The question of how a divided Germany became a pillar of Western stability is more relevant today than ever. In a rare appearance as a guest, podcast editor Ron Granieri sits down in the studio with host Jadwiga Biskupska to discuss his latest book, Adenauer’s Heirs: The CDU/CSU from Détente to Reunification.
They trace the political evolution of the German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Social Union (CSU) from the deep Cold War through the dramatic reunification of 1990. Granieri argues that German reunification was the ultimate success of Konrad Adenauer’s Westbindung – a strategy of anchoring Germany to NATO and Western democratic institutions to build international trust.
Their conversation reveals that modern debates over European integration, strategic autonomy, and national identity are deeply rooted in the existential challenges that West German leaders navigated decades ago.
As late as the summer of 1989, people still viewed German unification as something that was just not going to happen. And then it did.
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Ron Granieri is Professor of History and the Chair of the Department of National Security and Strategy at the U.S. Army War College and the Editor of A BETTER PEACE.
Jadwiga Biskupska is associate professor of military history at Sam Houston State University and co-director of the Second World War Research Group, North America. She is the Harold K. Johnson Visiting Chair of Military History at the U.S. Army War College for AY26. She received her PhD from Yale University. Her first book, Survivors: Warsaw under Nazi Occupation (Cambridge University Press 2022), won the Heldt Prize and an honorable mention for the Witold Pilecki International Book Award.
The views expressed in this presentation are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Army War College, U.S. Army, or Department of War.
Photo Description: The Federal Republic of Germany becomes a member of NATO Paris, France. Germany (Chancellor Konrad Adenauer) takes his seat at the Council table, 6 May 1955.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of the NATO Archives