2020 Volume 2020 Issue 200 Pages 200_67-200_83
With respect to the international negotiations on the German unification in 1989/1990, not only the massive publication of memoirs by contemporaries, but also the release of historical materials by governments concerned has advanced the elucidation of the event. Existing studies, however, tended to characterize the German unification on October 3, 1990 as “goal” and to assess who contributed to it. On the other hand, more recent studies have shifted the research interest from the “happy end narrative”. In other words, they came to regard German unification not as “goal” or “end” but as “start” or “formative phase” of the post-Cold War European international order.
While sharing the view that the German unification process is a period of the formation of the post-Cold War European international order with the latest research, this paper focuses on the issue of NATO (non-)enlargement. Using newly available diplomatic sources, the author tries to reevaluate the role of Hans-Dietrich Genscher, foreign minister of the FRG. What is clear from this approach is the differences of visions within the West German government concerning how to end the Cold War and what kind of new international order should be created, and the impact of these differences on actual international politics.
As shown in this paper, it can be said that after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Genscher had consistently envisaged “the ending the Cold War by emphasizing reconciliation with the Soviet Union.” The Bush administration, on the other hand, placed top priority on the survival of NATO. After the Camp David talks in late February, the Bush administration and Helmut Kohl, Chancellor of the FRG, began to seek “the ending the Cold War based on the preeminence of the United States or NATO.”
Kohl, who strived for the swift reunification of Germany, put priority on cooperation with the United States on security issues. Nevertheless, Genscher continued to stick to his vision. Due to Kohl’s rebuke and the Bush administration’s pressure, he no longer spoke of the NATO’s non-expansion to the east after April 4, 1990, but repeated arguments for strengthening the CSCE and changing the nature of NATO. Ironically, it was Genscher’s idea that was subsequently effective in convincing the Soviet Union of a unified Germany’s full membership in NATO. Genscher contributed to the end of the Cold War in terms of the “victory of the West” by advocating his vision of the end of the Cold War as a “reconciliation with the East” even after it lost its reality.
