“Aggression in Felt Slippers:” Bahr, Kissinger, and the Geopolitics of <i>Ostpolitik</i>, 1962–2022
Journal: Global Studies Quarterly
Year: 2025

Abstract The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine plunged Germany's Ostpolitik (Eastern Policy) into crisis. Whereas Ostpolitik had commonly been seen to have brought about system change in the Soviet Bloc, it now appeared as the root of Germany's doomed approach towards Putin's Russia. This essay examines the vision that drove Ostpolitik's architect Egon Bahr, a man who continued to guide social democrat security policy as a party grandee and elder statesman until his death in 2015. I spotlight Bah