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A preponderance of stability: Henry Kissinger’s concern over the dynamics of Ostpolitik

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Abstract

Drawing on American and German evidence, Stephan Kieninger’s contribution looks into Henry Kissinger’s ambivalent relationship with Germany scrutinizing both the parallels between Kissinger’s détente and Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik as well as the frictions and the competition between both approaches. Richard Nixon’s and Henry Kissinger’s priority was international stability provided by the understanding between the USA and the Soviet Union, whereas Willy Brandt’s dynamic détente approach was aimed at Europe’s transformation overcoming the Iron Curtain. In Nixon’s and Kissinger’s balance of power policy, stability was essential to cement what they perceived as an endangered status quo in Europe. Brandt and his foreign policy advisor Egon Bahr saw détente as a way to facilitate liberalizing changes. They envisaged stability in international relations a precondition to guarantee the regimes behind the Iron Curtain the kind of security that would over time allow them to open up their societies for Western influence. Finally, the overlaps between both approaches prevailed. Examining Kissinger’s initial doubts over Ostpolitik’s feasibility, the essay depicts his way to control the détente process in Europe through the Quadripartite negotiations over Berlin in 1971. Eventually, Ostpolitik’s success was a catalyst and a prerequisite for Richard Nixon’s and Henry Kissinger’s own approach to the Soviet Union despite the escalation of the Vietnam War.

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Notes

  1. Henry Kissinger, The Response in: Remembering Willy Brandt: Egon Bahr, Henry Kissinger und die deutsch-amerikanischen Beziehungen (Berlin: Bundeskanzler-Willy-Brandt-Stiftung, 2003), 44, see https://www.willy-brandt.org/fileadmin/stiftung/Downloads/Schriftenreihe/Heft_10_Remembering_Willy_Brandt.pdf. Accessed 19 November 2018.

  2. See Gottfried Niedhart, U.S. Détente and West German Ostpolitik: Parallels and Frictions, in: Matthias Schulz and Thomas A. Schwartz (Eds), The Strained Alliance: U.S.–European Relations from Nixon to Carter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 23–44; Holger Klitzing, The Nemesis of Stability: Henry A. Kissinger’s Ambivalent Relationship with Germany (Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag, Trier).

  3. See Gottfried Niedhart and Oliver Bange, ‘Die Relikte der Nachkriegszeit beseitigen’. Ostpolitik in der zweiten außenpolitischen Formationsphase der Bundesrepublik Deutschland im Übergang von den Sechziger zu den Siebziger Jahren, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 44 (2004), 415–448.

  4. On self-restraint and self-assertion in the FRG’s foreign policy, see Helga Haftendorn, Deutsche Außenpolitik zwischen Selbstbeschränkung und Selbstbehauptung, 1945–1990 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2001).

  5. Henry A. Kissinger, White House Years (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1979), 412.

  6. See Carole Fink and Bernd Schäfer (Eds), Ostpolitik 1969–1974: European and Global Responses (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

  7. Remarks by Scheel at the Meeting with the Foreign Ministers of the United States, the United Kingdom and France, 4 December 1969, in Akten zur Auswärtigen Politik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (AAPD), 1969, 1360.

  8. For the term ‘selective détente,’ see Kissinger, White House Years, 410.

  9. See, for instance, Gottfried Niedhart, The Federal Republic´s Ostpolitik and the United States. Initiatives and Constraints, in Kathleen Burk and Melvyn Stokes (Eds), The United States and the European Alliance since 1945 (Oxford: Berg Publishers, 1999), 289–311.

  10. Memorandum from Rogers to Nixon ‘Meetings with Brandt’, 22 December 1971, in: Martin J. Hillenbrand Papers (MJHH), Richard R. Russell Library, Athens (GA), Series IV (Research Material, Declassified Documents, 1952–1998), Box 6.

  11. Letter from Rogers to Brandt, 21 October 1969, in MJHH, Series IV, Box 6.

  12. See Gottfried Niedhart, The Kissinger-Bahr Backchannel within the Context of U.S.-FRG Relations, 1969–1974, in: Giles Scott Smith and Valerie Aubourg (Eds), Atlantic, Euratlantic, or Europe-America? The Atlantic Community and the European Idea from Kennedy to Nixon (Paris: Soleb, 2011), 284–305.

  13. For Bahr’s, Kissinger’s and Hillenbrand’s accounts of this meeting, see Egon Bahr, Zu meiner Zeit (Munich: Blessing Verlag, 1996), 269–270; Kissinger, White House Years, 410–411; Martin J. Hillenbrand, Fragments of our Time: Memoirs of a Diplomat (Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 1998) 286–287.

