Two Views of Intelligence

This article originally appeared in Cicero Magazine on 19 June 2014.

The purpose of intelligence is to speak truth to power. Intelligence agencies exist to provide decision-makers with absolute, unbiased facts or, failing to obtain absolute facts, to provide as clear, unbiased and true a picture of a situation as possible using what facts are available to enable decision-makers to reach informed conclusions as to what course of action to take. Rarely is it the case that Intelligence can present a picture of a situation that is purely fact-based. There are common intelligence requirements, such as determining the intent of another party, which can never be known for certain because their very nature prevents certain, permanent determination. ‘Gaps’ in fact while attempting to form as clear, accurate and true a picture of a situation as possible can only be filled with conjecture or informed ‘guesswork’ based upon past actions, history, logic and/or statistical probability. Informed ‘guesswork’ is what intelligence analysts do.

One of the central arguments in the field of intelligence analysis regards which angle estimative or predictive strategic intelligence analysis should be approached. Two schools of thought have emerged: Straussians, based around University of Chicago political scientist Leo Strauss, and Kentians, around Sherman Kent, founding father of CIA’s estimative process.

Values or Truths?

The Straussian view of analysis is founded on the idea that the ‘regime’—specifically the form of government and society a state adopts—provides a window through which the political thought, intentions and actions of a state can be observed and predicted. It assumes there is a continual human search for which form of regime is ‘best’ and a qualitative analysis of the differences between these different forms is the route to determining which regime is ideal. For example, Strauss believed during the Cold War that the essential qualitative differences between American democracy and Soviet communism was the most important issue of the day.

At first read, there appears to be nothing controversial about that idea. However, the Straussian view requires that the judgment of the quality of a regime be based upon how well it provides public goods such as liberty, freedom, justice and so forth. This invites what can be called a ‘values’-based judgment into the process using determinants which are subjective in nature. This conflicts with the objective focus of mainstream notions of the social scientific approach which focusses on facts over values judgments and pictures measureable differences between regimes as a matter of different degrees of focus in pursuit of universal human pursuits.

The Kentian view of analysis is based firmly in the belief that intelligence analysis should be approached as an intellectual subject in the liberal social science tradition. Analysts were certainly not to make values judgments, but rather search for the underlying universal ‘truths’ common to man. Kent, a Yale historian, shied away from establishing or applying theoretical analysis based in international relations to intelligence, preferring instead more practical empirical frameworks and methods. He held that the intellectual and emotional detachment of his analysts allowed them to produce better estimates than military analysts or policymakers and their staffs because they focused on academic ‘truth’ as their goal without an attached or vested interest in their particular ‘regime’. Kent’s belief in the value of this objective analytical system was such that he held it to be more valuable than clandestine intelligence collection. No number of microphones or satellite photos could substitute for the value of being able to objectively divine the meaning of long-term trends in order to accurately estimate future actions.

While Kentian objective analysis can lead analysts down blind alleys due to strategic deception, Straussian analysis can lead one to look at regimes such as the Soviet Union or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in light of worst-case scenarios because of their (supposed) diametrical opposition to the U.S. regime.

Kent created a system for intelligence analysis with the goal of creating ‘institutional memory’ so knowledge would become cumulative and not be lost between generations. While building CIA’s analysis structures Kent was very much committed to the professionalization of intelligence analysis. Besides its academic commitment to neutrality, the Kentian view was also shaped by organisational factors. The positioning of CIA’s early estimative body between the military and political leaders required it to maintain a reputation for objectivity so as not to become a target for either. Kent held up the CIA’s performance in more accurately estimating Soviet capabilities during the Bomber and Missile Gaps of the late 1950s compared with military intelligence estimates as an example of its detached view of analysis discouraging it from inflating estimates to support its own organisational goals. The Air Force was accused of inflating Soviet bomber and ICBM estimates in order to justify an ever greater share of the defence budget going to its SAC and U.S. ICBM programmes.

