(2 of 4)
Honecker was off by 99 years; the Wall lasted barely three weeks longer than he did. Likewise, the rigid repression of his Stalinist system is suddenly dissipating. So, at least on the surface, the question of reunification has become more real. Stripped of its walls and barbed wire, shorn of its oppressive ideology, lacking history or tradition, East Germany would seem to have little reason to exist as a separate state. The East German dilemma, says Henry Kissinger, is that "liberalization will undermine its reason for being."
Nevertheless, reunification of Germany into a giant that would overwhelm Europe the way it would dominate an Olympic Games is, at least in the immediate future, probably not likely and perhaps not wise. Beneath the surface, there are factors even within the Germanys that make a headlong rush to unity unlikely. Although 40 years may not be long enough to create the distinct cultural identity that distinguishes, say, Austrians or Swiss from their German brethren, East and West Germany have developed different values, styles and outlooks.
Even apart from their ideological systems, two separate sets of governmental institutions have been firmly embedded. Though most Germans chafe at the division imposed by the loss of a war, not everyone in the East wants to be subsumed into the Federal Republic and ruled from Bonn. At an extraordinary news conference (both for its candor and the fact that it took place at all), the East German Ambassador to Washington, Gerhard Herder, replied when asked if he saw a unified Germany, "In my dreams, yes, but being a politician and standing with both my feet on the earth, I don't see a possibility in the foreseeable future."
Significant moves toward unification would be difficult without the concurrence of the rest of Europe and, more formally, the consent of the former "occupying powers" (the U.S., Britain, France and the Soviet Union), which technically still must approve changes in the structure of the two Germanys. Their support for the goal of a greater Germany will remain more rhetorical than real.
Neither neighbor nor ally is eager to see Germans achieve through an outbreak of peace the dominance they were spectacularly unable to win through two world wars. There was something moving about the unusual and spontaneous singing of the national anthem -- the third verse: "Unity and justice and freedom/ For the German Fatherland . . ." -- in the West German Bundestag when the announcement was made that the Wall was being opened. But it was also a bit chilling to those for whom the famous chords of the former Deutschland uber Alles are not so inspiring and for whom the dream of a united German fatherland more closely resembles a nightmare.
For some in the Atlantic Alliance, West Germany's urge to unify eastward raises the specter of neutralism, a concern heightened by the Gorbasms that occurred when the Soviet leader visited Bonn in June. For its partners in the twelve-member European Community, especially France, the economic threat of a united Germany is less worrisome than the possibility that Bonn will become preoccupied with pursuing its goals in Central Europe at the expense of strengthening unity within the E.C.