THE GERMAN QUESTION: A GOING WEST, A WITHERING EAST AND A FAILING HEAD OF STATE

WASHINGTON — Images on the evening news are startling. East Germans by the thousands stream into Austria with only perfunctory checks from amiable Hungarian border guards. Mostly young, many with children, they speedily cross the neutral country and are welcomed into West Germany as citizens come home. More wait in Hungary, preparing to take advantage of Budapest’s opening of what was an impenetrable Iron Curtain. As the East German state hemorrhages, its seemingly leaderless government impotently fulminates, Moscow half-heartedly protests and observers wonder if the postwar European order is unraveling. What is going on?

Long the East Bloc’s economic showcase, the German Democratic Republic has joined the list of communist countries in turmoil, including China, the Soviet Union, Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia. East German leader Erich Honecker, now reportedly gravely ill, has proved unable to solve the worst crisis in his country since the 1961 building of the Berlin Wall.

For three decades, the Communists have striven to forge an East German identity and instill patriotism. Parades feature the flag and a martial anthem beginning with “Risen from ruins and turned to the future.” Since the early 1970s, the country has broken out of its isolation and now maintains diplomatic relations around the world. Its athletes are at the pinnacle of international sports. In recent years, the government has stressed its German heritage, modifying its own ideological spin on history to identify with nationalist sentiments.

Problems, however, have been building. Despite infusions of loans and favorable trade terms extended by the Federal Republic of Germany, East Germany’s economy is stagnant. While Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev extols glasnost and perestroika , Poland elects a non-Communist government and Hungary embarks on a multiparty system. Honecker and his rigid colleagues steadfastly reject political or economic reform--preferring instead to support the Chinese government’s massacre in Tian An Men Square.

As early as 10 years ago, citizens’ groups began forming, championing a variety of peace, ecological and human-rights causes. There may be 500 such groups in East Germany today, most existing under the umbrella of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. In general, these protesters are a “loyal socialist opposition” seeking to improve an imperfect socialist system, not to jettison it. The bulk of the East German people, however, seems to prefer the more radical solution--for example, many voters in May’s local elections crossed off the names of unopposed official candidates.

What drives so many East Germans to abandon a homeland that provides a standard of living superior to that of other communist nations and equal to at least the poorer members of the European Community? Why leave the security of a guaranteed job for a competitive society with higher unemployment? For some, it is the lure of greater material rewards that capitalism bestows on success. East Berlin goods may outshine those in Bucharest or Warsaw, but they are no match for those of Bremen or Munich.

Interviews with East German refugees reveal a deeper reason: the impossibility of fulfilling individual potential amid dreary communist orthodoxy. Ideology remains pervasive. Party rallies with compulsory attendance punctuate the calendar. At work and school, commitment to the communist system is noted in personnel records, and lack of enthusiasm often warrants a negative mark. Preference for university places is given to good pupils also deemed ideologically correct. Controls on artistic creativity have been loosened somewhat, but these gestures have not satisfied the critical public.

Alienated East Germans have an alternative. Poles and Hungarians, with lower living standards, may travel to the West, but most return because emigration usually entails a change in nationality--there is no “West Hungary” or “West Poland.” But there is a West Germany.

Although more than 85% of East Germans receive TV programs from West Germany, first-hand knowledge was lacking until recently. Two years ago, as part of the warming between the two Germanys, and perhaps as a steam vent, East Germany began allowing thousands of working-age citizens to travel to the Federal Republic--as long as spouses and children stayed behind. They saw prosperity of a different magnitude could be combined with democracy and a comprehensive social safety net. Most returned--but they spread the word. Meanwhile, the East German government permitted increased emigration.

Mainstream West German politicians were jolted by elections earlier this year, when right-wing parties rode sentiment against immigrants--German and non-German--to significant gains. Debate erupted about policy toward East Germany, with agreement only that nothing should be done to destabilize the situation further. Several West German politicians urged Honecker to undertake reforms so East Germans would not seek to leave.

Honecker refused, arguing logically that if East Germany abandoned its socialist system it lost any reason for a separate existence. This was an implicit admission of an illegitimacy that does not permit compromise.

So for the second time in 30 years, East Germany has been humiliated before the entire world, and the Hungarians show no inclination to staunch the flow of refugees, most of whom are skilled workers East Germany can ill afford to lose. Can the ossified Communist regime survive?

In the short term--undoubtedly. East Germany withstood graver challenges in the 1950s--an uprising in 1953 and the emigration of one-sixth of its population. It could temporarily forbid travel to Czechoslovakia and Hungary and absorb the public outrage. An efficient security police can nip serious opposition in the bud. The presence of several hundred-thousand Soviet troops offers a further guarantee. Economically, the country is far better off than in the ‘50s, even if the gap with West Germany has widened.

Yet the longer term outlook appears dimmer. Honecker’s potential successors are a provincial lot, not likely to enact necessary reforms. Contrasts with West Germany would hardly be more stark. The Federal Republic is the dominant economic force in a dynamic European Community now embarked on an ambitious program of integration. East Germany remains the engine of a disintegrating Comecon organization. The Federal Republic may have security-related disputes with some of its North Atlantic Treaty Organization partners, but the political underpinnings are solid. The Communist Bloc, on the other hand, is split between liberalizing reformers and obdurate conservatives. Its principal power, the Soviet Union, is rent by nationalities conflicts and unable to rouse its lethargic economy.

All analyses of East and West German relations--or even European politics--ultimately return to “The German Question,” otherwise known as reunification. Conventional wisdom has it that no one wants reunification. Perhaps. But East German refugees are forcing it back on the agenda. Moreover, some foreign attitudes seem to be changing. Poles harbor deep distrust of Germans, but Solidarity leaders acknowledge they cannot deny self-determination to Germans when they have just won it themselves. French diplomats now speak of reunification with equanimity. U.S. Ambassador to Bonn Vernon A. Walters recently declared the division of Germany was abnormal and he expected reunification soon.

Of course the key to the German Question lies with the Soviets. Other than whispers at diplomatic parties, no evidence of the Soviet Union changing its veto of reunification exists. Still, deterioration of the Soviet economy and social fabric might induce the Kremlin to cut its huge obligations in Eastern Europe--if appropriate security arrangements could be made. Might a neutral, drastically disarmed, reunified Germany provide such a security guaranty--particularly if it pledged to rescue the Soviet economy? Farfetched? You bet. But last year how many were predicting a non-Communist Polish government? Stay tuned.