The Limits of Linkage: The Nixon Administration and Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik , 1969–72
2011; Routledge; Volume: 33; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/07075332.2011.555447
ISSN1949-6540
Autores Tópico(s)Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics
ResumoAbstract This article takes a look at the reaction of the White House to the new Ostpolitik of the Federal Republic of Germany, initiated in 1969 by the newly elected Chancellor, Willy Brandt. The President, Richard M. Nixon, and his National Security Advisor, Henry A. Kissinger, viewed Bonn's new policy as a challenge to Western unity and their own policy of détente. For them, Ostpolitik, as a policy aiming at rapprochement with the Soviet bloc, represented an irritating element in international politics. However, the Nixon administration understood that it was impossible for the United States to take action against Brandt's initiatives in the East without causing irreparable damage to the vital German–US relationship. In this context, Kissinger came to see the four-power negotiations on Berlin (1970–1) as a way to link Ostpolitik with other diplomatic issues of interest to the United States. He hoped that this would allow him control Brandt's Eastern policy and exploit it to further US interests. This strategy of linkage did not bring the US many positive results; indeed, it put a strain on relations between Washington and Bonn. Nevertheless, in the end the Nixon administration got most of what it wanted out of Ostpolitik, despite its limited influence on its course. Keywords: United StatesFederal Republic of GermanyForeign RelationsOstpolitikCold WarDétenteWilly BrandtRichard M. NixonHenry A. Kissinger Notes 1. Two notable exceptions are G. Niedhart, ‘The Federal Republic’s Ostpolitik and the United States: Initiatives and Constraints' in K. Burk and M. Stokes (ed), The United States and the European Alliance since 1945 (Oxford, 1999), 289–311; H. Klitzing, ‘To Grin and Bear It: The Nixon Administration and Ostpolitik’ in C. Fink and B. Schäfer (ed), Ostpolitik 1969–74: European and Global Responses (Cambridge, 2009), 80–110. 2. See for example J. Hoff, Nixon Reconsidered (New York, 1994); R.S. Parmet, Richard Nixon and His America (Boston, 1990); W. Isaacson, Kissinger. A Biography (New York, 2005). 3. M.E. Sarotte, ‘The Frailties of Grand Strategies: A Comparison of Détente and Ostpolitik’ in F. Logevall and A. Preston (ed), Nixon in the World: American Foreign Relations, 1969–77 (Oxford, 2008), 146–65; H. Haftendorn, ‘German Ostpolitik in a Multilateral Setting’ in H. Haftendorn, et al. (ed), The Strategic Triangle. France, Germany, and the United States in the Shaping of the New Europe (Washington, 2006), 209–27; G. Niedhart, ‘Frankreich und die USA im Dialog über Détente und Ostpolitik 1969’, Francia, xxxi (2004), 65–85. See also the contributions in D.C. Geyer and B. Schäfer (ed), American Détente and German Ostpolitik. Bulletin of the German Historical Institute, supplement no. 1 (2004), and in Fink and Schäfer (ed), Ostpolitik 1969–74. 4. See for example Hoff, Nixon; W. Bundy, A Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency (New York, 1998); J. Hanhimäki, The Flawed Architect: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy (New York, 2004); J. Hanhimäki, ‘An Elusive Grand Design’ in Logevall and Preston (ed), Nixon in the World, 25–44. For an earlier example of scholarship critical of ‘Nixinger’ diplomacy, see S. Hersh, The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House (New York, 1983). 