ABSTRACT
The terrorist attacks on New York and Washington D.C. of September 11, 2001 had a significant but limited impact on German security policies, which continued trends visible since the end of the Cold War, German unification in 1990, and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991. In a multilateral context, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) contributed to gestures of political support for the USA by the EU and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Parliamentary debates revealed significant differences in the government coalition regarding the appropriate response and the German contribution to this response. Of the government parties, the larger Social Democratic Party (SPD) was less likely to be affected by disillusionment amongst left Social Democrats with pacifist leanings than the smaller Alliance 90/Greens party. German authorities had some experience with terrorism from the 1970s and 1980s, when the Baader-Meinhof Gang was responsible for kidnapping and murdering politicians and business leaders.
