German Unification, Putin & Ukraine

In his campaign against Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has deployed both military and psychological weapons. One of his tools is to falsify the story of German unification within NATO in an attempt to weaken Berlin’s support for Kyiv.

On February 8-9, 1990, US Secretary of State James Baker met President Mikhail Gorbachev in Moscow. The Berlin Wall had opened only three months earlier. Germans—East and West—were establishing the facts of unification on the ground. But three of the four victorious powers of World War II— and especially the Soviet Union—were reluctant to address international arrangements so that a united Germany could regain its full sovereignty.

Baker’s primary aim was to get Moscow to agree to a Two-plus-Four process to negotiate the end of limitations imposed by the Potsdam Conference of 1945. Under Baker’s plan, the FRG and GDR (the “Two”) would negotiate the internal arrangements, while six would resolve the international and historical questions. Within a week, all the countries agreed to launch this Two-plus-Four mechanism.

During his trip to Moscow, Baker also tried to persuade Gorbachev that the future security of Europe would be enhanced if a unified, democratic Germany were a member of NATO. To prod the Soviets to face a choice they were trying to ignore, Baker offered a hypothetical: “Would you prefer to see a united Germany outside of NATO, independent and with no U.S. forces, or would you prefer a unified Germany to be tied to NATO, with assurances that NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastwards?”

The Soviets were not disposed to contemplate a united Germany in NATO so they brushed Baker’s hypothetical aside. In the following days, Baker substituted the term “special military status” for “jurisdiction” when referring to the former GDR lands within NATO; Manfred Woerner, the Secretary General of NATO, had suggested the phrase.

Over the next seven months, the debates within the Two-plus-Four paralleled the internal German negotiations. The Final Settlement, signed in Moscow on September 12, 1990, reveals why Putin’s disinformation is false. First, the Soviets negotiated a special military status for the former GDR. The limitations within this status applied while the Soviets were withdrawing as well as afterwards. Anyone who has negotiated with Russians recognizes as ludicrous Putin’s claim that Moscow relied on an earlier conversation as a promise—without affirming it in writing.

Second, one of the treaty limitations is that non-German NATO forces would not be “stationed” or “deployed” in the former GDR. The deal almost fell apart the night before signing over the meaning of the word “deployed.” As the US negotiator, I thought that someday Poland might want to join NATO; therefore, we needed to ensure that NATO forces could travel east to reach Poland. We compromised with an agreed minute that left the meaning of “deployed” at the discretion of the German government.

Third, President George HW Bush brought Gorbachev around to the idea of a united Germany in NATO with an argument that could apply to future members. On May 31, at a summit in Washington, Bush said that he favored Germany’s membership in NATO, and then asked if Gorbachev could accept, according to the CSCE principle, that Germany was free to select its alliance. To the surprise of everyone in the room, Gorbachev agreed. Bush repeated the question to make sure—and Gorbachev agreed again. This long-standing CSCE principle would permit others in the East to join NATO, too.

Fourth, both Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze and Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev later affirmed that no one promised not to enlarge NATO. In fact, at a NATO summit in May, 1990, its members even proposed that its former foes could establish diplomatic liaison with NATO, which a few of us hoped might lead to eventual membership for eastern states.

Finally, a German ambassador later recounted to me that when NATO began to enlarge and negotiate a Founding Act with Russia in 1996/1997, the Russians did not claim that anyone had promised not to add new NATO members. If Putin’s assertion were true, some Russian would have stated so at the time.

So what happened in 1989-90? German unification occurred within the blink of an historical eye. During fast-paced negotiations over 10 months, the United States and the FRG explored ideas that could achieve unification peacefully and rapidly, while adapting new security arrangements.

In February, 1990, Baker proposed an approach for German, European, and Soviet security within trans-Atlantic structures that countries had developed over 40 years. None of those discussions involved limiting the alliance options of the Central and Eastern Europeans. To the contrary, the negotiations underscored the principle of a Europe whole and free, with respect for sovereign, independent states. Today, Putin seeks to smash that principle. The best way for Germans to keep faith with the precepts of self-determination and mutual security that guided unification is to assist Ukraine in resisting Putin’s revanchism.