The Berlin Wall Crisis: Perspectives on Cold War Alliances

233 Pages·2003·1.58 MB·English

by  John Gearson

Cold War History Series
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London
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Titles include:
Günter Bischof
AUSTRIA IN THE FIRST COLD WAR, 1945–55
The Leverage of the Weak
Christoph Bluth
THE TWO GERMANIES AND MILITARY SECURITY IN EUROPE
Dale Carter and Robin Clifton (editors)
WAR AND COLD WAR IN AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY, 1942–62
Saki Dockrill
BRITAIN’S RETREAT FROM EAST OF SUEZ
The Choice Between Europe and the World, 1945–1968
Martin H. Folly
CHURCHILL, WHITEHALL AND THE SOVIET UNION, 1940–45
John Gearson and Kori Schake (editors)
THE BERLIN WALL CRISIS
Perspectives on Cold War Alliances
Ian Jackson
THE ECONOMIC COLD WAR
America, Britain and East–West Trade, 1948–63
Saul Kelly
COLD WAR IN THE DESERT
Britain, the United States and the Italian Colonies, 1945–52
Dianne Kirby (editor)
RELIGION AND THE COLD WAR
Wilfred Loth
OVERCOMING THE COLD WAR
A History of Détente, 1950–1991
Donette Murray
KENNEDY, MACMILLAN AND NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Andrew Roadnight
UNITED STATES POLICY TOWARDS INDONESIA IN THE TRUMAN AND
EISENHOWER YEARS
Kevin Ruane
THE RISE AND FALL OF THE EUROPEAN DEFENCE COMMUNITY
Anglo-American Relations and the Crisis of European Defence, 1950–55
Helene Sjursen
WESTERN POLICY–MAKING IN THE POLISH CRISIS
International Relations in the Second Cold War
Antonio Varsori and Elena Calandri (editors)
THE FAILURE OF PEACE IN EUROPE, 1943–48
Cold War History
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The Berlin Wall Crisis
Perspectives on Cold War Alliances
Edited by
John P. S. Gearson
King’s College London
and
Kori Schake
National Defense University, Washington, DC
Editorial matter and selection © John P. S. Gearson and Kori Schake 2002
Chapters 1–9 © Palgrave Macmillan Ltd 2002
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First published 2002 by
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The Berlin Wall crisis : perspectives on Cold War alliances/eds.,
John P. S. Gearson, Kori Schake.
p. cm. — (Cold War history series)
“This book grew out of an international research project, the Nuclear
History Programme (NHP) conducted in the late 1980s and the
1990s...”—Pref.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0–333–92960–8
1. Berlin Wall, Berlin, Germany—1961–1989. 2. Cold War. 3. Berlin
(Germany)—Politics and government—1945–1990. 4. Germany
(West)—Politics and government. 5. Germany (East)—Politics and
government. I. Gearson, John P. S., 1963– II. Schake, Kori N.
III. Series.
DD881 .B4767 2002
943′.155087—dc21
2002072342
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham and Eastbourne
Contents
Acknowledgements vi
List of Abbreviations vii
Notes on the Contributors viii
Editors’ Introduction x
Berlin Crisis Timeline xv
1 Berlin and the Cold War 1
Lawrence Freedman
2 Origins of the Berlin Crisis of 1958–62 10
John Gearson
3 A Broader Range of Choice? US Policy in the 1958
and 1961 Berlin Crises 22
Kori Schake
4 Britain and the Berlin Wall Crisis, 1958–62 43
John Gearson
5 De Gaulle, the Bomb and Berlin: How to Use a
Political Weapon 73
Cyril Buffet
6 The German Democratic Republic, the Soviet Union
and the Berlin Wall Crisis 96
Hope Harrison
7 The Berlin Crisis and the FRG, 1958–62 125
Jill Kastner
8 Italy and the Berlin Crisis, 1958–61 147
Leopoldo Nuti and Bruna Bagnato
9 Three Hats for Berlin: General Lauris Norstad and the
Second Berlin Crisis, 1958–62 175
Gregory W. Pedlow
Index 199
v
Acknowledgements
This book grew out of an international research project, the Nuclear
History Programme (NHP) conducted in the late 1980s and the 1990s
on the history of nuclear weapons and the policies of the United States,
the Soviet Union and the countries of Europe. The NHP included teams
working to recount the national histories of nuclear programmes, gain
new insights into the major nuclear crises (Berlin, Cuba and others),
and open up archival material in a variety of countries.
The authors were nearly all junior academics whose research was
funded and judgement was trained by the Nuclear History Programme.
