Willy Brandt

Willy Brandt
Brandt in 1980
Chancellor of Germany[a]
In office 22 October 1969 – 7 May 1974
President	Gustav Heinemann
Vice Chancellor	Walter Scheel
Preceded by	Kurt Georg Kiesinger
Succeeded by	Walter Scheel (interim) Helmut Schmidt
Leader of the Social Democratic Party
In office 16 February 1964 – 14 June 1987
Federal Manager	Hans-Jürgen Wischnewski Holger Börner Egon Bahr Peter Glotz
Preceded by	Erich Ollenhauer
Succeeded by	Hans-Jochen Vogel
Vice Chancellor of Germany
In office 1 December 1966 – 22 October 1969
Chancellor	Kurt Georg Kiesinger
Preceded by	Hans-Christoph Seebohm
Succeeded by	Walter Scheel
Minister for Foreign Affairs
In office 1 December 1966 – 20 October 1969
Chancellor	Kurt Georg Kiesinger
Preceded by	Gerhard Schröder
Succeeded by	Walter Scheel
Governing Mayor of West Berlin
In office 3 October 1957 – 30 November 1966
Mayor	Franz Amrehn Heinrich Albertz
Preceded by	Otto Suhr
Succeeded by	Heinrich Albertz
President of the Bundesrat
In office 1 November 1957 – 31 October 1958
First Vice President	Kurt Sieveking
Preceded by	Kurt Sieveking
Succeeded by	Wilhelm Kaisen
President of the Abgeordnetenhaus of Berlin
In office 11 January 1955 – 2 October 1957
Preceded by	Otto Suhr
Succeeded by	Kurt Landsberg [de]
Personal details
Born	Herbert Ernst Karl Frahm (1913-12-18)18 December 1913 Lübeck, Free City of Lübeck, German Empire (now Schleswig-Holstein, Germany)
Died	8 October 1992(1992-10-08) (aged 78) Unkel, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany
Resting place	Zehlendorf, Berlin
Citizenship	Germany (revoked 1938; regained 1948) Norway (from 1940)
Political party	Social Democratic Party (1930–1931; from 1948)
Other political affiliations	Socialist Workers' Party (1931–1946)
Spouses	Carlotta Thorkildsen ​ ​ (m. 1941; div. 1948)​ Rut Hansen ​ ​ (m. 1948; div. 1980)​ Brigitte Seebacher ​ (m. 1983)​
Children	4, including Matthias
Awards	Nobel Peace Prize (1971)
Signature

Willy Brandt (German: [ˈvɪliː ˈbʁant] ^ⓘ; born Herbert Ernst Karl Frahm; 18 December 1913 – 8 October 1992) was a German politician and statesman who was leader of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1964 to 1987 and served as the chancellor of West Germany from 1969 to 1974. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1971 for his efforts to strengthen cooperation in western Europe through the EEC and to achieve reconciliation between West Germany and the countries of Eastern Europe.^[1] He was the first Social Democratic chancellor since 1930.^[2]

Fleeing to Norway and then Sweden during the Nazi regime and working as a left-wing journalist, he took the name Willy Brandt as a pseudonym to avoid detection by Nazi agents, and then formally adopted the name in 1948. Brandt was originally considered one of the leaders of the right wing of the SPD, and earned initial fame as Governing Mayor of West Berlin. He served as the foreign minister and as the vice chancellor in Kurt Georg Kiesinger's cabinet, and became chancellor in 1969.

As chancellor, he maintained West Germany's close alignment with the United States and focused on strengthening European integration in western Europe, while launching the new policy of Ostpolitik aimed at improving relations with Eastern Europe. Brandt was controversial on both the right wing, for his Ostpolitik, and on the left wing, for his support of American policies, including the Vietnam War, and right-wing authoritarian regimes. The Brandt Report became a recognised measure for describing the general North–South divide in world economics and politics between an affluent North and a poor South. Brandt was also known for his fierce anti-communist policies at the domestic level, culminating in the Radikalenerlass (Anti-Radical Decree) in 1972. In 1970, while visiting a memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising crushed by the Germans, Brandt unexpectedly knelt and meditated in silence, a moment remembered as the Kniefall von Warschau.

Brandt resigned as chancellor in 1974, after Günter Guillaume, one of his closest aides, was exposed as an agent of the Stasi, the East German secret service.

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