‘Bother, it’s becoming more and more rocky’. In 1955, in the satirical East German magazine Eulenspiegel, cartoonist Kurt Poltiniak deplores the efforts of West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and French Prime Minister Pierre Mendès France to make progress on the issue of rearmament in the Federal Republic of Germany. The government authorities in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) are concerned at the danger of a return of West German militarism. In the sentry box pushed by the two Western leaders, we can see a soldier in Wehrmacht uniform looking threatening and armed with a bayonet rifle.