5. H.A. Kissinger, White House Years (Boston, 1979), 529–34, 797–833. For examples of studies arguing that Nixon and Kissinger ‘co-opted’ Ostpolitik for their own aims, see Hanhimäki, Flawed Architect, and Klitzing, ‘Nixon Administration’. 6. Speech, Brandt, 28 Oct. 1969, in W. Brandt, Berliner Ausgabe, vol. 6: Ein Volk der guten Nachbarn. Aussen- und Deutschlandpolitik 1966–74 (Bonn, 2005), 236–46 (citation 237). 7. See his famous Tutzing speech (1963) in E. Bahr, Sicherheit für und vor Deutschland (Munich, 1991), 11–17. See also the studies he and his policy-planning staff at the West German Foreign Office wrote in the fall of 1969: memo, Bahr, 18 Sept. 1969, A[kten zur] A[uswärtigen] P[olitik der Bundesrepublik] D[eutschland], 1969, 1030–47; memo, Bahr, 21 Sept. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1047–57. 8. On Ostpolitik, see P. Bender, Die ‘Neue Ostpolitik’ und ihre Folgen: vom Mauerbau bis zur Vereinigung (Munich, 1995); T. Garton Ash, In Europe's Name: Germany and the Divided Continent (New York, 1993); G. Niedhart, ‘Ostpolitik: Phases, Short-Term Objectives and Grand Design’, in Geyer and Schäfer (ed), American Détente, 118–36. See also E. Bahr's memoirs, Zu meiner Zeit (Munich, 1996). 9. On the conservative character of international détente, see J. Suri, Power and Protest: Global Revolution and the Rise of Détente (Cambridge, 2003). 10. Memo, Bahr, 21 Sept. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1053. 11. See the exhaustive study on European security that Bahr oversaw when he was director of the policy planning staff in the Foreign Office in Bahr, Sicherheit, 60–82. US political scientist Walter F. Hahn brought it to the attention of US policy-makers and scholars by publishing a very critical article playing on fears of West German neutralism: ‘West Germany's Ostpolitik: The Grand Design of Egon Bahr’, Orbis. A Quarterly Journal of World Affairs, xvi (1973), 859–80. 12. See T.A. Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe: In the Shadow of Vietnam (Cambridge, 2003); D. Selvage, ‘Transforming the Soviet Sphere of Influence?: U.S.-Soviet Détente and Eastern Europe, 1969–76’, Diplomatic History, xxxiii (2009), 671–87. 13. The expression is from Richard Löwenthal and designates the fundamental incompatibility between West German and Soviet interests (overcoming vs. consolidating the status quo). R. Löwenthal, ‘Vom Kalten Krieg zur Ostpolitik’ in R. Löwenthal and H.-P. Schwarz (ed), Die zweite Republik 25 Jahre Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Eine Bilanz (Stuttgart, 1974), 604–99. 14. Memcon, Nixon with Kiesinger, 7 Aug. 1969, [Washington, United States] N[ational] A[rchives and] R[ecords] A[dministration], R[ecord] G[roup] 59, C[entral] F[iles], box 2137. 15. Memo, Cline, 8 April 1970, NARA, N[ixon] P[residential] M[aterials] P[roject], N[ational] S[ecurity] C[ouncil], box 683. 16. ‘Germany and the Future of Western Europe’, 23 Feb. 1968, NARA, RG 59, CF, box 2117. 17. Ibid. 18. Embassy at Bonn to State Department, 11 April 1968, NARA, RG 59, CF, box 2136. 19. Embassy at Bonn to State Department, 13 March 1970, NARA, RG 59, CF, box 2317. 20. Memcon, Brandt with Rush, 28 Oct. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1167. 21. S. Kieninger, ‘Transformation or Status Quo. The Conflict of Stratagems in Washington over the Meaning and Purpose of the CSCE and MBFR, 1969–73’, in O. Bange and G. Niedhart (ed), Helsinki 1975 and the Transformation of Europe (New York, 2008), 75. 22. Note, Bahr, 8 Dec. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1384–6. 23. Cited in Klitzing, ‘Nixon Administration’, 90. 24. Memo, Kissinger, 20 Oct. 1969, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 682. 