Research On Germany Foreign Policy After Reunification

As an important country in the world, Germany’s foreign policy is undergoing some changes after reunification. As is known to all, Germany had launched the twice world wars, brought great disasters to the people and world. After World War Ⅱ, in order to prevent Germany from recommitting the same error once again, Victors occupied the German into some districts. After the outbreak of the Cold War, America, Britain and France, allowing their occupied Germans became a sovereign state in order to fight against the Soviet Union. Subsequently, the East German occupied by Soviet has gained the status of a sovereign state. After the end of the Cold War, East German and West German realized reunification. After the reunification, Germany became the most powerful economic country with advantageous geographical position in Europe and the bipolar confrontation situation no longer exists with the end of the cold war led to a qualitative change of international structure, therefore, German repositioned and adjusted its foreign policy in this background.After the World War Ⅱ, Germany deep introspected his guilty of heinous crimes, and focuses on the economic strength, realizing the trading nation, and especially devoted himself to European integration. During this period, Germany’s fundamental goal is get rid of its sovereignty limit, realize equality and unity, and not much "action" in its foreign policy; it’s an "abnormal" foreign policy. However, with the German unification, its foreign policy also makes adjustments, more and more prominent attention to its national interests. Germany’s first breakthrough policy barriers, and gradually began to use force to participate in military operations, realizing the "normal" diplomacy. At the same time, the maintenance and defend of its interests become more and more obvious, especially European interests as Germany’s most important interest remains in Europe after the end of the cold war. For that, this paper summarizes the concept of national interests which are including the survival and the development of a country, that are national security, the state system and the development of the country, this paper expounds the relationship between the national interests and diplomacy, and the theoretical basis of this analysis for this paper, and this paper analysis Germany’s foreign policy after the reunification is inseparable from the concept of national interests. Secondly, this paper summarizes the change of domestic and international environment which are faced by Germany after the reunification. The drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the disintegration of the bipolar pattern led the international pattern towards multipolarization. The reunification of two Germanys, German rise in Central Europe again, the superior geographical position, the national strength increases, which all these things provide the conditions for the adjustments of German foreign policy. Thirdly, this paper selected some typical cases. In German foreign policy to achieve the "normalization", in the Yugoslav crisis, for restoration of the region’s traditional influence, German admitted the independence of Slovenia and Croatia at the first, which is a Germany bold attempt autonomous, normalizatious diplomatic policy just shortly after reunification. Followed by a series of problems in the Middle East, Germany began to try to use force and to participate in military operations, and follow US to combat terrorism until 9-11 event, marking the true realization of the foreign policy of "normal". Meanwhile, the enlargement of the EU and the European debt crisis is reflected the maintenance and protection of German interests. German is the most active in the enlargement of EU because the eastward expansion of EU is mean to German geopolitical security line enlargement toward to east, which gave the security Germany didn’t have during the Cold War. At the same time, the EU’s eastward expansion will bring a lot of economic benefits for Germany; the latter although Germany initial hesitation attitude towards the Greek sovereign debt, but with the further deterioration of the crisis, Germany has to help, this is because Germany and the European Union have close interests.By studying the Germany foreign policy after the reunification, we can find that German efforts to achieve the "normalized" foreign policy and maintain and defend its national interests are increasingly obvious and high-profile, like a "normal country" as the pursuit of their own national interests, to pursue promising foreign policy. That the Germany diplomacy adjusts according to the national interests is an important feature of the present Germany diplomacy. At the same time, it provides the favorable factors to continue to analyze. With the Germany rise, diplomacy practices oriented international interests strongly confirm the theory of national interests.