German Leaders Research Articles

War by Revolution: Germany and Great Britain in the Middle East in the Era of World War I

A comprehensive study of the World War I rivalry between Germany and Great Britain in the Middle East. Donald M. McKale examines how both countries waged by revolution, attempting to incite native peoples to revolt against the other. German leaders believed that in the event of a among European powers, they could organize and exploit a unified Islam. In addition to assisting the Ottomans militarily in the war, they collaborated with the Turks in appealing to pan-Islamism - a doctrine that proclaimed the sultan-caliph's religious authority over all the world's Muslims - to stoke the fire of native Muslim revolts against the British in Egypt and India, and they inflamed anti-British passions in the Turkish provinces of Arabia and Mesopotamia and in Libya, Abyssinia, Persia and Afghanistan. Key British leaders panicked after defeats at Gallipoli and in Mesopotamia. They feared pan-Islamism and a holy war directed against Britain's control of Muslim lands and its rule in India. With the help of T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), they assisted the Arab Revolt of 1916 that contributed to the defeat of Turkey. At the war's end, Britain (and France) purposely destroyed the Turkish empire and divided its former lands among themselves and the Arabs. In the long term, however, McKale concludes that the German in the Middle East helped to weaken Britain's global empire.

Former East German Leaders Take Their Criminal Convictions to the European Court of Human Rights

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German Identity and European Integration

Although the structural constraints facing Germany shifted dramatically with the end of the Cold War and reunification, the direction of its European policy did not. The more powerful Federal Republic continued to press for deeper economic and political integration, eschewing a more independent or assertive foreign policy course. Neorealism, neoliberalism and liberalism cannot adequately explain this continuity in the face of structural change. This article sets out a constructivist account centered around the effects of German state identity. It develops a two-step analytical framework designed to pinpoint the content of state identity and establish its effects on state action, and then applies it to the German case. In the wake of reunification, German leaders across the political spectrum identified the Federal Republic as part of an emergent supranational community. This European identity, with roots in the postwar decades, drove Germany's unflagging support for deeper integration across the 1989-90 divide.

Heisenberg and the Nazi Atomic Bomb Project: A Study in German Culture

No one better represents the plight and the conduct of German intellectuals under Hitler than Werner Heisenberg, whose task it was to build an atomic bomb for Nazi Germany. The controversy surrounding Heisenberg still rages, because of the nature of his work and the regime for which it was undertaken. What precisely did Heisenberg know about the physics of the atomic bomb? How deep was his loyalty to the German government during the Third Reich? Assuming that he had been able to build a bomb, would he have been willing? These questions, the moral and the scientific, are answered by Paul Lawrence Rose with greater accuracy and breadth of documentation than any other historian has yet achieved. Digging deep into the archival record among formerly secret technical reports, Rose establishes that Heisenberg never overcame certain misconceptions about nuclear fission, and as a result the German leaders never pushed for atomic weapons. In fact, Heisenberg never had to face the moral problem of whether he should design a bomb for the Nazi regime. Only when he and his colleagues were interned in England and heard about Hiroshima did Heisenberg realize that his calculations were wrong. He began at once to construct an image of himself as a 'pure' scientist who could have built a bomb but chose to work on reactor design instead. This was fiction, as Rose demonstrates: in reality, Heisenberg blindly supported and justified the cause of German victory. The question of why he did, and why he misrepresented himself afterwards, is answered through Rose's subtle analysis of German mentality and the scientists' problems of delusion and self-delusion. This fascinating study is a profound effort to understand one of the twentieth century's great enigmas.