25. Ibid. 26. Memo, NSC, 6 Nov. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 685. 27. Memo, NSC, undated (1970–71), NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684. 28. Memo, Kissinger, 16 Feb. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683. 29. Ibid. 30. Kissinger, White House Years, 409–11. 31. See for example the letter from the British Ambassador to West Germany, Sir Roger Jackling, to a high-ranking diplomat, Sir Thomas Brimelow, 1 Feb. 1971, in which Jackling refers to the concerns of the State Department and the Quai d'Orsay regarding Ostpolitik, concerns which he admits to share. Jackling to Brimelow, [Kew, United Kingdom] N[ational] A[rchives], F[oreign and] C[ommonwealth] O[ffice], 33/1556. See also memo, R.A. Burroughs, 18 April 1969, NA, FCO, 49/265. 32. W. Brandt, Erinnerungen (Berlin, 2003), 89. 33. The French and British attitudes toward Brandt's Ostpolitik are beyond the scope of this article. For more information on this topic see Georges-Henri Soutou, ‘L’attitude de Georges Pompidou face à l’Allemagne', in Association Georges Pompidou (ed), Georges Pompidou et l'Europe: colloque, 25 et 26 novembre 1993 (Brussels, 1995), 267–313; G. Niedhart, ‘The British Reaction towards Ostpolitik: Anglo-West German Relations in the Era of Détente, 1967–71’, in C. Haase (ed), Debating Foreign Affairs: The Public and British Foreign Policy Since 1867 (Berlin, 2003), 130–52; D. Geppert, ‘Grossbritannien und die Neue Ostpolitik der Bundesrepublik’, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, lvii (2009), 385–412. 34. See for example the document that Bahr transmitted to the US, French, and British ambassadors after his first round of talks with Gromyko in Moscow: note of the federal government, 25 Feb. 1970, AAPD, 1970, 308–13. 35. Memo, Kissinger, 16 Feb. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683. 36. Telcon, Kissinger with the Vice-President, Spiro Agnew, 10 April 1970, NARA, NPMP, H[enry] A[.] K[issinger], box. 4; telcon, Kissinger with Nixon, 19 Dec. 1970, NARA, NPMP, HAK, box 29. See also memo, Kissinger, 16 Feb. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683. 37. Kissinger, White House Years, 410–1. 38. Memo, Rogers, 16 July 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683 39. Memcon, Bahr with Kissinger, 14 Oct. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1114–18. 40. Memcon, Kissinger with Bahr, 20 Oct. 1969, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 682. 41. Memcon, Bahr with Kissinger, 14 Oct. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1114–18. 42. See the aforementioned very critical memorandum that he wrote only a few days later: Memo, Kissinger, 20 Oct. 1969, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 682. 43. Memo, ministerial director Hans Ruete, 27 Nov. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1338–41 44. Embassy at Washington to French Foreign Ministry, 21 Nov. 1969, [Paris,] A[rchives du] M[inistère des] A[ffaires] É[trangères], Europe, R[épublique] F[édérale d']A[llemagne] 1961–70, vol. 1546. 45. Note, sous-direction d'Europe Centrale, 4 Dec. 1970, AMAE, Europe, RFA 1961–70, vol. 1547. 46. Memo, Kissinger, 10 March 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683. 47. Nixon's handwritten comments on: memo, Kissinger, undated (July 1970), NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684. 48. See M.E. Sarotte, ‘A Small Town in (East) Germany: The Erfurt Meeting of 1970 and the Dynamics of Cold War Détente’, Diplomatic History, xxv (2001), 85–104. 49. Telcon, Nixon with Kissinger, cited in Selvage, ‘Transforming’, 675. 