HISTORY
The rise of Prussian power
in the 19th century, supported by growing German nationalism,
eventually ended in the formation of the German empire in 1871
under the chancellorship of Otto von Bismarck. Political parties
developed during the empire, and Bismarck was credited with passing
the most advanced social welfare legislation of the age.
However, Emperor William II's
dynamic expansion of military power contributed to tensions on
the continent. The fragile European balance of power, which Bismarck
had helped to create, broke down in 1914. World War I and its
aftermath, including the Treaty of Versailles, ended the German
Empire.
Fascism's Rise and Defeat
The postwar Weimar Republic (1919-33) was a peaceful, liberal
democratic regime. This government was severely handicapped and
eventually doomed by economic problems and the rise of the political
extremes. The hyperinflation of 1923, the world depression that
began in 1929, and the social unrest stemming from resentment
toward the conditions of the Versailles Treaty worked to destroy
the Weimar government.
The National Socialist (Nazi)
Party, led by Adolf Hitler, stressed nationalist and racist themes
while promising to put the unemployed back to work. The party
blamed many of Germany's ills on the alleged influence of Jewish
and non-German ethnic groups. The party also gained support in
response to fears of growing communist strength. In the 1932 elections,
the Nazis won a third of the vote. In a fragmented party structure,
this gave the Nazis a powerful parliamentary caucus, and Hitler
was asked to form a government. He quickly declined. The Republic
eroded and Hitler had himself nominated as Reich Chancellor January
1933. After President Paul von Hindenburg died in 1934, Hitler
assumed that office as well. Once in power, Hitler and his party
first undermined and then abolished democratic institutions and
opposition parties. The Nazi leadership immediately jailed Jewish
opposition and other figures and withdrew their political rights.
The Nazis implemented a program of genocide, at first through
incarceration and forced labor and then by establishing death
camps. Nazi revanchism and expansionism led to World War II, which
resulted in the destruction of Germany's political and economic
infrastructures and led to its division.
After Germany's unconditional
surrender on May 8, 1945, the United States, the United Kingdom,
the U.S.S.R. and, later, France occupied the country and assumed
responsibility for its administration. The commanders in chief
exercised supreme authority in their respective zones and acted
in concert on questions affecting the whole country.
The United States, the United
Kingdom, and the Soviet Union agreed at Potsdam in August 1945
to treat Germany as a single economic unit with some central administrative
departments in a decentralized framework. However, Soviet policy
turned increasingly toward dominating that part of Europe where
their armies were present, including eastern Germany. In 1948,
the Soviets, in an attempt to abrogate agreements for Four Power
control of the city, blockaded Berlin. Until May 1949, the Allied-occupied
part of Berlin was kept supplied only by an Allied airlift. The
Berlin airlift succeeded in forcing the Soviets to accept, for
the time being, the Allied role and the continuation of freedom
in a portion of the city, West Berlin.
Political Developments
in West Germany
The United States and the United Kingdom moved to establish a
nucleus for a future German government by creating a central Economic
Council for their two zones. The program later provided for a
constituent assembly, an occupation statute governing relations
between the Allies and the German authorities, and the political
and economic merger of the French with the British and American
zones. The western portion of the country became the Federal Republic
of Germany.
On May 23, 1949, the Basic
Law, which came to be known as the constitution of the Federal
Republic of Germany, was promulgated. Conrad Adenauer became the
first federal Chancellor on September 20, 1949. The next day,
the occupation statute came into force, granting powers of self-government
with certain exceptions.
The FRG quickly progressed
toward fuller sovereignty and association with its European neighbors
and the Atlantic community. The London and Paris agreements of
1954 restored full sovereignty (with some exceptions) to the FRG
in May 1955 and opened the way for German membership in the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Western European Union
(WEU).
The three Western Allies retained
occupation powers in Berlin and certain responsibilities for Germany
as a whole, including responsibility for the determination of
Germany's eastern borders. Under the new arrangements, the Allies
stationed troops within the FRG for NATO defense, pursuant to
stationing and status-of-forces agreements. With the exception
of 45,000 French troops, Allied forces were under NATO's joint
defense command. (France withdrew from NATO's military command
structure in 1966.)
