ABSTRACT
For the older generations, the exposed position of West Germany at the edge of the East-West conflict in Europe has generated ambiguous feelings and, perhaps, a somewhat manipulative approach to Western defense. West Germans have little sympathy for a policy of military strength, or buildup, preferring instead notions of approximate military balance, and the mutual de-escalation of aggressive rhetoric. When US leadership of the Western alliance is perceived as faltering or inept, and when US economic and monetary policies are seen as selfish or exploitive of the nations of Western Europe, the question of a European option—perhaps a French-led defensive union or a European currency—is likely to arise. The changing perceptions of the Soviet threat to West Germany during the years before and after the heyday of Ostpolitik faithfully mirror the declining level of distrust of Soviet intentions before and during the years that are sometimes described as the softening-up process of detente.