Leo Strauss never worked, studied or wrote about intelligence analysis. He was a political scientist. However, as Gary Schmitt and Abram Schulsky argue, Strauss’ work on political analysis can be related to intelligence analysis. Strauss argued that political and social sciences could never be true or ‘hard’ sciences because of ‘deception’. Atoms and particles do not attempt to hide, conceal or deceive their observers. Human beings can and do. Strategic deception should always be a consideration in intelligence analysis, especially when dealing with a foe aware of interest in their activity and have counterintelligence capability.

Hall of Mirrors

When applying a detached, academic analysis to a problem, how can one account for strategic deception by the enemy? The annals of intelligence are filled with tales of strategic deception. Prior to the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Japanese diplomats continued to conduct negotiations, not allowing U.S. analysts to narrow the field of Japanese intentions. Operation Mincemeat saw the body of an RAF officer carrying fake plans released into Spanish waters by submarine and successfully duped German intelligence into believing the allies would invade Greece rather than Sicily. Operation Bodyguard supported the pre-conceived German view that D-Day would come at Calais, not Normandy.

Some deception debates still continue today. Col. Oleg Penkovsky, a GRU military intelligence officer, was the highest ranking source the West had in Moscow during the Cold War. The intelligence he provided on Soviet nuclear capabilities is claimed to have directly influenced President Kennedy’s actions during the Cuban Missile Crisis. However, he was compromised, arrested, put on show trial and apparently executed. Questions remain. Penkovsky’s job did not give him access to the material he provided, so how did he get it? At what point was he compromised and how? Was he executed as a spy or was it a Soviet deception operation from the beginning?

Strangely, after his execution the CIA went to unprecedented lengths to get Penkovsky’s story out, granting full access to the authors of the generously-named The Spy Who Saved the World. Was it to exploit the psychological effect of such a high-ranking source against the USSR? Or was it to cover up the fact they had been comprehensively duped themselves? All this to say that strategic deception is a vital consideration in intelligence analysis and part of James Jesus Angleton’s ‘hall of mirrors’. Is this what they are doing? Or is it what they want me to think they are doing?

While Kentian objective analysis can lead analysts down blind alleys due to strategic deception, Straussian analysis has led in some equally undesirable directions. The values-based judgment Straussian analysis invites can lead one to look at regimes such as the Soviet Union or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in light of worst-case scenarios because of their (supposed) almost diametrical opposition to the U.S. regime. Those who place primacy on a qualitative analysis of regimes and their ideology and view another regime as possessing an opposing ideology come to view that foe as a major threat where an objective analysis of the same regime considering its past actions, current posture and capability might see the same foe as posing only a minor threat.

From Cuba to Iraq

In 1976, President Ford approved an exercise in competitive analysis, pitting a junior team of CIA analysts applying standard Kentian methods against an external team applying Straussian methods to an analysis of Soviet nuclear capabilities. The episode has come to be known as ‘Team B’. Team B accused CIA of ‘mirror imaging’—assuming the foe holds the same universal principles and goals as the analyst does. Its analysis focused on Soviet intentions, ideas, aspirations and motivations rather than capabilities. It drew conclusions as to intentions based upon an assumption that the Soviet regime not only wanted to defeat the U.S. militarily, but destroy its regime politically, socially and economically. Team B began its analysis from that anchor point and used data to reinforce the assumption as opposed to drawing conclusions from data.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Team B’s analysis of Soviet capabilities was conclusively proven to be flawed. As an example of how far off path such methods can lead, Team B cited the lack of proof that the Soviet Union had developed an advanced submarine detection system as proof that it did in fact have it. They found it hard to believe the Soviets had not yet done so, so assumed that they had. The continued application of this kind of thinking is exhibited by Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s 2002 statement on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction that ‘the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.’

However, Kentian analysis has also failed at times, most famously in failing in successive National Intelligence Estimates, utilising the entirety of America’s intelligence machinery, to predict the placement of Soviet nuclear missiles on Cuba, leading to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. In 1964, Sherman Kent authored his own well-written post-mortem of how it came to pass, since becoming a classic of intelligence literature. He writes that one of the hazards of the profession of intelligence analysis is filling in gaps in fact with informed guesswork. These gaps are filled with conjecture based upon past actions. That Khrushchev would place missiles on Cuba exhibited a different posture from any of his past actions. Khrushchev ‘zigged’ when they expected him to ‘zag’. Kent goes so far as to say CIA got the estimates wrong because Khrushchev had made such a poor decision that it caught them by surprise.

