10 - Hazards from the Global South (1970–1972)

Summary

Turning to the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, Chapter 10 explores the challenges Bonn faced amidst the turmoil of the early 1970s. Tightened budgets, occasioned by worries about inflation, hampered efforts by aid minister Erhard Eppler to follow through on Brandt’s promises of expanding development aid to the Global South. Karl Schiller insisted that trade, not aid, was the better path forward. Bonn’s liberal, free-trade approach drew criticism from African leaders, as West Germany invested heavily in apartheid South Africa; Brandt’s government did, however, enact tighter restrictions on weapons exports outside NATO. German officials frowned upon Global South demands for a more balanced world trading order, but they played a mediating role at UNCTAD III, a global trade and development conference in Santiago, Chile. Confronted with a rash of kidnappings in Latin America and Palestinian terrorism on German soil, Brandt’s government opted repeatedly to appease the hostage-takers rather than prosecute them. This passive response contributed to the disaster at the Munich Olympics in 1972, when Israeli athletes were captured and murdered.