-9-

separate states linked by a Customs Union. Something like
that might happen again, though it must be remembered that
the 19th century German Confederation and Customs Union
eventually led to a unitary state. A confederation may make
it easier to satisfy Soviet security concerns by maintaining
East Germany as a special security zone with limited arma-
ments.

But in the end, the outcome will be shaped by the
wishes of the German people, not by outside forces. Outsid-
ers can impose a solution only if they are prepared to use
force - and prepared to defy a people whose desire for
freedom was strong enough to puncture the Berlin Wall after
28 years of repression.

The synchronization of economic policies and free
elections in East Germany will inevitably raise the issue of
the German Democractic Republic's military role. Even in a
confederation, its long-term membership in the Warsaw Pact

-10-

would become extremely questionable. It is hard to imagine
how a German confederation whose Eastern portion was domi-
nated by more or less the same political parties as the
Western portion could be allied to the Warsaw Pact in
Eastern Europe and allied to NATO in Western Europe. And it
is inconceivable in the more likely event of a unitary - if
federal - state.

How can Moscow be persuaded that East Germany leave the
Warsaw Pact? On one level the Soviet Union has no choice.

For after free elections, membership of the German Democrat-
ic Republic in the Warsaw Pact will become untenable.

Certainly the Soviet Union is entitled to guarantees against
its well-founded nightmare of military aggression from the
West. Some sort of special military status for East Germany
is certainly desirable and the presence of some Soviet
forces for an agreed period is conceivable. A transition
period to new conditions is essential. The United States and

-11-

its allies should be prepared to deal with these subjects
with an open mind. But in the end, Soviet security concerns
will have to be met by new arms control arrangements or by a
European peace treaty rather than by continued East German
membership in the Warsaw Pact.

If the German Democratic Republic cannot remain in the
Warsaw pact indefinitely, what about West German membership
in NATO? The Soviet spokesman, Gerasimov, has asserted that
unification is impossible so long as the two Germanies are
each part of opposing military blocs. Does this mean that
Gorbachev has decided to play the "German card?~ Will the
Kremlin offer unification in return for German military
neutrality, perhaps even allowing a unified Germany to
remain in the European Community in the process? Indeed, in
his speech to the East German parliament in October,
Gorbachev referred favorably to a proposal along those lines
made by Stalin in 1953.

-12-

It is to be hoped that in the end the Soviet leader
will not be tempted by a specious symmetry between East
Germany's membership in the Warsaw Pact and West Germany's
alliance to NATO. If East Germany leaves the Warsaw Pact it
does not follow that the Soviet Union is any better off if
the Federal Republic leaves NATO. I would argue in fact that
it is worse off. No Russian leader should disregard the
lessons of history: that this century's two world wars grew
out of Germany's attempt to pursue a purely national policy
in the center of the Continent. Seeking to preempt every
possible combination of surrounding countries - of which
Germany has more than any other European state - Germany
threatened each neighbor individually and provoked them to
form the rigid military structures that led to war.

Today, a nation of 80 million standing alone in the
center of the Continent would once again threaten European
stability - and in the long run even Soviet security. How

-13-

would one define military neutralization for a nation of
such magnitude? How would one verify or monitor it? Over
time, such a Germany would be bound to become a military
force. Or else the Soviet Union might be tempted to exploit
a neutralization agreement by insisting on verification
measures tantamount to hegemony over Germany. Either course
would threaten European stability.

Thus the safest outcome would be a united (or confeder-
ated) Germany that remains integrated into NATO but is
constrained by new arms limitations throughout Europe.
Strange as it may sound, membership in NATO would provide
the best verification mechanism for monitoring agreed limits
on armaments. Such limits would have to provide that no NATO
deployments advance beyond present dividing lines in Europe
and include special provisions for the territory that is now
the German Democratic Republic.

-14-

The problem of German unification is above all conceptual. It requires an idea of process - of how Germany might be unified, and over what period of time: will it become a single country with federal institutions; a confederal state, or something in between? What arms limitations are needed or acceptable? What is the appropriate European and Atlantic framework in which these changes should take place?

In seeking to answer these questions, the Federal Republic and its Western allies must work together closely. Neither the United States nor its allies should seek to control internal German discussions. But they - and particularly the United States - have the responsibility to contribute their own ideas and initiatives - keeping in mind one overriding reality: the only way to keep the Federal Republic in the Western camp will be to concede some form of unification - and to work to ensure that it happens under

-15-

circumstances that make every nation including the Soviet
Union feel secure.

NATO and the European Community

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, any attempt to
continue business as usual can only cause NATO to atrophy
even further. Events in East Germany have culminated a
process of attrition that has been going on for several
years, driven by arms control negotiations and "Gorbachev
fever." All NATO countries have stopped any serious effort
to modernize and improve their armaments. The Bush Adminis-
tration agreed last May to postpone the modernization of
medium range nuclear missiles in the Federal Republic. Now
that postponement is likely to become permanent; under
current conditions, there is no political party in Germany
prepared to reopen the issue. A recent German visitor to
Washington called the modernization prospect "laughable."

-16-

Yet the argument made against modernizing Lance mis-
siles - that the Federal Republic must take special measures
to avoid becoming a nuclear battlefield because it is so
geographically exposed - logically applies to all nuclear
weapons deployed on German soil. Indeed, the shorter the
range of the weapons the more valid becomes the argument.
Thus the likely next phase of the NATO debate, even before
the recent upheaval in East Germany, was the promotion of a
nuclear free zone in Central Europe. And once the concept of
a nuclear free zone is accepted, a doctrine of no first use
of nuclear weapons - that NATO will not fire first under any
circumstances - cannot be far behind. For given the range of
nuclear weapons, participants in a nuclear free zone can
only avoid the danger of nuclear war by foregoing on its
territory any use of nuclear weapons based outside that
zone.

-17-

Recent events in East Germany and Eastern Europe will
surely accelerate these trends. The progressive reduction of
Western conventional forces on the central front appears to
be irreversible. West Germany already plans to reduce the
length of compulsory military service, a move that will cut
its armed forces from 600,000 to 420,000 - proportionately a
larger _unilateral_ reduction than what the West has proposed
for the Soviet Union. And the Soviets will surely insist on
 additional _reciprocal_ German cuts as a part of arms control
negotiations later on.

A significant reduction of American ground forces in
Europe has also become highly probable. Whether undertaken
under a direct mandate by Congress, or simply in anticipa-
tion of congressional pressures, the result will be a
further erosion of existing NATO strategy. The concept of
flexible response - that deterrence is only credible if it

-18-

includes many stages short of all-out nuclear war - cannot
be sustained under current conditions.

Even if the Federal Republic remains in NATO - by far
the best outcome for the stability fo Europe - a reassess-
ment of NATO's strategy and organization has become impera-
tive. Against what threat - and with what forces - should
NATO be organized? What reductions of US forces should be
made, and based on what strategy? How great a US presence
should be left in Europe? What is to be the role of Eurpean
forces? What should be the relationship betwen conventional
and nuclear forces?

This is not the occasion to answer questions that ought
to be the subject of the fullest and deepest NATO consulta-
tions since the formation of the Atlantic Alliance.
Nevertheless, a number of principles can be stated:

(1) NATO should be adapted to new realities, not
abandoned. The end of NATO would spell political chaos in

-19-

Europe, trigger nationalist rivalries and tempt renewed
Soviet expansionism.

(2) Clearly at the end of the process stand substantial reductions of US and Soviet groundforces - perhaps their total removal if the Soviet troops withdrew deep enough into the Soviet Union. But this prospect can be realized only if the NATO nations put an end to the irresponsible process of unilateral reductions now going on. While no country has anything to be proud of, the United States - as the leader of the alliance - is setting an appalling example. Our highest defense officials and leaders of Congress are acting as if the peace which we are working for is already here. If this process is not stopped, NATO will hand to the Soviets the impotent Europe it should be our pride to have avoided at the precise moment that our goal is within sight.

(3) Whatever the balance of conventional forces, some American nuclear presence and airforces must be retained on

the European continent with the exact level subject to
negotiation. If the defense of Europe were again to rely
exclusively on conventional weapons, peace would be at the
mercy of historical patterns that for centuries have proved
highly unstable. War after war has occurred despite the
existence of conventional forces that on paper appeared more
or less in balance. This is because success in conventional
war depends on so many intangibles of leadership and maneu-
ver that the actual balance has proved very difficult to
calculate.

But Europe should not rely on US nuclear weapons based
on American soil or at sea. It was the fact that such a
distant deterrent lacked credibility that brought American
ground forces, nuclear and conventional, to Europe in the
first place. What was true when NATO's nuclear forces were
hugely superior is even more crucial today, given the growth
of the Soviet nuclear stockpile and the trend of strategic

-21-

arms control negotiations. In short, NATO must link the
nuclear and air defense of Europe and America whatever
happens with German unity or with conventional disarmament.
Otherwise we are on the road to Soviet hegemony if
perestroika succeeds, and to nationalist chaos if
perestroika fails.