  14. Looking back, Bahr emphasized that ‘Washington [i.e., the White House] could have blocked what later came to be called Ostpolitik. […] Being able to negotiate with American backing was an indispensable prerequisite for success.’ Egon Bahr, Understanding for Germany, in: Remembering Willy Brandt: Egon Bahr, Henry Kissinger und die deutsch-amerikanischen Beziehungen, 30.

  15. See Memorandum of Conversation between Bahr and Kissinger, 13 October 1969, in AAPD, 1969, 1114–1118.

  16. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘Visit by Willy Brandt’s Emissary, Egon Bahr’, 20 October 1969, in Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS), 1969–1976, Vol. XL (Germany and Berlin 1969–1972), 105.

  17. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘Visit by Willy Brandt’s Emissary, Egon Bahr’, 20 October 1969, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 105.

  18. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Nixon, 13 December 1969, in National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), College Park (MA), Nixon Presidential Materials Project (Nixon), National Security Council (NSC), Henry A. Kissinger Telephone Transcripts (HAK Telcons), Box 3.

  19. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘Bonn Negotiations with the East’, 7 April 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 201.

  20. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Nixon, 10 April 1970, in NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, Box 4.

  21. Kissinger observed that ‘though they do not state it openly, the West Germans have concluded that by accepting the status quo in most important respects, and thereby conciliating the Soviet Union, the can then proceed to work on some rapprochement with the East Germans in which the ‘natural assets’ of West Germany’s superior position would finally prevail.’ Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘Bonn Negotiations with the East’, 7 April 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 200.

  22. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘Brandt’s Eastern Policy’, 16 February 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 150–153.

  23. Remarks by Nixon before his Cabinet and a number of selected NSC staffers, 16 June 1972, in FRUS 1969–1976, Vol. I (Foundations of Foreign Policy, 1969–1972), 409.

  24. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Pompidou, 24 February 1970, in NARA, Nixon, NSC, Presidential/HAK Memcons, Box 1023.

  25. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Brandt, 11 April 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 225–226. For the German record, in AAPD, 1970, 591–595.

  26. In June 1970, Helmut Sonnenfeldt returned from a journey to Germany reporting that CDU and CSU were eager to obtain support from the Nixon White House to bring the new government down. However, Kissinger responded that ‘we should not do so’. Memorandum for the Record, Monday Morning Operations Staff Meeting, 15 June 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 250.

  27. Handwritten Remarks by Nixon, Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon, ‘Your Meeting with German Foreign Minister Scheel, Saturday, July 18, at 10 a.m.’, 17 July 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 281.

  28. Minutes of a Senior Review Group Meeting on European Security, 31 August 1970, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 314.

  29. Ibid.

  30. Kissinger argued that ‘the objective obstacle facing Brandt is that he cannot keep Soviet friendship if he emphasizes West Germany’s ties to NATO. German ties to the European Community can be agreeable to the Soviets only if they see it as a means to weaken NATO.’ See Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon ‘The German-Soviet Treaty’, 1 September 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 319.

  31. For the context, see Bernd Schäfer, Washington as a Place for the German Campaign: The U.S. Government and the CSU/CSU Opposition, 1969–1972, in: David C. Geyer and Bernd Schäfer (Eds), American Détente and German Ostpolitik, 1969–1972 (Washington DC: Bulletin of the German Historical Institute, Supplement 1, 2004), 98–108.

  32. Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Barzel, 4 September 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 324.

  33. See National Security Decision Memorandum 91 ‘United States Policy on Germany and Berlin’, 6 November 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 392–394.

  34. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and McCloy, 31 October 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 387.

  35. Ibid.

  36. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon, 4 December 1970, Annotation, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 403. For the record of the meeting between Nixon, Kissinger, Acheson, McCloy, Dewey and Clay, 7 December 1969, see Memorandum of Conversation, prepared by Acheson, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 403–406.

  37. Chalmers Roberts’s piece in the Washington Post on 10 December 1970 had the title ‘Acheson urges Brandt’s Race to Moscow be cooled off.’ See Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 412.

  38. Remarks by Secretary of State Rogers before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 10 December 1970, Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 413.

  39. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Rogers, 19 December 1970, Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 415.

  40. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Rogers, 19 December 1970, Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 419.

  41. For an analysis of the events in December 1970, see Gottfried Niedhart, Ostpolitik. Phases, Short-Term Objectives, and Grand Design, in: David C. Geyer and Bernd Schäfer (Eds), American Détente and German Ostpolitik, 1969–1972, 118–136.

  42. Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Ehmke, 21 December 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 450.

  43. Note by Ehmke, 23 December 1970, in Archiv der sozialen Demokratie (AdsD), Depositum Horst Ehmke, Vol. 788. See also Horst Ehmke, Mittendrin: Von der Großen Koalition zur Deutschen Einheit (Berlin: Rowohlt Verlag, 1994), 141–142.