Political life in the FRG
was remarkably stable and orderly. After Adenauer's chancellorship
(1949-63), Ludwig Erhard (1963-66) and, Kurt Georg Kiesinger (1966-69)
served as Chancellor. Between 1949 and 1966 the united caucus
of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Christian Social Union
(CSU), either alone with the smaller Free Democratic Party (FDP),
formed the government. Kiesinger's 1966-69 "Grand Coalition" included
the FRG's two largest parties, CDU/CSU and the Social Democratic
Party (SPD). After the 1969 election, the SPD, headed by Willy
Brandt formed a coalition government with the FDP. Brandt resigned
in May 1974, after a senior member of his staff was uncovered
as an East German spy.
Helmut Schmidt (SPD) succeeded
Brandt, serving as Chancellor from 1974 to 1982. Hans-Dietrich
Genscher, a leading FDP official, became Vice Chancellor and Foreign
Minister, a position he would hold until 1992.
In October 1982, the FDP joined
forces with the CDU/CSU to make CDU Chairman Helmut Kohl the Chancellor.
Following national elections in March 1983, Kohl emerged in firm
control of both the government and the CDU. He served until the
CDU's election defeat in 1997. In 1983, a new political party,
the Greens, entered the Bundestag for the first time.
Political Developments
in East Germany
In the Soviet zone, the Communist Party forced the Social Democratic
Party to merge in 1946 to form the Socialist Unity Party (SED).
Under Soviet direction, a constitution was drafted on May 30,
1949, and adopted on October 7 when the German Democratic Republic
was proclaimed. On October 11, 1949, a SED government under Wilhelm
Pieck was established. The Soviet Union and its East European
allies immediately recognized the GDR. The United States and most
other countries did not recognize the GDR until a series of agreements
in 1972-73.
The GDR established the structures
of a single-party, centralized, communist state. On July 23, 1952,
the GDR abolished the traditional Laender and established 14 Bezirke
(districts). Formally, there existed a "National Front"--an umbrella
organization nominally consisting of the SED, four other political
parties controlled and directed by the SED, and the four principal
mass organizations (youth, trade unions, women, and culture).
However, control was clearly and solely in the hands of the SED.
Balloting in GDR elections was not secret. On July 17, 1953, East
Germans revolted against totalitarian rule. The FRG marked the
bloody revolt by making the date the West German National Day,
which remained until reunification.
Inter-German Relations
During the 1950s, East Germans fled to the West by the millions.
The Soviets made the inner German Border increasingly tight, but
Berlin's Four Power status countered such restrictions. Berlin
thus became as escape point for even greater numbers of East Germans.
On August 13, 1961, the GDR began building a wall through the
center of Berlin, slowing down the flood of refugees and dividing
the city. The Berlin Wall became the symbol of the East's political
debility and the division of Europe.
In 1969, Chancellor Brandt
announced that the FRG would remain firmly rooted in the Atlantic
Alliance but would intensify efforts to improve relations with
Eastern Europe and the GDR. The FRG commenced this "Ostpolitik"
by negotiating nonaggression treaties with the Soviet Union, Poland,
Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Hungary. Based upon Brandt's policies,
in 1971 the Four Powers concluded a Quadripartite Agreement on
Berlin to address practical questions the division posed, without
prejudice to each party's view of the city's Four Power status.
The FRG's relations with the
GDR posed particularly difficult questions. Though anxious to
relieve serious hardships for divided families and to reduce friction,
the FRG under Brandt was intent on holding to its concept of "two
German states in one German nation." Relations improved, however,
and in September 1973, the FRG and the GDR were admitted to the
United Nations. The two Germanys exchanged permanent representatives
in 1974, and, in 1987, GDR head of state Erich Honecker paid an
official visit to the FRG.
German Unification
During the summer of 1989, rapid changes took place in the GDR.
Pressures for political opening throughout Eastern Europe had
not seemed to affect the GDR regime. However, Hungary ended its
border restrictions with Austria, and a growing flood of East
Germans began to take advantage of this route to West Germany.
