Republicans Convene in Berlin
>> Text of speech by Guenter Nooke MdB: Page 2

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One part of Germany was punished for the lost war and the genocide of the Jews. The people in this part of the country remained deprived of freedom and oppressed, because it was under the rule of the Soviet Union, whilst those in the other part quickly gained freedom and prosperity, in particular due to American assistance with building a democracy, and the Marshall Plan. In the West, even in West Berlin, many had come to terms with the situation. For us in the East it was not so easy!

It was exactly 15 years ago today that the SED dictatorship in the GDR began to collapse. On 7 May 1989, the opposition groups were able to prove, fairly conclusively, that the local elections in the GDR had been rigged. This opposition consisted of several hundred people in small political circles in various towns in the GDR, who were only able to meet in private apartments or churches. 

In the summer of 1989, a rising tide of people began to leave the GDR via the Hungarian-Austrian border. As early as May 1989, it had been decided in Hungary that this border would be opened. Tens of thousands of people fled the GDR, including many who had only decided to do so during their holidays in Hungary. Thus, initially, people voted with their feet on the totalitarian regime. 

Next, particularly after the so-called "prayers for peace" in the Nikolai church in Leipzig, people demanded political changes in the GDR. Before the summer, the people had been shouting "we want to get out". By the time the summer was over, with the flood of people who had left the country and the occupations of the embassies in Prague and Budapest, the people were threatening "We're staying here" and chanting "We are the people".

Opposition groups appealed to the public: the "New Forum" on 10 September 1989, the "Democracy Now" initiative on September 13, and on 1 October I was myself present in Berlin when "Democratic Awakening" was founded. And on 7 October, the Social Democratic Party of East Germany was established near Oranienburg in Schwante. 

The peaceful demonstration which took place on Monday 9 October 1989 in Leipzig is the most important date in talking about the collapse of the GDR. 

That Monday, on 9 October 1989 in Leipzig, no one knew whether or how the forces of the state would intervene. Political associations were forbidden in East Germany, and it wasn't possible to simply give notification of demonstrations. In Dresden, on 4 and 5 October, demonstrators had grappled with police when trains carrying refugees from the West German embassy in Prague passed through on their way to the Federal Republic. East Germany had closed its border with Czechoslovakia on 2 October 1989. On the weekend of 7 and 8 October, police had attacked demonstrators in Berlin and in Plauen in the Vogtland. During the first eight days of October, over 3,000 people were arrested throughout the country.

In other words, the situation was extremely tense. Respected public figures in Leipzig, such as Kurt Masur, director of the Gewandhaus orchestra, well known also in the United States, appealed to everyone to remain calm. All armed units were placed in a state of alarm, and hospitals prepared for emergency admissions by stockpiling larger supplies of blood than usual. But, as you know, the situation remained peaceful. Not a single person was injured on that day or any of the following days - neither demonstrators nor police officers. It was a revolution of candles, a Protestant revolution, a peaceful revolution that has earned a prominent place in German history books. 

At that time I jotted down the following words after listening to the evening news: "50,000 to 70,000 people have demonstrated in Leipzig for democracy and reforms. The situation has remained peaceful not, I believe one can say, although there were so many of them but precisely because were so many of them." In other words, we should be grateful to all those who had the courage to go out and join the Peaceful Revolution.

My gratitude to the party and those running the state at that time is, by contrast, much more modest. Even after the demonstration they continued their operational planning and their preparations for using force. For my part, like many others who opposed the regime, I knew on that day, 9 October 1989, they had missed their chance to intervene. On that day, I felt that the fear had vanished. On the following Monday, 100,000 people were out on the streets of Leipzig, then over 200,000, and finally the Monday demonstrations engulfed the entire country. In the largest Monday demonstration of all in Leipzig, on 6 November, 400,000 people stood in the pouring rain to demand the end of the SED's monopoly of power, the legalization of the "New Forum", and free elections.

What happened then was less spectacular and, as we perceived it back then, also less dangerous.

On 4 November 1989, the single largest demonstration of this revolutionary autumn of 1989 took place in Berlin, attended by nearly a million people. 

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