If Germany wanted to break away from NATO and join the Soviets in an alliance, do you think they were free to do so?
Hard to answer, truly. They didn't want to. For very good reasons, which they saw every day. Had they wanted to, the history beforehand would have been very different. Would the US have wanted to risk nukes on their soil, then...?
But I don't remember us going to war over Czechoslovakia, either. Or, later, Hungary, Poland, Czechoslovakia again... so if West Germany had truly tried to join the East, would they have been allowed?
I don't think the US were pleased when WG joined the ECSG (or whatever - European Coal and Steel Group, fore-runner to the EEC, dominated by France and not at all pro-American). But I think they were, wisely, content enough to see Germany capitalist and tied to the West - even if they cut a lot of strings. There simply wasn't the question of their leaving the West - nor, despite popular feeling, did they remove Western troops from their soil... |