The notable exception is Lawrence Freedman, who has been a mentor
to several of the contributors to this volume. Gregory W. Pedlow, who
is historian at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, was also
a senior colleague. The Berlin research effort, in which many of the
authors worked together, included Marc Trachtenberg, Wolfgang Krieger,
and David Allan Rosenberg and focused on the role of nuclear weapons
in the 1958 and 1962 Berlin crises. We are indebted to them for their
leadership and the opportunities they provided. William Burr of the
National Security Archive was of great assistance in identifying docu-
ments concerning the Berlin crisis and was an active collaborator in the
NHP’s Berlin studies.
vi
List of Abbreviations
EAC European Advisory Council
EEC European Economic Community
EFTA European Free Trade Area
FRG Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany)
GDR/DDR German Democratic Republic (East Germany)
ICBM Intercontinental Ballistic Missile
IRBM Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organisation
SACEUR Supreme Allied Commander Europe (NATO)
UK United Kingdom
US United States of America
USSR/SU Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
WEU Western European Union
WTO Warsaw Treaty Organisation (Warsaw Pact)
vii
Notes on the Contributors
Bruna Bagnato is Associate Professor of History of International Relations
at the Faculty of Political Sciences of the University of Florence. She
isthe author of Storia di una illusione europea. Il progetto di unione
doganale italo-francese (1995) and is currently editing the journal of Luca
Pietromarchi, Italian Ambassador to the USSR from 1958 to 1961,
and is completing a volume on Italo-Soviet relations 1958–1963.
Cyril Buffet is Political Adviser to the Chairman of the French National
Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Committee. He has published widely on French
and German foreign and security policy and has held research fellow-
ships from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and from the
Centre Marc Bloch in Berlin. He holds his doctorate from the Sorbonne
(Paris IV).
Lawrence Freedman is Professor of War Studies and Head of the School
of Social Sciences and Public Policy, King’s College London. He is
author of Kennedy’s Wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam (2000).
John Gearson is Senior Lecturer in Defence Studies, King’s College
London. He has published widely on Cold War history and is author of
Harold Macmillan and the Berlin Wall Crisis 1958–1961: The Limits of
Interests and Force (1998).
Hope Harrison is Assistant Professor of History and International Affairs
at the George Washington University in Washington, DC. Her book,
Driving the Soviets Up the Wall: Soviet–East German Relations, 1953–1961,
is forthcoming in 2003.
Jill Kastner received her PhD in 1999 from Harvard University, where
she focused on German–American relations during the Cold War. She
has worked with the Presidential Recordings Project at the University of
Virginia on Berlin policy during the Kennedy administration, and was
most recently a visiting Research Fellow at King’s College, London.
Leopoldo Nuti is Professor of History of International Relations at the
School of Political Science, University of Roma Tre. With a number of
viii
Notes on the Contributors ix
other Italian Cold War historians, he promoted the creation of the
Machiavelli Centre for Cold War Studies. He has published extensively
on US–Italian relations and Italian foreign and security policy, and is
author of Gli Stati Uniti e l’apertura a sinistra. Importanza e limiti della
presenza americana in Italia (1999).
Gregory W. Pedlow is Chief of the Historical Office at the Supreme
Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, NATO’s military headquarters for
Europe. In 1990–91 he wrote the official history of LIVE OAK, the Allied
crisis management staff for Berlin contingency plans and operations,
after it was disbanded because of German unification.
Kori Schake is Senior Research Professor in the Institute for National
Strategic Studies, US National Defense University, and also teaches at
the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.