(4) Conventional arms control negotiations must be redesigned. Currently, they are based on the continued existence of two military blocs. But the future of the Warsaw Pact - and especially of East German membership - is now in question. Above all, arms control proposals must get away from the pedantic "bean counting" approach - weapons system by weapons system - so much in vogue. It must be brought into line with the emergent political reality especially the growing sense of independence of the East European countries and with a special status for the territory of the German Democratic Republic.

-22-

(5) Whatever happens, the relative weight of America within NATO is bound to diminish. A major withdrawal of US forces, combined with the emergence of an economically integrated Europe, makes it necessary to rethink an organization that evolved when America had a nuclear monopoly and was militarily and economically dominant. Europe must assume a growing responsibility for its own defense, with the United States playing a supporting role.

For the European Community to assume this strengthened role and to take the lead in restoring the new democracies of Eastern Europe to their historical relationships, it will have to come to terms with German unification. Some leading Europeans and Americans have warned that the European Community was never designed to accommodate a united Germany with a population of some 80 million. Though historically accurate, that view is irrelevant to the existing situation. However justified the historic fears of Germany's neighbors,

-23-

the European Community cannot survive if the Germans see it
as a device to thwart unification.

There is merit to the concern that a unified Germany
would have disproportionate weight within the European
Community. But the other members have the means and the
mechanisms to prevent German hegemony. Surely Britain,
France, Spain, and Italy, not to mention the smaller states,
could shape a consensus that prevents domination by any one
country, however powerful. Indeed, the strongest argument
for Britain's wholehearted participation in the 1992 process
is the need for Britain's political experience in establish-
ing the right political balance within the European Communi-
ty.

The precise evolution of that balance is for Europeans
to decide. But Americans can help to close a growing gap
between the European Community, where national boundaries
are being blurred and the United States is not represented,

-24-

and NATO, where nations still speak with separate voices and
the European Community has no means of expression. This
suggests a two-fold task: (a) Europe should be given some
institutional voice within NATO, perhaps by reviving the
West European Union; (b) the European Community and the
United States should develop some systematic method of
political consultation at a high level.

## The Future of East-West Relations

Ever since the advent of Gorbachev, the West has been
obsessed with his mercurial and courageous personality. But
reliance on a single personality is in fact a counsel of
despair. It suggests that Gorbachev's foreign policy is not
sustained by a consensus on national interest; if that were
true, everything gained in recent years would be highly
vulnerable.

Ironically, events in Eastern Europe suggest that
Gorbachev's position is probably less precarious than had

-25-

been thought. No Soviet leader could have risked the Soviet
Union's position in Central Europe without the support of
the Red Army and the KGB. Those two institutions must have
concluded that the only other option - repression - would
have required such brutality as to isolate the Soviet Union
and thwart any hopes of enlisting Western help in moderniz-
ing the Soviet economy. But if one believes that there
exists a relatively wide consensus in the Soviet leadership,
it becomes especially important to analyze of what strands
it may be composed.

There are three possibilities: (a) the Soviet leaders
may believe that by relaxing the grip on Eastern Europe,
they will be able to maintain existing arrangements at less
cost; (b) they may be playing the German card - that is,
using the prospect of a neutral unified Germany to drive
American military power from the Continent. In Moscow's view
that might reduce Soviet vulnerability if perestroika fails

-26-

and lay the basis for eventual Soviet hegemony over Europe
if perestroika succeeds; (c) the Soviets may want to conduct
a serious negotiation on a new East-West equilibrium.

Unfortunately, Soviet leaders have made statements
supporting all three theories. The most likely reason is
that the Soviets may not yet have made up their own minds.

At least one strand of Soviet thought is likely to hope
that discarding the baggage of a failed ideology is the
prerequisite to continuing the historic Russian policy of
disany power center within reach of Russian power.

Last summer an eminent Soviet scientist, a member of the
Supreme Soviet reported to be close to Gorbachev, told me
that the Soviet Union's strategic position could not be
challenged so long as it retained a large stockpile of
nuclear weapons and Germany and Japan were denuclearized.

Hence, he argued, the thrust of Soviet policy should be to
remove US nuclear weapons from Eurasia. After that, it would

-27-

be safe to ask Germany and Japan to help rebuild the Soviet Union. For the Soviet Union could always keep those countries in line by brandishing its nuclear monopoly in Eurasia.

At the time, I considered these the abstract musings of an out-of-power intellectual. I am no longer so sure. It is not impossible that some in the Kremlin are gambling for high stakes. This group may calculate that a neutral unified Germany would enable the Soviet Union to salvage the Warsaw Pact and frighten Western Europe while exploiting new disarmament provisions to achieve step-by-step political domination over Central Europe.

Gorbachev is too intelligent not to recognize the perils of such a strategy unless Western confusion hands it to him on a silver platter. For on the road to hegemony lie many potential pitfalls for the Soviet Union, any one of which could spell disaster. Every effort should therefore be

-28-

made to negotiate a true equilibrium. History teaches that a
stable peace can occur only if the interests of <u>all</u> major
players are met; if the security concerns of both sides are
adquately recognized. This would require that both the
Soviet Union and the United States break from traditional
patterns. On the Soviet Union's part, it would require
abandoning the stragegy of weakening every other power
center in Eruasia. On America's part, it would require a
willingness to drop challenges to the Soviet Union within
its national frontiers.

We have no reason to approve of the internal arrange-
ments of the Soviet Union or to help in sustaining them. But
we should be prepared to leave their erosion to the forces
of history. The test of the new equilibrium is simple: the
Soviet Union must be prepared to settle for a balance of
power; the United States must be willing to coexist with an
unfriendly ideology.

-29-

In practice, this means: (1) working out a concept for German unification based on self determination; (2) creating a special security status for East German territory now occupied by East Germany; (3) balancing forces on both sides of the present dividing line in Europe, with most Russian ground forces withdrawn deep into the Soviet Union; (4) withdrawing a major portion of US ground forces, but with some provision for keeping US nuclear weapons and airforces as part of the common Western defense strategy. The level of remaining forces and the duration of their stay is obviously a subject for negotiation; (5) Encouraging an integrated Western Europe to strengthen its ties with the emerging democracies in Eastern Europe.

The United States, which did so much to build the postwar era, can render one more signal service in preparing the transition to a new international order. The meeting in Malta cannot produce any agreements, as President Bush has

-30-

repeatedly pointed out. But it can mark the first step of a
long march toward a new and hopefully better world. In that
journey, the United States can no longer dominate; but it
has the opportunity to inspire. It cannot solve every
problem but it can contribute a sense of direction. In
short, if the new international order is to fulfill man-
kind's hopes, American leadership is needed.

In a period of turmoil, it is important to avoid
recklessness. But caution preserves the status quo; boldness
is needed to reach a better future. Few presidents have had
the opportunity before President Bush to leave their imprint
on an era. The time has come - it has never been more urgent
- for what President Bush has called "that vision thing."

NOV 23 '89 23:19 KISSINGER ASSOCATES N.Y.

P. 152

DR. KISSINGER NEWSWEEK ARTICLE FINAL DRAFT 11/23/89

"Policy," the 20th century Austrian foreign minister, Metternich, wrote, "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inexorably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the performance will not go on is an absurdity. The play will be completed either by the actors or by the spectators who mount the stage."

In recent weeks, the curtain has risen on a new play unfolding center stage in Europe. Many of the players are still on the sidelines, hesitant and unsure of their parts, above all waiting to see what roles others assume first. Not is anyone precisely sure of the nature of the play. Still,

NOV 23, '89 23:16 KISSINGER ASSOC IATES N.Y.

P.2

-2-

in the end, only one choice will remain: to finish the play
or to be consumed by it.

Although the weight of the past - and uneasiness about
the reemergence of a unified Germany - may keep some from
acknowledging it, we are witnessing the end of the immediate
post-war era. The process now in train will reshape patterns
of thought in place for over a generation. The political
world as we have known it is disintegrating before our eyes.

The new realities are:

- German unification in some form has become inevitable,
whatever the misgivings of Germany's neighbors and World War
II victims. So far the only statesman who seems to understand
this fully is President Mitterrand of France - the
Western country that viscerally fears German unification the
most.

XI

NOV 23 '89 23:16 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

C.W.44

P.3

-3-

- NATO will have to be fundamentally altered to take into account the transformation of Germany and the perceived erosion of the Soviet threat.

- The Warsaw Pact will not be able to survive in its present form very far into the next decade.

- The integration of the European Community will have to be accelerated, or else risk being torn apart by the centrifugal pull of changes in Eastern Europe.

