West Germany has watched developments in Czechoslovakia with as much interest and concern as the Soviet Union, Poland and other East European countries. It is symbolic of the changed climate in Central Europe that Bonn has come to feel that it has as much stake in the continuing stability of the communist system in Prague as Moscow, Warsaw and East Berlin.
No policy maker or student of East European affairs in Bonn, Berlin or elsewhere claims that he anticipated the breath-taking pace of developments in Czechoslovakia. As several of them put it to me during a brief visit to West Germany: “The Czechs generally arrive by the last train. We certainly did not expect them to jump the queue and march ahead of all other communist countries”. The good soldier Schweik remains the world’s stereotype of the Czechs.
The sense of restraint in Bonn in discussing developments in Czechoslovakia is something new. West Germans realise that Moscow cannot allow the new leaders in Prague to jeopardise the communist system in Czechoslovakia and with it the delicate power balance in Central Europe. Indeed, officials and experts in Bonn take the view that a rash attempt on the part of students and intellectuals in Czechoslovakia to take the country out of the Warsaw Pact and Mr. Dubcek’s failure to control them can provoke Soviet intervention as in the case of Hungary in 1956.
Thought
This is a frightening thought. The use of the Russian army in Czechoslovakia could revive the cold war in all its intensity at least for some time, set the clock back by several years in all Soviet bloc countries and thwart Bonn’s own policy of improving relations with them. In spite of the vastly changed circumstances in the communist world as a result of the Sino- Soviet split, the reassertion of independence, notably by Rumania, and the general trend in favour of poly-centrism, West German experts are not willing to rule out altogether the possibility of Russian intervention in case events get out of hand in Prague. They therefore welcome the election of General Svoboda as President. The General commanded the Czech forces in Russia during the war and has received the highest Soviet honour. He stands unequivocally for a continuing alliance with the Soviet Union. His election is Mr. Dubcek’s gesture of goodwill to Moscow.
The West Germans know only too well that in view of the recent events in Prague, the Polish Government will be even more reluctant to respond to Bonn’s gestures of friendship than before and that the Czech leaders themselves will be extremely cautious in dealing with the Federal Republic in spite of their desire for immediate and substantial credits from it. The communiqué issued at the end of the high-power Dresden conference of Russia, Poland, East Germany and Czechoslovakia made it obvious that they still need the Federal Republic in the role of a bogeyman. Bonn does not take too tragic a view of this. But it fears that public opinion in West Germany may once again stiffen in case the East European governments do not respond to its gestures of friendship.
How then is one to explain the timing of the speech of the West German Foreign Minister, Herr Brandt, favouring the recognition of the Oder-Neisse frontier? Broadly, he has acted under three diverse sets of pressures. First, the US Administration has been urging Bonn to open out to the East as part of its overall policy of detente with the Soviet Union. The proposed non-proliferation treaty is intended to serve the same purpose and quite logically Herr Brandt fully supports it. Secondly, President de Gaulle has been urging a similar course on the West German Government in pursuance of his dual policy of reducing West Europe’s dependence on America and of bridging the gulf between the East and the West.
Allies
Thus the Federal Republic’s two principal allies are agreed on this issue. Britain favours the same approach but its views no longer matter in German calculations. Finally, the left-wing in the Social Democratic Party has been restive. It opposes the coalition with the Christian Democrats and favours a more dynamic approach to Eastern Europe. Herr Brandt had to make the statement on the Oder-Neisse line in order to carry this sizeable section of the party with him in spite of his awareness that Mr. Gomulka is neither willing nor able at this stage to respond to this gesture and that the right wing in the Christian Democratic Party would seek to exploit it as it has indeed sought to do.
But Herr Brandt does not have to worry much on the second count though the ten million refugees from across the Oder-Neisse frontier account for 20 per cent of the country’s population. A recent poll in West Germany has indicated that 62 per cent of the people have given up the hope of ever getting back the lost territories. Equally significant is the attitude of the intellectuals many of whom admit that in view of the history of the past three centuries the Poles have good reason to distrust and fear West Germany and that it is for Bonn to dispel these fears.
