A NETFLIX ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY
[gunshot]
APRIL 1, 1991
[ominous music plays]
PRESS
[Classen] April 1st was Easter Monday.
I was in the newsroom until around 10:00 p.m....
and then headed home to Dusseldorf-Unterrath.
-[siren] -That's when I noticed...
the city was full of blue light.
[sirens wail, horns honk]
Fire trucks, ambulances, police cars.
I've never seen anything like it in my whole career,
never before and never since.
[sirens continue]
I followed the police cars
and they all drove to Kaiser-Friedrich-Ring.
Rich, famous people live there.
I still didn't know what had happened.
I asked a policeman,
"Can you tell me what's going on? The whole city is on lockdown."
He said, "Not just the whole city.
All freeways are closed.
We're running a dragnet."
I asked him, "What must have happened?"
He said, "The very worst kind of crime."
[sirens]
He said, "You must have heard of Mr. Rohwedder."
"Who's Rohwedder?"
"You don't know him?
He's the President of the Treuhand in Berlin.
He's liquidating the GDR."
[sirens continue]
[Hoffmann-Becking] My wife and I were on a skiing holiday.
We were traveling back to Dusseldorf that night.
We passed the Rohwedder house. It was all lit up.
And 20 meters in front of the house
I met a policeman and asked him just one thing,
"Is he dead?"
"Yes."
I knew what had happened. It was crystal clear.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
ZDF apologizes for interrupting this movie.
There is a sad and shocking reason for this interruption.
The head of the Treuhand Agency, Detlev Rohwedder,
was reportedly killed in his apartment in Dusseldorf
on Monday evening, at around 10:30 p.m..
GERMANY
[upbeat theme music plays]
[Hitler] The German Reich.
[Ulbricht] Nobody intends to build a wall!
[reporter] West and East Germany - a divided nation.
♪ Unity and justice and freedom ♪
[reporter 2] Red Army Faction.
[reporter 3] ...insane attacks by barbaric terrorists.
♪ For the German fatherland ♪
♪ Risen from ruins ♪
[Reagan] Tear down this wall!
Our fatherland, reunited.
♪ Flourish, German fatherland ♪
A PERFECT CRIME
[telephone rings]
[Waigel] I was skiing in Austria.
My security agents woke me up in the night and said,
"Rohwedder has been murdered."
I had only been skiing for two days.
And I'd been really looking forward to that skiing vacation.
[sirens wail]
[Classen] He said, "Go photograph the top window."
I said, "But I can't see a thing."
He said, "Just turn on the flash and shoot.
You'll find out what you've photographed later on."
[shutter clicks]
[telephone rings]
[Hofmeyer] I was at home when the phone rang.
I knew right away why he had been attacked.
BUREAU OF CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION HEAD OF COUNTER-TERRORISM
-[sirens] -[radio chatter]
[Hofmeyer] Our investigation units went over there,
the crime scene task force was alerted
and they started work right away, in the middle of the night.
[sirens wail]
[Classen] Huge numbers of police arrived,
including the Bureau of Criminal Investigation.
Strangers took command of the situation.
I was forced away.
[Fundermann] We arrived between 3:00 and 4:00 a.m.
First we went into the building to see what the situation was.
The body was still lying in the study on the first floor.
BUREAU OF CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION HEAD OF COMMUNICATION
Mr. Rohwedder was across from the window,
slumped on the floor in front of the bookshelves.
[telephone rings]
-Evening, Mr. Schmok. -[Schmok] Hello, Mr. Voß.
Has the Ministry of the Interior in Dusseldorf
confirmed Rohwedder's murder?
[Schmok] Yes, it has been confirmed.
The city is in shock.
He was an extremely likeable person,
but he knew that his new role
also posed a danger to him.
We can be sure that this was a political act.
[telephone disconnects]
[Classen] Back in the newsroom, the first thing I did
was develop the film.
I remember it so clearly.
I was shocked by what I saw.
[Fundermann] You can see two bullets
have passed through this completely normal glass window.
One bullet struck and killed Detlev Karsten Rohwedder.
The second bullet injured his wife, who was standing behind him.
If the local police
had put sufficient protection measures in place,
there wouldn't have been normal glass in these windows,
but bulletproof glass that stopped the bullets getting through.