- These trends will require a new look at East-West relations, including (and perhaps especially) arms control negotiations.

The observer's perplexity is the statesman's challenge.

President Bush has an opportunity unequaled since the great period of American statesmanship immediately following the end of World War II. Rarely have so many elements of international affairs been so fluid at the same time. The occasion to build a new international order both more stable

XI

P. 000

P. 4

-4-

and more hopeful than its predecessor's occurs no more than
once in a century.

For better or worse, that process must now begin at
Malta between President Bush and Secretary Corbachov though
it will take many months and perhaps years to complete. What
had been conceived - at least on the American side - as a
relaxed, philosophical stocktaking, has turned into a
maturity beginning an opportunity to shape a fast-moving, revolutionary
situation. [Whether Corbachov has deliberately tried to
accelerate events in Eastern Europe to produce a sense of
urgency at Malta cannot be known at this time, and it is my
assumption] To be sure, President Bush will not fall
into the Reykjavik trap of negotiating a surprise Soviet
agenda. But this does not change the fact that the Malta
summit will take place under conditions of international
upheaval not foreseen when it was planned.

Let me discuss the key issues in turn:

XI

NOV 23 '89 23:17 KISSINGER ASSOC CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS N.Y.

P. 204

P. 5

-5-

German Unification

In recent weeks German unification, for so long the subject of ambivalent rhetoric, has become a real possibility. Understandably, the prospect fills many with uneasiness. But it can no longer be avoided. Perhaps - as some seem to hope,740 years of Communist rule have produced the ironical result of stimulating not Communism but East German nationalism.

As the long familiar status quo of disintegrating, a coalition of nostalgia for it is suddenly developing. Atlanticists insist that the alliance can weather this storm unchanged and that German unification remains the responsibility of the victors of World War II. Believers in detente with the Soviet Union warn against ending the division of Germany in order not to disquiet the Soviet Union.

To be sure, the West has no reason to get ahead of German desires on reunification. But if this is not the

7

NOV 23 '89 23:17 KISSINGER ASSOC ATES N.Y.

NOV. 23 '89 23:17

It would be extremely dangerous for the Western democracies - whatever their secret yearnings or their theoretical legal rights - to try to keep Germany divided against the wishes of the German people. For sooner or later, such a stand would ignite German nationalism. And that would only serve to undermine the current responsible, essentially pro-Western, leaders in all of West Germany's political parties.

Until recently, German unity, in so far as it had any operational meaning, was equated with the unification of Europe. Extending some of the benefits of the European Community to Eastern Europe - was expected to help repair Europe's various fault lines. But though that goal remains essential, recent events leave no doubt that the unification of Europe has a different rhythm than the unification of Germany. For in Germany the moving force is not a

XI

NOV 23, '89 23:17 KISSINGER ASSOC IATES N.Y.

P.7

-7-

theoretical concept of integration based on *pseudopotential* elementarist approach for popular participation in government.

When the new East German leader, Egon Krenz, was appointed less than a month ago, he announced that the so-called German Democratic Republic had to be a Communist state or it was nothing. He was right. There is no historic basis for the East German state except as a Communist outpost. If it becomes democratic, it loses the rationale for its separate existence.

But democracy is exactly what the repulsive East German population is passionately demanding and why its government has promised to bring about. The impact of free elections would be quite different, however, in the German Democratic Republic than it has been elsewhere in Eastern Europe. In Poland or Hungary, free elections arguably strengthen the state; in the German Democratic Republic they are likely to undermine it. Genuinely free elections would

E

NOV 23 '89 23:18 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.8

in all likelihood, almost certainly, bring parties similar to those in the Federal Republic into government. The winners would almost certainly seek to synchronize West and East German policies and move the country toward unity as quickly as possible.

Political developments will be reinforced by economic realities. Now that the border between the two Germanic has for all practical purposes been opened, it will be necessary to equalize economic conditions in the two parts of Germany. Otherwise, there will be an exodus, especially of younger and more ambitious groups that will drain the East German economy. But such improvement will require massive help from the Federal Republic. That is unlikely - and indeed传感器 less - if the Communist party insists on maintaining its dominance over East German political life. Free elections in East Germany is the one mainstay demand put forward by the West German government. (Of course, the Soviet Union has the physical power to stop all this but at this point it would be too late.)

38

NOV 23 '89 23:18 KISSINGER, ASSOC, TFS N.Y.
NOV.23 '89 18:05

P.9

-9-

be only at a fearsome peril: the prospect of heavy casualties and the collapse of Corvachev's mystique in the West.)

What form will the new Germany ultimately take? It is conceivable that the two Germanies may form some sort of confederation with ~~parallel, similar, domestic institutions and comparable economic programs but separate governments~~ linked by some common institutions. There is a historical precedent: 19th century Germany was organized as a Confederation of separate, states linked by a Customs Union. Something like that could be the outcome, though it must be remembered that the 19th century German Confederation and Customs Union eventually led to a national state. A confederation may make it easier to satisfy Soviet security concerns by maintaining East Germany as a special security zone with limited armaments. But in the end, the outcome will be shaped by the wishes of the German people, not by outside forces. Outsiders can impose a solution only if they

XI

—NOV 23 '89 23:19 KISSINGER ASSOC. N.Y.
NOV. 23 '89 18:56 KISSINGER ASSOC. N.Y.

P.11

-10-

are prepared to use force - and prepared to defy a people whose desire for freedom was strong enough to puncture the Berlin Wall after 28 years of repression. The synchronization of economic policies and free elections in East Germany will inevitably raise the issue of the German Democratic Republic's military role. Even in a confederation, its long-term membership in the Warsaw Pact would become extremely questionable. It is hard to imagine how a German confederation whose Eastern portion was dominated by more or less the same political parties as the Western portion could be allied to the Warsaw Pact in Eastern Europe and allied in NATO in Western Europe. And it is inconceivable in the more likely event of a unitary - if federal - state. After free elections, membership of the German Democratic Republic in the Warsaw Pact will become untenable. [Emphasized]

will have to be decided as soon as the better part by new arms control

How can Moscardo be persuaded to let East Germany leave the Warsaw pact? On one hand, the Soviet Union wants peace. From

III

NOV 23 '89-23:20 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.1312

-11-

arrangements or by a European peace treaty than by continued
East German membership in the Warsaw Pact.

If the German Democratic Republic cannot remain in the
Warsaw pact indefinitely, what about West German membership
in NATO? The Soviet spokesman, Cerasimov, has asserted that
unification is impossible so long as the two Germanies are
each part of opposing military blocs. Does this mean that
Gorbachev has decided to play "the German card"- will the
Kremlin offer unification in return for German military
neutrality, perhaps even allowing a unified Germany to
remain in the European Community in the process? Indeed, in
his speech to the East German parliament in October,
Gorbachev referred favorably to a proposal along those lines
made by Stalin in 1953.

NONOV 23 '89 23:20 KISSINGER ASSOC ES N.Y.

-12-

alliance to NATO. If East Germany leaves the Warsaw Pact it
does not follow that the Soviet Union is any better off,
than if the Federal Republic leaves NATO. I would argue
that it is worse off. No Russian leader should disregard the
lessons of history: that this century's two world wars grew
out of Germany's attempt to pursue a purely national policy
in the center of the Continent. Seeking to preempt every
possible combination of surrounding countries - of which
Germany has more than any other European state - Germany
threatened each neighbor individually and provoked them to
form the rigid military structures that led to war. Today, a
nation of 80 million standing alone in the center of the
Continent would once again threaten European stability - and
in the long run even Soviet security. How would one define
military neutralization for a nation of such magnitude? How
would one verify or monitor it? Over time, such a Germany
would be bound to become a military force. Or else the

NÓV 23 '89 23:21 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P. 15 of 24

-13-

Soviet Union might be tempted to exploit a neutralization agreement by visiting on visiting means different from the means intended. Either course would threaten European stability.

Thus the safest outcome would be a united (or confederated) Germany that remains integrated into NATO but is constrained by new arms limitations throughout Europe. Strange as it may sound, membership in NATO would provide the best verification mechanism for monitoring agreed limits on armaments. Such limits would have to include special provisions for ensuring the territory that is now the German Democratic Republic. These arrangements could be embodied either in an arms control agreement or as part of a broader European peace treaty whose time may at last have come.

Above all, the problem of German unification is conceptual. It requires an idea of process - of how Germany might be unified, and over what period of time: will it become a

NOV 23 '89 23:21 KISSINGER ASSOC

-14-

single country with federal institutions; a confederate
state, or something in between? What arms limitations are
needed or acceptable? What is the appropriate European and
Atlantic framework in which these changes should take place?

