202. During the Cold War, to which bloc did the GDR belong?

Answer options

1. to the Western powers
2. to the Warsaw Pact
3. to NATO
4. to the Non-Aligned States

Explanation

During the Cold War, the GDR belonged to the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc and, from 1955 to 1991, was a member of the Warsaw Treaty Organization; economically it was integrated into COMECON. Created in response to the Federal Republic’s 1955 accession to NATO, the Warsaw Pact subordinated the National People’s Army to Soviet command structures, effectively constraining the GDR’s sovereign autonomy. This bloc alignment was reflected in its socialist constitutional order (the 1968/1974 constitutions), which entrenched the SED’s leading role and socialist internationalism, in contrast to the Federal Republic’s liberal-democratic Basic Law. Only with the 1989/90 peaceful revolution did the GDR exit this framework; it acceded to the Federal Republic under former Article 23 of the Basic Law via the Unification Treaty, and the Warsaw Pact dissolved in 1991.