Abstract
The concern of public opinion in the Federal Republic with national security affairs seems to have exhibited dramatic swings over the years. Up to the dual-track decision by NATO of December 1979 it had become a standard lament that the attentive sectors of public opinion were largely restricted to the military itself, to selected political decision-makers, and to a few academics and journalists, while the public at large did not care about these things a great deal.1 In the early 1980s, the rise of the peace movement and its activities caused the opposite lament that public opinion might pose a severe threat to the maintenance of a viable national security policy based upon the familiar combination of deterrence and defence.2 At the same time, these developments were hailed as indicative of a long overdue ‘democratization’ of defence policy.3 However, the rapid return of peace movement actions and media attention to more ‘normal’ levels following the onset of new INF deployment cast some shadow of doubt over both interpretations.
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Notes
For an overview, see Helga Haftendorn, Security and Detente: Conflicting Priorities in German Foreign Policy (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1985).
See the author’s, ‘Politics and the Peace Movement in West Germany’, International Security, Spring, 1983.
See especially, Gordon Smith, ‘The Changing West German Party System: Consequences of the 1987 Election’, Government and Opposition, Spring, 1987.
For an excellent analysis of German rearmament in the early 1950s, see Gerhard Wettig, Entmilitarisierung und Wiederbewaffnung in Deutschland 1943–1955 (Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 1967).
See Lothar Wilker, Die Sicherheitspolitik der SPD (Bonn-Bad Godesberg: Verlag Neue Gesellschaft, 1977).
For more on Erler’s views regarding the Bundeswehr, see Fritz Erler, Democracy in Germany (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1965).
and his ‘Gedanken zur Politik und inneren Ordnung der Sozialdemokratie’, Die Neue Gesellschaft, January-February, 1958.
See especially, Gordon Craig, ‘Germany and NATO: The Rearmament Debate, 1950–1958’, in Klaus Knorr (ed.), NATO and American Security (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), pp. 249–53.
See especially, Catherine McArdle Kelleher, Germany and the Politics of Nuclear Weapons (New York: Columbia University Press, 1975).
Uwe Nerlich, ‘Washington and Bonn: Evolutionary Patterns in the Relations between the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany’, in Karl Kaiser and Hans-Peter Schwarz (eds), America and Western Europe (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1977), p. 376.
See Calleo’s, The German Problem Reconsidered: Germany and World Order (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1978), p. 177.
For an excellent analysis of CDU-CSU security policies, see Clay Clemens, ‘The CDU/CSU and Arms Control’, in Barry M. Blechman and Cathleen Fisher (eds), The Silent Partner: West Germany and Arms Control (Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1988).
The SPD-SED agreement on chemical weapons was published as ‘Chemische Abrüstung: Modell für eine chemiewaffenfrei Zone in Europa’, Politik Nr. 6, (Bonn: SPD, July 1985).
For a broader analysis of patterns of party alignment following the 1987 election, see Manfred Kuechler, ‘After Chernobyl: Economic Voting Prevails?’, in Newsletter of the Conference Group on German Politics, March, 1987.
See Werner Kaltefleiter, ‘A Legitimacy Crisis of the German Party System?’ and Jutta A. Helm, ‘Citizen Lobbies in West Germany’, in Peter H. Merkl (ed.), Western European Party Systems (New York: The Free Press, 1980).
See Lothar Wilker, Die Sicherheitspolitik der SPD, 1955–1966 (Bonn-Bad Godesberg: Verlag Neue Gesellschaft, 1975).
See the author’s, ‘The Politics and Ideology of SPD Security Policies’, in Blechman and Fisher (eds), The Silent Partner: West Germany and Arms Control (Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1988).
Egon Bahr, ‘Sozialdemokratische Sicherheitspolitik’, and Horst Ehmke, ‘Sicherheitspartnerschaft’, Die Neue Gesellschaft, February, 1983.
The von Bülow draft was released under the title, ‘Strategie Vertrauensschaffender Sicherheitsstruckturen in Europa: Wege zûr Sicherheitspartnerschaft’ (Bonn: SPD, September 1985).
For CDU-CSU criticism of the report, see Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 11 September 1985, p. 4.
and Wolfgang Pordzik, ‘Aspects of the West German Security Debate’, German Studies Newsletter (Center for European Studies, Harvard University, November 1985).
Erwin Horn, see Neue Ruhr Zeitung, 9 September 1985.
See Manfred Woerner, ‘A Missile Defense for NATO Europe’, Strategic Review, Winter, 1986.
see Donald L. Hafner and John Roper (eds) ATBMS and Western Security (Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1988).
Manfred Woerner, ‘West Germany and the New Dimensions of Security’, in Wolfram Hanrieder (ed.), West German Foreign Policy, 1949–1979 (Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1980), p. 41.
For a general review of CDU-CSU security policy, see Wolfgang Pordzik, ‘Aspects of the West German Security Debate’, German Studies Newsletter (Center for European Studies, Harvard University, November, 1985).
For more on the FDP, see Christian Soe, ‘The Free Democratic Party’, in H. G. Peter Wallach and George K. Romoser (eds), West German Politics in the Mid-Eighties: Crisis and Continuity (New York: Praeger, 1985).
Barry M. Blechman and Cathleen Fisher, ‘The Free Democratic Party’, in Blechman and Fisher (eds), The Silent Partner: West Germany and Arms Control (Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1988).
see Geoffrey K. Roberts, ‘The “Second Vote” Campaign Strategy of the West German Free Democratic Party’, European Journal of Political Research, May, 1988, p. 325.
For more on the Greens, see Werner Hulsberg, The German Greens: A Social and Political Profile (London: Verso, 1988).
Gordon Smith, ‘The Changing West German Party System: Consequences of the 1987 Election’, Government and Opposition, Spring, 1987.
See also, Gerd Langguth, The Green Factor in German Politics, Richard Strauss, trans. (Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1986).
see Horst Afheldt, Atomkrieg: Das Verhangnis einer Politik mit militarischen Mitteln (Munich: Hanser, 1984).
Alfred Mechtersheimer, Zeitbombe NATO (Cologne: Diederichs, 1984).
See Alfred Rothacher, ‘The Green Party in German Politics’, West European Politics, July, 1984.
The most prominent exponent of the need to find a third way between the superpowers is Peter Bender, Das Ende des ideologischen Zeitalters (Berlin: Severin & Siedler, 1981).
Fritz Stern, ‘Germany in a Semi-Gaullist Europe’, Foreign Affairs, Spring, 1980, p. 885.
See especially, William Griffith, ‘The Security Policies of the Social Democrats and the Greens in the Federal Republic of Germany’, draft manuscript prepared for the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, 1 November 1987.
See the author’s ‘The German Search for Security’, in Stephen J. Flanagan and Fen Osler Hampson, Securing Europe’s Future (London: Croom Helm, 1986).
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© 1990 Stephen F. Szabo
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Rattinger, H. (1990). The Bundeswehr and Public Opinion. In: Szabo, S.F. (eds) The Bundeswehr and Western Security. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-11032-2_6
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