In seeking to answer these questions, the Federal
Republic and its Western allies must work together closely.
Neither the United States nor its allies should seek to
control internal German discussions. But they - and particu-
larly the United States - have the responsibility to provide
their own ideas, table and initiatives for keeping in
a framework for them. The United States should not seek to
mind one overriding reality: I impose a solution: but it has the right and the duty to
advance its own ideas. We must not give the appearance that
something can be will
we be by seeming to collude in the division of Germany.
After recent events, the only way to keep the Federal
Republic in the Western camp will be to concede some form of
unification and to work to ensure that it happens under

NOV. 23 '89 23:21 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

-15-

## NATO and the European Community

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, any attempt to continue business as usual can only cause NATO to atrophy even further. Events in East Germany have culminated in a process of attrition that has been going on for several years, driven by arms control negotiations and "Gorbachev fever." All NATO countries have stopped any serious effort to modernize and improve their armaments. The Bush Administration agreed last May to postpone the modernization of medium range nuclear missiles in the Federal Republic. Now that postponement is likely to ~~become~~ be seen as permanent; under current conditions, there is no political party in Germany prepared to ~~even~~ reopen the issue. A recent German visitor to Washington called the modernization prospect "laughable." But the argument made against modernizing Lance missiles —

NOV 23 '89 23:22 KISSINGER ASSOC N.Y.

NOV. 23 '89 23:22

KISSINGER

ASSOC N.Y.

-16-

Thus the next likely phase of the NATO debate, even before the recent upheaval in East Germany, would have been the promotion of a nuclear free zone in Central Europe, though the debate might have been delayed until after the German elections.

that the United States will not fire first under any circumstances - cannot be far behind. For given the range of nuclear weapons, participants in a nuclear free zone can only avoid the danger of nuclear war by foregoing on its territory any use of nuclear weapons based outside that zone.

NÓV. 23 '89 23:22 KISSINGER ASSOC IATES N.Y.

P.1918

-17-

Recent events in East Germany and Eastern Europe will surely accelerate these trends. The creation of conventional forces on the central front appears to be irreversible. West Germany already plans to reduce the length of compulsory military service, a move that will cut its armed forces from 600,000 to 420,000 — proportionately a larger unilateral reduction than what the West has proposed for the Soviet Union. And the Soviets will surely insist on additional reciprocal German cuts as a part of arms control negotiations later on.

A significant reduction of American ground forces in Europe has also become highly probable. Whether undertaken under a direct mandate by Congress, or simply in anticipation of congressional pressures, the result will be a further erosion of existing NATO strategy. The concept of flexible response — that deterrence is only credible if it

NOV. 23 '89 23:23 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P. 20

can be stopped short of all-out nuclear war - cannot be sustained under current conditions.

Assuming that the neutralization of a united Germany can be avoided, NATO will have to choose between two scenarios - the creation of a European security system involving varying zones of limited arms deployments - or a process of unilateral reductions that will drain NATO of strategic significance.

Even if the Federal Republic remains in NATO - by far the best outcome for the stability of Europe - a reassessment of NATO's strategy and organization has become imperative. Against what threat - and with what forces - should NATO be organized? What reductions of US forces should be made, and based on what strategy? How great a US presence should be left in Europe? What is to be the role of European forces? What should be the relationship between conventional and nuclear forces?

NOV 23 '89 23:23 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.2120

-19-

(1) NATO should be adapted to new realities, not abandoned. The end of NATO would spell political chaos in Europe, trigger nationalist rivalries and tempt renewed Soviet expansionism.

E

NOV. 24 '89 09:35 KISSINGER ASSOC IATES N.Y.

P.1

-20-

as if the peace which we are working for is already here. If
this process is not stopped, NATO will land to the
Soviets with the goal of a generation of effort in-sight
the impotent Europe it should be our pride to have avoided
at the precise moment that one goal is within reach.

(3) Whatever the balance of conventional forces, some
and airforces American nuclear presence must be retained on the European
continent with the exact level subject to negotiation. If
the defense of Europe were again to rely exclusively on
conventional weapons, peace would be at the mercy of historical
patterns that for centuries have proved highly unstable. War after war has occurred despite the existence of
conventional forces that on paper appeared more or less in
balance. This is because success in conventional war depends
on so many intangibles of leadership and maneuver that the
[balance] actual has proved very difficult to calculate. [Europe should
not rely on US nuclear weapons based on American soil or at
sen. It was the fact that such a distant deterrent lacked]

P. 22

-20-

as if the peace which we are working for is already here. If
this process is not stopped, NATO will land to the
Soviets with the goal of a generation of effort in 9/8
the impotent Europe it should be our pride to have avoided
at the precise moment that our goal is within reach.

(3) Whatever the balance of conventional forces, some
and airforces
American nuclear presence must be retained on the European
continent with the exact level subject to negotiation. If
the defense of Europe were again to rely exclusively on
conventional weapons, peace would be at the mercy of historical
patterns that for centuries have proved highly unstable. War after war has occurred despite the existence of
conventional forces that on paper appeared more or less in
balance. This is because success in conventional war depends
on so many intangibles of leadership and maneuver that the
[balance]
actual has proved very difficult to calculate. [Europe should
not rely on US nuclear weapons based on American soil or at
sea. It was the fact that such a distant deterrent lacked]

NOV 23 '89 23:24 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

NOV. 23 '89 19:00

KISSINGER

ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.23

credibility that brought American ground forces, nuclear and conventional, to Europe in the first place. What was true when NATO's nuclear forces were hugely superior is even more crucial today, given the growth of the Soviet nuclear stockpile and the trend of strategic arms control negotiations. In short, NATO must link the nuclear/defense of Europe and America whatever happens with German unity or with conventional disarmament. Otherwise we are on the road to Soviet hegemony if perestroika succeeds, and to national ist chaos if perestroika fails.

(4) Conventional arms control negotiations must be redesigned. Currently, they are based on the continued existence of two military blocs. But the future of the Warsaw Pact - and especially of East German membership - is now in question. Above all, arms control proposals must get away from the pedantic "BEAN counting" approach - weapons system by weapons system - so much in vogue. It must be

NNOV 23 '89 23:25 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.14

historically accurate, that view is irrelevant to the
existing situation. Whatever the nostalgia for Monnet-1

NOV. 23 '89 19:01 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.823

brought into line with the emergent political reality
especially the growing sense of independence of the East
European countries and with special status for the territory
now occupied by the German Democratic Republic.

For the European Community to assume this strengthened and to take the lead in restoring the old democracies role, it will have to come to terms with German unification.

-23-

historically accurate, that view is irrelevant to the
existing situation. Whatever the nostalgia for Monnet's
original design (and however justified the historic fears of
Germany's neighbors, the European Community cannot survive
if the Germans see it as a device to thwart unification.

There is merit to the concern that a unified Germany
would have disproportionate weight within the European
Community. But the other members have the means and the
mechanisms to prevent German hegemony. Surely Britain,
France, Spain, and Italy, not to mention the smaller states,
could shape a consensus that prevents domination by any one
country, however powerful. Indeed, the strongest argument
for Britain's wholehearted participation in the 1992 process
is the need for Britain's political experience in establish-
ing the right balance within the European Community.

NOV. 23 '89 23:26 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

-24-

between the European Community, where national boundaries
are being blurred and the United States is not represented,
and NATO, where nations still speak with separate voices and
the European Community has no means of expression. This
suggests a two-fold task: (a) Europe should be given some
institutional voice within NATO, perhaps by reviving the
West European Union; (b) the European Community and the
United States should develop some systematic method of
political consultation at a high level.

Ever since the advent of Gorbachev, the West has been
obsessed with his mercurial, ~~and courageous personality.~~

More and more frequently one hears the argument that

Gorbachev should be "helped," what this concept means is ~~for, ~~ and an international role ~~must be made explicit. It is sufficiently understood that the

NOV 23 '89 23:26 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.3

sustained by a consensus on national interest; if that were
true, everything gained in recent years would be highly
unprecipitable. Ironically, events in Eastern Europe suggest
that Gorbachev's position is probably less precarious
than had been thought. No Soviet leader (with his own could
have brought about the startling changes in Moscow's policy
toward its satellites, Gorbachev's courage and intelligence
were surely important factors, but he could not have risked
the Soviet Union's position in Central Europe without the
support of the Red Army and the KGB. Those two institutions
must have concluded that the only other option - repression
- would have required such brutality as to isolate the
Soviet Union and thwart any hopes of enlisting Western help
in modernizing the Soviet economy. If one believes that
there exists a relatively wide consensus in the Soviet
leadership, it becomes especially important to analyze
the

NOV 23 '89 23:27 KISSINGER ASSOC IS N.Y.
NOV. 23 '89 19:02 KISSINGER

P.4

purposes they seek to follow of what strands it may be composed.

