgrave Macmillan, 2000). He completed his habilitation, Ostpolitik und Détente: Die Anfänge 1966–1969, due to be published in 2009. Csaba Békés is the Founding Director of the Cold War History Research Centre, Budapest, and Senior Research Fellow of the 1956 Institute. He worked as an archivist in the Hungarian National Archives and later as a librarian in the National Széchenyi Library. His main field of research, Cold War history, includes the history of East-West relations, Hungary’s international relations after World War II and the role of the East

– 200 –

Contributors | 201

Central European states during the Cold War. His publications include The 1956 Hungarian Revolution: A History in Documents (CEUP, 2002). Kostadin Grozev is an Associate Professor of Contemporary World History at Sofia University. He has written on US political and social history, international relations, the Cold War, European diplomacy and integration, and transition trends in Eastern Europe after 1989. His book, The White House and Presidential Campaigns in the Early Cold War Years, 1948–1964, was published in 2007 in Bulgarian. He is an editor of the Bulgarian Journal of American and Transatlantic Studies and the Minalo Quarterly of History. Mihail E. Ionescu, Major General (ret.), is the Director of the Institute for Political Studies of Defence and Military History at the Romanian Ministry of Defence and since 2005 the Director of the Elie Wiesel National Institute for Studying the Holocaust in Romania. He holds a doctorate in history and is the Vice-Chairman of the Greater Black Sea Area Working Group of the PfP Consortium of Defence Academies and Security Studies Institutes. His numerous publications cover a wide range of militarysocietal themes from 1800 to the present. Wanda Jarząbek studied History at Warsaw University. She is Assistant Professor in the German Studies Department at the Institute for Political Studies in Warsaw, and co-editor of the Polish-German Yearbook. She specialises in Polish political and social history of the twentieth century, international relations and Cold War diplomacy, with a special focus on the German question, and has published several articles on related subjects. She has been a visiting professor at Maison des sciences de l’homme in Paris and a visiting scholar at the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Stephan Kieninger studied Modern History and Political Science at the University of Mannheim. He worked as a research assistant for the project ‘Ostpolitik and Détente’ funded by the Thyssen Foundation and held an internship at the Cold War International History Project in Washington, D.C. He is currently working on a document edition on the GDR’s policy towards the CSCE and preparing his doctoral thesis, ‘American Multilateralism in the Détente Era’. Gottfried Niedhart is a retired Professor of Modern History at the University of Mannheim and at present is heading an international research project, ‘Détente and CSCE in Europe 1966–1975’. He has published widely on English and German history and on the history of international relations, mainly in the twentieth century, and more recently on East-West relations. His publications include Geschichte Englands im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Beck, 2004) and Die Außenpolitik der Weimarer Republik (Oldenbourg, 2006). Luca Ratti is Assistant Professor in History of International Relations at the University of Rome III and Associate Lecturer in International Relations at the American University of Rome. He obtained his Ph.D. in International Relations in 2004 from the University of Cardiff. His publications include Italy and NATO Enlargement to the Balkans: An Examination of Realist Theoretical Frameworks (Carocci, 2004). He is currently completing a monograph on Britain, the German question and the CSCE between 1955 and 1975.

202 | Contributors

Marie-Pierre Rey is Professor of Russian and Soviet History and Director of the Centre of Slavic Studies at the University of Paris I Panthéon Sorbonne. Her books include Le dilemme russe: La Russie et l’Europe occidentale d’Ivan le Terrible à Boris Eltsine (Flammarion, 2002); La Tentation du Rapprochement, France et URSS à l’heure de la détente, 1964–1974 (Publications de la Sorbonne, 1991). She has recently edited Les Russes de Gorbatchev à Poutine (Armand Colin, 2005) and is currently writing a biography of Tsar Alexander I. Svetlana Savranskaya is Director of Russia Programs at the National Security Archive, Washington, D.C., and an Adjunct Professor at the American University. She worked at the Institute of World Economy and International Relations in Moscow and at the Carter Presidential Center. She also runs an annual summer school in partnership with Kuban State University for young Russian academics. She is a co-editor of Masterpieces of History: The Peaceful End of the Cold War in Europe, 1989 (Central European University Press, 2007).