Returning to the Straussian argument about the Kentian susceptibility to strategic deception, Khrushchev clearly intended to surprise the United States with nuclear missile placements on Cuba and to use them as a bargaining chip against President Kennedy. By suddenly changing posture in a way out of character for Soviet leadership, the Soviet Union was able to fool CIA analysts. Applying Straussian thinking to the situation may have led analysts to assume the USSR would attempt to place missiles on Cuba at some point because of its strategic intent to destroy the United States and look for data to support the assumption. U.S. imagery intelligence did discover missile placements on Cuba, but only because DCI John McCone had suspicions about Khrushchev’s intentions and told them to keep watch over Cuba despite Sherman Kent’s estimates. If estimators began with the assumption Khrushchev would try, they may have been discovered earlier.

This argument about which method of analysis is best suited to producing strategic intelligence estimates has gone on since the beginning of the U.S. Intelligence Community. As episodes from WWII through the Cold War to the Iraq War show, there is no sign of it being decided any time soon. The purpose of intelligence is to speak the truth to power, but the job of analysts is to determine what the ‘truth’ will be before it happens. Whether thinking like Sherman Kent or Leo Strauss, attempting to peer into the future while surrounded by the hall of mirrors is a task anyone is bound to fail at from time to time.

The U.S.-Chinese War Over Africa

This article originally appeared in Cicero Magazine on 9 June 2014.

American and Chinese efforts in Africa can be characterized by two contrasting outlooks. The United States focuses on security, the Chinese on economic investment. Contrary to Howard French’s claims in his new book, China’s Second Continent, that Chinese settlers constitute “the beginnings of a new empire,” Beijing’s relationship with the continent is more nuanced than that – China is a burgeoning world power in desperate need of resources and profits. Unlike its European predecessors, Beijing has no interest in re-imagining colonies in its own image. Yet, its attention toward the continent may foretell a larger strategic competition between the United States and China. Whereas the Chinese look at Africa and sees dollar signs, Americans look at the continent and see dangers – Islamic terrorists, pirates, and corrupt dictators chief among them. This may not be the first time China has made advances in Africa. But this time around, its economic might and no-strings-attached sales pitch may prove a winning combination.

Pivot to Africa

The U.S. recognized the need to boost its presence in Africa because of its geographic and strategic importance. The establishment of U.S. Africa Command and its 2008 designation as a separate combatant command exhibit America’s renewed commitment to security on the continent. America has expanded airstrips to accommodate increasing personnel and logistical traffic and ramped up its training and liaison support of African militaries and intelligence agencies and institutions such as the African Union. U.S. Special Forces, intelligence officers and security contractors have been increasingly employed to target militants. Secretary of State John Kerry, on a recent trip to the region, linked U.S. assistance with a country’s democratic achievements.

Washington now has a military and intelligence presence in over a dozen countries there. For example, it employs private contractors to fly light civilian aircraft out of Burkina Faso over western Africa to track militants. Djibouti is its largest permanent base, home to 4,000 U.S. personnel and a hub for UAVs and manned reconnaissance aircraft. Washington also flies manned reconnaissance aircraft from Uganda, assisting in the hunt for Joseph Kony’s LRA. It has also established drone bases in Niger and Ethiopia, expanded facilities in Kenya for training African troops, and deployed forces to Mali to assist British and French efforts following the 2012 coup. The U.S. has also sent troops to Somalia, South Sudan, Chad, Congo and the Central African Republic in recent years. Most recently, it deployed a contingent to Nigeria to assist in the search for Boko Haram militants.

In contrast, China has focused on economic partnership and development. China’s rapid growth and demand for natural resources requires it to look outside its borders for stable and affordable resources. In this regard, Africa provides China with a bonanza: Over 85% of China’s imports from Africa consist of raw natural resources. Trade between Africa and China has swelled by 30% per annum over the last ten years, while trade volume has been more than double that with the United States. China has also invested in roads, railways and ports to help transport these resources, benefiting Africans as well. For example, China recently pledged to build a $3.8 billion railway in Kenya. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visited the same African countries John Kerry had just a few weeks before.