There are three possibilities: (a) the Soviet leaders may believe that by relaxing the grip on Eastern Europe, they will be able to maintain existing arrangements at less cost; (b) they may be playing the German card - that is, using the prospect of a neutral unified Germany to drive American military power from the Continent. In Moscow's view that might reduce Soviet vulnerability if perestroika fails and lay the basis for eventual Soviet hegemony over Europe if perestroika succeeds; (c) the Soviets may want to conduct a serious negotiation on a new East-West equilibrium.

Unfortunately, Soviet leaders have made statements supporting all three theories. The most likely one is that the Soviets may not have yet made us very fast indeed. At the very least, however, we should up their own minds. At least we should assume that one strand of Soviet thought hopes to use the is likely D

NOV 23 '89 23:27 KISSINGER ASSOC. & N.Y.

NOV. 23 '89 19:03

KISSINGER, ASSOCIATES

P.5

fluency of the current situation to increase long-range
in support of traditional policy.

Soviet power in Eurasia is being descarded by the baggage of a
principle which is not only illogical but违法.

the historic Russian policy of preventing any strong power
center from forming near their borders, or if Russian power
within their reach, would be limited.

Last summer an eminent Soviet scientist, a member of
the Supreme Soviet reported to be close to Gorbachev, told
me that the Soviet Union's strategic position could not be
challenged so long as it retained a large stockpile of
nuclear weapons and Germany and Japan were denuclearized.
Hence, he argued, the thrust of Soviet policy should be to
remove US nuclear weapons from Eurasia. After that, it would
be safe to ask Germany and Japan to help rebuild the Soviet
Union. For the Soviet Union could always keep those coun-
tries in line by brandishing its nuclear monopoly in
Eurasia.

NOV 23 '89 23:28 KISSINGER ASSOC & N.Y.

NOV. 23 '89 19:03

KISSINGER, ASSOC. & N.Y.

P. 6

-28-

At the time, I considered these the abstract musings of an out-of-power intellectual. I am no longer so sure. It is not impossible that some in the Kremlin are gambling for high stakes. This group may calculate that a neutral unified Germany would enable the Soviet Union to salvage the Warsaw Pact and frighten Western Europe while exploiting new disarmament provisions to achieve step by-step political domination over Central Europe.

Gorbachev is too intelligent not to recognize the perils of such a strategy unless Western confusion lands it too high on a silver platter. For on the road to hegemony

lie many potential pitfalls for the Soviet Union, any one of which would spell disaster. Every effort should Thurgus, I therefore regard it as possible

that Gorbachev may be prepared to negotiate a true equilibrium. History teaches that a stable peace can occur only if the interests of all major players are met; if the security concerns of both sides are adequately recognized.

NEW YORK, N.Y.

P.7

P.001

-29-

This would require that both the Soviet Union and the United States break from traditional patterns. On the Soviet Union's part, it would require abandoning the strategy of weakening every other power center in Eurasia. On America's part, it would require a willingness to drop ~~any~~ challenges to ~~Soviet Union~~ within its national frontiers.

We have no reason to approve of the internal arrangements of the Soviet Union, ~~or to help in maintaining them~~ But we should be prepared to leave their erosion to the forces of history. The test of the new equilibrium is simple: the Soviet Union must be prepared to settle for a balance of power; the United States must be willing to coexist with an unipolar world.

In practice, this means: (1) working out a concept for German unification based on self-determination; (2) creating a special security status for the territory now occupied by East Germany; (3) balancing forces on both sides of the present dividing line in Europe, with most Russian ground

NOV 23 '89 23:28 KISSINGER ASSOCIATES N.Y.

P.8.002

forces withdrawn deep into the Soviet Union; (4) withdrawing
a major portion of US ground forces, but with some provision
for keeping US nuclear weapons and airforces as part of the
common Western defense strategy. The level of remaining
forces and the duration of their stay is obviously a subject
for negotiation.

⑤ Encouraging an integrated Western Europe & strengthening its ties with the emergency elements on Eastern Europe.

The United States, which did so much to build the postwar era, can render one more signal service in preparing the transition to a new international order. The meeting in Malta cannot settle anything, as President Bush has repeatedly pointed out. But it can mark the first step of a long march toward a new and hopefully better world. In that journey, the United States can no longer dominate; but it has the opportunity to inspire. It cannot solve every problem but can contribute a sense of direction. Where there is confusion, it can provide purpose; amidst uncertainty, it can offer confidence. In short, if the new international

NOV 23 '89 23:29 KISSINGER ASSOC '85OCIATES N.Y.

P.9

P.003

-31-

order is to fulfill mankind's hopes, American leadership is needed.

Few presidents have had the opportunity before President Bush to leave their imprint on an era. In a period of turmoil, it is important to avoid recklessness. But caution preserves the status quo; boldness is needed to reach a more hopeful future. The time has come - it has never been more needed - for what President Bush has called "that vision thing."

"Policy," the 19th century Austrian Foreign Minister, Metternich, wrote, "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inexorably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the performance will not go on is an absurdity. The play will be completed either by the actors or by the spectators who mount the stage."

In recent weeks, the curtain has risen on a new play unfolding center stage in Europe. Many of the players are still on the sidelines, hesitant and unsure of their parts, above all waiting to see what roles others assume first. Nor is anyone precisely sure of the nature of the play. Still,

-2-

German unification in some form has become inevitable,
whatever the misgivings of Germany's neighbors and World War
II victims. So far the only statesman who seems to under-
stand this fully is President Mitterrand of France - the
Western country that viscerally fears German unification the
most.

-3-

NATO will have to be fundamentally altered to take into
account the transormation of Germany and the perceived
erosion of the Soviet threat.

The intergration of the European Community will have to
be accelerated, or else risk being torn apart by the cen-
trifugal pull of changes in Easern Europe.

The observer's perplexity is the statesman's opportuni-
ty. President Bush has an opportunity unequaled since the
great period of American statesmanship immediately following
the end of World War II. Rarely have so many elements of
international affairs been so fluid at the same time. The
occasion to build a new international order both more stable

-4-

For better or worse, that process must now begin at
Malta between President Bush and Secretary Gorbachev though
it will take many months and perhaps years to complete. What
had been conceived - at least on the American side - as a
relaxed, philosophical stocktaking, has turned into an
opportunity to help shape a fast-moving, revolutionary
situation. Whether Gorbachev has deliberately tried to
accelerate events in Eastern Europe to produce a sense of
urgency at Malta cannot be known at this time, and is in any
case irrelevant. To be sure, President Bush will not fall
into the Reykjavik trap of negotiating a surprise Soviet
agenda. But this does not change the fact that the Malta
summit will take place under conditions of international
upheaval not foreseen when it was planned.

-5-

German Unification

In recent weeks German unification, for so long the subject of ambivalent rhetoric, has become a real possibility. Understandably, the prospect fills many with uneasiness. But it can no longer be avoided. Perhaps - as some seem to hope, 40 years of Communist rule have produced the ironical result of stimulating not Communism but East German nationalism.

As the long familiar status quo is disintegrating, a coalition of nostalgias for it is suddenly developing.

-6-

case, it would be extremely dangerous for the Western democracies - whatever their secret yearnings or their theoretical lelgal rights - to try to keep Germany divided against the wishes of the German people. For sooner or later, such a stand would ignite German nationalism. And that would only serve to undermine the current responsible, essentially pro-Western, leaders in all of West Germany's political parties.

Until recently, German unity, in so far as it had any operational meaning, was equated with the unification of Europe. Extending some of the benefits of the European Community to Eastern Europe - was expected to help repair Europe's various fault lines. But though that goal remains necessary, recent events leave no doubt that the unification of Europe has a different rhythm than the unification of Germany. For in Germany the moving force is not a

-7-

theoretical concept of integration based on logical calcula-
tion but pressures for popular participation in government.

When the new East German leader, Egon Krenz, was
appointed less than a month ago, he announced that the
so-called German Democratic Republic had to be a Communist
state or it was nothing. He was right. There is no historic
basis for the East German state except as a Communist
outpost. If it becomes democratic, it loses the reationale
for its separate existence.

But democracy is exactly what the rebellious East
German population is passionately demanding and what its
government has promised to bring about. The impact of free
elections would be quite different, however, in the German
Democratic Republic than it has been elsewhere in Eastern
Europe. In Poland or Hungary, free elections arguably
strengthen the state; in the German Democratic Republic they
are likely to undermine it. Genuinely free elections would

-8-

almost certainly bring parties similar to those in the Federal Republic into government. The winners would almost certainly seek to synchronize West and East German policies and move the country toward unity as quickly as possible.

Political developments will be reinforced by economic realities. Now that the border between the two Germanies has for all practical purposes been opened, it will be necessary to equalize economic conditions in the two parts of Germany. Otherwise, there will be an exodus, especially of younger and more ambitious groups that will drain the East German economy. But such improvement will require massive help from the Federal Republic. That is unlikely - and indeed senseless - if the Communist party insists on maintaining its dominance over East German political life. Free elections in East Germany is the one unanimous demand put forward by the Bonn government. (Of course, the Soviet Union has the physical power to stop all this but at this point it would

do so only at a fearsome peril: the prospect of heavy
casualties and the collapse of Gorvachev's mystique in the
West.)