To be able to gauge the change that has taken place in the West German attitude three more points need to be noted. First, West German intellectuals and students now admit that their country started the Second World War and that the victors have certain rights. They have not cared to define these rights but tacitly imply that these include the right to redraw frontiers in the security interests of the victors. In psychological terms this is a most important development. Secondly, the West Germans feel that however necessary and appropriate the Adenauer policy of developing ties with the West may have been in the ’fifties, it no longer accords with the reality of the Central European situation. Even West German officials who normally plug the old propaganda line are now anxious to make this point. Thirdly, in spite of the wind of change that has been sweeping the communist world West German students of international affairs believe that the communist system is there to stay in Eastern Europe and that the earlier their country comes to terms with this reality the better for it and for the rest of Europe.
There is bound to be a divergence of opinion on how far the stability of the communist system in Eastern Europe depends on the presence of Soviet divisions there. But most of the officials, professors and students I met expressed the view that the system is rapidly adjusting itself to the aspirations of the countries concerned and is by the same token becoming more and more self-reliant. It is difficult to say how far this opinion is representative and how far it takes note of the basic changes that appear to be in the offing in Czechoslovakia. But as of now the consensus is that the end of Stalinist terror, over-centralised economy and Soviet domination does not mean the end of communism as such. Among the experts I met there was not one who expected the nationalised industries to be returned to private hands.
Offensive
Major international developments like the Viet Cong offensive, the gold rush, the exposure of the weakness of the dollar, the strong peace sentiment in America as symbolised by Mr Robert Kennedy’s candidature for presidency and by President Johnson’s decision not to offer himself as a candidate for the party’s nomination and, above all, the state of race relations in America, have tended to reinforce the view that in spite of everything the Soviet Union may prove more stable than the United States in the ’seventies. This feeling is more widespread than it might appear on the surface. Needless to add, this has far-reaching foreign policy implications, specially in the context of the overwhelming Soviet military power. Moscow has not been slow to take note of this prevalent atmosphere. That is presumably why it recently provided to television networks in Western Europe a one hour film on Soviet military hard ware and prowess. The film was televised in the Federal Republic.
The new approach does not exclude East Germany. No one in authority in Bonn or West Berlin minimises the GDR’s economic achievements. It is widely recognised that the Ulbricht regime implemented a programme of economic reforms in 1963 when Prof Libermann was still struggling to convince Moscow of the need for similar measures. The next generation of communist leaders who proudly describe themselves as managers are expected to do even better. In my discussions with them some West German professors and politicians went so far as to argue that it was possible that in the ’seventies the West might have something to learn from the East in industrial relations, specially in respect of the association of workers with management and that the GDR had become first country in the world to pay higher wages to farm labourers than to industrial workers.
In this changed climate Bonn cannot but seek to normalise its relations with Pankow. There have been several manifestations of this desire. Dr Kiesinger has proposed unconditional wide-ranging talks with the East German Prime Minister Herr Stoph. A Hamburg delegation which recently visited East Berlin proposed the construction at cost of Bonn of a new highway from Hamburg to Berlin through GDR territory to facilitate the development of trade. Pankow has rejected these and other similar gestures and continues to insist on recognition.
Obstacle
The principal obstacle is West Berlin. The city gets five billion marks a year from the Federal Republic and will wither away in a few years if it is made a separate State as has been repeatedly proposed by the Soviet Union. In spite of a booming economy it is losing about 8,000 men a year to the Federal Republic. Over 20 per cent of its population is over 55. But it is symbolic of the remarkable change in the political climate of West Germany that discussion even on the question of recognition is no more taboo. Intellectuals discuss it freely. Two leading publishers have been campaigning in favour of recognition. Mr Schmidt, leader of the SPD group in the Bundestag, recently called for an exchange of Commissioners-General (a variant of High Commissioners exchanged among Commonwealth countries) between the two Germanies. This is not the kind of atmosphere which can breed Neo-Nazis and revanchists.
The Times of India, 10 April 1968