309. Memorandum Prepared in the Central Intelligence Agency1
EAST GERMANY: The Political Scene and Relations With the US [portion marking not declassified]
Since early 1988, the East German regime has backtracked somewhat on the more liberal domestic policies it began implementing last year. The desire for greater acceptance and economic support from the West had led East Berlin to modify some of its harshest policies, including restrictions on travel to the West and the shoot-to-kill order at the Berlin Wall. Although the strategy of Westpolitik won some limited diplomatic successes, it did not quell rising dissatisfaction at home. Frightened by even small challenges to its authority, the leadership has cracked down with new arrests and expulsions of dissidents even at the risk of souring prospects for better relations with the West. Meanwhile, tensions between the GDR and the USSR could also intensify as East Germany continues to reject Soviet reforms and fails to meet Soviet demands for larger quantities of more technologically advanced goods. [portion marking not declassified]
The GDR sees improved political and economic relations with the United States as the crowning achievement of Westpolitik. The aging Honecker apparently is convinced that an invitation to visit Washington is within his grasp, at relatively little cost. Although East Berlin has made some moves to signal its interest—including the visit of Politburo member Axen last month2 and more flexibility in talks on Jewish and US official claims—it remains unwilling to take the practical steps needed to meet US concerns and improve relations. This holds especially true of GDR support for terrorist groups and Third World radical regimes. [portion marking not declassified]
The Leadership’s Dilemma
Over the past ten months the East German leadership has tried to increase its acceptance by the major Western powers (Westpolitik) without diminishing its authoritarian and centralized rule at home. [Page 956] Last fall the regime carried out its largest ever amnesty of prisoners (including virtually all political detainees) and liberalized restrictions on travel to the West by East Germans below pension age. The shoot-to-kill order at the Berlin Wall, initially suspended during party chief Honecker’s trip to Bonn last fall, remains in abeyance. Moreover, until last November, the leadership seemed increasingly prepared to tolerate activities of peace and human rights activists. [portion marking not declassified]
This strategy has won some limited diplomatic successes. Following his first ever visit to Bonn last fall, East German leader Honecker travelled to the Netherlands, Belgium, and France and is currently angling for an invitation to Madrid. Official visits to London and Washington remain the ultimate objective. [portion marking not declassified]
Nevertheless, the regime’s seemingly conciliatory moves on the domestic front have not reversed growing popular dissatisfaction with East Berlin’s policies. Applications for emigration to West Germany have increased, many from those who have visited the West under the recent and more liberal travel arrangements. Criticism by the party rank-and-file of the leadership’s rejection of Soviet-style glasnost has grown, and solidarity demonstrations with those arrested during the regime’s crackdowns on activists last fall and this spring have intensified. [portion marking not declassified]
The leadership is responding with new arrests and expulsions of dissidents to West Germany and has threatened a massive purge of disaffected party members. It has not abandoned its reliance on repression to preempt challenges to its authority from any quarter. Over time, however, such tactics could sour the GDR’s relationship with West Germany—especially in the all-important area of economic ties—and prevent closer ties to those Western states that demand improvements in East Germany’s human rights record and greater maneuvering room for non-party groups such as the church. [portion marking not declassified]
We believe Honecker’s tacking and veering on domestic policies will become increasingly difficult to sustain over the next few years. Popular dissatisfaction almost certainly will rise as the GDR’s economic slowdown makes it increasingly difficult to sustain living standards. The approach of succession will add to uncertainties over the regime’s long-term policy course. The East German Politburo on the average is the oldest in Eastern Europe, and the traditionally monolithic leadership is showing greater divisions over the treatment of dissidents, the costs and benefits of Westpolitik, and ways to improve economic performance. Although Honecker shows no sign of relinquishing power voluntarily, he could be eased out in the next year or so if economic stagnation continues and anti-regime protests spurred by Soviet leader Gorbachev’s glasnost intensify. [portion marking not declassified]
[Page 957]Differences with Moscow
East Berlin’s public rejection of Gorbachev-style reforms—and the arrogant tone it has used—has brought the regime increasingly into conflict with the USSR. GDR officials scarcely bother to hide their conviction that reforms would raise dangerous popular expectations in the GDR and already are destabilizing Eastern Europe. The regime has censored GDR media coverage of Soviet events and debates. Moscow to date has tolerated Honecker’s defiance, apparently because it anticipates East German deliveries of more technologically advanced goods and increased economic cooperation to aid Soviet modernization efforts. If East Berlin fails to live up to Moscow’s expectations, however, and if Gorbachev further consolidates his power at home, frictions with the Soviets are likely to intensify. [portion marking not declassified]
To preserve maneuvering room with Moscow on domestic policy and deflect Soviet criticism of economic footdragging, the East German leadership bends over backwards to accommodate Moscow on most foreign policy issues. Recently, it has been careful not to get out ahead of Moscow on policy towards Bonn and actively supports radical Third World regimes and terrorist groups which further Soviet interests. East Berlin has taken pains to underscore its ability to further Soviet arms control objectives. In this vein, it is sponsoring this summer and fall a series of conferences on East-West security cooperation this summer and fall. [portion marking not declassified]
Courting the US
East Berlin clearly wants to improve political and economic relations with the United States. It has played up the recent Washington visit of GDR senior Politburo member and Honecker ally Hermann Axen as an important breakthrough, even though neither side abandoned long established positions. During US Deputy Secretary Whitehead’s visit last fall,3 the GDR intimated a willingness to expand the scope of exchanges on terrorism. This spring, during discussions with the Council on Jewish Material Claims (a private, US-based organization negotiating on behalf of losses by US Jewish citizens in Nazi Germany), East Germany for the first time accepted unequivocally the concept of reparations. During US-GDR claims negotiations sessions this April the GDR agreed to a preliminary text for a settlement. [portion marking not declassified]
Nevertheless, the East Germans are still unwilling to take the kind of substantive steps needed to improve relations. Talks on terrorism this spring were as disappointing as at any previous time. The GDR evidently has curbed only its most high-profile assistance to terrorists and Third World radicals—chiefly the provision of diplomatic safehaven and tolerance of commercial front activities in East Berlin; training on East [Page 958] German soil and other forms of substantive assistance continue. The GDR also has yet to offer more than a one-million-dollar token payment for “Jewish suffering” and still insists that US trade concessions precede any final settlement of US material claims. [portion marking not declassified]
An invitation to Washington remains the ultimate prize—the jewel in the crown of Westpolitik—for the aging Honecker. He and his associates, however, still seem to believe that it can be acquired at bargain-basement prices. [portion marking not declassified]
- Source: Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Russian and European Analysis, Job 02–06156R: Intelligence Publication Files—Record Copy of Finished Intelligence Pubs (1982–1996), Box 2, Folder 361: 23 May 1988 East Germany: The Political Scene & Relations with the United States EURM 88–20089. Confidential; [handling restriction not declassified]. Prepared in the Office of European Analysis based on information available as of May 20.↩
- Telegram 146548 to East Berlin, May 7, summarized Axen’s meeting with Shultz. (Department of State, Central Foreign Policy File, D880394–0522)↩
- See Documents 299 and 300.↩