Ministers reunite
Twenty years later, dignitaries reminisce over Berlin Wall
Seth Brown
Issue date: 11/6/09 Section: News
While students prepared for Night Of Decadence weekend, a group of suited men reunited around the piece of the Berlin Wall in front of the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy Friday afternoon, nearly 20 years after the fall of the wall on Nov. 9, 1989.
The former foreign ministers of France, the Soviet Union, and East and West Germany, as well as the former private secretary to the British prime minister, joined former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III in a panel Friday evening at the Baker Institute. The panel spoke to a mixed audience of more than 200 Rice faculty, students and alumni on the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent quest for German reunification.
History Professor Douglas Brinkley moderated, asking each speaker about their roles in the events as well as the historical significance of each.
Baker said though many believed the fall of the wall to be inevitable, the reunification process and results were far from clear.
"There were a number of questions which had to be answered, such as how the merger [between East and West Germany] would take place, and the relationship of the united Germany with NATO and the European community," Baker said.
Roland Dumas, French foreign minister during the end of the Cold War, noted that the reunification spanned two years following the wall's fall.
"Germany lost the war, but there was no peace treaty," he said. "The negotiations for the Two Plus Four Agreement [to unify East and West Germany] needed six sessions to create a peace treaty that we didn't have."
The speakers widely credited the East German people for their role in bringing down the wall, thereby accelerating the process of reunification.
Markus Meckel, the minister of foreign affairs for the German Democratic Republic for four months during 1990, said the turning point for him was Oct. 9, 1989, when 70,000 East Germans were allowed to demonstrate peacefully in Leipzig.
The former foreign ministers of France, the Soviet Union, and East and West Germany, as well as the former private secretary to the British prime minister, joined former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III in a panel Friday evening at the Baker Institute. The panel spoke to a mixed audience of more than 200 Rice faculty, students and alumni on the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent quest for German reunification.
History Professor Douglas Brinkley moderated, asking each speaker about their roles in the events as well as the historical significance of each.
Baker said though many believed the fall of the wall to be inevitable, the reunification process and results were far from clear.
"There were a number of questions which had to be answered, such as how the merger [between East and West Germany] would take place, and the relationship of the united Germany with NATO and the European community," Baker said.
Roland Dumas, French foreign minister during the end of the Cold War, noted that the reunification spanned two years following the wall's fall.
"Germany lost the war, but there was no peace treaty," he said. "The negotiations for the Two Plus Four Agreement [to unify East and West Germany] needed six sessions to create a peace treaty that we didn't have."
The speakers widely credited the East German people for their role in bringing down the wall, thereby accelerating the process of reunification.
Markus Meckel, the minister of foreign affairs for the German Democratic Republic for four months during 1990, said the turning point for him was Oct. 9, 1989, when 70,000 East Germans were allowed to demonstrate peacefully in Leipzig.
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