[Waigel] To this day I still don't understand
why only the ground floor of his house
had safety windows installed.
In the house where I lived,
all of the windows
and all of the doors were designed
to protect against a direct attack.
[Hofmeyer] Feelings of anger and pity.
Anger and pity.
Anger because the thing you wanted to protect wasn't protected,
and pity for the people
who placed their trust in the country and the country couldn't protect
or didn't want to protect.
[reporter] This is the daily news on First German Television.
Head of the Treuhand Agency, Rohwedder,
has reportedly been murdered.
The victim was a key figure in the so far futile attempt
to overhaul the economy of what was once communist East Germany.
[reporter 3] The left-wing Red Army Faction claim they killed him,
but a German security official has said the Stasi,
the former East German secret police, may also have been involved.
[reporter 4] The Federal Prosecutor General declined to confirm
whether the RAF really had carried out the attack.
They do not expect to find the perpetrator soon,
or perhaps ever.
[reporter 5] Finance Minister Waigel, who supervised the Treuhand,
interrupted his Easter vacation and traveled to Bonn.
[Waigel] Rohwedder is, I think...
the martyr, or a martyr,
of German reunification.
And in view of that...
there was a deep sense of gratitude
towards him for his courage and willingness
to take on that hazardous role at the Treuhand.
For the good of Germany.
MARTYR
[techno beat plays]
[Brahms] Rohwedder was the boss
of the world's biggest industrial holding company.
There were around 15,000 GDR companies in that holding company.
Dockyards, steel foundries, the textile sector, the chemical sector.
By Western standards, those companies had every problem
it was possible to have.
And each of those 15,000 companies needed major restructuring.
[Hoffmann-Becking] A huge task.
It was probably the first time that an agency, the Treuhand Agency...
TREUHAND BUSINESS LAWYER
...had to group all of the companies, restructure, liquidate and sell them.
TREUHAND AGENCY
[reporter] Mrs. Breuel, your reaction to the attack...
All of the staff are very sad and feel committed now
to continuing Mr. Rohwedder's work.
That's our job, and we're dedicated to getting it done.
Awful. Terrible.
I'm lost for words.
-It's terrible. He was my boss. -I'm... sad.
Outraged, actually.
I'm wondering...
why there were no measures in place to protect him?
[Scheunert] The day after Rohwedder's murder
I arrived at the Treuhand.
It was buzzing.
The wheels were still turning.
Investors were standing there, managers who wanted loans,
investors who wanted information about their transfer applications.
I walked around feeling totally out of place.
Uh... just think about it: you work in an organization
and then the boss is shot and killed.
What kind of sick structures cause that to happen?
A man gives up a secure position in the West
to come to the East and tackle this whole thing.
Unlike all of those smart alecks in Munich or Bonn or wherever,
sitting there safe and sound and shooting their mouths off,
uh, he came over and faced the challenge.
And that man gets shot dead. I thought it was sick.
[interviewer] The economy in the former GDR is on the brink of collapse.
The new states of Germany are facing an ever-growing mountain of problems.
Mr. Rohwedder, many people are wondering why you took this on?
5 WEEKS
UNTIL THE MURDER
Maybe a look at your background can help us explain it.
You were born the son of a bookseller in Gotha in 1932.
That's in Thuringia.
You're from Central Germany. Did that inform your decision?
[Rohwedder] Yes, I was always very interested
in the so-called "new" states of Germany.
I was often in the GDR during my time in Bonn.
Reunification has always meant a lot to me
and that's why, despite all the criticism,
and all of the disapproval that could be leveled at my work,
I'm proud to be able to do this job
and that allows me to see past the difficulties we're facing.
[narrator] Oversized companies, self-important staff, outdated machinery,
low productivity and above all products that are difficult to sell.
The Treuhand Agency is overwhelmed by the magnitude of the problems.
[reporter] What do you think of the agency?
-Not a lot. -Why not?
So far their restructuring has destroyed things,
not created jobs.
My wife already lost her job.
Everyone is scared.
Right now we're worse off than we were before.
You feel unhappy in yourself
because you don't know if you'll keep your job or not.
[explosion]
[Rohwedder] The situation is characterized
by soaring unemployment levels, a large number...