Index

o Adenauer, Konrad, 20, 26, 40, 55–56, 110, 158 Albania, 160, 168, 170 Algeria, 167 Alphand, Hervé, 53, 65 Andréani, Jacques, 46, 51, 66 Andrei, Stefan, 135 Andropov, Yuri, 181–183, 185–186, 189–190 Arbatov, Georgy, 183 Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (of USA, ACDA), 73 Atlantic Policy Advisory Group (APAG), 27, 32, 36–37, 50 Austria, 26, 62, 82, 145, 162, 168–169, 185 Auswärtiges Amt, 24, 28, 31, 38, 41, 46, 118, 134, 137–138, 141 Axen, Hermann, 58 Bahr, Egon, 3, 5, 11, 16, 23–25, 27–35, 35–38, 41–43, 49–50, 67, 70, 78, 78–81, 87–88 Bashev, Ivan, 161, 163–164, 173 Belgium, 145, 164 Berlin, 1, 33–34, 41–42, 50, 56, 58–59, 61–62, 74–75, 83, 86–91, 113–114, 119–120, 130–132, 136, 138–139, 141–142, 160, 162–163

Blech, Klaus, 49, 52, 136 Bock, Siegfried, 9, 20, 51 Bogdan, Corneliu, 138, 143 Brandt, Willy, 2–3, 5, 11–12, 16–17, 19–20, 23–25, 28–35, 35, 35–45, 50– 51, 56–58, 60–61, 63, 64–67, 69–72, 74–75, 78, 80, 83, 86–91, 93–97, 103, 110–111, 119–120, 123, 130, 133, 139, 141–142, 179, 191, 193–194, 197–198 Brezhnev, Leonid Ilych, 2, 7, 10, 14–15, 17, 19–20, 42, 46, 49, 50–52, 54, 61– 62, 66, 72, 74, 76–77, 80–81, 91–92, 120, 134, 139, 167, 170–171, 173–176, 178–181, 183, 189 Brimelow, Thomas, 79, 87, 89, 95–97 Brunner, Guido, 51, 78, 136 Bucharest Declaration (of July 1966), 115–116, 120, 144, 162, 176–177 Budapest Appeal (of March 1969), 4, 33, 69, 117, 147–148, 165, 172, 177 Bukovsky, Vladimir, 184, 186, 189 Bulgaria, 4, 10, 15, 21, 108, 110–111, 113–114, 117, 132, 139, 160–174 Bulgarian Agrarian People’s Union (BAPU), 165, 172, 177 Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP), 4, 15, 164–167, 170 Bundestag (West German Parliament), 18, 25, 26, 29, 36, 76, 97, 103, 138

– 203 –

204 | Index

Callaghan, James, 52, 92, 97 Canada, 110–111, 124, 164, 167, 178, 183 Cargo, William, 70, 79–80 Carter, Jimmy, 169, 186 Ceausescu, Nicolae, 4, 14, 73, 120, 130–132, 139, 142, 163, 165, 167, 169–171, 173 Chernyaev, Anatoly S., 179, 184–185, 188–90 China, 104, 119, 132, 168 Christlich Demokratische Union (CDU), 17–18, 24–26, 58, 64, 74, 85, 88–90, 137–138, 165, 172 Christlich-Soziale Union (CSU), 18, 26, 137–138 Cloake, J. C., 98, 110 Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), 54, 177, 179, 181, 186, 189–190 Conference of European Communist Parties (of 1975), 180 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE, also Conference on European Security and Cooperation, European Security Conference), vi, vii, 1–20, 24–54, 57–69, 71–72, 74–85, 90–94, 97–99, 101–102, 104– 109, 111–117, 119–129, 131–160, 162–166, 169–181, 183–190 Confidence Building Measure(s) (CBM), 27, 43, 115, 134, 153 Conservative Party (of Great Britain), 13, 88 Coordinating Committee for Export to Communist Areas (CoCom), 103, 110, 146 Cuban Missile Crisis, 1, 3, 160 Cyprus, 160, 166–167, 169 Czechoslovakia (CSSR), 3, 4, 10, 14, 19–20, 30, 32, 41–42, 50, 53, 60, 70, 85–86, 90, 110, 114, 116–117, 121–123, 127, 139–140, 147–149, 162, 164–166, 184–185, 198 Denmark, 153, 164, 166–167 Demirel, Suleyman, 170, 173 Department of State (USA), 12, 68–73, 75–82, 135, 142