Hitler, Intelligence and the Decision to Remilitarize the Rhine

Why did Hitler reoccupy the Rhine in 1936, when Germany was still weak? On Saturday, 7 March 1936, Adolf Hitler marched German troops into the hitherto demilitarized zone on the Rhine's left bank and in doing so launched his boldest 'Saturday Surprise' to date. Against the more cautious advice of his generals, Hitler risked embroiling Germany in a war at a time when her military might was insufficient to repel a French retaliation. A French counterattack and victory would have been a major setback for Germany's revisionist aims and a serious defeat for Hitler's young regime. Yet no French countermeasures occurred, no strong western responses were forthcoming, and Hitler's success raised him to new heights of popularity with the German people. What led Hitler to take such bold action? Historians have often asserted that Hitler merely sensed Allied weakness. Unlike his generals, who studied French troop strength and counted numbers of divisions in the field, Hitler employed his intuition and instinctively sensed the democracies' reluctance to act. Hitler did indeed possess intuition, but was his instinct the principal factor in his decision to reoccupy the Rhine? There is no question that Hitler intended from early on to cast off the shackles of Versailles and the reoccupation of the demilitarized zone represented an essential step in that process. It was a goal shared by most German leaders. Yet to march troops into the Rhine before German rearmament had reached parity with France was generally considered unwise. The German Foreign Minister, however, Constantin Freiherr von Neurath, consistently urged the Chancellor onward. When others in Hitler's inner circle proved reticent, Neurath remained steadfast in his conviction that France would not retaliate. In doing so he took a considerable risk with regard to his own political career. Neurath's assurances were based not merely on his own political instincts, but upon accurate intelligence on French political and military leaders. Trusting in the accuracy of his ministry's reports, Neurath felt emboldened to encourage the Rhine coup. Gottfried Aschmann, Chief of the Foreign Ministry's Press Division, obtained sensitive information on French political and military attitudes towards a German reoccupation of the demilitarized zone. His report of 10 January 1936 to Legation Adviser Gustav Braun von Stumm quickly found its

Germany's troublesome devotion

The nature of Germany's devotion to national self‐determination has undergone a fundamental transformation in this century. German leaders advocated national self‐determination, first, as a means to blatantly selfish ends, but then as an end in itself, namely, as the cornerstone of a lasting European peace order. The evolution of German foreign policy priorities from the interwar period to the post‐Cold‐War era illustrates some of the inherent shortcomings of embracing self‐determination as a path to peace. In particular, Germany's controversial advocacy of the right to national self‐determination for Croatia and Slovenia in 1991 demonstrated that even a sincere devotion to this concept can produce more suffering than peace. One of the tragedies of the 20th century is that national self‐determination and ethnic cleansing have been the preferred solutions to nationalist conflict. Today there is reason for optimism in that the Europeans have learned that only a firm international commitment to the rights of minority ethnic populations offers a real path to peace.

Political leadership in Western Europe: Helmut Kohl in comparative context

The German Chancellorship is one of the key political offices in western European liberal democracies. This article situates Chancellor Helmut Kohl's leadership in the more general perspective of the study of political leadership in western Europe. After an introduction to approaches to the study of political leadership, and an historical overview of the chancellorship of Helmut Kohl, the article evaluates Kohl's leadership in comparative perspective, both by comparing the German chancellor with his British, French and Italian counterparts, as well as situating him by reference to past German leaders.

The past in the present: Historical memory and German national security policy

In recent years a number of scholars and commentators have suggested that freed of the constraints placed upon it by the Cold War, Germany is likely to aspire to a more active, great power role. This article argues that such predictions overlook the extent to which German national security policy continues to be burdened by the lessons that its population drew from the Second World War and that make it profoundly difficult for any German leader to implement a more active defence and national security policy.

