"Tiananmen Square" option in East Germany

In the weeks preceding the fall of the Berlin Wall, there was widespread rumours that hardliners in the SED would seize power and order a massacre of protesters in Leipzig. What if that had occurred, and the hardliners then proceeded on a brutal crackdown on dissidents, even more brutal than in OTL China? Would Gorby be able and willing to use the Red Army to remove Honecker and intervene?
 
You'd have to have Gorby out of power to get anything like this IMO.

The movie WW3 deals with this scenario.


This pretty much. My personal opinion is that while the East Germans may have considered it (and there is a legend that a signed order was already existing) they would never have acted without Soviet blessing.
 
This pretty much. My personal opinion is that while the East Germans may have considered it (and there is a legend that a signed order was already existing) they would never have acted without Soviet blessing.


Exactly, and one of the reason the entir Carnival of Revolution occured in the first place was that Gorby was supporting it, at least unintentionally. If the hardliners had actually tried this, you might well have the very surreal situation of seeing Soviety tanks rolling in to support the protestors.
 
Exactly, and one of the reason the entir Carnival of Revolution occured in the first place was that Gorby was supporting it, at least unintentionally. If the hardliners had actually tried this, you might well have the very surreal situation of seeing Soviety tanks rolling in to support the protestors.

Sounds like a good idea for a TL. Anybody up for it? ^^
 
Exactly, and one of the reason the entir Carnival of Revolution occured in the first place was that Gorby was supporting it, at least unintentionally. If the hardliners had actually tried this, you might well have the very surreal situation of seeing Soviety tanks rolling in to support the protestors.

According to Gorby himself, Soviet satellites were free to determine their own fate. Would the hardliners in the Soviet Politburo accept him using force to suppress the sovereignty of a brotherly socialist nation?
 
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