Diehl, Günter, 24–27, 31, 35–37 Dobrosielski, Marian, 152, 157–158 Dobrynin, Anatoly Fyodorovich, 75, 127 Douglas-Home, Sir Alec, 88–89, 95–97 Drinkall, John Kenneth, 87 Dubček, Alexander, 120 Dubinin, Yuri V., 179, 189 Duckwitz, Georg Ferdinand von, 30, 37 Eagleburger, Lawrence, 69, 79 Economic Commission for Europe (ECE, of United Nations), 106–107, 112, 149 Elliot, Anthony, 92, 97 Erdélyi, Károly, 121, 127 Erhard, Ludwig, 26, 36, 85, 145 European (Economic) Community (EEC/EC), 9, 14, 44, 46–48, 54–57, 63–64, 66–67, 69, 77, 86–87, 91, 95, 97, 100, 106–107, 111, 134, 136, 146 European Security System (ESS), 5, 7–8, 11, 15, 23–37, 68, 71, 159, 164, 178 Farley, Phil, 73–74, 80 Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), vii, 1–52, 56–66, 69, 72–73, 76–77, 83–86, 97, 99, 103, 110, 113–114, 116–117, 119–121, 123, 125–127, 129–143, 145, 147, 150, 152, 154–156, 159, 161, 163–164, 185 Fenwick, Millicent, 183 Fessenden, Russell, 28 Final Act (of CSCE), vii, 2–5, 12–15, 35, 41–42, 44, 48, 62–63, 67, 74, 78–79, 83, 88, 101–108, 112, 114–115, 118, 121–122, 135–136, 139–140, 150–151, 160, 162, 165, 168–171, 175, 180–184, 186–187, 190 Finland, 169 Finlandisation, 71–73, 76, 98, 103 Fischer, Oskar, 162 Fischer, Per, 32, 37 Fontaine, André, 57 Ford, Gerald, 17, 40, 50–51, 77 Foreign (and Commonwealth) Office (FCO/FO), 47, 87–88, 91–96, 101–103

Index | 205

France, 3, 4, 9, 12–13, 26, 30, 38, 40, 46– 47, 53–66, 72, 74–75, 78, 86, 89, 91, 99, 119, 132, 135, 142, 148, 151–152, 158, 161, 164, 166–167, 169, 176, 179, 184 Franco-German Treaty (of January 1963), 56 Freie Demokratische Partei (FDP), 4, 20, 23, 26, 33–34, 37, 41, 75, 79, 119 French Communist Party, 184 Garvey, Sir Terence, 93, 97 Gaulle, Charles de, 2–3, 12, 16, 25, 36, 53–57, 63, 64, 68, 78, 176 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), 107, 112 Genscher, Hans-Dietrich, 47–49, 52, 135, 138 German Democratic Republic (GDR), 4, 9–10, 14–15, 17, 19, 20, 24–26, 28, 32–34, 40–41, 44, 47, 51, 56, 58–60, 65, 67, 85, 90, 99, 110, 114, 116, 118–126, 130–132, 136–137, 139, 145, 147–148, 162, 164 Germany, vii, 2, 4, 6, 9, 14, 24, 26–27, 30, 33, 35, 39, 40, 43, 45, 47, 51, 53–54, 56, 57, 60–61, 63, 73, 75, 83–88, 94, 96, 110, 115, 132, 137, 145–146, 163, 188 Gierek, Edward, 156 Ginzburg, Alexander, 187 Goldberg, Arthur, 187, 190 Gomułka, Władysław, 4, 14, 19, 117, 120, 122–127, 147, 152, 157–158 Gorbachev, Mikhail, 15, 153–154, 177, 179, 188–189 Grand Coalition (between SPD and CDU/CSU, 1966–1969), 3–4, 11, 24–26, 41, 50, 117, 119 Great Britain, 13, 17–18, 26, 28, 30–32, 43, 61, 66, 72, 75, 83–97, 101–103, 105, 146, 158, 164, 166, 169 Grechko, Andrei, 181 Greece, 161, 166–171 Groll, Götz von, 51, 137 Gromyko, Andrej, 20, 48–49, 51–52, 65, 77, 81–82, 89, 96, 170, 174, 179, 181 Grundlagenvertrag (Basic Treaty between FRG and GDR of December 1972), 32, 90, 125, 137

