I love a different style and focus of wargame. A game that takes a look at an important but somewhat obscure or rarely addressed historical topic, such as espionage or intelligence, and creates a gaming experience tailored around the events to highlight and evoke the difficulties and tension that would have been present. In January 2026, GMT Games announced such a game in Checkpoint Charlie, which is a solo or cooperative game focused on SIS espionage missions in Berlin in the 1960’s designed by Russell Brown. We have posted an interview with Russel and it was very well received and he has now agreed to create a series of History Behind the Cards to highlight the events of the 1960’s Cold War struggle in West Germany but also to share aspects about the game play and how it models the history.
*Note: The cards highlighted in this series and their event text, as well as any pictures used showing any of the various components, are still in the design and development process and as such event effects and text might still change prior to final development and publication.Also the art and layout of the cards are only for playtest purposes at this point and the game will enter the art department as it nears publication.
History Behind the Cards – Checkpoint Charlie from GMT Games – Card #4: Faceoff with the Soviets
On August 13th, 1961, in a dramatic move to stop the flow of millions of East Germans defecting to the West, East German police placed miles of barbed wire overnight, cutting off access between East and West Berlin and catching the western powers by surprise. It wasn’t clear what the response of the west would be, and whether it would ultimately lead to the war with the Soviets that many people felt was inevitable.
For days there seemed to be no reaction. West Berlin and Mayor Willie Brandt looked to U.S. President Kennedy to respond quickly and forcefully to the wall, but U.S. troops in Berlin made no move to intervene. Instead, on August 16th, Kennedy sent Vice President, Lyndon Johnson, and General Lucious Clay (more about him on card #6) to deal with the situation. At the same time, he ordered the U.S. 18th Infantry regiment in West Germany to cross East Germany on the autobahn to Berlin, along the access corridor established by the Potsdam Conference. The troops came equipped for battle and paraded through the streets of West Berlin with Johnson and General Clay. This showed U.S. support for Berlin, but did nothing to remove the wall, which quickly turned from barbed wire to concrete.
Over the next two months, disputes arose over the rights of French, British and U.S. troops to travel in the Soviet sector of Berlin, which were also established by the Potsdam Agreement. Tensions came to a head when a U.S. diplomat was stopped at Checkpoint Charlie while crossing into East Berlin. On October 27th, after heated exchanges, mostly between the Soviet Commandant and General Clay, Clay attempted to send another diplomatic mission through Checkpoint Charlie, this time accompanied by ten jeeps full of American soldiers, with ten U.S. tanks in reserve back in West Berlin. The crossing succeeded, but the Soviets responded by sending ten of their own tanks right up to the Checkpoint Charlie crossing. The U.S. tanks moved up to face them.
The standoff lasted nearly a full day, with the tanks and soldiers facing each other, ready for battle. Kennedy and Khrushchev managed to negotiate a resolution and the Soviet tanks pulled back slightly first (presumably because they had moved up to the border first), then the U.S. tanks pulled back. This gradual retreat alternated until the faceoff was at an end and traffic through the checkpoint resumed.
The Faceoff with the Soviets card in Checkpoint Charlie places a Faceoff marker in the Checkpoint Charlie location, which prevents any assets and KGB agents from entering this location during the Movement step of the turn (though some played card effects still allow this). This marker can only be removed by the General Clay Steps In event (card #6).
In the next article in this series, we will take a look at Berlin Film Festival and how its effect caused some issues with various locations operating as Honey Traps about the city.
In my opinion, this game looks extremely interesting and I am very much excited to learn more about it. I am appreciative to Russell and his efforts to bring us these cards and to write these entries to share with our readers. I am also very glad that this topic is being covered in a game and look forward to playing this one day soon.
I love a different style and focus of wargame. A game that takes a look at an important but somewhat obscure or rarely addressed historical topic, such as espionage or intelligence, and creates a gaming experience tailored around the events to highlight and evoke the difficulties and tension that would have been present. In January 2026, GMT Games announced such a game in Checkpoint Charlie, which is a solo or cooperative game focused on SIS espionage missions in Berlin in the 1960’s designed by Russell Brown. We have posted an interview with Russel and it was very well received and he has now agreed to create a series of History Behind the Cards to highlight the events of the 1960’s Cold War struggle in West Germany but also to share aspects about the game play and how it models the history.
