Kohl’s Hedged Unity Pitch

Few international questions bear so heavy a weight of history as what is called the German Question. Few carry so many practical and emotional implications; fewer still demand so much restraint and sensitivity from all parties.

With an eye obviously on the Malta superpower summit this weekend, West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl showed both restraint and sensitivity Wednesday, when he advanced a noteworthy set of proposals on German unity in a speech to Parliament. His country, Kohl said, is prepared “to develop confederative structures between the two states in Germany in order to create a federation . . . . New forms of institutional cooperation can emerge and be developed in stages,” the chancellor said. “Nobody knows how a reunified Germany will look. But I am sure that unity will come, if it is wanted by the German nation.”

Setting no timetable, Kohl was careful to point out that any future exercise of German self-determination would have to occur within the context of an expanding European Community and with recognition of his country’s commitment to NATO. These are welcome reassurances. After 40 years of successful democracy in Bonn, the rest of the world no longer can presume that the fate of the two Germanys will necessarily be decided by anyone other than the Germans. They, for their part, cannot proceed as if other nations have anything less than a major stake in their decisions.

The complexities inherent in these realities were evident in the responses Kohl received from Washington and Moscow. State Department spokeswoman Margaret D. Tutweiler, while restrained in her characterization, said the chancellor was “responding to the deepest aspiration of his people,” and argued that there was no need for alarm because he had “laid out his vision for the future of Germany.” By contrast, Nikolai Portugalov, the Soviet’s leading specialist on German affairs, declared flatly that “under today’s geopolitical conditions, Europe cannot bear a (German) confederation.”

Twice in this century, an aggressive, highly centralized, authoritarian German nation has plunged the world into catastrophe. That cannot be forgotten or ignored. But while it is foolish to pretend that the past has no influence on the present, it is simplistic, and vulgar, to insist that the past is an unfailing guide to the future.

Groping for the answer to today’s German Question obviously will require every ounce of creativity and goodwill that can be mustered by statesmen on both sides of the Elbe.