  44. Anatoly Dobrynin, In Confidence: Moscow’s Ambassador to America’s Six Cold War Presidents (New York: Times Books, 1995), 206.

  45. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 19 December 1970 (first conversation, no time), in NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, Box 29.

  46. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Nixon, 19 December 1970 (second conversation, 5.30 p.m.) in NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, Box 29.

  47. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 19 December 1970 (first conversation, no time), in NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, Box 29.

  48. See Oliver Bange, Ostpolitik as a Source of Intra-bloc Tensions, in: Mary A. Heiss and S. Victor Papacosma (Eds), NATO and the Warsaw Pact: Intrabloc Conflicts (Kent, Ohio: The Kent State University Press, 2008), 106–121.

  49. Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Ehmke, 21 December 1970, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 455.

  50. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 29 May 1971, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 723.

  51. Hillenbrand Diary, 30 December 1972, in MJHH, Series II, Box 2.

  52. For three good accounts on the Berlin negotiations and their international contextualization, see James Sutterlin and David Klein, Berlin: From Symbol of Confrontation to Keystone of Stability, (New York: Praeger Frederick, 1989); David C. Geyer, The Missing Link. Henry Kissinger and the Back-Channel Negotiations on Berlin, in: Geyer and Schäfer (Eds), American Détente and German Ostpolitik, 80–98; Kenneth Weisbrode, The Atlantic Century: Four Generations of Extraordinary Diplomats who forged America’s Vital Alliance with Europe (New York: Da Capo Press, 2009), 221–230.

  53. See Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Dobrynin (U.S.), 23 January 1971, in: David C. Geyer and Douglas Selvage (Eds), Soviet-American Relations: The Détente Years, 1969–1972 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 2007), 265–268.

  54. Memorandum from Kissinger to Nixon, ‘Meeting with Egon Bahr’, 31 January 1971’, 4 February 1971, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 511–514.

  55. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Barzel, Annotations by Kissinger, 14 April 1971, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 655.

  56. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Rush, 14 June 1971, Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 739.

  57. Ibid.

  58. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon, Kissinger and Haldeman, 28 May 1971, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 716.

  59. Ibid.

  60. Ibid.

  61. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Rush, 25 August 1971, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 902.

  62. Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Nixon, 9 April 1972, in NARA, Nixon, HAK Telcons, Box 13.

  63. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 10 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XIV (Soviet Union, October 1971–May 1972), 716.

  64. See Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Rush, 8 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 992–993. See Kissinger, White House Years, 1117.

  65. See Memorandum from Nixon to Kissinger, 23 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. VIII (Vietnam, January–October 1972), 303–307.

  66. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 10 April 1972, Editorial Note, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 995.

  67. Ibid.

  68. For Kissinger’s account on the mining of the North Vietnamese harbors, see Kissinger, White House Years, 1165–1201.

  69. Memorandum of Conversation between Nixon and Kissinger, 26 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 1011.

  70. Memorandum from Nixon to Kissinger, 20 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XIV, 449.

  71. Message from Kissinger to Nixon, 23 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XIV, 588.

  72. For the background, see Jussi M. Hanhimäki, The Flawed Architect: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004): Mario del Pero, The Eccentric Realist: Henry Kissinger and the Shaping of American Foreign Policy (Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press, 2006).

  73. See Transcript of Telephone Conversation between Kissinger and Dobrynin, 29 April 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XIV, 649.

  74. In his memoirs, Bahr called the ‘Verkehrsvertrag’ a ‘forgotten treaty’. See Bahr, Zeit, 381.

  75. See Peter Bender, Die Neue Ostpolitik und ihre Folgen: Vom Mauerbau bis zur Vereinigung (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1995), 195–196.

  76. See Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Brezhnev, 13 September 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 1058–1064.

  77. For Bahr’s account on these negotiations, see Bahr, Zeit, 393–428. The bulk of the documents on Bahr’s negotiations with the GDR authorities in printed in Dokumente zur Deutschlandpolitik (DzD), Series VI, Vol. 2, 1970–1973.

  78. Memorandum from Sonnenfeldt to Kissinger, 7 November 1972, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XL, 1090.

  79. Helmut Schmidt, Address at the World Economic Summit in London, 3 June 1977, in: Archiv Helmut Schmidt Hamburg, Eigene Arbeiten, April 77–May 1977, Doc. 19.

  80. See James E. Goodby, Europe Undivided: The New Logic of Peace in U.S.-Russian Relations (Washington DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1998); Oliver Bange and Gottfried Niedhart (Eds), Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe (New York/Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2008); Weisbrode, The Atlantic Century; Stephan Kieninger, Dynamic Détente: The United States and Europe (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield 2016).