*Note: The cards highlighted in this series and their event text, as well as any pictures used showing any of the various components, are still in the design and development process and as such event effects and text might still change prior to final development and publication.Also the art and layout of the cards are only for playtest purposes at this point and the game will enter the art department as it nears publication.
History Behind the Cards – Checkpoint Charlie from GMT Games – Card #3: Demonstrations
West Berlin, and West Germany as a whole, spawned a number of large, very active student demonstration organizations in the late 1960’s. These were generally in response to a perceived return to very traditional German authoritarian government, and specifically as a reaction to former members of the Nazi party, like Chancellor Kiesinger, serving in the Bonn government.
However, during the slightly earlier time period of Checkpoint Charlie (early 1962 to late 1963), demonstrations were not as organized. They were spontaneous and in response to specific events, like the Speigel Affair (Card #16) and President Kennedy’s Visit (Card #7). As with those later, more organized movements, they consisted primarily of young Germans, and the universities acted as catalysts and staging areas. Even during the period of this game, marches and demonstrations were common enough to warrant an event card.
As a side note, Chancellor Keisinger, who’s Nazi affiliation spawned some of those later protests, was replaced as Chancellor of West Germany in 1969 by Willie Brandt, who was mayor of West Berlin during the period of Checkpoint Charlie. Mayor Brandt has his own token in the game and plays a role in a few of the missions.
The Demonstrations Event Card places a special Demonstrations marker in one of the West Berlin locations on the map. Demonstrations could last for hours, or even days, so this marker generally remains on the City Map for the rest of the mission. East Berlin locations are not eligible because the Stasi secret police, along with the confinement imposed by the Berlin Wall, had effectively suppressed any open opposition in the East. In game terms, the Demonstrations marker provides some cover for assets, increasing their chances of passing both detection and compromise saves.
In the next article in this series, we will take a look at Faceoff with the Soviets when East German police placed barbed wire barriers to stop East Germans from defecting.
In my opinion, this game looks extremely interesting and I am very much excited to learn more about it. I am appreciative to Russell and his efforts to bring us these cards and to write these entries to share with our readers. I am also very glad that this topic is being covered in a game and look forward to playing this one day soon.
I love a different style and focus of wargame. A game that takes a look at an important but somewhat obscure or rarely addressed historical topic, such as espionage or intelligence, and creates a gaming experience tailored around the events to highlight and evoke the difficulties and tension that would have been present. In January 2026, GMT Games announced such a game in Checkpoint Charlie, which is a solo or cooperative game focused on SIS espionage missions in Berlin in the 1960’s designed by Russell Brown. We have posted an interview with Russel and it was very well received and he has now agreed to create a series of History Behind the Cards to highlight the events of the 1960’s Cold War struggle in West Germany but also to share aspects about the game play and how it models the history.
*Note: The cards highlighted in this series and their event text, as well as any pictures used showing any of the various components, are still in the design and development process and as such event effects and text might still change prior to final development and publication.Also the art and layout of the cards are only for playtest purposes at this point and the game will enter the art department as it nears publication.
History Behind the Cards – Checkpoint Charlie from GMT Games – Card #1: Cousins Operation
The British SIS wasn’t the only intelligence agency operating in Berlin in the 1960’s, not by a longshot. The Potsdam Agreement of 1945 had divided Germany into allied occupation zones, with West Berlin itself divided into British, French and American sectors for administration and military presence, but those boundaries in no way restricted the activities of intelligence organizations in the city. The US Central Intelligence Agency had the largest presence.
The remarkably close relationship between US and British intelligence was formalized in 1946 under the British-US Communications Intelligence Agreement (BRUSA). It became the UKUSA agreement in 1955, including Canada, New Zealand and Australia (the “Five Eyes”), and still stands today. The term “cousins” was used within the British and American intelligence communities to refer to their counterparts from the other agencies, in reference to their longstanding Special Relationship. There were notable examples of not just coordination, but cooperation among the agencies, like Operation Gold – a joint operation in the 1950’s to tunnel beneath the city and tap into the landline communication of the Soviet Army headquarters in Berlin.