TREUHAND PRESIDENT
...of companies collapsing.
[inaudible dialogue]
-[inaudible dialogue] -[sad music]
[Rohwedder] Yes, the unemployment is depressing.
In some areas it is devastating and alarming,
and the people have every right to feel distressed
because every worker is doing a good job
and that makes decisions like this very hard.
We...
don't take decisions like this lightly at the agency.
Whenever we make a decision, we think about what it means for people.
[sad music]
[factory worker] I worked here 18 years.
And at the age of 43 I won't find any work anywhere.
The job center is sending me from one place to the next.
The welfare office is doing the same.
The apartment isn't an apartment, it's a dump.
I'm on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
Honestly.
And with just 500 Marks unemployment benefit
I'm at the point where I might as well just hang myself right now.
And I'll take my kids with me. I will.
I'm telling you. I won't leave them alone here.
[interviewer] Did you really turn the gas on yesterday?
I just didn't know what to do.
[woman] We'll get through this.
We'll fight.
OCTOBER 1989
18 MONTHS UNTIL THE MURDER
[upbeat music plays]
EAST BERLIN
[Scheunert] Nobody went hungry in the GDR. Everybody had an apartment.
Nobody was homeless.
Things like that were so well organized in the GDR.
The companies functioned. The people worked hard.
But it was like a hamster wheel.
Nothing came of it. It didn't produce any wealth.
If the Berlin Wall hadn't fallen in 1989,
in two, three, less than five years, it would have imploded.
[crowd cheering]
The system and the whole internal structure
were so broken down.
[protestor] No violence!
People were no longer willing to stand up for the intrinsic values anymore.
Freedom!
[reporter] Thousands of mostly young people
in many cities are demanding freedom and political reform.
[anchor] This November 9th is a historic day.
The GDR has announced that its borders are open with immediate effect.
The gates in the wall are wide open.
[crowd reveling]
[reveling continues]
[Waigel] For everyone who was politically active, November 9th is a day
they will remember their whole lives.
[reporter] East Berliners were overcome as they crossed the border
that's been closed to them for 28 years.
It was clear this would be one of Berlin's most dramatic days.
[Waigel] But in the midst of the joy
there immediately came the question:
And what now?
What's in store for the Finance Minister?
[cheering]
[Waigel] Days before, in the Ministry of Finance,
we had already starting thinking about what had to happen
in order to lead the GDR out of its disastrous economic situation.
I'm still amazed to this day
at the level of innovation our Ministry of Finance showed.
[Sarrazin] In 1989, when the Berlin Wall fell...
MINISTRY OF FINANCE HEAD OF UNIT
...from November on
I was on full alert,
in a way that I had never been before.
There was a two-volume manual on the GDR.
I got it so that I could learn about all the different institutions.
And there were also studies on the economy of the GDR.
I got my hands on all of it and then I said to myself,
in my youthful arrogance, at the age of just 44,
"Nobody knows more about the GDR than I do now."
And I tackled things with that mentality.
[Waigel] It was a decisive moment,
the time to restructure the economic and social order of the GDR.
So that means...
competition, property, independent monetary policy.
We had thought about all of those things for the people in the GDR.
[telephone rings]
[Luft] On November 14th, I received a call from the Council of Ministers.
"We need you in the government."
Half an hour later, I held the highest office of my life.
MINISTER OF ECONOMY GDR
It was my second son's birthday that day.
Wonderful!
And then it all just went from there, didn't it?
I didn't sense any malice in the national or international press.
It was more like, "She's brave."
Or, "In her line of business, people want to make a difference."
That was the general feeling.
[narrator] Christa Luft stated plainly
the government's plan to make a radical but regulated, shift to a market economy.
For us it's about a market economy
that proves to be economically efficient and internationally competitive.
[Luft] We wanted to use freedom of trade
to encourage people to set up small independent businesses.
We had passed a joint venture law in the People's Chamber.
Things like that weren't just in the planning stages,
some of them had already been introduced.
[Flake] For a few weeks we really believed
that the country would make huge progress and get better.
That a GDR would develop without the downsides...
RAMMSTEIN KEYBOARDIST
...that we had before, meaning the Stasi and the oppression
and the political cronyism.