Germany and peace enforcement: Participating in IFOR

Six years after reunification, few observers would argue that Germany is anything but a contributor to international peace and stability. Building on the Cold War era traditions of the Federal Republic, the foreign policy of the newly unified Germany remains anchored in a commitment to multilateral security organisations. Moreover, many German leaders now argue that their country should no longer be unnaturally burdened by its history and that it should, as a consequence, assume a more appropriate range of international responsibilities.1 The advocacy of increased international responsibilities is very apparent in the role that Germany has sought to play within the international efforts to resolve the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia.2 During those conflicts, German policy sought to demonstrate leadership within the international community while avoiding a direct ground-based military commitment to the United Nations peacekeeping efforts. As the first major European crisis following reunification unfolded, Bonn at first attempted to lead from the front. In the summer of 1991, Germany called for the active participation of the European Community (then EC, now European Union or EU), the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (then CSCE, now Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe or OSCE) and the Western European Union (WEU) to find a peaceful solution to the growing violence among the republics of the former Yugoslavia. It was the subsequent failure of the 1991 Hague Conference' that led Bonn to pressurize the European Union (EU) to recognize the independence of Croatia and Slovenia. International criticism that that action had exacerbated the situation in the former Yugoslavia and, moreover, the charge that it was 'throwing its weight around' within the EU, led the Federal Republic to alter its approach. During the subsequent four years, it adopted the role of a 'helpful fixer', operating behind the scenes in the pursuit of a negotiated peace settlement. To some degree, Bonn has been successful in that endeavour. In particular, its proposal to create the Contact Group in early 1994 mitigated the serious The views expressed are those of the authors.

Zusammenarbeit and Spoluprace: Sudeten German-Czech Cooperation in Interwar Czechoslovakia

On 22 December 1918 Tomáš G. Masaryk delivered his first political message as president of the fledgling Czechoslovakia. Addressing the Constituent Assembly at Hradčany in Prague, he vowed that the frontier districts of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia, which contained a predominantly German-speaking population (and which German nationalists eventually designated collectively as the Sudetenland) would remain in the new Republic. Inimical toward and unwilling to live in a state dedicated to the sovereignty of Czechs and Slovaks, virtually all German leaders at the time of Masaryk's address were working to separate German districts from Czechoslovakia and link them with Austria.

East German Communists and the Jewish Question: The Case of Paul Merker

Before 1945 most German communists, and after 1945 most East German communists, viewed 'the Jewish question', that is, the whole complex of anti-semitism, the Holocaust and the place of the Jews in Germany and Europe, as peripheral to the main drama of class struggle and anti-fascism.' Before and after 1945, there existed a minority communist tradition in which the Jewish question was central. By January 1953, following Paul Merker's arrest the previous month, the East German dictatorship had crushed this tradition. As the East German communists sought, after 1945, to establish their legitimacy as German leaders, they rejected association with the Jews, still the great 'other' and pre-eminent outsider of German nationalism.

Germany Divided: From the Wall to Reunification, by A. James McAdams

Germany Divided is the first comprehensive scholarly interpretation of the forty-year relationship between East and West Germany and of the problems of contemporary German unity. When the Berlin Wall was opened on November 9, 1989, there was widespread surprise at the rush to unification: Germany was reuniting just when almost everyone, political participant and observer alike, had become accustomed to it being divided. In this politically controversial and analytically sophisticated account, A. James McAdams dissects the complex process by which East and West German leaders moved over the years from first pursuing the ideal of German unity, to accepting what they believed to be the inescapable reality of division, and then, finally, to meeting the challenges of an unanticipated reunification. In addition to relevant primary and secondary materials, including archival holdings in both German states, McAdams draws on an unprecedented series of interviews conducted throughout the 1980s and early 1990s with officials of the Federal Chancellery, the Foreign Office, and the Ministry of Intra-German Relations of the Federal Republic in Bonn, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the SED Central Committee of the German Democratic Republic in East Berlin. With this unique access to information on high-level decision making, he chronicles an era when the restoration of German unity appeared anything but assured.

