The debt-to-GDP ratio reached 20% in 1989, a manageable level, but large in relation to the GDR's capacity to export sufficient goods to the West to provide the hard currency to service these debts. In October 1989, a paper prepared for the "Politbüro" (the "Schürer-Papier", after its principal author) projected a need to increase export surplus from around 2 billion DM in 1990 to over 11 billion DM by 1995 to stabilize debt levels. It is doubtful whether such a Herculean effort could have succeeded without political turmoil, or indeed at all.