TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/092589/09258900.000

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 5.9 KB | 120 lines

                                                                                ESSAY, Page 88

Return of the German Question


By Charles Krauthammer


    Say what you will about imperialism, it does have a way of
keeping the natives from killing one another. This truth is
entirely color-blind. What was true for, say, British India and
East Africa is true for Europe. For 40 years the brutal Soviet
dominion over Eastern Europe suppressed a myriad of
nationalisms and kept things quiet. Now that Soviet power is in
retreat, things are quiet no more.

    As the Soviets retreat, America is sure to follow (that is,
if the U.S. has not, in a mood of euphoric anticipation, left
first). As the smoke and fog of the cold war dissipate, so does
the postwar division of Europe. With the receding of the two
empires, many long dead questions return -- the Hapsburg, the
Balkan, even the Danzig question. But none are so formidable as
the one the wartime Allies thought they had buried in Berlin in
1945, the German question.

    Germany was conquered, then divided into two states
designed to remain forever in a state of permanent, if cold,
antagonism. Pax Americana and Pax Sovietica solved the German
problem. To put it another way, the first achievement of NATO
is that it contained the Soviet Union. The second achievement,
underappreciated now but not for long, is that with the
collaboration of the Soviet Union, it solved the German problem.

    No longer. It may not yet be polite to say so, but the
German question is back. The first widely noticed hint occurred
this spring when the West German Foreign Minister, in a rare
demonstration of German assertiveness, forced a change in the
American position (and entirely undercut Britain) on the issue
of short-range nuclear weapons. The issue is relatively minor,
but the demonstration was not. It not only showed alliance
willingness to accommodate German demands, it also showed German
willingness to make them, and to make them purely and
unashamedly in terms of its national interest.

    This mood of independence was further on display during
Mikhail Gorbachev's visit in April, when West Germans showed an
enthusiasm for the Soviet leader so wild that the Economist
aptly dubbed it a "Gorbasm." Now, with West Germany absorbing
huge numbers of East German refugees, talk of reunification
grows louder.

    Germany's immediate aim is to rid itself of the burden of
being Europe's battlefield. (Hence the campaign against
short-range nuclear weapons and low-flying training aircraft.)
Its medium-range interest is to rid itself of foreign soldiers,
which would turn it from an instrument of alliance policy into
an entirely independent entity of its own. But its long-range
goal is reunification or, to paraphrase Secretary of State James
Baker in another context, dreams of a Greater Germany.

    That dream is -- there is no need to be diplomatic --
everybody's nightmare.

    The problem is that a united Germany, or even a
confederated Germany, would be the hegemonic power in an
independent Europe. Consider the evidence. The West Germans have
built from rubble the most powerful economy in all Europe. Yet
an even greater feat may have been performed by the East
Germans. They have created a relatively productive economy under
the impossible, absurd conditions of Marxist economics. Put
these two together and you have what all of Europe understands
will be its dominant power.

    This does not, of course, mean German armies retracing the
path of the Wehrmacht. But it does mean Germany coming to
dominate the political economy of the Continent. Would such a
Germany continue to, in effect, sustain and subsidize much of
the European Community? Would it accept in perpetuity its
shrunken postwar borders? Would it continue to abjure nuclear
weapons?

    Americans assume that West Germany is a Western power. But
in fact Germany has traditionally seen itself as a Central
European power. How it will define itself, with whom it will
ally itself, and how it will choose to assert its power are at
the heart of the anxiety that attends the German question.

    The answer lies in the race between two enormous historical
transformations occurring on either side of Germany. To the
west is the integration of the European Community, a project
that Robert Hormats, former Assistant Secretary of State,
correctly calls the greatest voluntary transfer of sovereignty
in history. Europe '92, which will establish a single West
European market and might lead to a common currency and
ultimately some kind of political confederation, is the major
force pulling Germany west. With the decline of NATO, the great
hope of keeping Germany oriented to the West is to lock it into
a web of intimate economic, and ultimately political, relations.

    The other great pull is to the east. It comes from the
gradual dissolution of the Soviet empire, which will draw
Germany into the geopolitical and economic vacuum left behind.
Europeans already talk of West Germany, with its proximity,
historical ties and vast economic power, developing a
minicolonial sphere of influence among its East European
neighbors. There is even talk of the French trying quietly to
renew prewar ties to the East (in the interwar period France had
close ties with Poland and the countries of the Little Entente)
as a flanking maneuver to contain any eastern expansion of
German influence. Plus ca change.

    Europe's future will be determined by the contest between
these two sirens calling Germany to its destiny. Which is strong
reason for the U.S. to encourage a successful West European
integration. True, such a Europe might turn into a protectionist
fortress unfriendly to the American economy. But a unified
Europe with ties that bind Germany is the best hope for a
tranquil post-cold war world. And say what you will about
unification, it is an even better national tranquilizer than
imperialism.