Nazism, liberalism, and Christianity: Protestant social thought in Germany and Great Britain, 1925-1937

The Great Depression devastated the economies of both Germany and Great Britain. Yet the middle classes in the two countries responded in vastly different ways. German Protestants, perceiving a choice among a Bolshevik-style revolution, the chaos and decadence of Weimar liberalism, and Nazi authoritarianism, voted Hitler into power and then acquiesced in the resulting dictatorship. In Britain, Labour and Tory politicians moved gingerly together to form a National Government that muddled through the Depression with piecemeal reform.In this troubling book about troubled times, Kenneth Barnes looks into the question of how theologians and church leaders contributed to a cultural matrix that predisposed Protestants in these two countries to very different political alternatives. Holding fast to the liberal social gospel, British churchmen diagnosed the problems of the 1920s and the Depression ao solvable and called for genuine reforms, many of which foreshadowed the coming welfare state. German leaders, in contrast, were terrified by the socioeconomic and political problems of the Weimar era and offered no social message or solution. Despairingly, they referred the problems to secular politicians and after 1933 beat the drum for obedience to the Nazi state.Based on extensive research in European archives, especially the rich papers of the interwar ecumenical movement housed at the World Council of Churches in Geneva, this book examines key intellectual figures such as Karl Barth, Paul Tillich, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Archbishop William Temple, as well as many lesser known church officials and theologians. Barnes brings to life the intellectual struggles and dilemmas of the interwar period to help explain why good people could, for moral and religious reasons, choose opposing courses of political action.

Woodrow Wilson, Revolutionary Germany, and Peacemaking, 1918-1919: Missionary Diplomacy and the Realities of Power

Schwabe examines the political, economic, and ideological motivations that prompted American and German leaders to adopt strategies that led to discord during this period of transition from war to peace in the international field and from monarchy to republic in Germany. He disputes the interpretation that Wilson betrayed his ideals at Versailles and the thesis that a secret conspiracy between the United States and Germany attempted to contain the Bolshevik threat. Originally published in 1985. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

Social Events and Social Science: a Personal Case Report on Open‐ended Causality

THE OUTLOOK OF ALL MEMBERS OF THE GENERATION OF social scientists contributing to this issue certainly bears the imprint of the upsurge of National Socialism and the chain of events this entailed and which led to the Second world War. On their part, these events are directly embedded in the aftermath of the First World War which began with the Bolshevik Revolution and was in many respects overshadowed by it. Some specificality of my way of relating to the more immediate background is accounted for by the fact that I experienced the events as a German Jew who decided to join in the return to the Jewish homeland, then Palestine. Furthermore, I left Germany in 1936 not only as a Zionist but also as a ‘Bernsteinist’ revisionist who remained unshaken in his belief that ‘Weimar’ had not suffered defeat as the result of a basic systemic weakness of liberal democracy which could accommodate social reform acceptable to an electoral majority. Ineptitude, shortsightedness and above all the lack of toughness of the German leaders dedicated to the democratic republic were one set of factors that made possible the victory of the Nazis.

Weimar Republic and Nazi Era in East German Perspective

Communist countries are notably history-minded. Since they see mankind as advancing toward socialism and communism as part of a law-determined historical process, they base their legitimacy in large part on historical antecedents. East Germany, being faced with the opposing claims of West Germany, has been particularly concerned with establishing its historical legitimacy. The German Democratic Republic (GDR) traces its roots back into a distant past, along a road on which medieval peasant risings, socioreligious upheavals, Reformation and Peasants' War, the War of Liberation against Napoleon I, and the revolutions of 1848 and 1918 stand as significant milestones. Perhaps no Communist leadership ever did its homework in history more thoroughly prior to its assumption of power than did the East German leaders. From the mid-1930s on, in their Moscow exile, they devoted considerable attention to the exploration of historical questions from the Marxist perspective; later, Marxist historians and Communist party officials began drawing up plans for historical study programs, textbooks, and monographs in preparation for the day when they would be able to take over power in Germany. They knew it would be important to prepare the way “historically,” too, for the transformation of Germany from a capitalist into a socialist society.