Thousands of East Germans also tried to reach the West by staging
sit-ins at FRG diplomatic facilities in other East European capitals.
The exodus generated demands within the GDR for political change,
and mass demonstrations in several cities--particularly in Leipzig--continued
to grow. On October 7, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev visited
Berlin to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the establishment
of the GDR and urged the East German leadership to pursue reform.
On October 18, Erich Honecker
resigned and was replaced by Egon Krenz. The exodus continued
unabated, and pressure for political reform mounted. Finally,
on November 9, the GDR allowed East Germans to travel freely.
Thousands poured through the Berlin Wall into the western sectors
of Berlin. The Wall was opened.
On November 28, FRG Chancellor
Kohl outlined a 10-point plan for the peaceful unification of
the two Germanys. In December, the GDR Volkskammer eliminated
the SED's monopoly on power. The SED changed its name to the Party
of Democratic Socialism (PDS), and numerous political groups and
parties formed. The communist system had been eliminated. A new
Prime Minister, Hans Modrow, headed a caretaker government that
shared power with the new, democratically oriented parties.
In early February 1990, Chancellor
Kohl rejected the Modrow government's proposal for a unified,
neutral Germany. Kohl affirmed that a unified Germany must be
a member of NATO. Finally, on March 18, the first free elections
were held in the GDR, and Lothar de Maiziere (CDU) formed a government
under a policy of expeditious unification with the FRG. The freely
elected representatives of the Volkskammer held their first session
on April 5, and the GDR peacefully evolved from a communist to
a democratically elected government.
Four Power Control Ends
In 1990, as a necessary step for German unification and in parallel
with internal German developments, the two German states and the
Four Powers--the United States, U.K., France, and the Soviet Union--negotiated
to end Four Power reserved rights for Berlin and Germany as a
whole. These "Two-plus-Four" negotiations were mandated at the
Ottawa Open Skies conference on February 13, 1990. The six foreign
ministers met four times in the ensuing months in Bonn (May 5),
Berlin (June 22), Paris (July 17), and Moscow (September 12).
The Polish Foreign Minister participated in the part of the Paris
meeting that dealt with the Polish-German borders.
Of key importance was overcoming
Soviet objections to a united Germany's membership in NATO. The
Alliance was already responding to the changing circumstances,
and, in NATO, issued the London Declaration on a transformed NATO.
On July 16, after a bilateral meeting, Gorbachev and Kohl announced
an agreement in principle to permit a united Germany in NATO.
This cleared the way for the signing of the "Treaty on the Final
Settlement With Respect to Germany" in Moscow on September 12.
In addition to terminating Four Power rights, the treaty mandated
the withdrawal of all Soviet forces from Germany by the end of
1994. This made it clear that the current borders were final and
definitive, and specified the right of a united Germany to belong
to NATO. It also provided for the continued presence of British,
French, and American troops in Berlin during the interim period
of the Soviet withdrawal. In the treaty, the Germans renounced
nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons and stated their intention
to reduce German armed forces to 370,000 within 3 to 4 years after
the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty, signed in
Paris on November 19, 1990, entered into force.
German unification could then
proceed. In accordance with Article 23 of the FRG's Basic Law,
the five Laender (which had been reestablished in the GDR) acceded
to the FRG on October 3, 1990. The FRG proclaimed October 3 as
its new national day. On December 2, 1990, all-German elections
were held for the first time since 1933.
The Final Settlement Treaty ended Berlin's special status as a separate area under Four Power control. Under the terms of the treaty between the F.R.G. and the G.D.R., Berlin became the capital of a unified Germany. The Bundestag voted in June 1991 to make Berlin the seat of government. The Government of Germany asked the Allies to maintain a military presence in Berlin until the complete withdrawal of the Western Group of Forces (ex-Soviet) from the territory of the former G.D.R. The Russian withdrawal was completed August 31, 1994. On September 8, 1994, ceremonies marked the final departure of Western Allied troops from Berlin.
In 1999, the formal seat of the federal government moved from Bonn to Berlin. Berlin also is one of the Federal Republic's 16 Laender.