50. P. Frank, Entschlüsselte Botschaft. Ein Diplomat macht Inventur (Stuttgart, 1981), 287 (italics in the original). 51. Author's interview with Robert Gerald Livingston, 31 May 2006, Washington. Livingston worked at the political section of the US embassy to the FRG between 1968 and 1971 and was a member of the NSC in 1972–3. 52. Bahr to Scheel, 20 Aug. 1970, [Berlin, Foreign Office] P[olitisches]A[rchiv im] A[uswärtigen] A[mt], B 150, Bd. 210. 53. Memo, Kissinger, 16 Feb. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 683. 54. Pauls to Foreign Office, 18 Dec. 1970, AAPD, 1970, 2293–5. 55. Kissinger, White House Years, 531. 56. D. Brinkley, Dean Acheson. The Cold War Years, 1953–71 (New Haven, 1992), 293. 57. Brandt to McCloy, 24 March 1971, Brandt, Berliner Ausgabe, vi. 356–9 (citation 357). 58. Pauls to Foreign Office, 18 Dec. 1970, AAPD, 1970, 2293–5. 59. For such comments by Fessenden see memo, Ruete, 27 Nov. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1338–41; memo, Bahr, 28 Nov. 1969, AAPD, 1969, 1347–8. 60. Pauls to Foreign Office, 22 Dec. 1970, AAPD, 1970, 2305–9 (citations 2305–6); memcom, Kissinger with Ehmke, 21 Dec. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 690. See also H. Ehmke, Mittendrin: Von der Grossen Koalition zur Deutschen Einheit (Berlin, 1994), 140–2. 61. Nixon to Brandt, 12 March 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 753. 62. Kissinger, White House Years, 698–708. 63. Ehmke made this observation in September 1970: Ehmke, Mittendrin, 140. 64. Memo, Kissinger, 1 Sept. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684 (emphasis in the original). 65. Ibid. See also memcon, Kissinger with Bahr, 20 Aug. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684. 66. Memo, NSC, 6 Nov. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 685. 67. Author's interview with Robert Gerald Livingston, 31 May 2006, Washington. 68. Kissinger, White House Years, 805. 69. Ibid., 804. 70. The most informative documents on the informal discussions within the ‘group of three’ are Bahr's back channel messages to Kissinger, which can be found in [Bonn, SPD archives at the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung], A[rchiv] d[er] s[ozialen] D[emokratie], [Depositum] Bahr, box 439. See also W. Keworkow, Der geheime Kanal: Moskau, der KGB, und die Bonner Ostpolitik (Berlin, 1995); D.C. Geyer, ‘The Missing Link: Henry Kissinger and the Back-Channel Negotiations on Berlin’ in Geyer and Schäfer (ed), American Détente, 80–97. 71. On Kissinger and Nixon's attempt to link the recognition of the territorial status quo to armaments limitations, see W.F. Hanrieder, Germany, America, Europe. Forty Years of German Foreign Policy (New Haven, 1989), 98. See also G. Lundestad, The United States and Western Europe since 1945 (Oxford, 2005), 174–5. 72. Kissinger, White House Years, 819. 73. Ibid., 821. 74. Ibid., 830. 75. Ibid. 76. R.M. Nixon, RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon (New York, 1978), 522–3. 77. Soviet intransigence in disarmament negotiations was due to an earlier promise made by Kissinger that the United States would not insist on a link between SALT and ABM. See Bundy, Tangled Web, 167–73. Bundy further argues that the May 1971 agreement on SALT and ABM that Kissinger concluded with the Soviets left ‘many loose ends, in another sloppy negotiating performance’. Ibid., 253. 78. Ibid., 247–8. 79. Cited in Hersh, Price of Power, 420 (footnote). 80. These remarks were noted by Brandt after a conversation with the President. Memcon, Brandt with Nixon, 15 and 16 June 1971, AAPD, 1971, 266–72. 