Whereas the Chinese looks at Africa and sees dollar signs, the United States looks at the continent and sees dangers – Islamic terrorists, pirates, and corrupt dictators chief among them.
Unlike the United States and other Western trade partners, China does not condition its relationships in Africa with political or ideological commitments. This advantage is appreciated by African strongmen subject to harangues from the West on democracy, human rights, and rule of law. Still, some fear China’s goals are purely mercenary and an attempt to “lock up” all of Africa’s resources and that China will abandon the continent once it has gotten what it wants.

Reading Mao in Kinshasa

This is not for the first time Africa has become a chessboard of global competition between great powers, especially China. Though Washington and Moscow competed in Africa, the more interesting story is the competition between Beijing and Moscow for “hearts and minds” in Africa. As the Sino-Soviet Split deepened in the early 1960s, China began to challenge the Soviet Union for leadership of the socialist bloc. It saw an opportunity to build independent influence in states recently liberated from or still fighting for independence from European colonialism. Its influence was strongest in nearby North Korea and the former French colonies Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. However, as Jeremy Friedman writes, China presented a real challenge to the Soviets in Africa as well.

It attempted to create an Afro-Asian bloc and played up its own armed guerrilla insurgency and quest for independence and development as shared traits with Africans struggling for the same. It supported Algerian independence when Moscow did not and pictured Khrushchev’s ‘peaceful co-existence’ with the West and disarmament talks as evidence of lack of support for armed socialist revolutionaries in Africa and elsewhere. Chinese propaganda depicted the 1963 Cuban Missile Crisis as Moscow backing down from the U.S. China greatly increased its African propaganda efforts by increasing local-language radio broadcasts and the distribution of books and pamphlets throughout the continent, far outpacing Soviet and even Western efforts. China seemed for a time to be winning the ideological battle with Moscow for leadership of socialism in the Third World.

But by 1963, it became apparent that though China was winning ideological and propaganda battles in Africa and elsewhere, it could not compete with the Soviet Union—or the West—in terms of material and financial support to socialist movements in Africa and elsewhere in the developing world. Cold War China lacked the capacity to provide large amounts of troops, weaponry or money to allies in far off places such as Africa. It could not buy nor project power. The Soviet Union and the West could. China lost its first round in the competition for Africa.

China is in a quite different position today. It is an economic powerhouse with the clear ability to contribute large amounts of wealth to the economies of African countries with the natural resources they seek. Today it is able to build the roads, railways and ports it could not afford during the Cold War and which the Soviets and the West could. While its first efforts in Africa were driven and focused purely on communist ideology and the shared revolutionary struggle, its African efforts today are marked by a clear lack of any connection to ideology. It buys resources and builds necessary infrastructure seemingly with no strings attached. Additionally, its relationship with the U.S. itself is one characterized by mutual dependence, rather than clear opposition as the competition during the Cold War was. African countries do not have to choose definitively between East and West.

While Chinese policy is to remain militarily disentangled from events that do not directly affect its interests, it has shown a greater willingness to contribute to African security. Beijing, for example, was instrumental in the passage of Security Council 1769 in 2007, authorizing a joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur. It has provided over 1500 troops to UN peacekeeping efforts in Africa, more than any other member of the UN Security Council. Its navy is part of the joint multinational effort to combat piracy off the African coast. Even Chinese aid and arms transfers to Africa have been misrepresented, as they give more military arm and aid to democratic regimes than the United States, according to a 2012 study.

In the mainstream narrative of the Cold War, the focus was placed on the conflict between the United States versus a monolithic Soviet Union, which supported socialist movements from Cape Horn to the Cape of Good Hope. But this was never the case. Moscow was not the puppet-master it was believed to be. China and the Soviet Union fell out badly beginning in the late 1950s, and the relationship remained rather sour until the 1980s. This has perpetuated a view that China has always been isolationist and lacking in ambitions overseas, as well as concerns over the “rise” of China being over-inflated. China, in fact, attempted to project power outside of its own borders before—in Africa specifically. Previously it tried and failed because it lacked the resources to become a global power. But that has all changed.

