Key Question 7: Co-operation and Reconciliation

• Kohl's policies were aimed at reunification with East Germany, which he believed would be beneficial to both countries
• The colla of communism and the role of Kohl

  In 1982 Helmut Kohl became the Chancellor of West Germany and under his leadership the economy began to recover from the recession of the late 1970s. His period in office was at the end of the cold war.
• The collapse of communism and the role of Kohl

  Mikhail Gorbachev (leader of the Soviet Union in 1985) had

  policies of perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost (openness)

  which ended tensions between east and west but also relaxed the ban on other political parties in Eastern Europe. The Polish and Hungarian governments changed into coalition governments where communists were either in a minority position or non-existent. The new Hungarian government dismantled the Iron Curtain, opening up its borders to Austria in March 1989.
• The collapse of communism and the role of Kohl

  • This had a dramatic impact in East Germany where thousands now had a new route to move west. By June 1989 12 per cent of the entire population of East Germany had placed applications to emigrate. In September 1989, 33,000 people moved west from East Germany. The East German economy was heading for bankruptcy. Gorbachev had already announced that he would not order the Red Army to crush opposition in Eastern Europe as had happened on so many previous occasions in the past.
• The fall of the Berlin Wall and Reunification

  On 9 November 1989 the East German government had no option left, without Russian support, but to open its borders and allow free travel. Thousands marched to the Berlin Wall and pulled it down in one of the most momentous events in post-war history. In the next few days hundreds of thousands of East Germans crossed the remains of the wall and visited the west.
• The fall of the Berlin Wall and Reunification

  • Kohl now seized the opportunity to lead the reunification of Germany. Huge loans were made by the West German government to bail out the bankrupt state of East Germany. By March 1990, 300,000 East Germans had left for the west. At this rate of emigration, coupled with its poor economy, East Germany had no long- term future as a country.
• The fall of the Berlin Wall and Reunification

  • Gorbachev assured Kohl he would not oppose reunification in return for West German loans to the USSR: by 1997 133 billion marks had been paid to the USSR and the countries that replaced it.

  There was overwhelming support for reunification in East Germany as was shown in free elections in March 1990.
• The fall of the Berlin Wall and Reunification 


  Germany now became a complete federal democracy. The two currencies were merged in May 1990 and East Germans found that

  their mark could be exchanged at a value of one for one with the West German Deutschmark even though the market value was only a fraction of the West German mark. This was an important factor ensuring that unification was popular in the east.