It had uncovered extra ambivalences than it solved. yet as meant, it laid the root for fruitful collaboration later. <> * * * * Bonn and Berlin and the Enigma of Germany O ur subsequent cease was once Bonn. the placement of the Federal Republic of Germany used to be extra advanced. German politics have been in preelection flux and we arrived in the course of an incipient Berlin situation. The West German President, a principally ceremonial determine, is chosen by way of a different meeting of the Bundestag or representatives of the states (Länder). On all previous events this consultation was once held within the outdated Reichstag construction in West Berlin. This used to be to stress Bonn’s declare to symbolize the continuity of the valid German kingdom. The Soviets and their East German affiliates had formerly neglected this implied problem; by means of 1969 they felt powerful adequate to make a subject of it. They protested the electoral assembly in Berlin at the flooring that West Berlin used to be no longer legally a part of the Federal Republic. They began harassing the entry routes for the 1st time considering that 1962. This used to be guaranteed to reason profound anxiousness in Bonn. Berlin’s vulnerability had turn into proverbial. there has been uncertainty approximately how the recent management might react. there has been a pervasive unease prompted partially via Germany’s uncovered place, partially through coverage disputes with the 2 administrations previous us. Bonn had disagreed with the McNamara emphasis on non-nuclear local safeguard, fearing that it may well tempt Soviet aggression. Bonn observed within the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty a transparent instance of discrimination opposed to it within the nuclear box. Bonn resented American pressures to pay for the stationing of yank forces on German soil. Chancellors—Konrad Adenauer and Ludwig Erhard—had visible their departure hastened by way of their controversies with the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. All this mirrored the shaky mental place of the doubtless so strong new German nation. Defeated in wars, bearing the stigma of the Nazi earlier, dismembered and divided, West Germany was once an financial system looking for political goal. there has been no longer in Bonn that British self-confidence born of centuries of uninterrupted political evolution and imperial glory. Bonn itself, selected because the new capital for the non-public comfort of the 1st postwar Chancellor (it used to be on the subject of the small city the place Adenauer lived), and embodying no prior culture of presidency, symbolized the precariousness of Germany’s postwar resurrection. The Federal Republic used to be like a majestic tree with shallow roots, susceptible to surprising gusts of wind. The tenuousness of its place used to be mirrored within the experience of lack of confidence of its leaders. Adenauer, a really nice guy, had thought of it his basic responsibility to revive for Germany a name for reliability. He resolutely rejected many temptations to take advantage of Germany’s possibilities for maneuver among East and West. He resisted the accusations of his household competition that his pro-Western direction threatened the clients for German reunification.