Beijing is once again putting up stiff competition for Africa, this time for Washington instead of Moscow. Its “no strings attached” partnerships are attractive to many African governments. America’s financial and military aid, by contrast, often comes with strings attached, such as criteria for good governance and human rights. China’s efforts focus on obtaining the natural resources it requires and pays African states well in return in terms of both sales and infrastructure development to obtain them with no added conditions. With $2 trillion in trade, China may well win its second round in the scramble for Africa.

‘Nobody intends to put up a wall’: Walter Ulbricht, Khrushchev and Building the Berlin Wall, 1961

March 2014

Drawing predominantly on the work of Harrison, Maddrell, Slusser and Zubok, this essay will argue that the Berlin Wall was not conceived of nor built by Nikita Khrushchev alone, that building the Berlin Wall served the immediate needs of East Germany’s Walter Ulbricht more than Khrushchev’s international goals, and that Khrushchev was heavily influenced by Ulbricht’s campaign to pressure him into finally allowing the DDR to erect the Berlin Wall on 13 August 1961.

Khrushchev’s International Goals v Ulbricht’s Immediate Needs: Maximum & Minimum Objectives
Much of the early Western-based literature on the Berlin Wall Crisis of 1961, and indeed throughout the Cold War, pictured Nikita Khrushchev as a puppet-master, pulling the strings of satellite states. It portrays Khrushchev as the sole architect and decision-maker on Soviet and socialist bloc policy in Berlin. However, this is a misrepresentation (Slusser,1973:ix). Archives and recollections of Cold War actors show Khrushchev did not decide alone to build the Berlin Wall. Khrushchev’s decisions were especially influenced by East German head-of-state Walter Ulbricht, First Secretary of the German Social Unity Party (SED) of the German Democratic Republic (DDR). Harrison (2000:53-74) discusses at length the lack of study of ‘super allies’ in the Cold War that led to the focus solely on ‘super-powers’. As Leffler (1996:120-135) argues, the picture developed from Cold War archives is more complex.

Slusser (1973:2) holds many Western scholars have reduced Ulbricht’s role because it was official Western policy that the DDR did not exist, that Ulbricht and the DDR had no recognised rights in Berlin, and there were no official ties between the DDR and Western governments in 1961 (Slusser, 1973:2). Bonwetsch and Filitow (2000:155-56) point out responsibility for die Mauer and Ulbricht’s role was and continues to be deflected onto Khrushchev by many former-DDR officials attempting to avoid public and criminal liability since the Wall fell in 1989. Khrushchev and the USSR are no longer there to defend themselves.

Harrison (1993:7-8) lists comprehensively motives ascribed in the literature to Khrushchev in the 1961 crisis: ‘to prevent West Germany from having access to nuclear weapons, to get Western recognition of the East German regime and thus stabilize that regime, to show Khrushchev's domestic opponents how strong and successful he was, to show Khrushchev's Chinese critics that he was not "soft on the imperialists," to divide the Western alliance, to force the West to accept the Soviet Union as its political and military equal, to test the rules of the new nuclear game to see if nuclear weapons could be used for coercive purposes, and to force the West to a summit conference to discuss German and disarmament issues.’ Khrushchev’s concerns in 1961 Berlin had more to do with global issues and the position of the USSR and socialism than with the future of Berlin itself.

Walter Ulbricht had much more immediate concerns. For the DDR, West Berlin in 1961 presented three threats to its very existence (Harrison, 2002:99). First, Berlin, with free movement throughout all sectors of the city guaranteed by the post-WWII four-partite agreement, was a ‘loophole’ that could not be closed by the DDR. The borders throughout the rest of East Germany had been secured since 1952 (ibid.; Schaefer, 2011:509) However its citizens could still freely cross into West Berlin and fly out of Tempelhof Airport, leaving the DDR permanently behind. Western powers did not recognise the DDR had any control in Berlin which would allow them to close the border. 1,000 people per day were fleeing the DDR into West Berlin (Schake, 2001:29). In June 1961, The Economist reported that since 1949 2.5 million citizens had fled the DDR (Slusser, 1973: 67). The annual number rose from 120,230 in 1959 to 182,278 in 1960 (Harrison, 2002:108) and continued to rise in 1961 (ibid.; CIA, 1961:2). Pictures and press testimonials of Germans leaving the DDR was bad publicity for the DDR, USSR and socialism as a whole. Additionally, many of those leaving were skilled professionals. According to CIA:

