North Korea claims that the two Koreas have a hostile relationship and will never be able to achieve the goal of reunification. Shortly after this statement, North Korea launched an artillery attack on South Korea, and more than 200 shells fell on the inter-Korean maritime border. The Korean Peninsula, which had been calm for a long time, was once again shrouded in the dark clouds of war. North Korea no longer recognizes that the two Koreas are homogeneous relations, but hostile countries. North and South Korea are no longer two regimes under the same nation, but two hostile countries. The DPRK recognizes the sovereign state status of South Korea and no longer pursues the reunification of the two countries under the same nation.
The atmosphere of emergency on the Korean Peninsula was pulled to the point of saber rattling in an instant. Is there still a possibility of peaceful reunification between the DPRK and the ROK?Why did East Germany and West Germany complete the peaceful reunification, while North and South Korea are moving more and more towards confrontation?What was the heavy, little-known price paid for the merger of Germany?Why is it difficult to reproduce the story of the reunification of Germany on the Korean Peninsula?Today, Iilin would like to talk to you about why North and South Korea today cannot reproduce the miracle of the merger of East and West Germany
In history textbooks, the merger of East and West Germany seemed to be the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, and it was done. But history has never been accidental, and the fall of the Berlin Wall did not happen overnight. Those seemingly easy historical moments are full of heavy costs behind them, and without the joint efforts of the people of the two Germanys, there will be no reunification of the two Germanys.
During the Cold War, the confrontation between Germany, the United States and the Soviet Union was at the forefront of the confrontation, one was the US-led NATO camp and the other was the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact camp. On both sides of the Berlin Wall, which was at the forefront of the confrontation between the world's two superpowers at that time, the United States and the Soviet Union had about 500,000 troops stationed in Germany. After the defeat in World War II, West Germany and East Germany were just two puppets controlled by the United States and the Soviet Union. During World War II, France and Britain, which were only frightened by Germany, certainly did not want a unified and powerful Germany to emerge.
The two Germanys were originally of the same ancestry, but they were forced to divide into two camps and regard each other as enemies, and such a national and national scene was like a sharp knife, deeply piercing the hearts of the German people. As far as the Germans are concerned, the two Germans were completely imposed on them by the United States and the Soviet Union, and were not willingly imposed on them by the two German peoples. A high Berlin Wall forcibly divided the relatives and friends of countless Germans into two completely different worlds. The desire to unify Germany has never disappeared and is even getting stronger day by day. As early as the Prussian period, Germany completed the cultural and spiritual unification. This kind of cultural unification is the same as the unification of China by Qin Shi Huang of China. It is not only a geographical unity, but also a civilizational unity.
The East Germans looked out of place under the oppressive rule of the Soviet Union, and West Germany was not willing to be cannon fodder for the United States against the Soviet Union. For Germany to become independent again, the two Germany must be reunited. This is not only a personal wish, but also the mission of the rise of the German nation.
But the ideal is very plump, and the reality is very skinny. With the Soviet Union on one side and the United States on the other, how easy is it to reunify Germany?
It's a two-way reunification. The Germans are working on two fronts, one is economic integration. West Germany, which is more economically developed, took the lead in throwing an olive branch and signed a series of cooperation agreements with East Germany in many fields such as economy, transportation, culture, and environment. These massive economic and trade exchanges have made the east and west Germany inseparable from each other, strengthening the economy of the two Germany in an all-round way, and paving the way for reunification and merger.
Second, wait for historical opportunities. It is difficult for two people who love each other to be together, and the parents do not agree. If the two Germans want to be reunified, they will never be able to do it without the consent of the United States and the Soviet Union, and they must get rid of France and reduce all obstacles in order to escort the reunification of the two Germanys.
But the United States and the Soviet Union were a pair of sworn enemies, and they both wanted to use the two Germanys as their bridgeheads to contain their opponents. If you are forced to do so, you will never let go.
The Germans were lucky. They soon waited for this moment of necessity. By the end of the 80s of the last century, the Soviet army was deeply involved in the war in Afghanistan, and the Soviet economy was crumbling, step by step towards the abyss of collapse.
