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Epitaph For Brezhnev
In Berlin's DDR Museum, there are details published regarding a 1980 plan formulated by the East German politburo and presented to Erich Honecker whereby West Berlin would be taken by East German armed forces and the city would be reunited in the process. However, when details of this initiative were relayed to Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader was not so enthusiastic, citing his country's problems in Afghanistan and the forthcoming Moscow Olympic Games as obstacles prohibative to any attempt to secure
West Berlin for the Warsaw Pact. This rejection effectively blew the proposed operation out of the water, so to speak.
'Epitaph For Brezhnev' moves forward two years to when Brezhnev is terminally ill and the in-fighting has started in the battle to establish who Brezhnev's successor will be. Having managed to discredit his rivals as being incompetent or either to old or two young,former KGB chief Yuri Andropov decides to resurrect the East German plan and uses the initiative as his principal pitch for the Soviet leadership, promising to deliver West Berlin for the Warsaw Pact in the process.
News of the plan reaches the United States by way of news of a build up of Warsaw Pact armed forces around the city of Berlin. The bearer of these tidings - a Polish diplomat in Washington - also speaks of the US 'Strategic Defence Initiative - 'Star Wars' - being common knowledge in Eastern Europe... some three months before being made public in the United States!
Of course, Andropov's gamble is successful and West Berlin is duly taken and annexed as part of the German Democratic Republic. This presents problems for the United States of America, the United Kingdom and France both politically and geographically; politically because the US were only recently out of Viet Nam, while the UK were embroiled in Northern Ireland and the Falkland Islands, and geographically because West Berlin, being actually located within the DDR, was closer to Poland than West Germany.
'Epitaph For Brezhnev' tells the story about the West's efforts to reclaim their lost territory.
West Berlin for the Warsaw Pact. This rejection effectively blew the proposed operation out of the water, so to speak.
'Epitaph For Brezhnev' moves forward two years to when Brezhnev is terminally ill and the in-fighting has started in the battle to establish who Brezhnev's successor will be. Having managed to discredit his rivals as being incompetent or either to old or two young,former KGB chief Yuri Andropov decides to resurrect the East German plan and uses the initiative as his principal pitch for the Soviet leadership, promising to deliver West Berlin for the Warsaw Pact in the process.
News of the plan reaches the United States by way of news of a build up of Warsaw Pact armed forces around the city of Berlin. The bearer of these tidings - a Polish diplomat in Washington - also speaks of the US 'Strategic Defence Initiative - 'Star Wars' - being common knowledge in Eastern Europe... some three months before being made public in the United States!
Of course, Andropov's gamble is successful and West Berlin is duly taken and annexed as part of the German Democratic Republic. This presents problems for the United States of America, the United Kingdom and France both politically and geographically; politically because the US were only recently out of Viet Nam, while the UK were embroiled in Northern Ireland and the Falkland Islands, and geographically because West Berlin, being actually located within the DDR, was closer to Poland than West Germany.
'Epitaph For Brezhnev' tells the story about the West's efforts to reclaim their lost territory.
Kindle Edition
First published April 17, 2013
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