‘The high proportion of professionals, engineers, and intellectuals has been of particular concern to the (DDR) regime. From 1954 through 1960, the refugees included 4,334 doctors and dentists, 15,330 engineers and technicians, 738 professors, 15,885 other teachers, and more than 11,700 other college graduates. In addition, industrial managers have been leaving East Germany in significant numbers, many of them Socialist Unity Party (SED) members of long standing’
(CIA, 1961:2).

The flood of migrants not only reflected bad light on socialism, but also represented a ‘brain drain’ of skilled workers from East to West Germany.

A second threat was the economic impact of Grenzgaengern (Harrison, 2002:99): the estimated 50,000 East Germans who worked in West Berlin, were paid in West Marks and who returned home daily to East Berlin to enjoy the advantageous exchange rate against the East Mark. The term also included West Berliners who crossed into East Berlin to shop, also enjoying the exchange rate and contributing to scarcity of goods in the East, thus increasing prices for less-wealthy East Berliners (ibid.). The number of East Germans working in West Berlin rose from 50,000 to 65,000 in 1961 alone (ibid.:108).

The third threat was to DDR security. Western intelligence agencies used Berlin as a transit point for intelligence material and agents. Maddrell (2006:829-847) argues that while the DDR refugee crisis and the economic situation were the main impetus for building the Berlin Wall, DDR security concerns regarding Western espionage were a more important factor than often cited. Western intelligence agencies used Berlin as a major base of operations, obtaining information from refugees and using the free movement of Grenzgaengern to conduct espionage, ferry information and meet agents. To be fair, the East bloc used it in the same manner against the West. The DDR State Ministry for Security—the Stasi—was concerned that Western intelligence would use the fragile state of the DDR in 1961 to incite an uprising in East Berlin similar to that of 1953, which Ulbricht had blamed on subversion coming from West Berlin (US State Department, 1954), ending in a massive uprising against Ulbricht’s government that was only eventually put down by Soviet tanks. Maddrell (2006:833) points out, ‘in the whole history of states, it is hard to think of a state which has suffered an espionage and subversion crisis as grave as that which gripped the DDR in the years up to 1961.’ For Ulbricht, choking off this attack point was vital to DDR survival.

Slusser (1973:9) argues that for Khrushchev, Berlin was a ‘lever’ to be used in the larger struggle with the West, while for Ulbricht Berlin was not a means to an end, but the end itself. For Ulbricht, Berlin was the prize to be won (Harrison, 1993:11). Ulbricht sought elimination of the embarrassing refugee problem, the ‘brain drain’, Grenzgaengern, security worries and the vanishing prestige of the DDR itself. Building a wall could do that. Khrushchev’s international concerns were secondary to him. Harrison (2002:103) agrees Khrushchev’s goals in Berlin were larger, global concerns, whereas Ulbricht’s were DDR-specific and could be immediately addressed by building the Berlin Wall. During 1961, it was Ulbricht who was impatient, confrontational and aggressive, while Khrushchev was patient and more restrained (ibid.). As Ahonen (2011:40-56) points out, for Ulbricht controlling the borders was about the legitimacy of the DDR.

Slusser (1973:93) adroitly describes this tension between Khrushchev’s larger international goals and Ulbricht’s immediate needs as a choice between ‘maximum’ and ‘minimum’ objectives. He describes Khrushchev’s maximum objective as, ‘inflicting a major diplomatic defeat on the Western powers by forcing them to accept the fait accompli of a Soviet-East German peace treaty, bringing with it the end of Western occupation rights in West Berlin.’ Ulbricht’s minimum objective was, ‘shoring up the East German regime by shutting off the escape route via West Berlin.’ In the end, Khrushchev set aside his maximum objective and in favour of Ulbricht’s minimum objective.