81. On 19 May 1971, Falin assured Brandt that the Soviet Union was willing to guarantee access to West Berlin through the GDR. Memcon, Brandt with Falin, 19 May 1971, AAPD, 1971, 802–5. See also Bahr to Kissinger, 6 June 1971, AAPD, 1971, 918–19. In mid-June, Bahr and Rush were confident that the quadripartite negotiations could be completed within four weeks. Memcon, Bahr with State Department official Martin Hillenbrand, 16 June 1971, AAPD, 1971, 983. 82. Memo, department II A 1, Foreign Office, 25 Aug. 1971, AAPD, 1971, 1269–83. 83. On the link between a Soviet consulate and the diplomatic representation of West Berlin and its citizens by Bonn, see Bahr to Kissinger, 30 June 1971, AAPD, 1971, 1198–9; memo, Under-secretary Günther van Well, 12 Aug. 1971, AAPD, 1971, 1240–3. 84. See the account by two US diplomats involved in the Berlin negotiations: J.S. Sutterlin and D. Klein, Berlin: From Symbol of Confrontation to Keystone of Stability (New York, 1989), 121. 85. Memcon, the Foreign Minister of the GDR, Otto Winzer, with Gromyko, 11 Jan. 1971, Berlin, East German Communist Party archives, Stiftung Archiv der Parteien und Massenorganisationen in der DDR im Bundesarchiv, Büro Hermann Axen, DY / 30 / IV 2 / 2.035 / 55. 86. Sutterlin and Klein, Berlin, 134–5. 87. A. Dobrynin, In Confidence: Moscow's Ambassador to America's Six Cold War Presidents, 1962–86 (New York, 1995), 223. 88. Ibid., 233. 89. Sutterlin and Klein, Berlin, 86. See also State Secretary Paul Frank's talks with Falin: memcon, Frank with Falin, 27 May 1971, AAPD, 1971, 861–6. 90. See the messages Bahr sent and received through the backchannel in AdsD, Bahr, box 439. 91. Hanhimäki, ‘Grand Design’, 26. See also D. Caldwell, ‘The Legitimation of the Nixon-Kissinger Grand Design and Grand Strategy’, Diplomatic History, xxxiii (2009), 633–52. 92. H.R. Haldeman, The Haldeman Diaries: Inside the Nixon White House (New York, 1994), 367. 93. Memcon, Bahr with Kissinger, 1 April 1972, AdsD, Bahr, box 439. 94. Pauls to Foreign Office, 25 March 1972, AAPD, 1972, 327–30. 95. Pauls to Foreign Office, 1 May 1972, PA AA, B150, Bd. 254. 96. Telcon, Kissinger with McCloy, 3 May 1972, NARA, NPMP, HAK, box 14. 97. H.A. Kissinger, Diplomacy (New York, 1994), 737. 98. Cited in J. Aitken, ‘The Nixon Character’, Presidential Studies Quarterly, xxvi (1996), 244. 99. Telcon, Kissinger with McCloy, 3 May 1972, NARA, NPMP, HAK, box 14. 100. Memo, Kissinger, 3 Sept. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684. 101. Cited in Klitzing, ‘Nixon Administration’, 103. 102. Memo, Kissinger, 27 Jan. 1972, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 686. 103. Pauls to Foreign Office, 1 May 1972, PA AA, B150, Bd. 254. 104. Memcon, Frank with Irwin, 30 Nov. 1971, AAPD, 1971, 1861–4. 105. A. Baring, Machtwechsel. Die Ära-Brandt-Scheel (Stuttgart, 1982), 447. 106. Memo, Kissinger, 20 Dec. 1972, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 689. 107. Habe to Kissinger, 5 March 1973, NARA, NPMP, HAK, box 61. 108. Henry Kissinger and William Burr, The Kissinger Transcripts: The Top Secret Talks With Beijing and Moscow (New York, 1999), 89. 109. Sonnenfeldt had warned Kissinger about this possibility. Memo, Sonnenfeldt, 16 Oct. 1970, NARA, NPMP, NSC, box 684. Additional informationNotes on contributorsJean-François Juneau I would like to thank Paul Létourneau, Carole Fink, Bernd Schäfer, and Frédéric Cyr, as well as two anonymous reviewers for their valuable advice and very helpful comments on various versions of this article. I would also like to express my gratitude to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and to the Center for International Peace and Security Studies.
Referência(s)