Haig, Alexander Meigs, 72, 75, 80–81 Hallstein, Walter, 19, 55, 117 Hallstein doctrine, 55, 117 Harmel, Pierre, 3, 31, 37, 41 Harmel Report (of 1967), 3, 31, 37, 41 Hartman, Arthur, 138 Heath, Edward, 13, 43, 79, 88–91, 94, 96 Heinemann, Gustav, 119 Heusinger, Adolf, 31, 36–37 Hildyard, Sir David, 92, 94, 97 Hillenbrand, Martin, 37, 51, 69, 77, 79, 81 Honecker, Erich, 10 Humboldt, Alexander von, 161 Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party (HSWP), 114, 118, 125–127 Hungary, 4, 10, 14, 21, 60, 73, 102, 107– 108, 110–111, 113–115, 117–128, 132, 139, 153, 157, 168, 177, 180 Ilichev, Leonid, 121 Inozemtsev, Nikolai N., 177, 189 Institute for World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO, Moscow), 177–178 Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBM), 161 International Monetary Fund (IMF), 107 Ireland, 169 Italy, 99, 164 Jabukovskii, Ivan, 120 Jackling, Roger, 87–88, 95, 97 Jackson, Henry, 77, 188 Jackson-Vanik Amendment, 77, 188 Jaruzelski, Wojciech, 153, 159 Jobert, Michel, 62 Johnson, Lyndon B., 2–3, 12, 16, 36, 68, 78 Jupiter (IRBMs, stationed in Turkey), 161 Kádár, János, 14, 114, 120, 125–127 Karamanlis, Constantine, 170–174 Karlovy Vary Declaration (of Warsaw Pact in 1967), 116 Kashlev, Yuri, 179, 189 Kennedy, John Fitzgerald, 23, 35

206 | Index

KGB (Committee for State Security of the USSR), 175, 181–182, 185–186, 188–190, 196 Khrushchev, Nikita, 17, 114, 143 Kiesinger, Kurt Georg, 20, 24–25, 27, 35–36, 41, 50, 127 Killick, Sir John, 92–93, 97, Kissinger, Henry, 7, 12–13, 17–18, 33, 37, 40, 44–52, 65, 68–82, 91, 103, 180, 183 Kohl, Helmut, 20, 132, 158 KOR (Workers’ Defence Committee, Poland), 152, 158 Kornblum, John, 135 Kornienko, Georgy, 176, 184, 189 Kosygin, Alexei, 176 Kovalev, Anatoly, 179–181, 189 Krasin, Viktor, 186 Labour Party (of Great Britain), 13, 85–86 Lahr, Rolf, 118 Laird, Melvin, 72, 80–81 Larsen, Reydar, 165, 173 Lenin, Vladimir Ilych, 80, 101–102 Leonov, Nikolai, 188, 190 Lipatti, Valentin, 135–136, 142–143 Macovescu, George, 135, 142–143 Malta, 167 Mannheim, University of, CSCE project, vii, 10 Mansfield, Mike, 71–72 Mansfield Resolution, 71–72 Marchais, Georges, 184 Maresca, John J., 18, 43, 50–52, 79, 82, 105, 111–112, 190 Marx, Karl, 101–102 Mastanduno, Michael, 103, 110–111 Matlock, Jack, 184 McGuire, Ralph, 70, 79 Medvedev, Roy, 181, 186, 189–190 Millar, Frederick Hoyer, 84–85, 94 Millard, Guy E., 102 Mladenov, Petar, 166, 169 Molotov, Vyacheslav Mikhaylovich, 114, 161 Molotov Plan, 161