Ulbricht Probes Khrushchev and the West on the Border
Why would Khrushchev, premiere of the Soviet Union, be influenced by Walter Ulbricht, the leader of a divided country dependent upon aid from Moscow and not even recognised by Western powers? Zubok (1993:11-12) argues Khrushchev was tied politically and sentimentally to Ulbricht because of their history. During the 1953 East Berlin uprising, Khrushchev sided with Ulbricht over other Soviet leaders and accused them of abandoning socialism in the DDR, thus tying himself politically to Ulbricht’s success. While Khrushchev faced uprisings in Poland and Hungary in 1956, Ulbricht swiftly quelled protests and had no quarrel with Soviet troops on East German soil and in fact welcomed them, a story explored further by Granville (2006:422). Ulbricht’s commitment to building socialism in East Germany won him Khrushchev’s praise (CWIHP, 1993:60), though it was these very ‘collectivisation’ policies that caused the economic hardship in the DDR that precipitated the refugee crisis. Zubok (1993:11-12) says Khrushchev did not want to lose the DDR, a place millions of Russians died to win in WWII, a place where a higher standard of living was enjoyed than anywhere else in the socialist bloc (CWIHP, 1993:61), and the place Westerners could most easily come into contact with socialism to be ‘won over’ by it. Khrushchev developed a similar affinity for the embattled socialist island of Cuba (Zubok, 1993:12). In 1961, Ulbricht ‘masterfully exploited’ Khrushchev’s fears of losing the DDR to force a confrontation with the West over Berlin (CWIHP, 1993:58).

Talk of a Berlin Wall neither began in 1961 nor just between Khrushchev and Ulbricht. There is evidence that Wilhelm Zaisser, the first head of the DDR’s Stasi, put forward a plan to build a wall to separate the two halves of Berlin in the early 1950s (Maddrell, 2006:833). Though DDR security officials such as Erich Honecker, charged with erecting the Wall, claimed the operation was a surprise to and great success against Western intelligence (Harrison, 2002:113), that the border may one day be sealed was no surprise at all to them. In fact, Western intelligence had been planning and instructing its agents regarding the possibility since 1953 (Maddrell, 2006:833). The Soviets had been turning down DDR requests to seal the border in Berlin for at least that long (Harrison, 2002:96). Erecting a barrier between East and West Berlin was not a new concept in 1961.

The rest of the DDR border outside Berlin was sealed since 1952 (Schaefer, 2011:509). The East Berlin border was temporarily sealed during the 1953 uprising, but soon reopened. The DDR announced in 1957 that it was now illegal for East Germans to leave the country without official permission (Maddrell, 2006:833). Until 1960, attempts by Ulbricht to secure the Berlin border were limited to controlling transit of East Germans into the West. However, from 1960 Ulbricht began to probe Western responses—and Khrushchev’s—to increased security measures affecting West Berliners and the Western allies. He acted without consulting Khrushchev and often even against Soviet cautions.

On 21 September 1960, Ulbricht, frustrated with Khrushchev’s slow approach on a permanent solution regarding the status of the DDR and Berlin, decided to press the issue by requiring Western diplomats obtain DDR Foreign Ministry permission to enter East Berlin. He had not notified Moscow and under the post-war four-partite agreement on Berlin (to which the DDR was not a party) he had no recognised authority to do so. The Soviet response was negative as they wanted no reciprocal restrictions made against them (Harrison, 2002:105).

On 17 October 1960, the Soviet embassy cabled Moscow that, ‘Our friends [East Germany] are studying the possibility of taking measures directed towards forbidding and making it more difficult for DDR citizens to work in West Berlin, and also towards stopping the exodus of the population of the DDR through West Berlin. One of such measures by our friends could be the cessation of free movement through the sectoral border and the introduction of such a process for visiting West Berlin by DDR citizens as exists for visiting the BRD [West Germany].’ (Harrison, 2002:107; Zubok, 1993:18). The next day, 18 October, Ulbricht wrote to Khrushchev directly defending the restrictions, arguing they should stand firm against the Western powers which did not recognise the DDR’s right to control its own borders, a fundamental right of any state. In a 30 November meeting, Khrushchev instructed Ulbricht to refrain from measures on the border (Harrison, 2002:107). Ulbricht tried again. On 19 May 1961 Soviet Ambassador Pervukhin reported that an impatient Ulbricht was not following Soviet guidance and wanted to immediately close the border to address the growing economic and refugee problems (ibid.:110-11).