We thought it would be more open and relaxed.
A sort of paradise.
And many people tried to realize their dreams.
Every second person opened up a cafe or a bar.
They were like kids in a toy shop who were finally allowed to play.
You could sense their joy as they said,
"Here you go, some white wine...
Yes, we're only open in the evenings."
Often they were apartments in back buildings
where people had begun meeting and drinking in the evenings.
Everyone did what they thought was right.
One person had sausages,
another person had salads with olives and exotic things like that.
Everyone was living out their dreams with an incredible sense of joy.
[techno music plays]
We have to find our own path and use this chance that we have.
There's a lot to change here,
but without capitalism or becoming like West Germany.
♪ Nations, hear the signal! ♪
We want for this to remain our country
and we don't want anyone else to decide its fate.
[crowd cheers]
[Luft] Sometimes I felt strange
and men felt strange too.
Near the beginning of my office in January 1990,
I had a meeting with around 15 managers from the former East German states.
I was the only woman!
And I had to give the introductory speech.
You've been accused of beating around the bush
and of not having said the phrase "social market economy" yet.
What does your regulatory framework look like?
Come on, I refuse to accept that.
I only had, I don't know, three minutes to talk.
And I stated very clearly
that we're going to start to create a functioning internal market,
that functions according to market economy principles...
That was where I saw Rohwedder for the first time in real life.
He was a giant...
huge and baroque.
He played up his role as a restructuring expert.
He had developed that expertise at Hoesch. It was indisputable.
And Rohwedder said what needed to be done.
The GDR companies have to prove themselves on the global market.
That is crucial.
[Luft] Not every company had to be privatized right away.
If the GDR keeps up the pace,
then I think we will very soon have a framework in place
where people can work and where they want to live.
We should create a new spirit of optimism,
and in my opinion the best way to do that
is for both sides to cooperate.
I also got the impression
that he wasn't someone who goes in like a bull in a china shop.
He was cautious and considered, not euphoric
or just serving his own interests.
He wanted to make his mark.
Thank you for coming.
Now back to the studio in Berlin.
My political experiences had taught me
that things have to mature to a certain point in time like a...
like a fine cheese.
And then they have to be eaten.
Otherwise they start to smell and it's too late.
That means it was a process.
And of course, I wanted German unity at the end of it.
I was completely convinced that the GDR was worthless.
The GDR was of a different opinion of course,
but it didn't matter what the GDR fortune was worth.
The truth came out in the end anyway.
[typewriter keys clack]
At the end of January, I found that I had
a feasible and well-thought out concept for a monetary union.
It was a 15-page document
and it had to stay a secret for another 14 days
until all of the preparations had been made.
And then in mid-February the time came.
FEBRUARY 13, 1990
14 MONTHS UNTIL THE MURDER
[suspenseful music plays]
MINISTER OF FINANCE
[Waigel] At that time, Minister of Economy Luft came to us
and demanded special compensation to the tune of 15 billion Deutschmarks.
And some West German politicians,
including cabinet members said,
"Maybe you don't have to give them 15 billion...
but ten or eight or at least seven,
you have to give them that."
Back then I said, "No."
[Luft] We flew from Berlin-Schönefeld to Bonn with Interflug.
We got off the plane and into a helicopter,
and landed in the garden of the Federal Chancellery building.
Helmut Kohl was standing outside, lined up with his whole team.
I felt like we were all going to a funeral.
They were all quite stony-faced.
Then we were invited in
and half of the cabinet was sitting there in the NATO hall.
Next to Kohl sat Waigel, and many others too.
Kohl...
was sitting at the front like Buddha.
And...
he said something about how wonderful it all was
and how in a few weeks it would all be sorted and so on.
And then each of us was allowed to speak.
"Chancellor,
the GDR's economy is in bad shape.
But what we need is an injection that cures us,
not a lethal injection.
Give us time.
We need two to three, maybe four years
to prepare for a step like this.
Otherwise not everyone will make it."
Fat chance!
[Waigel] Back then I said, "No."
That economic system
won't get a single penny or a single Mark.
We're prepared to offer more,
but only when a system is introduced
that fundamentally changes that economic and social system.
