Kretschmann - 'Uncle Herbert.' They call Wehner that to his face?

Guillaume - They don't dare. One look at that face and you can't say anything. It's like eating a persimmon. Your mouth dries. He appears on television and all the cats in Germany run under the sofa.

Wehner Any fool could have seen this coming. We had a good stable coalition with the Christian Democrats.

Ehmke As junior partners! Tied to a party that totally rejects any accommodation with the East!

Wehner We were learning to govern. We're still learning. The party's not ready for office yet. But we pick up a few more votes, and what happens? Without consulting anyone our great captain cuts the tow and lashes us to the Liberals instead. To a leaking old tub of a party that's sinking in front of our eyes. We all knew this government wouldn't last for six months. So then what happens? Fresh elections? The Liberals drop one more point at the polls and they're out of the Bundestag altogether. Then we haven't got a coalition at all.

Guillaume - You're getting all this? The man who's responsible for keeping the coalition going - and he's against it.

Ehmke Herbert treats the party like a china teacup that's too precious ever to drink tea out of.

Wehner Coalitions come and go. Parties remain. A coalition has no roots and no loyalties. A party has members and funds, offices and officers, patronage and punishments. We know we can rely on the loyalty of Herr Guillaume here because we know he's devoted his life to the party - and we know he's going to go on devoting his life to it because his job depends on it. And if any of our lads down there in the parliamentary party begin examining their consciences I'll begin examining their records.

Guillaume - He's got files on all of them.

Wehner I'll get Karl after them. They usually see sense.

Kretschmann - Karl Tromsdorf?

Guillaume - His private security service.

Kretschmann - A highly reliable one. Learnt his trade with us. Old double agent.

Wehner We've told the world we're going to 'dare more democracy.' Whatever that means. Let me tell you what I've learnt from bitter experience about democracy. The more of it you dare, the tighter the grip you have to keep on it. Not something that Number One wants to know about. He likes to look down at the end of a hard day's work and see two clean hands folded on the desk in front of him. But if the plumbing needs fixing someone's got to put their hands down the toilet. Never for one moment do I forget what finished representative government in this country in the thirties. Unstable coalitions, collapsing one after another like soap bubbles. It could happen again. Parliamentary democracy in Germany is still in its infancy. Without two strong legs to stand on it will go down to its enemies. One of those legs, whether we like it or not, is the Christian Democratic Party. The other one is this party of ours. Slowly, slowly, in these last twenty years, we've persuaded the electors to trust us. And now we've put our future into the hands of a dwindling band of dilettantes over whom we have no control at all. The Liberals. The name alone makes my blood run cold.