Lower demands
The Gera demands were four political demands of Erich Honecker on behalf of the GDR leadership to the Federal Republic of Germany . They were presented in a speech by Honecker on October 13, 1980, which the GDR State Council chairman gave on the occasion of the opening of the 1980/81 party training year at the SED's party conference of the Gera district in the Erwin-Panndorf -Halle in Gera .
requirements
The demands on the Federal Republic of Germany were:
- "Determine" the Elbe border at the middle of the river
- to dissolve the registration office for violent crimes of the GDR in Salzgitter
- the respect of the GDR citizenship
- the conversion of the permanent representations into embassies
background
The Gera demands represent an intensification of the inner-German conflict. After the years of détente from 1969, the global East-West conflict showed a clear trend towards hardening from the end of the 1970s. The main trigger for this renewed hardening is the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. The SS-20 armament by the Soviet Union and the NATO double resolution continued to exacerbate the situation .
A meeting between Honecker and the German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt was planned for 1981 ; With this in mind, the GDR decided not to vigorously pursue the four demands. Rather, they served to improve the GDR's negotiating position on practical issues such as minimum exchange , family reunification and intra-German trade through maximum demands .
Reaction in the Federal Republic of Germany
The Federal Republic of Germany rejected the Gera demands and thus kept the door to reunification open for the future. The recognition of GDR citizenship would also have been in contradiction to the Basic Law, which guaranteed Germans in the GDR German citizenship . While the CDU and FDP consistently pursued this position, voices came from the ranks of the peace movement as well as the SPD and the Greens who campaigned for these demands to be fulfilled.
In 1984, for example, Egon Bahr demanded that the first three of the Gera requirements be met. This position is not a departure from the " policy of small steps " that was successful in the 1970s . Against the background of the social democratic policy of détente , recognition of GDR citizenship would have been logical (“recognition of the status quo in order to overcome it”).
In fact, the Federal Republic did not respond to any of the demands. The change of government in 1982 changed nothing in the German policy of the Federal Republic of Germany; the path taken by the social-liberal coalition was continued.
literature
- Speech by Erich Honecker in Gera on October 13, 1980 (excerpts) in:
- Klaus Schroeder : The SED state. Party, State and Society 1949–1990. Hanser, Munich a. a. 1998, pp. 694-695.
- Neues Deutschland , October 14, 1980, p. 3f.
- Erich Honecker : Speeches and essays , Volume 7. Dietz-Verlag, Berlin (GDR) 1982, pp. 422–442.