ABSTRACT
The determination of both Germanys to maintain that precarious balance provides the key to understanding their relationship in the run-up to the events of 1989 onwards. Relations between Washington and Bonn were not in good shape. While Bonn tried to foster links between what it saw as two halves of one nation, East Berlin saw the relationship as being one between states and governments. During the first 20 years of its existence the Federal Republic was seen as a barrier to detente between the Superpowers, opposing or hampering progress in relations at every stage. That impression was reversed with the commencement of Ostpolitik. Egon Bahr, the chief architect of Ostpolitik, advocated a withdrawal of both NATO and the Warsaw Pact from German territory. A further blow to inner-German relations came in April 1974, when a close aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt was exposed as a Stasi spy.