This relationship was formalized in the rules of a much earlier version of Checkpoint Charlie, with a specific step in the turn sequence when SIS assets could call upon the CIA for assistance, though with increased risk of detection. However, even with liaison officers and daily intelligence briefings between the two agencies, it was impossible to inform the other service of every aspect of day-to-day activities, let alone coordinate at a task level, so I removed that interaction.
This card represents a CIA operation in one of the locations in the city that has come to the attention of the KGB and was unknown to SIS case officers. This card places a marker that makes it more difficult for SIS assets to operate in the location, as indicated by the negative detection save modifier, and also draws a KGB Agent closer to that location.
In the next article in this series, we will take a look at the Cuban Missile Crisis and how the status of Berlin, even though it is located halfway around the world, effected things on the world stage.
In my opinion, this game looks extremely interesting and I am very much excited to learn more about it. I am appreciative to Russell and his efforts to bring us these cards and to write these entries to share with our readers. I am also very glad that this topic is being covered in a game and look forward to playing this one day soon.
Some caveats ahead: The chancellors will be rated by the knowledge of their time. If they or their contemporaries could not have known about the effects of something, I will not use my hindsight to mark it as a mistake of theirs. The assessment is focused on their conduct as chancellor, but includes their life after holding the office (in which they will still be regarded in the public eye as (ex-)chancellors).
Now, to the system itself: There are three policy field categories (foreign, domestic, and economic policy) and three more general ones (vision, pragmatism, integrity). A chancellor can earn from one to five stars in each category (for a total sum of up to 30). In detail, the chancellor is assessed as follows:
Foreign policy: Did the chancellor increase German influence in the world and the security of Germans at home? Did the chancellor wield German power responsibly and with positive results for the regions affected (the latter counting for a greater deal in times of German power being great)?
Domestic policy: Did the chancellor increase the liberty of Germans to express themselves and to participate in the political process? Did the chancellor promote domestic security and shape the framework for fair justice dealing with offenses?
Economic policy: Did the chancellor facilitate the prosperity and economic security of Germans (including in the mid- and long-term)? Was the chancellor’s economic policy based on mutual benefit of those involved or did it unduly burden one side?
Vision: Did the chancellor have an idea of what Germany and Europe (the latter counting for more in times of German influence being great) should look like beyond the immediate future? Did the chancellor’s policies steer Germany (and, if applicable, Europe) in this direction?
Pragmatism: Did the chancellor succeed in seeing their policy through from inception to completion? How well did the chancellor manage the support from parliament, society, the administration, the media (the latter counting for more in more recent years)?
Integrity: Did the chancellor understand the office as a means to benefit themselves, special interest groups, the entire country, or another community? Did the chancellor respect the boundaries of the office?
Note: If you have read my UK prime minister or US president ratings, you will remember that I rated them on the global impacts of their vision as well. As the rating system is only really applicable to democratic leaders and no democratic German leader ever had the chance to conduct a truly global policy, I only assess their vision on national and European grounds.
Brandt’s Life
Willy Brandt was born on December 18, 1913, as Herbert Frahm. He adopted the name under which he would become famous in his Norwegian exile, after he had fled Germany to escape the Nazi persecution of socialists. Brandt returned to Germany after World War II – and also to German politics. He was elected a member of German parliament in 1949 and mayor of Berlin in 1957.
As mayor, Brandt was on the frontline of the Cold War. He weathered the Berlin Crisis of 1958 and the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, each time acting as a symbolic bulwark of liberty against Soviet encroachment. His party, the Social Democratic SPD, nominated him for the chancellorship in the elections of 1961 and 1965. While Brandt lost each time to the Christian Democratic incumbent (first Konrad Adenauer, then Ludwig Erhard), the SPD’s share of the vote increased each time he ran.
When the coalition between the Christian Democrats and the pro-business Liberals fell apart in 1966, Brandt’s Social Democrats finally entered the federal government as part of a “grand coalition” with the Christian Democrats. Brandt became vice chancellor and foreign minister. Three years later, after another strong Social Democratic showing at the election, Brandt formed a coalition with the Liberals and was elected chancellor – the first Social Democrat since the late days of the Weimar Republic.
