West German history shaped by Stasi spy

BERLIN, May 28 (UPI) -- Germany will have to rewrite part of its history: The man who in 1967 fired the shot that went on to change West Germany was a spy working for communist East Germany.

Until last week, Karl-Heinz Kurras had his place in history as the fascist cop who shot an unarmed student, Benno Ohnesorg, in the back of the head at a demonstration in Berlin in 1967.

The killing and the fact that a Berlin court later acquitted Kurras only strengthened the left-wing movement, which staged massive demonstrations in 1968. Ohnesorg became a martyr. His killing and Kurras' acquittal before a Berlin court, the students argued, was the clear proof for a violent an unjust state that, some two decades after World War II, was still run by fascist villains.

The left-wing student movement changed West Germany from a conservative state into the liberal society it is today; but it also gave rise to the Red Army Faction, the far-left group that went on to terrorize the country with its bombings and assassinations targeted for some two decades.

An important part of that post-war history will now have to be rewritten: It surfaced last week that Kurras, now 81, had already been working as an informant for the Stasi, East Germany's secret police, long before he shot Ohnesorg. In 1955, Kurras, a young policeman from West Berlin, approached East German authorities with the wish to resettle in East Germany to serve what he saw as the better half of the country. The Stasi, however, quickly realized Kurras could be of much more help to East Germany if he stayed on in West Berlin. They hired him as a spy tasked with infiltrating the West German police.

For the next 12 years Kurras rose in the Berlin Police Department while at the same time sending intelligence through the Iron Curtain. He became especially valuable to the Stasi when he was promoted into a special unit tasked with uncovering spies from East Germany. Until he shot Ohnesorg, Kurras got roughly 20,000 marks for his services, a pretty decent amount, German news magazine Der Spiegel reports. After the killing, the Stasi terminated the cooperation with Kurras.

All this was left in the dark until last week, when two researchers working for a government agency designed to oversee the Stasi files found 17 folders filled with documents chronicling Kurras' secret career. The fascist cop, the match that lit Germany's left-wing radicals, was a communist spy in disguise.

In an interview with German daily Bild, Kurras admitted that he was a member of East Germany's communist party, the SED. As for the Stasi, he replied, "And what if I did work for them? What does it matter? It doesn't change anything."

Well, maybe it does.

The news has sparked a frenzied debate here in Germany. It circles around the Stasis's role in shaping German history and its penetration into West German police, spy and political circles. Was Kurras an agent provocateur who was authored to destabilize West Germany? And who else may have worked for the Stasi who shaped West German policy in those years?

The first question can't be answered with absolute security. The documents that documented Kurras' Stasi activities do not contain evidence that Kurras got the order to destabilize, much less shoot anyone. It's very well possible that Kurras, who was a weapons fanatic, overreacted.

But it's pretty sure that if the man's Stasi links had surfaced in 1967, the student reaction would have probably been less swift and less fierce. And the police, who with their testimonies helped bring about his acquittal, may not have covered for Kurras if they had known he was working for the other side.

It also reminds Germans that a large part of the Stasi files, and thus the agency's reach into Western Germany, has not yet been fully researched.

The Stasi's penetration in East Germany had always been great.

The secret police in 1989 employed 91,000 people and had built up a network of more than 150,000 civilian informants who spied on politically subversive citizens and activists, but also on anyone they were told to.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who grew up in East Germany, said she was approached by the Stasi but denied working there, telling the officer she was "too gossipy" for the job.

Officials of the agency estimated that 6,000 West Germans have worked as informants for the Stasi; it is known that the agency trained Western German terrorists and helped members of the RAF escape into East Germany. A Stasi spy, Guenter Guillaume, even became a top aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt, ultimately bringing about his resignation.

But the Stasi's lower-tier links in Western Germany have not yet been uncovered.

Western Berlin's police force, for example, has not been checked for Stasi connections; neither have most members of Parliament.

Several German politicians have in the past years unsuccessfully filed petitions to have all parliamentarians checked for Stasi links. The last such request was denied by the current government in 2007, with most of Merkel's party colleagues among those refusing to back it, citing privacy rights and other legal difficulties. Those are arguments most people are not willing to buy anymore.