Mongolia, 132 Morega, Ion, 138, 143 Moscow Helsinki Watch Group, 188 Moscow Olympic Games (of 1980), 188 Most Favoured Nation (MFN principle), 107, 112 Multilateral Preparatory Talks (MPT, for CSCE), 32, 43, 62, 71, 77, 159, 163, 166, 179 Munich Agreement (of 1938), 14, 90 Mutual Balanced Force Reductions (MBFR), 11, 30–34, 36–38, 61–62, 67– 68, 71–77, 90, 103, 124, 130, 132, 166 National Security Council (NSC, of USA), 36, 49, 68, 72, 73, 76, 79–82, 169, 173 Netherlands, 99, 164, 167, 169 neutral and non-aligned states (N+N), vii, 5, 67, 140, 152, 162, 168–169, 173 Nixon, Richard, 12, 17, 36, 46, 59, 64–66, 68–72, 75–82, 103, 119, 123, 178, 180, 183, 186, 189 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), 33, 86, 95 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 3, 5, 8–9, 16, 18, 21, 26, 28, 31, 35, 41, 44, 47, 56, 67, 69, 70–72, 74–75, 77, 79, 87–88, 90, 95, 101, 115, 123–124, 126, 128, 136, 140, 149, 152–153, 161, 163–168, 176, 178–179, 181, 185, 187 Norway, 27, 165 Oder-Neisse line, 14, 33, 55, 85, 90, 120, 123, 127, 145, 147, 150, 157 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OSCE), 112, 157, 172 Orlov, Yuri, 183, 186–187 Ostpolitik (of FRG), vii, 1–6, 8–14, 16– 59, 63–69, 72, 74–76, 78–91, 93–97, 99, 103, 110–111, 114, 117, 119, 123, 126–127, 129–137, 139–143, 145, 157–158, 179 Paris Charter (of November 1990), 177 Pederson, Richard F., 73–74, 80

Index | 207

Permanent Consultative Committee (PCC, of Warsaw Pact), 114–115, 117, 119–121, 126–127, 163, 166, 170 Péter, János, 121, 127–128 Plyushch, Leonid, 184 Poland, 4, 9–10, 13–21, 41, 60, 66–67, 74, 85, 90, 95, 100, 107–108, 110, 114–115, 117–124, 127, 132, 138–139, 144–159, 164 Polish United Workers’ Party (PUWP), 146–147, 151, 153 Pompidou, Georges, 12, 17, 53–66 Ponomarev, Boris, 180, 184 Portugal, 169 Prague Spring (of 1968), 3, 10, 12, 30, 42, 53, 70, 85 Pungan, Vasile, 134 Quadripartite Agreement on Berlin (of September 1971), 33, 58–59, 62, 74–76, 89, 125, 131, 141 Radio Free Europe (RFE), 150 Rapacki, Adam, 14, 114, 145, 152, 161 Rapacki Plan, 14, 145, 152, 161 Rapallo, 72–73, 145 Richardson, Elliot, 68, 78 Rogers, William, 13, 38, 68, 75–78, 80–82, 96 Romania, 4, 14, 73, 110, 113–115, 117–118, 120–124, 127–143, 160, 162–171, 173 Romanian Communist Party (RCP), 131 Rusk, Dean, 25, 30, 36, 68 Sabri Chaglayangil, Ihsan, 161 Sahm, Ulrich, 33 Sakharov, Andrei, 182–183, 186, 188 Sanne, Carl Werner, 34, 36–37 Sauvagnargues, Jean, 38, 59, 65 Scharansky, Anatoly, 187 Scheel, Walter, 23, 35, 38, 41, 46, 51, 61, 65, 71, 78, 80, 142 Schlesinger, Arthur Meier, 23, 35 Schmidt, Helmut, 17, 41, 45, 48–52, 156 Schröder, Gerhard, 26, 36 Schumann, Maurice, 58–60, 70, 74, 79–80 Scowcroft, Brent, 39

