Germany and the politics of the neutron bomb, 1975-1979

This article explores the pivotal, but largely neglected 1977-1978 German neutron bomb (ERW) controversy in its broader domestic and international contexts. It explains how a domestic ideological intra-Social Democratic Party (SPD) argument over “security” and “Germany” between chancellor Schmidt and SPD executive party secretary Bahr turned a secret governmental issue—the question of ERW production and deployment—into a highly politicised public debate. Internationally the ERW affair revealed a deep Euro-Atlantic rift and rapidly worsening East-West relations which could threaten the “German” situation. On the domestic scene Bahr used the opportunity to stimulate moralist-pacifist thinking within his party and among the wider public by which he not only risked association with Soviet peace diplomacy, but also challenged Schmidt's political authority and strained the government coalition beyond repair. Above all, however, it provided the political context for Schmidt to embrace an international leadership role by verbalising his initial ideas of what in 1979 would become NATO's landmark “dual-track decision.

West Germany and the Baltic question during the cold war

West Germany's legal position on Baltic annexation, the question of official (West) German - Baltic relations; 1950 - 1954, Bonn, Moscow and the Baltic question, 1955 - 1961; neue ostpolitik, Helsinki, human rights and the end of the cold war

German unification

Ten years after German unification, this historiographical review discusses how the cascade of published material reflects on two questions vital for contemporary history on this subject: first, why and how did unification happen, and second, what kind of sources and evidence are used by authors to justify their particular interpretation of events? In answering these questions, this review will not only give an overview of published accounts – official, scholarly, and autobiographical – but go beyond the immediate confines of the 1990s to shed light on the question of why Chancellor Helmut Kohl was able to win a prize that had eluded all of his predecessors since Konrad Adenauer

Contemporary history in Europe: from mastering national pasts to the future of writing the world

Debates surrounding the approach to and distinctiveness of contemporary history qua history that had been simmering ever since the professionalization of history in the late nineteenth century re-emerged with vigour after 1990. This article attempts to identify what characterizes and distinguishes (the history of) our present time, by comparing the evolution of what has been labelled ‘contemporary history’ in France, Germany and Britain over the last 90 years. In discussing some of the conceptual problems and methodological challenges of contemporary history, it will be revealed that many in Europe remain stuck in an older, ‘national’ (and transnational) fixation with the second world war and the nazis’ atrocities, although working in medias res today appears to point to the investigation of events and phenomena that are ‘global’. The article will seek to make a fresh suggestion of how to delimit ‘contemporariness’ from the older ‘past’ and end with some comments on the significance of the role of contemporary history within the broader historical discipline and society at large

Between political rhetoric and realpolitik calculations: western diplomacy and the baltic independence struggle in the Cold War endgame

Fifteen years after the Baltic SSRs' independence declarations, this article sheds new light on the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian struggle to regain statehood in the context of international relations between 1988 and 1991. Based on declassified archival sources from Western and Eastern archives, memoirs and official histories, it reveals the nature of 'Western' Baltic policies and analyses how (far) they impacted on the Soviet Union's demise. Second, the role universal normative values played in Western, Soviet and Baltic politics will be discussed in historical perspective; with the article concluding by offering some reflections on the general relationship between political rhetoric and foreign policy