That's why we thought about
offering the GDR a monetary union,
but under certain conditions.
[Luft] They didn't want to hear about it.
The government wouldn't agree to give us a penny.
"We will--" "No," said Waigel.
"Completely impossible. And we need to speed all of this up too."
We want to do things one step at a time.
[Waigel] It was one of the most interesting and challenging things
that ever happened to me in my political career
and in my life as Minister of Finance.
Never had a whole national economy
been transformed in that way before.
[reporter] Rohwedder warned
against a monetary union between East and West Germany.
It's a high-risk project, with many GDR businesses forced to close
if they are suddenly exposed to international competition.
That could lead to high levels of unemployment.
[Waigel] We were looking
for a special person to be President of the Treuhand,
someone who could tackle this huge and unusual task.
And Rohwedder had very special qualifications for the job.
And Helmut Kohl and I both believed
we should ask him to take it on.
Rohwedder, CEO of Hoesch company based in Dortmund,
is set to privatize the GDR's formerly state-owned companies.
[Hoffmann-Becking] It's quite likely that at first,
Rohwedder wasn't aware of the scale of what was to come.
He hesitated about taking over the chairmanship of the board.
I remember that.
He hesitated, but it was inescapable.
He let himself be taken to task.
He was serving...
Let's just say it. Serving the fatherland.
9 MONTHS
UNTIL THE MURDER
SOCIAL CUTS + COMPANY DESTRUCTION = TREUHAND
[Brahms] The first major waves of layoffs came relatively quickly.
For the first time,
people had no right to work and had to go to a job center.
Next please!
The East German's were crushed by this incredible sense of frustration.
The anger towards the Treuhandanstalt had really grown.
JOBS FOR ALL!
You're one of the most-hated West Germans in all of East Germany.
One stroke of your pen causes thousands of job cuts.
760,000 people have already lost their jobs in the new German states.
How do you deal with that on a human level?
There are economic reasons that force you to do so,
but so many people are losing their jobs.
[Hofmeyer] Rohwedder was the most at-risk person
in Germany at that time.
We carried out an analysis, signed by me, and shared it
with the State Criminal Police, Constitutional Affairs Officers,
the Federal Public Prosecutor and the Ministry of the Interior.
We came to the conclusion
that Rohwedder is a K-106 person.
That put Rohwedder in the highest possible risk category
and declared that he was in extreme danger.
[narrator] The so-called anti-terror concept 106.
The approach is as follows:
high risk people are to be monitored via "covert measures".
These would reveal early on
if these prominent people were being "spied on by terrorists."
[Hofmeyer] The K-106 decision meant
that the local police authorities were to check Rohwedder's surroundings
in the knowledge that there could be spies operating.
We would have set up covert operations and waited
for there to be an attack on Rohwedder.
That is K-106.
[Classen] This is where the Rohwedder family lived.
It was Villa Maximilian.
The house was in an area full of people who weren't short on money.
The area is full of grand villas.
It's an area where strangers attract attention.
Anything that didn't belong attracted attention.
Even I would have attracted attention.
In 1991, when Rohwedder was murdered,
I was working for the Düsseldorfer Express
as a crime reporter.
And I'm still there today.
TREUHAND BOSS ROHWEDDER MURDERED!
The attack must have been planned a long time in advance.
The way it was carried out,
it should have attracted attention.
Unfortunately, no police noticed,
and no bodyguards noticed either.
Because there weren't any.
He lived all alone in that house,
and the only time he saw the police
was maybe every four hours when a patrol car passed.
12 DAYS
UNTIL THE MURDER
[narrator] Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigation,
Treuhand Task Force.
Safety precautions were taken at Dr. Rohwedder's house.
It was found that the video surveillance system,
had been switched off on the day of the attack.
The last recordings are from March 21st, 1991.
[Classen] The Rohwedder case has been on my mind ever since then.
And I had always wanted
to talk to Mrs. Rohwedder about it.
There were two telephone interviews with her.
Mrs. Rohwedder complained bitterly,
almost crying on the phone,
that her husband would still be alive today
if more had been done to keep the two of them safe.
[Mrs. Rohwedder] When he was brought back home on Holy Thursday
by his two escorts,
I said that to them
and they responded coolly with,
"What do you expect?
