From the Wall to Stavropol: Gorbachev’s German Policy

Abstract

Gorbachev could now claim a stunning victory. His opponents were scattered and defeated. A roster of the Kadars, the Honeckers, and the Ceauşescus was now duly entered into the register of discards of history. Ligachev was permitted to hold on only because the leader was reluctant to retire him and awaited the proper moment to deal the fatal blow. Gorbachev had got everything he wanted. But what had he got? He had to pause to remind himself of the initial aim in search of which he had set out on this vast journey. It was to achieve for the Soviet state world levels of technical proficiency, was it not? Yes, and to cleanse and renew the Communist idea. Or perhaps to save the world from the threat of nuclear war by the complete elimination of nuclear weapons by the year 2000? Was it to liquidate the tensions of the Cold War by promotion of the concept of the House of Europe? Or perhaps all of these. Well, had these great ideas not won a great victory? At any rate, their triumph was ensured, was it not, by the fact of their opponents and the other sceptics having been so convincingly vanquished?

Europe is getting ready to conclude a new treaty of Versailles. There are many indications that while one great European power is losing territory and zones of influence, another European power is turning into a great power … The first power is the Soviet Union, the second is Germany. The great power that won the Second World War is losing it after 45 years of peace … some irreversible changes are bound to take place in the world. They would consist mainly in drawing a line between the spheres of influence of Germany and Russia.

Laszlo Lengyel