The new alliance with the Liberals was based on two pillars: First, both parties sought domestic reform after two decades of socially conservative Christian Democratic chancellors which had been increasingly out of touch with their modernizing, sometimes rebellious, society. Brandt was particularly sensitive to these social currents and incorporated them into his administration’s agenda, labelled “Mehr Demokratie wagen” (Take a Chance on More Democracy).
Second, Brandt had a less misty-eyed look at the division of Germany and Germany’s post-war situation than many of his contemporaries. He accepted the division as an undeniable fact and the German territories incorporated into the Soviet Union and Poland after World War II as irretrievably lost. On this basis, he sought a new understanding with the Soviet Union and East Germany as well as Poland, Nazi Germany’s first victim in World War II. This new approach – (Neue) Ostpolitik ((New) Eastern Policy), as it was called – was to bring tangible benefits to the inhabitants of both German states and effect a long-term change, which would keep the door for German reunification open and help to re-admit Germany into the international community. Brandt accompanied the treaties he made with symbolic gestures – most spectacularly, his kneeling at the Memorial of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, widely understood to be a recognition of Germany’s guilt, symbolically taken on by a man who had not been personally guilty.
Brandt’s new foreign policy was controversial. The Christian Democratic opposition charged him with selling out the fatherland for his recognition of Germany’s post-war territorial losses. They motioned for a vote of no confidence, but failed to rally a parliamentary majority around their preferred candidate for chancellor, Rainer Barzel. Brandt called for snap elections which he turned into a plebiscite on him and his foreign policy. The electorate responded enthusiastically. Both Social Democrats and Liberals fared better than in 1969, and Brandt was returned as chancellor with an enlarged majority.
The 1972 was the high-water mark of Brandt’s chancellorship. Disagreement in the coalition about economic and fiscal policy after the end of the Bretton Woods system, during which Brandt seemed to be aloof even though two ministers of finance resigned (eventually, the ambitious Helmut Schmidt took the post), was exacerbated by the 1973 oil crisis. The increased energy costs further fueled inflation (which had been high before already), and the resulting demands for wage hikes threatened to send the country into a wage-price spiral (and, in the case of West Germany’s millions of public employees, directly affect public spending).
The coup de grace for Brandt’s chancellorship came from another direction, though. When Brandt’s aide Günter Guillaume was exposed as an East German spy, Brandt resigned on May 6, 1974. His cabinet ministers and the SPD parliamentary group did not lift a finger to stop him. Helmut Schmidt was elected chancellor, continuing the coalition with the Liberals.
Brandt remained chairman of the Social Democratic Party, in which he was still tremendously popular, until 1987. He was elected Chairman of the Socialist International in 1976 and revived this forum of the democratic socialist parties of the world.
Brandt’s foreign policy as chancellor would see itself crowned with success when the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and Germany was reunited the year after. The intra-German détente had been instrumental in the East German leadership’s decision to quietly step down instead of cracking down on the protests as the Chinese Communists had done. Brandt was content to see it. He died on October 8, 1992, in the united Germany he had helped bring about, in the democratic Germany he had shaped.
The Rating
Foreign policy:
Brandt’s Ostpolitik was equally daring and successful. He threw out tenets of West Germany foreign policy like the iron rule of no direct talks with the East German government and the claim to the former eastern territories of Germany and instead established a new foreign policy world of German negotiations across Cold War borders. Brandt’s approach tangibly improved the life of Germans on both sides of the Wall through eased transit regulations while laying a foundation for further peaceful exchange – borders were declared inviolable (but not immutable!) – which kept the door for reunification open. At the same time, Brandt improved West Germany’s standing in the world, which helped with the country’s admittance to the United Nations in 1973 and netted Brandt the Nobel Peace Prize in 1971. Finally, Brandt re-started the Franco-German Rapprochement which resulted in the enlargement of the European Community (1973) and paved the way for the founding of the European Union.
