In 1949 the newly created Federal Republic of Germany lacked freedom of action. The country was under Western Allied occupation, its new Government under supervision by the Allied High Commission. After coming to office in September 1949, chancellor Konrad Adenauer was determined to achieve West Germany's firm anchoring in the Western community, sovereignty, political, economic, and military security, and Western European integration. However, his later success should not obscure the fact that his policy was risky. In 1949-50 his course was complicated by the Saar issue, sparse Allied granting of sovereign rights, the rearmament question, and the problem of German unity. Meanwhile, the Opposition social Democrats under Kurt Schumacher criticized the concessions to the Allies and, as western integration assumed a quicker pace, stressed the primacy of German unity. Even members of the Bonn Cabinet started to doubt a policy that seemed likely to solidify German division. The West German press mirrored and judged the domestic fight over foreign policy. Four of the five leading publicists examined in this study tended to support economic and political integration in Western Europe, while not prepared to cede to French interests and to renounce German claims on the Saar, they did support the Petersberg Agreement on dismantling, accession to the Council of Europe, and involvement in the Schuman Plan negotiations. The issue of German unity played a limited role in their editorials. Two pundits, Paul Sethe and Hans Baumgarten, never mentioned it, while two others, Richard Tungel and Ernst Friedlaender, believed that western integration offered perspectives to regain East Germany in the future. Moreover, Schumacher's opposition found little positive echo. Only Rudolf Augstein and Sethe at times backed similar policies to that of the SPD. Although the broad tenets of Adenauer's course were accepted, there was consistent criticism of his diplomatic methods, in fact, in the spring of 1950 three commentators called on the Chancellor to surrender diplomatic affairs to someone else. Amongst the editorialists examined, only Augstein advocated a neutralist policy, hoping it would facilitate German unification. However, he did not sufficiently discuss the great risks associated with German neutrality. Augstein was also the only commentator to oppose West German rearmament categorically. Although none of the commentators supported outright rearmament, the pundits backed a para-military federal police against the perceived East German threat. The question of direct remilitarization was ignored or made dependent on Allied concessions.

In 1949 the newly created Federal Republic of Germany lacked freedom of action. The country was under Western Allied occupation, its new Government under supervision by the Allied High Commission. After coming to office in September 1949, chancellor Konrad Adenauer was determined to achieve West Germany's firm anchoring in the Western community, sovereignty, political, economic, and military security, and Western European integration. However, his later success should not obscure the fact that his policy was risky. In 1949-50 his course was complicated by the Saar issue, sparse Allied granting of sovereign rights, the rearmament question, and the problem of German unity. Meanwhile, the Opposition social Democrats under Kurt Schumacher criticized the concessions to the Allies and, as western integration assumed a quicker pace, stressed the primacy of German unity. Even members of the Bonn Cabinet started to doubt a policy that seemed likely to solidify German division. The West German press mirrored and judged the domestic fight over foreign policy. Four of the five leading publicists examined in this study tended to support economic and political integration in Western Europe, while not prepared to cede to French interests and to renounce German claims on the Saar, they did support the Petersberg Agreement on dismantling, accession to the Council of Europe, and involvement in the Schuman Plan negotiations. The issue of German unity played a limited role in their editorials. Two pundits, Paul Sethe and Hans Baumgarten, never mentioned it, while two others, Richard Tungel and Ernst Friedlaender, believed that western integration offered perspectives to regain East Germany in the future. Moreover, Schumacher's opposition found little positive echo. Only Rudolf Augstein and Sethe at times backed similar policies to that of the SPD. Although the broad tenets of Adenauer's course were accepted, there was consistent criticism of his diplomatic methods, in fact, in the spring of 1950 three commentators called on the Chancellor to surrender diplomatic affairs to someone else. Amongst the editorialists examined, only Augstein advocated a neutralist policy, hoping it would facilitate German unification. However, he did not sufficiently discuss the great risks associated with German neutrality. Augstein was also the only commentator to oppose West German rearmament categorically. Although none of the commentators supported outright rearmament, the pundits backed a para-military federal police against the perceived East German threat. The question of direct remilitarization was ignored or made dependent on Allied concessions. / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate

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The dismemberment and reparations policy France followed at the end of World War II as an occupying power in Germany was a traditional approach of the victor to the vanquished. The Saar, the Ruhr, and the Rhineland were the borderlands long in dispute. One new element was the idea that while demanding these territories, an attempt at national rapprochement could be carried on through educational measures. For many Germans the University at Mainz did not balance the dismantled factories. This postwar period was characterized by European economic ills. The 1947 Marshall Plan, an American approach to restore Europe to economic health through cooperative effort, was inaugurated. It stimulated the European integration movement which flourished during the 1950’s. The 1948 Council of Europe had not lived up to expectations, in the eyes of European federalists, but the next try, the European Coal and Steel Community, (1952) proved a lusty child of the functionalist movement. When the European Defense Community died, (1954) it embittered Franco-German relations for a while. The European Atomic Energy Community and the European Economic Community completed the European Community in 1958. Through the organizations for economic integration, France and Germany have, in spite of disputes and crises, been able to compromise many divergent drives in the interest of restoring Europe to full economic capacity. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, (1949) which originated as a joint military defense and symbolized Western unity in the face of Soviet aggression, became a seedbed of discord between France and German. When General de Gaulle became president in 1958, he pursued an active policy of rapprochement with Adenauer’s Federal German Republic seeking to establish a Paris-Bonn axis on which to base French leadership in the European Community. As leader of a West European bloc independent of the United States, France would hold that place in the first rank of nations that de Gaulle believed she must have. Chancellor Adenauer cooperated with the French president because he believed a tightly knit European group would benefit German interests. The high point in Franco-German rapprochement occurred in 1962 during the summer exchange of state visits, but by the time the Treaty was signed and ratified, (1963) the tone of Franco-German relations and changed. Disagreements on military policies in NATO, on political developments in the European Community, and on agricultural policies in EEC, all reached serious proportions at the time that Chancellor Erhard took office in 1963. The Erhard government’s shift of emphasis from a Europe focused on France to the Atlantic alliance focused on the United States led President de Gaulle to consider a new policy to replace Franco-German rapprochement which had been his primary strategy until 1963. Franco-Russian relations became noticeably warmer after the extension of long term credits by France to the Soviet Union. Germany protested this new turn in French policy. A closer French-Russian relationship may add to the discord which cooled the Franco-German accord of 1962.

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The Federal Republic of Germany (F.R.G.) used the Hallstein Doctrine from 1955-1970 to prevent the worldwide recognition of the German Democratic Republic (G.D.R.). By denying the existence of a separate German state and thus the de facto division of Germany, the F.R.G. sought to perpetuate the idea of one German nation and to ease reunification. In addition, the F.R.G. claimed to be the sole, legitimate representative of German interests, and hoped to prevent the G.D.R. from acting as a separate Germany in world affairs. As a sanction, the Doctrine effectively prevented the international recognition of the G.D.R.. Also, the G.D.R.'s trade with Third World nations, from whom recognition was most likely, was severely limited. Unfortunately, the Doctrine also prevented the reunification of Germany.

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Doctorat en sciences sociales, politiques et économiques / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished