Erich Honecker and Willi Stoph

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Difference between Erich Honecker and Willi Stoph

Erich Honecker vs. Willi Stoph

Erich Honecker (25 August 1912 – 29 May 1994) was a German politician who, as the General Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party, led the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) from 1971 until the weeks preceding the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. From 1976 onward he was also the country's official head of state as chairman of the State Council following Willi Stoph's relinquishment of the post. Honecker's political career began in the 1930s when he became an official of the Communist Party of Germany, a position for which he was imprisoned during the Nazi era. Following World War II, he was freed and soon relaunched his political activities, founding the youth organisation the Free German Youth in 1946 and serving as the group's chairman until 1955. As the Security Secretary of the Party’s Central Committee in the new East German state, he was the prime organiser of the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 and, in this function, bore responsibility for the "order to fire" along the Inner German border. In 1971, he initiated a political power struggle that led, with Soviet support, to his replacing Walter Ulbricht as First Secretary of the Central Committee and as chairman of the state's National Defense Council. Under his command, the country adopted a programme of "consumer socialism" and moved toward the international community by normalising relations with West Germany and also becoming a full member of the UN, in what is considered one of his greatest political successes. As Cold War tensions eased in the late 1980s under perestroika and glasnost, the liberal reforms of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Honecker refused all but cosmetic changes to the East German political system, citing the continual hardliner attitudes of Kim Il-sung and Fidel Castro, whose respective regimes of North Korea and Cuba had been critical of reforms, leaders who ruthlessly suppressed opposition. As anticommunist protests grew, Honecker begged the USSR to intervene and suppress the protests to maintain communist rule in East Germany like the Prague Spring of 1968 and the Hungarian Revolution of 1956; Gorbachev refused. Honecker was forced to resign by his party in October 1989 in a bid to improve the government's image before the public. Honecker's eighteen years at the helm of the soon-to-collapse German Democratic Republic came to an end. Following German reunification, he sought asylum in the Chilean embassy in Moscow in 1991 but was extradited back to Germany a year later to stand trial for his role in the human rights abuses committed by the East German government. However, the proceedings were abandoned due to illness and he was freed from custody to travel to join his family in exile in Chile, where he died in May 1994 from liver cancer. Willi Stoph (9 July 1914 – 13 April 1999) was an East German politician.

Communist Party of Germany

The Communist Party of Germany (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, KPD) was a major political party in Germany between 1918 and 1933, and a minor party in West Germany in the postwar period until it was banned in 1956.

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Council of Ministers of East Germany

The Council of Ministers (German: Ministerrat der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik) was the chief executive body of the German Democratic Republic from November 1950 until the country was unified with the Federal Republic of Germany on 3 October 1990.

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East Germany

East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; Deutsche Demokratische Republik, DDR), existed from 1949 to 1990 and covers the period when the eastern portion of Germany existed as a state that was part of the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War period.

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Egon Krenz

Egon Rudi Ernst Krenz (born 19 March 1937) is a former East German politician who was the last communist leader of East Germany during the final months of 1989.

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German Empire

The German Empire (Deutsches Kaiserreich, officially Deutsches Reich),Herbert Tuttle wrote in September 1881 that the term "Reich" does not literally connote an empire as has been commonly assumed by English-speaking people.

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Pantheon Books

Pantheon Books is an American book publishing imprint with editorial independence.

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Politburo

A politburo or political bureau is the executive committee for communist parties.

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Socialist Unity Party of Germany

The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED), established in April 1946, was the governing Marxist–Leninist political party of the German Democratic Republic from the country's foundation in October 1949 until it was dissolved after the Peaceful Revolution in 1989.

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State Council of East Germany

The State Council (German: Staatsrat) was the collective head of state that governed East Germany (German Democratic Republic) from 1960 to 1990.

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Volkskammer

The People's Chamber (German: Volkskammer) was the unicameral legislature of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

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Walter Ulbricht

Walter Ernst Paul Ulbricht (30 June 18931 August 1973) was a German Communist politician.

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World War I

World War I (often abbreviated as WWI or WW1), also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918.

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World War II

World War II (often abbreviated to WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although conflicts reflecting the ideological clash between what would become the Allied and Axis blocs began earlier.

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