Are we meant to keep coming across the river by boat?
We have covert investigations in place."
I suggested the house be protected with a guard sitting at the door.
They did nothing.
NIGHT OF THE MURDER
[narrator] Now the day of the attack.
The property protection patrol checked
the Rohwedder house on April 1st, 1991 during the late shift
at 15:05 p.m., 17:55 p.m., 20:10 p.m.
There was no check carried out during the night shift.
[Mrs. Rohwedder] There were clear signs that something was brewing.
The phone rang in the night,
and when we picked up, there was silence.
And then the phone rang again.
I looked down. Nothing. There was nobody there.
[Classen] Mrs. Rohwedder was full of bitterness
that nothing had been done.
And three and a half hours later, her husband was dead.
[narrator] Preliminary report of the autopsy of Detlev Karsten Rohwedder.
Bullet lodged in the chest, having entered the back,
directly to the left of the center of the body,
perforating it from the lower left to the upper right.
The thoracic spine has been shot through and shattered
at the level of the fifth thoracic vertebra.
Complete severing of the spinal cord.
Shot through the trachea.
Death caused by internal bleeding.
A difficult photo.
For a career like that to end in that way...
If I can put it like that.
And ultimately it's evidence of the country's incapacity,
that picture.
That it wasn't able
to prevent a person like that
from being killed.
POLICE
[reporter] This evening, 6:00 p.m.
There's a bunch of flowers lying
in front of the Rohwedder house in Oberkassel.
Detlev Karsten Rohwedder, head of the Treuhand,
wasn't given the highest level of police security.
[Hofmeyer] The Dusseldorf Chief of Police didn't protect Rohwedder
the way he should have been protected.
They decided not to do it.
That's a willful act.
There was no coordination.
The State Criminal Police Office in Dusseldorf
was incredibly weak
when it came to fighting terrorism.
It was actually the weakest in the whole of Germany.
[Classen] They all kept saying someone else was responsible.
I got the impression that it was complete chaos.
That also included upgrading the window panes.
There was bulletproof glass installed downstairs,
but not upstairs.
[narrator] Employees of Hoesch, the firm in charge of the safety measures,
explained on the phone
that it was the express wish of the Rohwedder family
for the bullet-resistant glass only to be installed on the ground floor.
[Classen] Mrs. Rohwedder said
that they also wanted the upstairs to be protected.
"That's my husband's office
and we want to have the panes there too."
The Federal Prosecutor General and the Bureau of Criminal Investigation,
who I questioned several times,
refused to provide any information,
saying it would impact Germany's security interests.
[narrator] Lead by the Bureau of Criminal Investigation,
a special Treuhand Task Force was set up in the police HQ in Dusseldorf.
By their own admission, they've made hardly made any progress.
They've received more than 100 tip-offs from the public,
but very few of them were promising.
[Fundermann] Nothing. We had nothing.
We didn't find out if it was men, women, two, three, or five,
whether they came with the train, with a car, a moped,
or with a paddle boat down the Rhine. Nothing.
[Classen] I chartered a helicopter on April 3,
and wanted to document what had happened
from the air.
It cost a grand, but it was interesting.
I flew over the crime scene in the helicopter
because I wanted to know how the perpetrators had got there.
I saw the Rohwedder house underneath me from the air.
I could still see the police barrier tape.
I could still see a lot of patrol cars.
And I could still see a chair,
and it was clearly the chair where the sniper had sat.
[narrator] The sniper had hidden in a community garden.
Armed with a gun, he sat here on this garden chair
until his victim went into the study.
[Classen] They also found binoculars at the crime scene,
a towel, and a letter of confession.
[reporter] The letter of confession that was found at the scene
is still being analyzed.
[Hofmeyer] We deemed the letter to be authentic
and it matched our assumptions.
We said from the start
that if there were an attack on Rohwedder,
we'd expect to receive an explanation like this.
[dramatic music plays]
In their letter confessing to the attack on Rohwedder,
the RAF described
how factories were being bulldozed,
and how the Western system was being imposed on them
without any care for the fate of the people.
Those are the exact words you'll find in the RAF letter.
I can read it to you. I have it here.
[suspenseful music playing]
Subtitle translation by Marisa Pettit