On 15 June, Ulbricht held an infamous press conference. He offered, ‘there are people in West Germany who would like us to mobilise the building workers of the DDR capital to put up a wall. I am not aware of any such intention…Nobody intends to put up a wall.’ This only two months before the Wall would go up. It has since become a phrase many Germans repeat when someone is not being completely honest. Ulbricht went on to mention Soviet/DDR control of Berlin would mean closing Tempelhof Airport, the main escape route for refugees, and that Berlin would become a neutral city, ‘free’ from ‘disturbance’ by Western forces (Slusser, 1973:8-10). Slusser argues that rather than just a blatant lie or an attempt to calm tensions, Ulbricht’s intent—and the effect—was to increase the panicked atmosphere in Berlin to force Khrushchev to bring a swifter conclusion to the crisis.

Ulbricht’s probing continued. On 28 June, Ulbricht ordered all foreign air traffic to notify DDR controllers upon entering and exiting DDR airspace, a move quickly brushed aside by the Western allies (ibid.:43). On 8 July, the East Berlin police chief refused entry of West German delegates to an All-Germany Protestant church conference. That day, 2,600 refugees crossed into West Berlin. Throughout July, DDR ministers continued to publicly push the issue of DDR recognition and control of Berlin. On 16 July, the Ministry of Justice publicly released a detailed plan for the administration of West Berlin under DDR control (ibid.:63). Western figures show that over 100,000 refugees left the DDR in the first six months of 1961 alone (ibid.:66).

Rather presciently, on 30 July US Senator and Kennedy-ally William Fulbright remarked to the press that he did not understand why the DDR does not build a wall in East Berlin, as he considered it their right to do so (ibid.:94; Zubok, 1993:29). It appears Khrushchev made the decision to finally agree Ulbricht’s request at just this time.

There is no ‘smoking gun’ record of when exactly Khrushchev decided to agree to Ulbricht’s continuous request to seal East Berlin. Harrison puts the period between 15 and 25 July 1961 and argues that it came about broadly as a result of Khrushchev’s disappointment with the Vienna talks with Kennedy in June (2002:110). Slusser (1973:93-4) believes the decision fell on 27 July and came about after Khrushchev read Kennedy’s 25 July television speech in which he announced a large increase in US defence spending, which Khrushchev interpreted as an escalating US response to his own recent decision to increase Soviet defence spending. Zubok (1993:26-7) also places the decision on or around 27 July, citing Khrushchev’s own recollections.

Khrushchev also claims credit for the idea of building a concrete wall, not just a barbed wire barrier. Literally interpreted, Khrushchev may be said to be responsible for a Berlin ‘Wall’, not just a Berlin fence. Khrushchev recalls Ulbricht, upon being informed of the decision said, ‘This is the solution! This will help. I am for this’ (ibid.). Ulbricht sent Khrushchev a copy of the speech he would deliver at the coming 3-5 August Warsaw Pact conference on Berlin, stating that in regard to sealing the borders, ‘we have prepared all the necessary measures’ (Harrison, 2002:111). The Berlin Wall would be erected as planned on 13 August 1961.

Conclusion
Contrary to much of the early Western-based literature on the Berlin Wall, more recent literature based on archival research shows Khrushchev did not make the decision to build it alone. Building the Wall served Ulbricht’s immediate needs to stabilise the DDR more than they did Khrushchev’s larger international goals in the Cold War. Ulbricht had been seeking to seal the DDR’s Berlin border for several years and his probing campaign, beginning in late 1960, played a key role in pressuring Khrushchev to finally allow DDR forces to build the Berlin Wall on 13 August 1961.



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