Opposition to German Reunification

The reunification of Germany in 1990 is seen as one of the momentous events in German history, but to some at the time it was not as welcomed as one may have imagined. As we have seen in the Carstens-Wickham's article, Gender in Cartons of German Unification , some in East Germany were not particularly looking forward to reuniting with West Germany. They instead looked to reforming the Communist Government already in place in the East with one that might allow for more liberties, while still keeping the socialist ideals alive.  Looking back, such reaction should not be so surprising considering the differences between East and West Germany, both in economic and ideological terms. People in East Germany had been taught all their lives that West Germany and their western allies were the Capitalist aggressors seeking to destroy their way of life either militarily or economically. Also while in East Germany, the luxuries were many times more expensive than in West Germany, the necessary goods (i.e food) were cheaper in East Germany due to being heavily subsidized by the Government. Thus after Reunification, people in East Germany all of sudden found themselves paying more for the basic good that used to get really cheap. As mentioned by Carstens-Wickham's,  all of these factors helped to contribute to what was known ostologia(combination of east in German and nostalgia) in which some in the former DDR wished they were back in the times when the DDR actually existed.  Also opposition against reunification existed among some people in both East and West Germany, based on the point of view which stated that since West Germany was so much stronger economically that it was basically exploiting  East Germany by  reuniting as quickly as it did. West Germany thus was the only who would profit from such an arrangement since it would take over the former DDR economy and keeping much of the benefits for themselves.

     Not only were some Germans skeptical of a reunified German, outsiders too mounted some opposition against a reunified Germany. Most notably France and Great Britain were slightly weary that a unified Germany would once again rise to shake the balance of Power in Europe and it would eventually seek to regain some of its losses from both World Wars. The French, however realized their goals of eventually creating a  more united European economy with a common currency (the eventual European Union) would be better served by allowing a strong Unified Germany to prosper once more. Great Britain eventually gave in since they saw that their fears were based on more historic facts, then actual modern politics, since it seem very unlikely Germany would harbor such ambitions anymore.

The Creation of Two Germanies

        After Germany's loss in the Second great War, the nation stood in its own ruins, its future uncertain. The victorious allies divided the country among themselves into occupation zones. The western Allies took the western part of Germany, dividing it into the American, British and French Zones, while the Soviets took the Eastern half of the country. The former German Capital, Berlin, was partitioned in a similar manner. The unified Germany  Bismarck had worked so hard to unite just 70 years earlier was no more. In 1949 the American, British and French Zones would unite and become the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and the soviet zone becoming the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). With the creation of these two new German States, the hopes of those Germans who wished to see Germany reunited were dashed for the next 40 years. Each Germany had a different type of Government on two different sides of the political system. One was more democratic and its citizens enjoyed more freedoms economically and in daily life. The other was staunchly communist, with its citizens living a more repressed existence under the state police (Statsi) and their Government. However different these two Germanys might have been,  they both claimed to be the rightful and legitimate German State.

             Who though is to blame for the division of Germany? The answer may be provided by several different factors. The first factor is the Soviet Union's desire to form a German State that would be friendly to them and have no desire to invade their country once more. This combined with  the Soviet Union's belief that they had fought and defeated the brunt of the German Wehrmacht and thus deserved to be rewarded with greater reparations from their eastern occupation zone assured that Germany was to become divided in the immediate aftermath of the war. Politicians within the two Germanies also responsible for the division of Germany as each considered the other to be "illegitimate" and each had no intentions of reaching a common ground in which would allow for Germany to unified under a single government. The last and arguably the most important factor that kept the two Germanies divided is what West and East Germany represented to the two opposing sides in the Cold War. It was essentially a microcosm of the cold war, with West Germany representing capitalism, democracy and other ideals of the Western World, and East Germany representing the communist ideals of the Soviet Union and its Allies. At times during the division of Germany did both sides often come close to war, including the Soviet blockade of Berlin and the subsequent Airlift by the Western Allies, and the 1961 Berlin Crisis where American Tanks and Soviets Tanks literally faced off in Berlin but no shots were fired. Neither side wanted or though they could afford to lose the whole of Germany to other side and as a result Germany was to remain divided