THE COLLAPSE/OVERTHROW [?] OF THE GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC

1961: The Berlin Wall exposes the GDR’s unpopularity1975: Helsinki Accord guarantees civil liberties all over Europe1985: Mikhail Gorbachev becomes the Soviet leader Jan. 1988: Small protest rally in East BerlinMay 1989: Dissidents expose fraudulent municipal elections;

Hungary opens its border with AustriaSummer 1989: 140,000 East Germans emigrateOct. 9, 1989: Leipzig authorities capitulate to protest marchersOct. 17, 1989: Honecker replaced by Egon KrenzNov. 9, 1989: Fall of the Berlin WallMarch 1990: East Germany’s first free electionsOct. 3, 1990: The Day of German Unity

From 1948 to 1961 Berlin was the only gap in the Iron Curtain

Walter Ulbricht says, "Heavy

Industry: The Foundation of Independence and

Prosperity" (German

Democratic Republic, 1952)

The “superworker” Wolf Hennecke

fills out his (exaggerated)

production record as a

hewer of coal, which then set the “norm” for

other coal miners.

By August 1961, about 2.5 million

East Germans

had fled to the West

The Death Strip at Potsdamer Platz (1982)

“On August 13, 1961, the peace of Europe was saved.”(GDR poster from 1986)

Erich Honecker,son of a Saarland coal

miner,victim of Nazi persecution,

East German dictator from 1971 to 1989.He increased the

proportion of industrial production in the “People’s Own Factories” from 82%

to 99%.

Erich Mielke’s Ministry of State Security employed

100,000 full time plus 200,000 informants, and

maintained files on 6 million of 15 million

citizens

ARTICLE VII OF THE HELSINKI DECLARATION,August 1, 1975

“The participating States will respect human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief, for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion….“Within this framework the participating States will recognize and respect the freedom of the individual to profess and practice, alone or in community with others, religion or belief acting in accordance with the dictates of his own conscience….“In the field of human rights and fundamental freedoms, the participating States will act in conformity with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [from 1948].”

Prof. Robert Havemann welcomes

Wolf Biermann & other dissidents to his apartment

(ca. 1970).In 1985 the GDR ransomed 2,500

dissidents.

TEEN-AGERS IN EAST BERLIN, 1981:Even to purchase the small, 26-horsepower

“Trabant” behind them would require years on a waiting list.

THE FAILURE OF HONECKER’S

CENTRAL ECONOMIC PLANNING

DDR foreign debt

1972 $1 billion

1980 $13.9 billion

1989 $20.6 billion

Estimated ratio between average household income in East and

West Germany

1970 64%

1983 46%

Strip mining for brown coal near

Leipzig

Mikhail Gorbachev, Perestroika:

The Second Russian Revolution

(1987).Gorbachev also

promoted glasnost, or openness.

President Reagan at the Brandenburg

Gate, June 12, 1987:

“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this

wall!”

The Hungarian and Austrian foreign ministers dismantlethe “Iron Curtain” near Sopron, 27 June 1989

In Aug/Sep 1989, 2,500 East Germans scaled the fence of the West German embassy in Prague, seeking to emigrate.

A “Freedom Train” from Prague arrives in Hof, West Germany, on 5 October 1989

THE GDR’s 40TH

BIRTHDAY PARTY,

OCTOBER 7, 1989

In private Gorbachev told Honecker, “When we fall behind, life punishes us immediately.”

The Leipzig “Monday rally” of October 9, 1989, when 70,000 citizens faced down the security

forces

Hope and anxiety at a Leipzig rally

On October 18 the SED chose Egon Krenz (born 1937) to replace Honecker. Cynics coined the term Wendehals (a bird that can swivel its head) to describe the grim Stalinists now posing as enthusiastic reformers.

Krenz and Günter Schabowski lead a rousing chorus of the International

One million marchers in East Berlin, November 4

“SOCIALISM IS ONLY AS SOCIALISTIC—AS ITS DEMOCRACY IS DEMOCRATIC!

THEREFORE:SECRET AND FREE ELECTIONS”

(Banner at the Berlin rally of November 4)

“WE ARE ONE PEOPLE”

(A sign from the later Leipzig Monday

rallies)

THE CONFUSION OF COMMUNIST LEADERS

On November 9 Egon Krenz secured agreement by the SED Central Committee that citizens WHO HAD PASSPORTS should in future receive exit visas “without preconditions.” Details still needed to be worked out.

Krenz passed the resolution to Günter Schabowski that evening as a televised press conference began.

Flustered by the journalists’ questions, Schabowski suggested that the resolution was probably meant to take effect immediately, and that exit visas could be granted at every border crossing.

The West German evening news reported at 8:00 p.m. that “the GDR is opening its borders.” By 10:00 p.m. many tens of thousands of East German citizens had arrived at the Berlin border crossings. By midnight the flustered East German guards had opened all the gates.

The youth of Berlin celebrate, 10 November 1989

A caravan of Trabis passes through Checkpoint Charlie, November 10, 1989: About 2/3 of all East

Germans visited the West in November and December.

East German sightseers receive a hearty welcome

in the city center of Lübeck

and at the Rasdorf border crossing in Hesse. The West

German authorities organized

“welcome money” of DM 100 per

guest.

Dismantling the Wall on November 11. The dissident Communist Hans Modrow became GDR prime minister on November 18.

The New Forum meets in

Gethsemane Church, East Berlin, November 10/11,

1989.Most leaders of the

protest marches(such as the lawyer

Rolf Henrich and Bärbel Bohley)

advocated “humanist

socialism” and an independent GDR.

Helmut Kohl in Dresden, December 19, 1989: He soon promised to redeem savings accounts at an exchange

rate of 1:1.In March 1990 the CDU won 41% of the GDR vote.

“Let the Stasi-parasites learn how to work!”(East Berliners invade Stasi headquarters, 15 January 1990)

East German army officers and civic groups soon disarmed the secret police and occupied its offices, while the 350,000 Soviet troops in East Germany did nothing.

Helmut Kohl and Hans-Dietrich Genscher visit Gorbachev in his vacation home in the Caucasus, July 15, 1990.

DM 5 billion secured permission for Germany to remain in NATO

Germans before the Reichstag celebrate their national reunification on October 3, 1990

The Bundestag election of 2 December 1990: Among East Germans, the organizers of the protest marches only won 5%

of the vote; the former Communists (PDS), 10%.

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POTSDAMER PLATZ TODAY WITH THE SONY CENTER