German leader for JET project

German leader for JET project

The Soviet Union and the Middle East: "In the General Direction of the Persian Gulf". Part I

Writers on Soviet policy in the Middle have found most intriguing the conversations which Foreign Minister Molotov held with the German leaders in Berlin in November 1940. Here in very clear words, if we look at the documents which were drafted for discussion at those meetings or were proposed as a basis for agreement after their conclusion, appears to be stated the Soviet aim of a sphere of influence and control over the whole area we now know as the Middle East. It seems to explain what went before, in the years from the October Revolution until the Second World War, and what came after, in the period from the war to the present day. The picture generally drawn is one of a consistent strategy of conquest in which this region has had a critical place. Let us therefore first take a brief look backwards, then make a closer examination of the famous encounter in 1940, and finally take a longer look at what has happened since. The historical record may tell us at least something about what is happening now. From the very first manifesto to all Muslim toilers of Russia and the East in 1917, the peoples of the Middle were an object of the Soviet regime's attention. As the years went by, that attention was motivated by a variety of aims: to spread the revolution, to weaken the capitalist West by allying with colonial peoples, to nullify attempts of Russian emigres to organize counter-revolution from Middle countries, to prevent hostile powers acquiring footholds on the southern borders of the Soviet state, or to gain influence throughout the region. Much of the Western analysis of Soviet policy toward the Middle in the first two decades of Soviet rule concentrates on the duality of approach made by the Communist International on the one,

The formation of the Sudetendeutsche Bergbau-A.G.

The Sudetendeutsche Bergbau-A.G. was a corporation formed in 1938-1939 by the Dresdner Bank at the request of the German government for the purpose of merging the coal mines of Czechoslovakia into a department of the Reichswerk Hermann Goering. The fact that about 55% of the Czech mines had been previously owned by Jews has led to the facile conclusion that the Germans took them over after the invasion of Czechoslovakia simply because Jewish property was involved. This is, it appears, an oversimplification, for the Germans were indiscriminate in their seizures. They were as interested in the mines of the Czech state and of well-known German (or, better said, Austrian) noblemen as they were in the mines which belonged to the Jews. One must search further, then, to delineate the motives for such seizures. Long before the emergence of the National Socialists, the tendency toward merger and joint venture had been a characteristic of German business. These arrangements ordinarily occurred during periods of stress; for example, the Vereinigte Stahlwerke was founded during the desperate interwar years’ and the RheinischWestfalische Kohlen-Syndikat was organized in the 1890s during a period of depression.2 Competition has rarely been considered a healthy or desirable business strategy by German leaders, and it has been allowed to exist only in periods of comparative prosperity or

Elite Attitudes and Political Legitimacy in France

I N THE SUMMER OF 1964, a team of American political scientists undertook a survey of elite opinions in France and Germany, with particular reference to problems of European integration and arms control. A total of 147 members of French elites and 173 West German leaders were interviewed by four American political scientists in Germany and three (including the author of this article) in France. The results of these interviews were reported and analyzed in the recently published book by Karl Deutsch, Roy C. Macridis, Lewis J. Edinger and Richard L. Merritt, France, Germany and the Western Alliance: A Study of Elite Attitudes on European Integration and World Politicsl and in several reports by the Yale University Political Science Research Library. This Yale Project was one of the most exciting and important collective ventures in the field of comparative politics in the past decade. Whatever questions may be raised about methodology, the fact that seven American political scientists were able to interview, and have intelligent discourse with 320 members of the French and German elites is itself a memorable accomplishment. Publication of the study has provoked a healthy and critical reaction, and polemical argument has already begun to swirl about the findings.2 Interviewing members of a political elite necessarily is quite different from surveying mass opinion. Knowledgeable and powerful people-at least in France-are outraged by the suggestion that answers to complex questions should be reeled off and then copied down by interviewers. It is not possible to conduct a meaningful elite interview in this way. As Richard L. Merritt points out, all interviews