Erich Honecker agenda now being the composition of the Politburo. Krenz and Mielke attempted by telephone on the night of 16 October to win other Politburo members over to remove Honecker. At the beginning of the session on 17 October, Honecker asked his routine question of “Are there any suggestions for the agenda?” Stoph replied, "Please, General Secretary, Erich, I propose that a new item be placed on the agenda. It is the release of Erich Honecker as General Secretary and the election of Egon Krenz in his place." Honecker reportedly calmly responded: "Well, then I open the debate". All those present
Wolfgang Schäuble head of the Chancellery by Chancellor Helmut Kohl. When in 1986 Soviet press belabored Kohl for having, in a magazine interview, made a comparison between the propaganda skills of Mikhail S. Gorbachev and Joseph Goebbels, Schäuble was reported to have counseled the Chancellor against writing Gorbachev an apology for the remark, saying it would be misunderstood as a sign of weakness. In his capacity as Minister for Special Affairs, Schäuble was put in charge of the preparations for the first official state visit of Erich Honecker, Chairman of the State Council of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), in 1987. By