  81. Remarks by Scheel at the NATO Ministerial Meeting in Copenhagen, 14 June 1973, in NATO Archives Brussels, Verbatim Records, Ministerial Meetings, 1966–1974, C-VR (73)36, Part 2.

  82. Remarks by van der Stoel at NATO’s Ministerial Meeting, 12 December 1973, in NATO, C-VR (73)74, Part 1.

  83. See Jens Gieseke and Doris Hubert, Die DDR-Staatssicherheit: Schild und Schwert der Partei (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2000, 86). For the Stasi’s interpretation of Western transformation strategies, see Oliver Bange, Zwischen Bedrohungsperzeption und sozialistischem Selbstverständnis: Die DDR-Staatssicherheit und westliche Transformationsstrategien, 1966–1975, in Torsten Diedrich and Walter Süß (Eds), Militär und Staatssicherheit im Sicherheitskonzept der Warschauer-Pakt-Staaten, Berlin: Links Verlag, 2010, pp. 253–296.

  84. Memorandum of Conversation between Brezhnev and Honecker, 18 June 1974, in: DzD, Series 6, Vol. 3, 1973–1974, 624. For the GDR’s policy in the CSCE process, see Anja Hanisch, Die DDR im KSZE-Prozess, 1972–1985: Zwischen Ostabhängigkeit, Westabgrenzung und Ausreisebewegung (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2012).

  85. Memorandum of Conversation between Brandt, Bahr and Belgium’s Prime Minister Leburton, 7 February 1973, in: AAPD 1973, 197.

  86. Memorandum of Conversation between Honecker and Brezhnev, 6 October 1975, in: DzD, Series 6, Vol. 4, 1975–1976, 403.

  87. See Oliver Bange, The GDR in the Era of Détente: Conflicting Perceptions and Strategies, in: Poul Villaume and Odd Arne Westad (Eds), Perforating the Iron Curtain: European Détente, Transatlantic Relations, and the Cold War 1965–1985 (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2010), 57–77.

  88. For the context, see Herman Wentker, Außenpolitik in engen Grenzen: Die DDR im internationalen System (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2007): Heinrich Potthoff, Im Schatten der Mauer: Deutschlandpolitik 1961–1990 (Berlin: Propyläen Verlag, 1999).

  89. Letter from Brandt to Wehner, 18 December 1973, in: DzD, Series 6, Vol. 3, 1973–1974, 402.

  90. Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Carstens, 18 July 1974, in: NARA, Records of the Department of State, Record Group 59, Records of the Counselor, Helmut Sonnenfeldt Papers, Box 5.

  91. See Stephan Kieninger, The Diplomacy of Détente: Cooperative Security Policies from Helmut Schmidt to George Shultz (London: Routledge, 2018).

  92. See ‘Notizen des Ministerialdirektors Sanne über das Ministergespräch beim Bundeskanzler, Bonn, 26 November 1974’, in: DzD, Series 6, Vol. 3, 1973–1974, 860–861.

  93. Minutes of Secretary of State Kissinger’s Staff Meeting, 9 December 1974, in FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. XXXIX (European Security, 1969–1976), 779. See Jussi M. Hanhimäki, ‘They can write in Swahili’: Kissinger, the Soviets and the Helsinki Accords, 1973–1975, Journal of Transatlantic Studies, 1, no. 1 (2003), 37–58.

  94. See Memorandum of Conversation between Ford, Kissinger and Schmidt, Genscher, 6 December 1974, in: Gerald R. Ford Library, Ann Arbor, MI (GFL), National Security Adviser (NSA), Memoranda of Conversation 1973–1977, Box 5. For the context, see Gottfried Niedhart, Peaceful Change of Frontiers as a Crucial Element in the West German Strategy of Transformation, in: Bange and Niedhart (Eds), Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe, 39–52.

  95. Memorandum of Conversation between Ford, Kissinger and Scowcroft, 3 December 1974, in preparation for Schmidt’s imminent visit, in GFL, NSA, Memcons, Box 7.

  96. See Kristina Spohr, The Global Chancellor: Helmut Schmidt and the Reshaping of the International Order (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).

  97. Memorandum of Conversation between Ford, Kissinger, Scowcroft, 3 December 1974, in: GFL, NSA, Memcons, Box 7.

  98. Memorandum of Conversation between Kissinger and Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Thorn, 29 May 1975, in: NARA, RG 59, Henry A. Kissinger Office Files, 1973–1977, Box 11.

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Kieninger, S. A preponderance of stability: Henry Kissinger’s concern over the dynamics of Ostpolitik. J Transatl Stud 17, 42–60 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1057/s42738-019-00003-3

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