Chapter 45: The End of the 80s (5)
Predicting German reunification is harder than predicting the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union had been showing signs of collapse for a long time... and more importantly, German reunification came first in the timeline.
The fact that East Germany fell was already enough to support predictions about the Soviet collapse.
Some say that if it hadn’t been for the August Coup, Gorbachev’s reforms might have succeeded... but honestly, even the coup was something foreseeable.
It’s just that no one expected it to crumble so pathetically, but there were plenty of scholars who already thought the Soviet Union was doomed.
But... the fall of the Berlin Wall wasn’t like that. That wasn’t a prediction—it was a prophecy.
‘I can’t even be sure that this timeline will follow the same path as history.’
If the party spokesperson hadn’t come back early from vacation and had more time to read the report... if he hadn’t answered the reporter’s question about when people could leave through the Berlin Wall with, “Immediately, without delay”... if that Italian journalist, who didn’t even speak German well, hadn’t misunderstood and published an article about “immediate dismantling of the Berlin Wall”... if, at the very least, the printing staff who accidentally deleted the footnote on the spokesperson’s document had been a little more careful...
History could’ve changed.
‘...Tsk, seeing it like this, there’s no way history is going to play out exactly like before. There’s way too many damn variables.’
The butterfly effect I’ve caused so far might’ve been small, but... isn’t it enough to shift history just by changing a few people’s schedules?
I’m not really a fan of “historical resilience,” but there’s no avoiding it. For the suffering people of East Germany, it’s time for anti-communist fighter Yoo Ha-yeon to step up.