What form will the new Germany ultimately take? It is
conceivable that the two Germanies may form some sort of
confederation with similar domestic institutions and compa-
rable economic programs but separate governments. There is a
historical precedent: 19th century Germany was organized as
a Confederation of separate states linked by a Customs
Union. Something like that could be the outcome, though it
must be remembered that the 19th century German Confedera-
tion and Customs Union eventually led to a national state. A
confederation may make it easier to satisfy Soviet security
concerns by maintaining East Germany as a special security
zone with limited armaments. But in the end, the outcome
will be shaped by the wishes of the German people, not by
outside forces. Outsiders can impose a solution only if they

-10-

are prepared to use force - and prepared to defy a people
whose desire for freedom was strong enough to puncture the
Berlin Wall after 28 years of repression. The synchroniza-
tion of economic policies and free elections in East Germany
will inevitably raise the issue of the German Democractic
Republic's military role. Even in a confederation, its
long-term membership in the Warsaw Pact would become ex-
tremely questionable. It is hard to imagine how a German
confederation whose Eastern portion was dominated by more or
less the same political parties as the Western portion could
be allied to the Warsaw Pact in Eastern Europe and allied to
NATO in Western Europe. And it is inconceivable in the more
likely event of a unitary - if federal - state. After free
elections, membership of the German Democratic Republic in
the Warsaw Pact will become untenable. Soviet security
concerns would be far better met by new arms control

-11-

If the German Democratic Republic cannot remain in the
Warsaw pact indefinitely, what about West German membership
in NATO? The Soviet spokesman, Gerasimov, has asserted that
unification is impossible so long as the two Germanies are
each part of opposing military blocs. Does this mean that
Gorbachev has decided to play "the German card?~ Will the
Kremlin offer unification in return for German military
neutrality, perhaps even allowing a unified Germany to
remain in the European Community in the process? Indeed, in
his speech to the East German parliament in October,
Gorbachev referred favorably to a proposal along those lines
made by Stalin in 1953.

-12-

alliance to NATO. If East Germany leaves the Warsaw Pact it
does not follow that the Soviet Union is (any) better off,
(than) if the Federal Republic leaves NATO. I would argue
that it is worse off. No Russian leader should disregard the
lessons of history: that this century's two world wars grew
out of Germany's attempt to pursue a purely national policy
in the center of the Continent. Seeking to preempt every
possible combination of surrounding countries - of which
Germany has more than any other European state - Germany
threatened each neighbor individually and provoked them to
form the rigid military structures that led to war. Today, a
nation of 80 million standing alone in the center of the
Continent would once again threaten European stability - and
in the long run even Soviet security. How would one define
military neutralization for a nation of such magnitude? How
would one verify or monitor it? Over time, such a Germany
would be bound to become a military force. Or else the

-13-

Soviet Union might be tempted to exhibit a neutralization
agreement to establish hegemony over Germany. Either course
would threaten European stability.

Thus the safest outcome would be a united (or confeder-
ated) Germany that remains integrated into NATO but is
constrained by new arms limitations throughout Europe.
Strange as it may sound, membership in NATO would provide
the best verification mechanism for monitoring agreed limits
on armaments. Such limits would have to include special
provisions for disarming the territory that is now the
German Democratic Republic. These arrangements could be
embodied either in an arms control agreement or as part of a
broader European peace treaty whose time may at last have
come.

Above all, the problem of German unification is concep-
tual. It requires an idea of process - of how Germany might
be unified, and over what period of time: will it become a

-14-

In seeking to answer these questions, the Federal
Republic and its Western allies must work together closely.
Neither the United States nor its allies should seek to
control internal German discussions. But they - and particularly the United States - have the responsibility to provide
a framework for them. The United States should not seek to
impose a solution; but it has the right and the duty to
advance its own ideas. We must not give the appearance that
we __ by seeming to collude in the division of Germany.
After recent events, the only way to keep the Federal
Republic in the Western camp may be to concede some form of
unification - and to work to ensure that it happens under

-15-

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, any attempt to
continue business as usual can only cause NATO to atrophy
even further. Events in East Germany have culminated a
process of attrition that has been going on for several
years, driven by arms control negotiations and "Gorbachev
fever." All NATO countries have stopped any serious effort
to modernize and improve their armaments. The Bush Adminis-
tration agreed last May to postpone the modernization of
medium range nuclear missiles in the Federal Republic. Now
that postponement is likely to prove permanent; under
current conditions, there is no political party in Germany
prepared to even reopen the issue. A recent German visitor
to Washington called the modernization prospect "laughable."
Yet the argument made against modernizing Lance missiles -

-16-

that the Federal Republic must take special measures to
avoid becoming a nuclear battlefield because it is so
geographically exposed - logically applies to all nuclear
weapons deployed on German soil. Indeed, the shorter the
range of the weapons the more valid becomes the argument.
Thus the next likely phase of the NATO debate, even before
the recent upheaval in East Germany, would have been the
promotion of a nuclear free zone in Central Europe - though
the debate might have been delayed until after the German
elections. And once the concept of a nuclear free zone is
accepted, a doctrine of no first use of nuclear weapons -
that the United States will not fire first under any circum-
stances - cannot be far behind. For given the range of
nuclear weapons, participants in a nuclear free zone can
only avoid the danger of nuclear war by foregoing on its
territory any use of nuclear weapons based outside that
zone.

-17-

Recent events in East Germany and Eastern Europe will
surely accelerate these trends. The erosion of conventional
forces on the central front appears to be irreversible. West
Germany already plans to reduce the length of compulsory
military service, a move that will cut its armed forces from
600,000 to 420,000 - proportionately a larger unilateral
reduction than what the West has proposed for the Soviet
Union. And the Soviets will surely insist on additional
reciprocal German cuts as a part of arms control negotia-
tions later on.

-18-

Even if the Federal Republic remains in NATO - by far
the best outcome for the stability in Europe - a reassessment of NATO's strategy and organization has become imperative. Against what threat - and with what forces - should NATO be organized? What reductions of US forces should be made, and based on what strategy? How great a US preserve should be left in Europe? What is to be the role of European forces? What should be the relationship between conventional and nuclear forces?

-19-

-20-

as if the peace which we are working for is already here. If
this process is not stopped, soon NATO will __ to the
Soviets - with the goal of a generation of effort in si__ -
the impotent Europe it should be our pride to have avoided.

(3) Whatever the balance of conventional forces, some
American nuclear presence must be retained on the European
continent with the exact level subject to negotiation. If
the defense of Europe were again to rely exclusively on
conventional weapons, peace would be at the mercy of histor-
ical patterns that for centuries have proved highly unsta-
ble. War after war has occurred despite the existence of
conventional forces that on paper appeared more or less in
balance. This is because success in conventional war depends
on so many intangibles of leadership and maneuver that the
actual has proved very difficult to calculate. Europe should
not rely on US nuclear weapons based on American soil or at
sea. It was the fact that such a distant deterrent lacked

-21-

credibility that brought American ground forces, nuclear and conventional, to Europe in the first place. What was true when NATO's nuclear forces were hugely superior is even more crucial today, given the growth of the Soviet nuclear stockpile and the trend of strategic arms control negotiations. In short, NATO must link the nuclear defense of Europe and America whatever happens with German unity or with conventional disarmament. Otherwise we are on the road to Soviet hegemony if perestroika succeeds, and to national-ist chaos if perestroika fails.

(4) Conventional arms control negotiations must be redesigned. Currently, they are based on the continued existence of two military blocs. But the future of the Warsaw Pact - and especially of East German membership - is now in question. Above all, arms control proposals must get away from the pedantic "bla__ counting" approach - weapons system by weapons system - so much in vogue. It must be

-22-

(5) Whatever happens, the relative weight of America
within NATO is bound to diminish. A major withdrawal of US
forces, combined with the emergence of an economically
integrated Europe, makes it necessary to rethink an organ-
ization that evolved when America had a nuclear monopoly and
was militarily and economically dominant. Europe must assume
a growing responsibility for its own defense, with the United
States playing a supporting role.

For the European Community to assume this strengthened
role, it will have to come to terms with German unification.
Some leading Europeans and Americans have warned that the
European Community was never designed to accommodate a
united Germany with a population of some 80 million. Though

NOV 23 '89 09:05 KISSINGER ASSOC

P.2

DR. KISSINGER NEWSWEEK ARTICLE SECOND DRAFT 11/21/89

"Policy," the 19th century Austrian Foreign Minister, Metternich, once wrote, "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inexorably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the performance will not go on is an absurdity. The play will be completed either by the actors or by the spectators who mount the stage."

