Kohl Foresees Larger Role for United Germany

Speaking on the eve of German unification, West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl pledged Monday that his nation will not shrink from the greater political role that will come with unity.

“We are acquiring new international obligations,” he said in a formal speech to a convention of his Christian Democratic Union party in the northern city of Hamburg. “There can be no withdrawal into a comfortable corner of world politics.”

The Kohl government drew criticism from many in the United States for not responding more quickly to American calls for support in the Persian Gulf crisis. Only after prolonged hesitation did the Bonn government earlier this month pledge $2 billion plus military equipment in assistance.

West German governments have always claimed that the country’s constitution prohibits sending troops outside the territory of the Western alliance, and for most of the post-World War II period this has not been challenged. Only with unification and the return of Germany’s full sovereignty have allies pushed the country to take a greater role.

During his hourlong convention speech, Kohl was repeatedly interrupted by standing ovations in an atmosphere more akin to a celebration than a pre-election conference.

Kohl, 60, who has headed the West German government for eight years, will at midnight tonight become the first all-German chancellor since Admiral Karl Doenitz, who surrendered to the Allies after the collapse of Hitler’s Third Reich.

The historical watershed will be marked by the raising of the now-all-German red, gold and black flag atop the city’s famed Brandenburg Gate, fireworks and the singing of the German national anthem.

In the course of the day today in Berlin, military commanders of the three major victorious World War II powers from the West--the United States, Britain and France--will meet for the last time, formally ending their role in the 45-year military occupation of the city.

In a foretaste of that ceremony, the U.S. commandant in Berlin, Maj. Gen. Raymond E. Haddock, formally deactivated his command Monday at a ceremony attended by top-ranking diplomats and his two Allied counterparts, British Maj. Gen. Robert J. S. Corbett and French Maj. Gen. Francois Cann.

Soviet authorities provided no details of how they plan to relinquish their military authority over the eastern part of the city.

The East German Christian Democrats survived in East Germany as a minor participant in the Communist-dominated government that was toppled in a bloodless revolution last fall. After a major shake-up and reform, they emerged last spring as the major winner in the country’s only free elections.

Kohl also won an overwhelming mandate from conference delegates to stand again as the party’s candidate for chancellor in all-German elections Dec. 2.