This is a godsend for Germany. The Germans seized the opportunity, did not wait any longer, and struck decisively.
First, the Golden Yuan offensive against the Soviet Union. At that time, the Soviet economy was on the verge of collapse, there was a shortage of supplies, and many people had difficulty even eating. In order to win the consent of the Soviet Union, West Germany took the initiative to stand up and used its money capacity to first provide tens of thousands of tons of canned beef, pork and other daily necessities, and then provided $15 billion in European Community aid to the Soviet Union, and also provided the Soviet Union with a preferential bank credit of 5 billion marks in the name of West Germany.
This is far from enough, the appetite of the USSR is too great to be able to handle it with such a small amount of money. The Soviet Union believed that it had stationed 380,000 troops in East Germany, and that the military expenditure was not a small amount. In order for the Soviet troops to withdraw, they had to pay compensation for military expenses. At that time, the Soviet Union could no longer afford to support a huge Soviet army. West Germany knew that the Soviet Union was taking advantage of the withdrawal of its troops and extorted a sum of money at the end, but in order to avoid complications, West Germany agreed to pay the Soviet Union 12 billion marks in compensation, plus 3 billion marks in direct financial assistance. Even taking into account the living problems of these Soviet troops stationed in Germany after they returned, West Germany ** also gave skills training to these hundreds of thousands of people, so that they could learn a skill, and after returning home, they could find a job and live a good life.
Having paid a large sum of money to the Soviet Union, West Germany had to curry favor with the United States. In the reunification plan of East Germany, Germany, which had experienced the bitter lessons of the two world wars, would remain militarily neutral after reunification. However, in order to obtain the consent of the United States, it was forced to change to a unified Germany to stay in the NATO camp and become a member of the NATO bloc.
This is a good thing for the United States, after the unified Germany becomes stronger, it is still my little brother, and my NATO front has also expanded eastward, so why not do it?The U.S. side has done it well. But there is also a major historical legacy on the Soviet side, the Soviet Union occupied the German land of Longxing: Königsberg, that is, Kaliningrad. What if after the reunification of the two Germanys, the Soviet Union will claim Kaliningrad?The Soviet Union can't let the tiger go back to the mountains.
In the end, Germany gritted its teeth and announced a decision that went down in history: after the reunification of the two Germanys, Germany never lost an inch of ground again. This decision was written into the German Constitution. It meant that Germany gave up Königsberg, and also gave up the 100,000 square kilometers of land allocated to Poland by the Soviet Union, which accounted for 1 3 of Germany's territory during World War II, and lost forever. The territories of Silesia, East Prussia and other territories were all assigned to the Soviet Union and Poland. The two Germany also promised that they would not deploy NATO troops on the territory of the former East Germany, weaken the size of their own armies, and never possess nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.
After making these promises, the Soviet Union finally acquiesced. When the United States and the Soviet Union agreed, France could not object. However, France made a demand, abandoning the Deutsche Mark and using the euro in a unified manner, and an EU with France and Germany as the dual core was established. Eventually, the Berlin Wall was torn down and Germany was reunited.
However, the DPRK and the ROK are not only politically antagonistic, but also economically isolated from each other. In the 3,000-year history of the Korean Peninsula, 1,800 years were divided between the north and the south. In this land, it is the norm for North and South Korea to live separately. North and South Korea also do not have as many historical assets as Germany that can be exchanged. If you want to talk about blood ties, the armistice between the two Koreas has been 70 years old, and the older generation, the relatives of the two Koreas who are related by blood, have basically passed away. The new generation of young people in North and South Korea has long lost their blood ties and no additional family ties. Even if the Soviet Union collapsed, it would not affect the partition of the two Koreas. The two Germanys are a short-term forced choice, and the partition of the DPRK and South Korea is the historical norm. Seventy years ago, the war for the reunification of the two Koreas was fought. That war has proved that the twisted melon is not sweet, but it is better to separate and separate each one, which is more conducive to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.