In recent weeks, the curtain has risen on a new play unfolding center stage in Europe. Many of the players are still on the sidelines, hesitant and unsure of their parts, either because they are not yet convinced of their proper roles or because they are waiting to see what roles the others will assume first. Nor is anyone precisely sure of

B

P.3

-2-

the nature of the play itself. Still, in the end, only one
choice will remain ✓ to complete the play or to be engulfed
by it.

Although the weight of the past -- and -- may keep some from acknowledging it,
for we are witnessing the end of the immediate post-war
era. On both sides of the dividing line, traditional categories have become too familiar, the uneasiness about the
reemergence of a unified Germany is too great to permit full
acknowledgment of the process now in train as one that will
be =
shape the categories of thought in place for over a
generation.

The political world as we have known it is disintegrat-
ing before our eyes. The new realities
its chief features are:

German unification in some form has become inevitable,
whatever the misgivings of almost all of Germany's neighbors
and of its victims during World War II. So far the only
statesman who seems to understand this fully is President

E

NOV 23 '89 09:07 KISSINGER ASSOC

P.5

NATO will have to be fundamentally altered to take into account the transformation of Germany and the erosion of the perception of the Soviet threat.

The Warsaw Pact will be even less able to survive in its present form very far into the next decade.

The integration of the European Community will have to be accelerated, or else risk being torn apart by the centrifugal pull of changes in gal tendencies unleashed by the disintegration of the Soviet Union's East European empire.

These events have transformed the upcoming Mal'ta summit between President Bush and Gorbachev. What had been conceived - at least on the American side - as a relaxed,

P.6

-4-

Les Burned, an opportunity to help shape
philosophical stocktaking, now becomes the initial explora-
tion of a fast-moving, revolutionary situation. He at
Reykjavik, an American president will have to deal with an
unexpected agenda evoked by Gorbachev. Whether Gorbachev has
deliberately tried to accelerate events in Eastern Europe,
any choice or is accelerating his actions to produce a sense
of urgency at Malta cannot now be known and is in any case
at this time
not been irrelevant. Most probably it is a combination of reacting to
events and conscious design. To be sure, President Bush will
not fall into the Reykjavik trap of negotiating the agenda
(a surprise Soviet)
awaiting him but this does not change the fact that the
Malta summit will take place under conditions of incipient
international
upheaval
not foreseen when it was being planned.
the key to this
contesting the superpower

Let me discuss these issues in turn:

German Unification

In recent weeks German unification, for so long the
rhetoric, became a real possibility
subject of ambivalent exhortation, has moved center stage.

NOV 23 '89 11:03 KISSINGER ASSOC

it can no longer be avoided, all reflection on Europe must take it into account.

policy must start from that premise.

To be sure, the West has no reason to get ahead of German desires on the reunification question. But if this is not the case, it would be extremely dangerous for the Western democracies - or their beneficial legal rights whatever their secret yearnings - to try to keep Germany divided. This would collude in the division of Germany against the wishes of the German people. For sooner or later such a stand would

ignite a German political landscape with nationalism. The present responsible, essentially pro-Western, leadership in West Germany's all German political parties would lose the capacity to shape the future.

Until recently, German unity, in so far as it had any operational meaning, was equated with the unification of Europe. The evolution of the European Community - especially the extension of its benefits to Eastern Europe - would heal Europe's various fault lines, in time melding

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together the two parts of Germany. But recent events leave

rhythm than the unification of Germany, which follows its

own momentum. In Germany, the moving force is not an

concept of integration based on legal calculation

stratified for unity but pressures for democracy, popular

participation in government.

When the new East German leader, Egon Krenz, was appointed less than a month ago, he announced that the so-called German Democratic Republic had to be a Communist state or it was nothing. He was right. There is no historic basis for the East German state except as a Communist state. It loses its地位 if it becomes democratic means abandoning the rationale of its separate existence.

But democracy is exactly what the East German population demands in large and relentless demonstrations and what its government has promised to bring about. The impact of free elections would be quite different, however, in the German Democratic Republic from what it is in Eastern Europe. In

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Eastern Europe ~~in Poland or Hungary~~ have free elections ~~in state~~, and in the German Democratic Republic they are likely to undermine it. Free elections -

if they are genuinely free - will almost certainly be ~~world~~, but for ~~those~~, ~~similar~~, ~~analogous~~ to the Federal Republic. The winners will be an overwhelming victory for~~ parties which will almost certainly seek ~~immediately~~ to synchronize West and East German policies and in a few short years move the country toward unity, as quickly as possible.

Political tendencies will be reinforced by economic developments. Now that the border between the two Germanies has for all practical purposes been opened, it will be necessary to equalize economic conditions in the two parts of Germany.

Otherwise the exodus, especially of the younger and more ambitious element will drain the East German economy. But such improvement will require massive help from the Federal

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in East Germany

Republic. That is unlikely - and indeed senseless - if the Communist party insists on maintaining its dominance over free election that the party can win. East German political life. It is the one serious demand put forward by the Bonn government. (Of course, the Soviet Union (at this point it would do so) has the physical power to stop all this but only at a fearsome peril: a heavy loss of life and the collapse of the Gorbachev mystique in the West.)

What form will the new Germany ultimately take? To be sure, there is a historical precedent that two things are conceivable: that the two Germanies may form some sort of confederation, or that they may form similar domestic institutions but separate governments. and comparable economic programs might conclude that they should merge into one state. 19th century Germany was organized as a Confederation of separate states linked by a Customs Union. It is conceivable that something like that could be the outcome, though it must be remembered that the 19th century German Confederation and Customs Union were eventually to a preëxisting national state. A confederation may make it easier to maintain East Germany as a special zone of security. ) with (

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limited armaments to meet Soviet security concerns. But the
--- thesitewill,
key decision will in the end be shaped by the wishes of the
German people not by outside forces. Outsiders can impose a
solution only if they are prepared to use force against a
-- and prepared to defy
people whose desire for freedom was strong enough to punc-
ture the Berlin Wall after 28 years of repression.

Moreover, the issue of the military role of the German
Democratic Republic will arise inevitably with the
syncretization of economic policies of the two Germanies and
will inevitably raise the issue of the German Democratic Republic's mill-
with free elections in East Germany. Even in a confedera-
tion, the long-term membership of the German Democratic
Republic in the Warsaw Pact would become extremely question-
able. It is hard to imagine how a German confederation whose
Eastern portion was dominated by more or less the same
political parties as the Western portion could be Warsaw
Pact allies in Eastern Europe and NATO allies in Western
Europe. And it is impossible in a more likely
event of a military-if federal-state

NOV 23 '89 09:12 KISSINGER ASSOC

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Gorbachev has decided to play the German card? Will the Kremlin offer unification in return for German military neutrality, perhaps even conceding Germany membership in the European Community in the process? Indeed, in his speech to the East German parliament on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the German Democratic Republic in October, Gorbachev referred favorably to a proposal along those lines made by Stalin in 1953.

It is to be hoped that in the end the Soviet leader will not permit himself to be tempted by a specious symmetry between the significance of Europe's military-blogs for the alliance to NATO, if East Germany leaves the Warsaw pact, or two Germanies. No Russian leader should disregard the lessons of history that the two European wars of this Century is two world wars, gross and small, century resulted importantly from Germany's attempt to pursue a purely national policy in the center of the Continent. Seeking to protect itself against all possible combinations of surrounding countries, of which Germany is more than any other European state, is threatened each neighbor individually and thus Germany does not follow that the Soviet Union is a unit, or that the Federal Republic leaves us to rule us, and not vice versa.

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contributed to bringing about the rigid military structures that led to war. Today such a nation of 80 million standing alone in the center of the Continent would once again threaten European stability -- and in the long run, in the end, even for the Soviet security Union. Moreover, how does one define military neutralization for a nation of such magnitude? How would one verify or monitor it? Over time, such a Germany would be bound to become a military factor. Or else the Soviet Union might be tempted to use the neutralization provisions to establish a hegemony over Germany. Either course would threaten European stability.

Thus the safest policy is a Germany that remains integrated into NATO with the territory that is now the Federal Republic as part of a regime of limited agreements. Through all of Europe, such a regime would have to include special disarmament provisions for the territory that is now the present-day German Democratic Republic. These arrangements

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Recent events in East Germany and Eastern Europe will surely accelerate this trend. The decline of conventional forces on the central front appears to be become irreversible. By reducing the length of compulsory military service, a move that will cut its German armed forces, will be from 600,000 to 420,000 (proportionally larger pre-nuclear unilateral reduction than what the West has proposed for the Soviet Union. And the Soviets will surely insist on additional reciprocal German cuts as a part of arms control negotiations later on.

