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Germany
Learn
languages (via Skype): Rainer: + 36 20 549 52 97 or + 36 20 334 79 74
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Germany
The Alps in the south, the Rhine
in the west, the Polish lowlands in the east, the North Sea, the Jutish
Peninsula (today Danmark) and the Baltic Sea in the north.
This is Germany, a multinational
society, at least in the big cities, and the economic engine of Europe with a
respected, female head of government, for most economic migrants the dream of
the future.
Very early, long before our era,
the first Indo-European groups came to the area around the Baltic sea,
these were Germanic tribes. They were fishermen, hunters, sometimes farmers,
but above all, like most peoples of cold regions at that time, warriors.
Julius Caesar described them as tall and mostly blond. For the educated Roman
probably just primitive barbarians who lived in holes in the ground.
However, Augustus had to learn
that these inhabitants of the rough wilderness could work together, such as
under the leadership of Armin the Cheruscan (later in High German: Herman der
Cherusker). The Teutons lured the Roman legions into the Teutoburg forest,
where the Romans could not use their effective turtle formation, and attacked
the Italian invaders from all sides. About 60 years later, under Emperor
Titus, the miserable remains of these legions were found, nobody had survived,
not even one soldier, that could have informed Rome of their fate. At the end
of the 19th century, German chauvinists should claim that this had been the
sign of the first Germans.
Furthermore, not much happened
until the Migration Period of the 4th and 5th century. New peoples flocked into
Europe from the east, this got everything moving and under the ever
increasing pressure, the 1000-year-old Roman Empire collapsed. Many Teutons
had served in Attila's conglomerate army, and the Romans also used Teutonic
warriors. The Romans paid them, Attila promised them rich booty.
When these waves subsided, the
Franconian Empire emerged, and after the death of Charlemagne it was divided
into three parts. France, the Middle Kingdom and Germany. In the Treaty of
Verdun 843 the word "Teutons" and "Teutonic" appeared for
the first time, from which the word "German" (Deutsch) was later to
be derived. The western and eastern empires divided the middle empire, which
led to a century-long dispute in the case of Alsace-Lorraine, for example.
Then the Eastern Empire grew
stronger, even conquered northern Italy, brought the Vatican under her
control and took over the imperial crown. The term "the Holy Roman
Empire of German Nation" (Heiliges Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation) was
not born until 1474 and 1512, and then used to satisfy German chauvinists.
The investiture controversy between
the king and the church (who appoints the church dignitaries), the
strengthening of the princes and landlords, or the free cities, all this
slowly led to a breakdown of central power, perhaps the Germans who did not
yet know that they were Germans wanted to be free rather than big.
Austria took over the imperial
crown and Germany looked like a patchwork with many small local rulers.
Unfortunately, the freedom mentioned above was limited to the aristocrats;
They levied ever higher taxes and tariffs, that way preventing the free flow
of goods and thus economic development, which could have been promoted by a
large market and competition.
First the plague and then the
30-year war changed the picture. But this European war on German soil brought
the end of Catholic Habsburg hegemony and the breakthrough of Protestantism.
This new religious movement brought a restructuring in society, a
secularization of life and a new definition of work: It was no longer a
punishment to work, but a way to prepare the coming paradise on earth.
The crusades were possible
through religious zeal, the modern state of authority through discipline. A
small principality, Prussia, in the heart of East Germany, first incorporated her small neighbours and then attacked her larger opponents. Perhaps Napoleon
had also learned something from it and made it even better. After the
restoration in 1816, Prussia's power grew rapidly.
With the victory over France in
1870/71 it was clear to the Germans that all of Germany should be united
under her leadership. The only question was whether it should be a small
German or a Greater German solution with Austria. But 2 rulers in the empire
are too unstable. The British prime minister of that time, Disraeli, saw the
German Junker, Bismarck, as an opportunity to cause so much strife in Europe
that Austria, France and Russia were bound to Europe and that England could
maintain its own leadership globally (balance of power-policy).
The hunger of Prussia and the
emerging new German empire for power was insatiable, and the unified German
market only intensified this feeling. Prussia also wanted to compete with
England at sea. The First World War brought these tensions to an end and the
U.S.A. entered the world stage. Germany lost the war and the Prussian royal
leadership fled, it did not return.
In the first post-war years,
council or soviet republics were established in many parts of the country.
But the industrialists and many abroad were afraid of the people. And after
the economic crisis of 1929, they found their leader, Hitler, in 1933. They
thought they could keep him at bay, but ended up being carried away or
intimidated by him.
Of course, this little
"Great Germany" or "3rd Reich” (1: The Roman Empire, 2: The
Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, 3: The Third Reich) could not win the
war against the whole world. However, the Germans also added another guilt:
the annihilation of 6 million people, including Jews, Gypsies, and members of
the opposition in concentration camps. Not to speak of the millions of soldiers and civilians who
died all over the world. Most inmates in the concentration camps were starved
to death or weakened by illnesses in inadequate barracks, many in gas
chambers that were probably used to test the latest war gases on them, or in
experimental hospitals where the cruelest medical experiments were carried out, or
just tormented.
It is difficult to guess what
could drive a whole people into this madness; And the wiser who did not act
or acted to late. I can understand that everyone wants to survive and prefers not to open their mouths. But most actively participated, and countries like
Hungary jumped on the “triumphal march”.
The nightmare lasted around 12 years, then, the big awakening came. The German nationalists
had left a pile of rubble.
Germany was physically destroyed
and the mental wounds were deep. The country was divided into 4 zones of
occupation, the Russian, the English, the French and the American. In 1949,
there were the first elections in the united western zones. However, it was
not the left-wing Democrats, some of whom had died in the concentration camps
for Germany that won the elections, but the right-wing participants and foot
lickers. Hadn't the Germans learned anything? Hadn't the horrors of war been
enough? People like Berthold Brecht, for example, preferred to go to the simultaneously
emerging GDR (eastern Germany).
It took around 15 years before
socialist Willi Brandt was elected; He expressed what many at home and abroad
thought: "I am the first chancellor who was not a Nazi." And he
brought about the opening in foreign policy when he made a state visit to
Warsaw and knelt down in front of the memorial for the deceased Polish soldiers
of World War II. Germany had thus regained part of her dignity.
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Sonntag, 2. August 2020
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