The Third World War: August 1985

On the Western side another argument raged almost as fiercely, though without the personally lethal outcome common to argument in the Kremlin. To invade or not to invade was the question. US reinforcements were now flooding in, the sea routes were more or less assured, the European Allies had recovered and regrouped. French participation had been an enormous source of strength. Evidence of Soviet disarray was seen at every hand. Why not now go over to the offensive, it was asked, and finish off for ever the threat from Eastern Europe, so that everyone could live happily ever after? There was no need to repeat Hitler’s mistake and go too far. No Lebensraum

was now required. East Germany and Poland could be freed and the advance could be pushed forward in the Ukraine as far as the Dnieper. Control of the Ukrainian harvest and of the Dnieper hydro-electric installations would be enough to cripple any further war effort by Soviet Russia. It would be tempting to go on and liberate Georgia and control Baku, but that might be counterproductive in the long run as it would expose too long a line of Western communications, with the need for garrisons to secure them, and repeat in the East the Soviet error in the West.

This line of argument, propounded largely by the more influential US commanders, was supported by those who thought in terms of land masses and geo-politics. But there was one element in it which ran foul of European political instincts and political fears. The first stage in this advance would obviously be to free East Germany from Soviet control and to occupy it with Western forces, among whom West Germans would be preponderant. Could it really be believed, asked the French, the British and the smaller Western Allies, that this would not result in Germany being reunited? In the cold war years of the 1950s the reunification of Germany had been a parrot-cry of Western governments. Many Europeans had gone along with this line only because they were fairly sure that nothing of the sort would happen. It seemed at the time a useful stick with which to beat the Russians and a useful carrot to hold out to the West Germans to bring them more closely into the Western Alliance. But it was not a genuine long-term aim, except to very few. Many of the more thoughtful Germans themselves had misgivings about what a reunited Germany might be like, and what effect it would have on its neighbours. They might be fairly confident that West Germany at least had profoundly changed and would not allow a reunited Germany to become an aggressive force again, but they saw equally clearly that others would not feel the same confidence in their pacific intentions; in contrast to the dawning hopes of reconciliation in Western Europe through the Economic Community a reunited Germany might start the same old dreary cycle of national antagonisms all over again. These views had received little expression in Germany, but there had certainly been an almost audible sigh of relief when Willi Brandt, with an act of supreme statesmanship, entered upon the Ostpolitik

in the 1960s, and to all intents and purposes renounced reunification as an aim of German policy for the foreseeable future.

Now, with the road to Berlin more or less open, the temptation was there. So, in even greater measure, was the fear and suspicion. There were some in the West German army who would find it hard to resist an opportunity to support an East German rising against Soviet occupation, and to knock down once and for all the hated Berlin wall and the frontier watch towers. The German command were doubtful as to how far they would be able to hold back all their units if this sort of opportunity presented itself. The French, British, Belgians, Dutch and Norwegians, on the other hand, refused absolutely to agree to a move forward beyond the West German border.

In addition to their fears of a united Germany, even one dominated by West Germany, they argued persuasively that an offensive into Soviet territory would be the one thing which might not only revive the Soviet will and capability to resist, but also spur them on, out of desperation, to make use of their still intact nuclear armoury. America might count on a measure of survival in such an event; the outlook for Western Europe would be far grimmer. Let the Western forces rather stand on the side lines, the argument ran, and watch the disintegration of the Warsaw Pact, assisted by such covert stimulus as they could give, in Poland and elsewhere, to national resistance.