Willy's Return

Nine months ago, West Berlin's Mayor Willy Brandt looked like a political washout. He had twice led his Social Democratic Party to defeat in national elections, and so severe was his drubbing at the hands of Chancellor Ludwig Erhard last year that Brandt declared bitterly that he would never again campaign for the chancellorship. Privately relieved, the Social Democrats began looking around for a successor.

Last week, by way of contrast, a cheering, whistling and applauding Social Democratic convention in Dortmund re-elected Brandt the party's national chairman by a record majority, 324 to 2. The vote was primarily an expression of thanks to Brandt for negotiating the unprecedented debate that is now all but certain to take place between the Social Democrats and East Germany's Communists in July.

Headlined Die Zeit: WILLY BRANDT HAS RETURNED. Exulted a Social Democratic strategist: "Brandt has given the party an issue." In fact, East German Party Boss Walter Ulbricht gave the Social Democrats the issue by offering to start the dialogue in the first place. Social Democratic Deputy Chairman Herbert Wehner persuaded Brandt, who was cool to the idea at first, to accept. Since then, Brandt has made the cause his own. He conducted the negotiations, indeed decided to lead the debate himself, dramatically announcing that he would even resign his office as mayor and go simply in his nongovernmental capacity as leader of his party if protocol demanded it.

Broken Ice. It was a relaxed Brandt who stood before the cheering delegates at the Dortmund convention. Gone was the dynamic but phony "Kennedy pose" that his public relations advisers had forced on him for last autumn's campaign. He demonstrated his new command of the party by decisively whipping a small, vociferous left-wing faction into line, then easily and naturally expounded his policy designed to lead to a unified Germany. He has always believed in kleine Schritte--small steps--toward that end, and the exchange of speakers with the Communists neatly fitted the pattern of limited contacts intended to break the ice of the cold war. It also fitted his conviction that not just the Big Four powers but West Germans themselves should play a more active role in seeking ways toward reunification.

Brandt hopes to follow up the speakers' exchange with a free exchange of newspapers between East and West Germany, more contacts with Eastern European countries, and more border passes. How well this all goes down with the voters will get its first test in the North Rhine-Westphalia state elections scheduled for July 10, four days before Brandt goes to his first debate at Karl-Marx-Stadt in East Germany.

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