Pricetag a.k.a. Mom a.k.a. Margaret (mprice) wrote in schlosseberbach, @ 2006-03-22 13:39:00 |
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INF, NATO, the US and West Germany
I'm doing research for a story that is set in 1987 and came across this article dated April 21, 1988.
Full article here.
It's lengthy and very helpful in my research, but several of the statements made me chuckle. Especially when one considers the events that followed in Germany and the Soviet Union shortly thereafter.
After The INF Treaty:
A New Direction For America's European Policy
by Christopher Layne
Executive Summary
Although only marginally significant militarily, the U.S.- Soviet treaty eliminating intermediate-range nuclear forces (INFs) has shaken NATO to its core. On both sides of the Atlantic, traditional security elites worry that the INF treaty sets Western Europe on the slippery slope to "denuclearization" and presages America's "decoupling" from Europe's defense.[l] The treaty has stirred West German fears that the United States is abandoning the Federal Republic, and its effect on West German foreign and security policies has prompted Bonn's security partners to ask, "Is West Germany going neutral?"
[. . .]
As former defense secretary James Schlesinger has written, U.S. nuclear weapons are the "glue" holding NATO together.
[. . .]
As a result, the INF treaty also has highlighted the divergent strategic interests of the alliance's two most important members: the United States and West Germany.
[. . .]
West German Apprehension
Western Europe appreciates the diminishing credibility of the U.S. nuclear guarantee, and in response Great Britain and France are enhancing their respective independent nuclear forces.[9] West Germany, on the other hand, though committed to NATO's doctrine of nuclear deterrence, is a nonnuclear power; so Bonn looks to the United States to provide the deterrent that West Germany itself lacks. NATO's strategic anomaly has always been that its most militarily exposed and important member lacks its own nuclear weapons and must rely upon others for its security. Extended deterrence is the underlying foundation of the U.S.-West German relationship. Thus, much of NATO's recent history--especially the INF affair--has consisted of U.S. attempts to reassure Bonn that the United States will risk nuclear war in West Germany's defense.
[. . .]
This really tickled me.
Moscow's "German Card"
If they only knew what would happen in 18 months time.
The Kremlin is well positioned to take advantage of West Germany's nuclear angst, rising national neutralism, and the growing friction in U.S.-West German relations.[41] The Soviets have a great deal of leverage because they can link progress in intra-German relations to Bonn's willingness to make political security and economic concessions to Moscow. Moreover, as Milan Svec recently argued in Foreign Policy, Gorbachev's greatest opportunity to "sway the West"--indeed to break up NATO--"is to take on the so-called German question."[42]
The Soviets can effectively play their "German card" without offering outright reunification. In fact there are signs (including hints by Valentin Fallin, a former Soviet ambassador to Bonn who now heads the Novosti press agency) that Gorbachev may soon offer to tear down the Berlin Wall in exchange for a central European nuclear-free zone and/or withdrawal of all foreign troops from East and West Germany. If such an offer is made, it is hard to see how a West German government that refused it could survive politically. Yet, accepting a deal like this would shatter the NATO alliance.