In from the Cold

For more than two decades East Germany was the pariah among nations, its huge foreign ministry building in East Berlin underused because only a dozen countries, all Communist, maintained full diplomatic relations with it. The West not only denied its existence as a nation but refused to call it the German Democratic Republic--its official name --insisting that it was nothing more than an extension of the Soviet Zone of Occupation. Then five years ago, Chancellor Willy Brandt relaxed Bonn's opposition to the East Berlin regime, and the G.D.R. began its long journey in from the cold. Nation after nation accorded it formal recognition, until last week the most important holdout fell into line. In a three-minute ceremony in Washington, the U.S. became the 110th country to establish diplomatic relations with the G.D.R.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Arthur Hartman and East German Diplomat Herbert Suss signed a four-page document formalizing relations. Rolf Sieber, 44, an economics professor with no previous diplomatic experience, was named East Germany's first Ambassador to the U.S., and John Sherman Cooper, 73, former Republican Senator from Kentucky and Ambassador to India and Nepal (1955-56), was chosen as the U.S.

envoy to the G.D.R.

No Responsibility. Both nations actually were prepared to hold the ceremony at the end of July. The U.S.

balked, however, when the East Germans began interfering with West German traffic on the roadways leading to West Berlin. The harassment by the Communists was in protest against Bonn's opening a branch of the West German Federal Environmental Protection Agency in West Berlin. Only after Secretary of State Henry Kissinger made it clear to the Soviets that he held them responsible for the East German action in violation of prior East-West agreements and the spirit of detente did the flow of traffic return to normal.

During the talks, the U.S. demanded that the East Germans agree to compensate the victims of Nazism. East Berlin insisted that as a "new state" it shared no responsibility for Nazi atrocities, but the U.S. refused to budge. The G.D.R. finally pledged to process the claims of Jews and others who had their property taken by the Nazis. While it is too early to estimate what the claims might cost the G.D.R., West Germany has already voluntarily paid out about $15 billion to claimants.

The East Berlin regime probably made a concession in order to participate in the rising tide of trade between Eastern Europe and the U.S. It may have also been seeking a respectability that it feels it will gain by winning America's recognition. But East Germany may discover that respectability could be slow in coming as long as it remains one of Europe's most repressive police states, still finding it necessary to limit the freedom of its 17 million citizens by walls, barbed wire and the presence of 20 Soviet divisions.

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