A significant reduction of American ground forces in Europe has become highly probable. Whether under-congress, or simply in Congress, or as an executive branch, under a direct or an Executive branch, taken as a Congressional mandate or as an anticipation of Congressional pressures, the result will be an erosion of existing NATO strategy. The concept of flexible response, that difference is only credible if it can be stopped short of all-out nuclear war, cannot be sustained under current conditions.

Thus the choice before NATO - assuming that the neutralization of a united Germany is avoided - is the creation of a new world order in Europe.

B

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of a European security system involving varying zones of
limited agreements or a process of unilateral reductions
that will drain NATO of strategic significance.

But even if the Federal Republic remains in NATO - by
far the best outcome for the stability of Europe - reassess-
ment of NATO's strategy and organization has become impera-
tive. Specifically: against what threat, and with what forces
should NATO be organized? What reductions of US forces can be
should be made, and based on? How great a
made in the service of what strategy? What residual US
preserve
forces should be left in Europe? What is to be the role of
European forces? What should be the relationship between
conventional and nuclear forces? What military organization
would best reflect the new realities?

This is not the occasion to give answers to questions
which should be the subject of
that angle to the
NATO
consultations since the formation of the Atlantic Alliance
is to retain its meaning.

NOV 23 '89 09:17 KISSINGER ASSOC

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Still, a number of principles can be stated:

1. (1) NATO should be adapted to new realities, not abandoned. The end of NATO would spell political chaos in Europe, <u>triggering</u> nationalist rivalries and tempting <u>Soviet expansionist</u> hegemonial designs.

2. (2) Whatever the balance of conventional forces, some American nuclear presence must be retained on the European continent, <u>with the exception</u> of its level subject to negotiation. If the defense of Europe <u>is redefined</u> exclusively <u>on</u> conventional weapons, peace would be at the mercy of <u>historical</u> <u>traditional</u> patterns <u>that</u> for centuries have proved highly unstable - war after war has occurred despite the existence of conventional forces that <u>seem</u>ed on paper more or less in balance. This is because <u>success</u> in conventional war depends on so many intangibles of leadership and maneuver that the actual <u>has</u> proved very <u>difficult</u> to calculate. At the other extreme, Europe should <u>not</u> rely on <u>American</u> nuclear weapons based on American soil.

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or at sea. It was the apparent lack of credibility of such a false credibility that brought American ground forces, nuclear and conventional, to Europe in the first place. What was true when NATO's nuclear forces were hugely superior is even more crucial today, given the growth of the Soviet nuclear weapons stockpile and the trend of strategic arms control negotiations depriving strategic nuclear war of all rationale. European opponents of American nuclear weapons on their soil might ask themselves why America should run risks in defense of distant countries which these countries are unwilling to run on their own behalf. NATO, in short, must link the nuclear defense of Europe and America in some organic manner, whatever happens with German unity, or with unconventional war. Otherwise we are on the road to Soviet hegemony if perestroika succeeds, and to nationalist chaos if perestroika fails.

E

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There is merit to the concern that a unified Germany have ~~within the European Community~~ would represent a disproportionate weight. But the members of the European Community have the means and the mechanisms to prevent German hegemony. Surely Britain, France, Spain, and Italy, not to mention the smaller states, could shape a consensus that prevents domination by any one European country, however powerful. Indeed, the strongest argument for Britain's wholehearted participation in the construction of a united Europe is precisely the need for Britain's political experience in establishing an appropriate balance within the European Community.

The precise evolution of internal European arrangements is for Europeans to decide. But Americans can point to one anomaly in existing Atlantic relations. Within Europe the weight of political decisions is moving from the nation to the national boundaries being blurred and the European Community where the United States is not represented and with which its consultation is a ventriloque of

3

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the period when the Community was a largely economic institution. But within NATO - where nations still speak with separate voices and the European Community has security - matters are left to the nation state with no means of expression for the emergent European political entity.

This suggests a two-fold task: (a) Europe should be given some institutional voice within NATO, perhaps by means of the West European Union; (b) the political relations between the European Community and the United States should develop into some systematic method of political consultation at a high level.

## The Future of East-West Relations:

For several years the argument has been advanced - each year more insistently - that the Western democracies should "help" Gorbachev weather the hostile forces arrayed against him at home. I have always questioned the wisdom of tying Western policy to a single personality no matter how able

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and impressive. Long-range policy can survive only if it is
sustained by a foreseeable consensus of Soviet leaders.

The concept of "helping" Gorbachev implies unilateral
concessions that we would not make to anyone else. But if
concessions reflect reciprocal interests, we would not be
helping Gorbachev but ourselves. Our policy should be
based on our own long-range
 Discussed in terms of a balance of interests, not its
 to influence
presumption of an internal Kremlin politics.

Ironically, events in Eastern Europe and especially in
Germany suggest that Gorbachev's position is probably much
less precarious than has been thought. No single Soviet
leader could on his own have brought about the startling
changes in the Soviet position in Eastern Europe and especially in East Germany. Gorbachev's courage and daring were
surely useful, but he could not have risked the Soviet
Union's position in Central Europe without the support of
the Red Army and the KGB. Those two institutions must have

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concluded that the only other route that of repression would have required an offset of such scale and brutality as to isolate the Soviet Union and thwart any hopes of modernizing the Soviet economy, without help in modernizing the Soviet economy, being the society with outside help.

Insist that the Soviet leadership is united in loosening its hold on Eastern Europe, it is not yet clear on its long term objectives. There are three possibilities: (a) the Soviet leaders may believe that by loosening the pressures in Eastern Europe, they will be able to maintain existing arrangements at less cost; (b) the Soviet leaders may be playing the German card that is, using the prospect of a neutral unified Germany to drive American military power from the Continent. In the Soviet view, this may reduce Soviet risks if perestroika fails and lay the basis for eventual Soviet hegemony over Europe if perestroika should succeed; (c) the Soviets may want to conduct a serious

E

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Last summer an eminent Soviet scientist, a member of the Supreme Soviet reported to be close to Gorbachev, argued to me that the Soviet Union's strategic position could not be challenged so long as Germany and Japan were not denuclearized and the Soviet Union retained a large stockpile of nuclear weapons. Hence, he argued, the thrust of Soviet policy should be to remove American nuclear weapons from Eurasia. After that, it would be safe to~~ the~~ Germany and Japan to~~ help~~ rebuild the Soviet Union. For the Soviet Union could always control any attempt by those countries to~~ keep those~~ in line achieve political gains by the threat of its nuclear monopoly in Eurasia. Nor would they dare to thwart Soviet designs so long as they were totally vulnerable.

At the time I considered these the musings of an out-of-power intellectual. I am no longer so sure. It is not impossible that Gorbachev is gambling for high stakes. Or, some of his colleagues, may calculate that

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We have no reason to approve the internal arrangements of the Soviet Union. But we should be prepared to leave their erosion to the forces of history rather than to foreign policy challenges. The test of the new equilibrium is quite simple: the Soviet Union must be prepared to settle for a balance of power. The United States must be willing to coexist with an unfriendly ideology.

In practice this means working out a concept for the German unification, based on the idea of self determination, creating a special security status for the territory occupied by East German states, balancing forces on both sides of the present dividing line in Europe, with most ground forces withdrawn deep into the Soviet Union, and a major withdrawing a major portion of US ground forces into the territorial United States, but with some provision for the use of nuclear weapons in Western defense strategy. The level of remaining air forces

NOV 23 '89 09:24 KISSINGER ASSOC

At this stage the need is not for detailed bargaining
but for a concept to be developed first with our allies and
then with the Soviet Union. The meeting in Malta ~~has~~ cannot
settle anything and should not attempt to ~~be~~ as President
Bush has repeatedly pointed out. But it can be useful in
exposing each side to the other's philosophy for handling
the present crisis. Before there can be any detailed negoti-
ation, we must reach some agreement on where we are going.

Great presidencies occur when there is a confluence of
opportunity and leadership. The Bush presidency has an
opportunity unprecedented in the immediate post-war period,
not since American and European statesmanship first forged
order out of chaos. But the current opportunity, though more
complex, is also more hopeful. In 1815, a European Congress
created a new order at Vienna that lasted a century; the

1919 peace settlement of Versailles lasted barely twenty years. Our hope must be that with America's encouragement the Western democracies will now forge an international structure worthy of the highest aspirations of our western civilization.

"Policy," the Austrian Foreign Minister, Metternich, once wrote, "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inexorably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the performance will not go on is an absurdity. The play will be completed either by the actors or by the spectators who mount the stage."

In recent weeks, the curtain has risen on a new play unfolding center stage in Europe. Many of the players are still on the sidelines, hesitant and unsure of their parts either because they are not yet convinced of their proper roles or because they are waiting to see what roles the others will assume first. Nor is anyone precisely sure of