Semenov, Vladimir S., 121, 127, 148 Semichastny, Vladimir, 182 Shakhnazarov, Georgy, 188 Solzhenitsyn, Alexander, 182 Sonnenfeldt, Helmut, 41–42, 48, 50–52, 68, 72, 75–76, 79–82 Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands (SPD), 23–25, 29, 41, 85, 87, 95, 117, 119, 121 Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (SED), 10, 16, 58 Spain, 167, 169 Stalin, Joseph, 84, 116, 143, 190 State Department. See Department of State (USA) Stewart, Michael, 86, 88, 95 Stoyanov, Dimitar, 172 Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT), 33, 77, 176 Suslov, Mikhail, 179–181 Sutterlin, James, 69, 79 Sweden, 99, 158, 162, 167, 169 Switzerland, 99, 162, 169 Thomson, John, 87, 90, 95–96 Tickell, Crispin, 52, 92 Tito, Josip Broz, 51, 170–171 Tomala, Mieczyslaw, 9, 20 Treaty of Moscow (between USSR and FRG of August 1970), 88–89, 123, 127 Treaty of Prague (between CSSR and FRG of 1973), 10, 90 Treaty of Versailles (1919), 180 Treaty of Warsaw (between Poland and FRG of December 1970), 19, 127, 155 Treaty on Polish-German border (between Poland and FRG of November 1990), 127 Trend, Sir Burke, 87, 95 Tunisia, 167 Turkey, 161, 166–167, 169–171 Ulbricht, Walter, 4, 14, 16, 19–20, 126– 127, 157–158 Union of Socialist Soviet Republics (USSR), 1–7, 9–12, 14–21, 25–32, 36–37, 39–50, 52–55, 58–81, 83–94,

208 | Index

Union of Socialist Soviet Republics (USSR) (cont.) 96–97, 99, 100, 103–105, 107–113, 115–127, 130, 132, 134–136, 138–140, 142–165, 167, 169–172, 175–190 United Nations Organization (UN), 26, 106–107, 112, 114, 145, 149, 164 United States of America (US/USA), 13, 31, 39–40, 43, 48–49, 51–53, 61, 64, 66–82, 88, 91, 93, 96, 99–101, 103, 116, 123, 130, 132, 134–136, 138–139, 142, 145–149, 152, 161–163, 166–172, 174, 176–178, 180, 183–187 Vanik, Charles, 77, 188 Vest, George, 75–81 Vietnam War, 31, 37, 69, 78, 130 VolkswagenStiftung, vii, 35, 200 Warsaw Pact (Warsaw Treaty Organization), vii, 1–21, 23–24, 28–30, 33, 35, 40–45, 54–55, 57, 60, 63, 67–73, 77, 83–86, 88, 90, 92–97, 104, 113–128, 130, 139–140, 142–147, 149, 152–154, 156–157, 161–166, 168–174, 176– 177, 187, 194–198

Well, Günther van, 51–52, 134, 138 Wiggin, Charles, 91, 97 Wilson, Sir Duncan, 87, 95–97 Wilson, Harold, 13, 87, 92 Witte, Sergei, 98, 110 Wolniak, Zygfryd, 148 World Bank, 107 World Trade Organization (WTO), 153 World War II, 7, 40, 73, 99, 116, 118– 119, 130, 141, 155 Wright, Oliver, 92 Yakir, Pyotr, 186 Yakovlev, Alexander, 188 Yalta Agreement (1945), 14, 139, 141–142 Yugoslavia, 139, 141, 151–152, 156, 158, 166–171, 187–188 Zarapkin, Semjon K., 25, 36–37 Zedong, Mao, 116 Zhivkov, Todor, 4, 14, 21, 163–167, 169–171, 173–174 Zimmermann, Warren, 72–73, 80, 82