Brandt’s far-reaching domestic reform program was ambitious. Some of his more notable projects:
The legal (and voting) age was lowered from 21 to 18, levelling the gap between civic rights and civic duties (the conscription age had already been 18)
Divorce did not require assigning guilt to one spouse anymore
Abortion was decriminalized (while technically still forbidden), a delicate compromise which persists until today
Democracy was extended from the purely political to other spheres of life, most notably by strengthening institutionalized labor representatives in companies (Betriebsräte, work councils)
The reform agenda did not only increase civic liberties, it was also crucial for integrating most of the rebellious youth of 1968 into German society. The few that turned to revolutionary violence were successfully opposed by Brandt with the centralization of the police which was instrumental to the arrest of the first generation of the RAF terrorists. In some respects, Brandt’s measures to defend democracy against radicals went too far, though: His “Radicals Decree” mandated extensive background checks on all (prospective) public servants. While theoretically ideologically neutral, the decree targeted only leftists in practice and was in stark contrast to the many former Nazi officials who had continued their careers with nary a dent after 1945.
Brandt’s economic record is mixed: On the one hand, his strengthening of labor representation in companies contributed to West Germany weathering the crisis of the mid- to late 1970s better than most other industrialized economies, and with fewer rifts in the social fabric. This mixed record is neatly exemplified by the cards representing the 1970s steel crisis on the one hand and the boom of the German car industry on the other – West Germany’s economy in the 1970s can go either way!
Despite this overall success, Brandt’s individual economic decisions were not always sound: He expanded public expenses when classical liberal, budding monetarist, and even Keynesian economics would have called for budget cuts to combat inflation. Germans were haunted by the specter of 1923. He meddled in collective bargaining, calling on the trade unions to forgo wage increases in an age of high inflation and high corporate profit increases (and, unsurprisingly, failed, further damaging his reputation in 1974).
Brandt’s economic policy is best captured in his decision to flexibilize the retirement age: While that improved the well-being of those able to retire earlier (and would help to keep unemployment in check in the economically anemic 1970s and 1980s), it put a cost on the working population and the taxpayers who had to shoulder higher expenses for pensions.
Brandt, however, offered a vision out of the economic woes: In his 1972 inauguration address, he favored improving the “quality of life” over growth or GDP numbers. This post-materialistic outlook was ahead of its time.
Rating: 3 out of 5.
Vision:
Brandt envisioned a broadly democratic, unified Germany. His domestic reform agenda helped to bring the former closer to perfection; his foreign policy laid the groundwork for the latter. Neither would have been realistically imaginable to an observer in the 1960s.
Brandt enjoyed a complex relationship with his sources of power. As West Germany’s first real media chancellor, he enjoyed a veritable hype during his first term, before the press dropped him in the second. He was popular with the electorate and able to form a lasting government coalition (which endured for another eight years after his resignation), but could not hold on to the reins under pressure: He left challenges to his leadership from the SPD parliamentary party and his ministers unchecked, something which his challengers interpreted as weakness. When he needed allies during the Guillaume affair, he had none willing to fight for him.
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Integrity:
Brandt earnestly attempted to improve life for all Germans on both sides of the Wall. His government engaged in fewer give-and-take with the traditional interest groups of West Germany (the farmers’ associations, the churches, the employers, and even the traditional trade union allies of the Social Democrats) than those of his predecessors. Still, the increased public spending of his government enabled many left-leaning liberals to carve out a niche for themselves at state-sponsored projects dear to their heart. Even though Brandt had been harshly attacked by his political opponents for having been in exile and was left in the lurch by his allies, he treated his political partners reliably and collegially, careful not to exceed the boundaries of his office. When they went low, he went high.
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Summary
Brandt’s impact much exceeds his relatively short time in office. His domestic reforms let Germany catch up with the social changes, his new foreign policy was quietly extended even by the Christian Democrats after their return to power. His shortcomings, especially his casual handling of the office, precluded a longer Brandt chancellorship and thus his chance to fully shape an era. He thus places in the top group of ranked leaders, but slightly behind the leaders of the pack.
How would you rate Brandt? Let me know in the comments!
Further Reading
For short overview essays on all German chancellors from Bismarck on, see Sternburg, Wilhelm von: Die deutschen Kanzler. Von Bismarck bis Merkel[The German Chancellors. From Bismarck to Merkel], Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin 2006 (in German).
A concise biography of Willy Brandt is Marshall, Barbara: Willy Brandt. A Political Biography, Macmillan, London 1997.
For the context of Germany’s tumultuous history, see Herbert, Ulrich: A History of Twentieth-Century Germany, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2019.
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