Four-Power Agreement on Berlin

The treaty led to noticeable improvements for the people of Berlin

Ten years after the construction of the Berlin Wall, the foreign ministers of the four occupying powers signed a treaty as part of the wider process of détente between East and West. Called the “Four-Power Agreement on Berlin” – or more widely, the “Berlin Agreement” – in West Germany, the DDR referred to it as the “Four-Party Agreement”. Addressing the legal status of the divided city, West Berlin’s relationship with West Germany, and the establishment of transport links between the two, its wording – referring only to “the area concerned” – sought to cover differences between the parties over the fundamental status of the city. Whilst the Western powers interpreted this as referring to the whole of Berlin, for the Soviets it meant only West Berlin. Moreover, as there was no official German-language version of the agreement, the translations used in the two German states did not always align.

Whilst the Western powers acknowledged that West Berlin was not a full part of the Federal Republic of Germany and was therefore not governed from Bonn, the Soviets recognized the existence of special ties between West Germany and West Berlin. Nevertheless, the text of the agreement used in the DDR referred to these ties only as “connections”. For the first time since 1945, the Soviet Union guaranteed unhindered road, rail and water transit between West Berlin and West Germany, thereby undertaking not to launch a new blockade of the city. The new communication links between West and East Berlin and between West Berlin and the DDR brought significant relief to ordinary Germans and provided a basis for improving German-German relations.