The idea of a united German state is something that existed arguably centuries before it
actually happened.
The German language and people had certainly been around for centuries, but for most of
German history, there was no country called Germany, but rather, a large collection of
independent German kingdoms, duchies, and principalities.
Now for over 800 years, the various German political entities that came and went were
all part of the Holy Roman Empire.
By its later years, the Empire was an extremely loose collection of basically independent
states who owed allegiance to the emperor, but it had very little central power, especially
after the Protestant Reformation and the Thirty Years War.
From the 15th century onwards, the monarchy became dominated by the Habsburgs, an Austrian
royal house.
For several centuries, Austria was the dominant German power, and before the 18th century,
the only one with any great deal of power.
Now this changed with the emergence of the Kingdom of Prussia, and for the first time
there were two major German powers.
Both Austria and Prussia wanted a unified German state, but both of them wanted to be
the leader of said state.
The Holy Roman Empire was eventually dissolved in 1806 after being defeated by the French
led by Napoleon in the Third Coalition War.
He reorganised many of the German states into the Confederation of the Rhine, a collection
of French satellite states.
This excluded the two most powerful German states, Austria and Prussia.
Germany later had their revenge though in the seventh coalition war in which France
was defeated.
This Rhine Confederation was dissolved and shortly afterwards the German Confederation
was founded, which did include Austria and Prussia, but not all of their territories.
Excluded from the confederation were lands that they had obtained which had not been
part of the Holy Roman Empire.
This confederation lasted about half a century, with just a minor interruption in 1848 in
which there was a revolution and a German Empire was proclaimed but quickly failed.
Throughout the years though, it seemed almost inevitable that there would be a war between
Austria and Prussia, as both German states were locked in a power struggle.
The two of them were far larger and more powerful than any of the other German states, and it
was clear that one of them would lead a united Germany, the question remained which one.
This inevitable war finally happened in 1866, with many of the central and north states
siding with Prussia, while most southern states sided with Austria.
The war was decisively won by Prussia, and in the preceding peace treaty the German Confederation
was dissolved, and Prussia founded the North German Confederation, made up of the victorious
German states.
The unification of Germany happened when France declared war on Prussia, although this may
have been purposely provoked.
The Prussians invaded France and the southern German states who were not part of the confederation
also helped in the war effort and fought against the French.
Prussia won the war in just six months, and this victory in the war helped unite all of
the German states, except for Austria, and the German Empire was founded in 1871.
Otto Von Bismarck, Minister President of Prussia, claims that this was all part of his master
plan, stating that "I did not doubt that a Franco-German war must take place before the
construction of a United Germany could be realised."
For the plan to work though, France had to be the aggressor, hence why he had provoked
the French by encouraging a German prince to ascend to the throne of Spain, after Isabella
II had been forced into exile during the so-called Glorious Revolution.
So that was how Germany became unified, Prussia defeated Austria to become the dominant German
power, then united all other German states with a defensive war against France.
Like I said, the idea of a unified Germany had existed for a long time, but one key difficulty
which became a debate in the 19th century, is what historians refer to as the “German
Question”, which effectively had two solutions.
The Greater Germany solution, or the Lesser Germany solution.
These were basically - with Austria or without Austria.
Of course, without Austria is indeed how things turned out, who ended up losing their sovereignty
over the Kingdom of Hungary, with whom they then formed a dual monarchy with equal power.
The German Empire was by all accounts incredibly successful.
The country rapidly became industrialised, their economy grew quickly, becoming the largest
in Europe, they had a strong military, and even excelled in science and culture.
The Germans became a colonial power as they built up a powerful navy and established colonies
in Africa and Asia.
However in the early 20th century Germany found itself somewhat politically isolated.
The now German Chancellor Bismarck was forced to resign by the new Kaiser Wilhelm II, who
was young and ambitious, and disagreed with Bismarck’s peaceful foreign policy in favour
of a more aggressive approach.
With Russia and France signing an alliance, Germany found itself in the middle of two
major European powers, one of whom had been its greatest rival for the last few centuries.
Germany had hoped for an alliance with Great Britain, like they had in the Napoleonic Wars
a century ago.
The British however, refused, and later went on to form alliances with both France and
Russia, creating the Triple Entente.
Germany did have its own allies in the “Triple Alliance” with Austria-Hungary and Italy.
This alliance would ultimately be the empire’s downfall though, because in June of 1914 when
the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by a Bosnian Serb, the German
Kaiser gave his unconditional support against Serbia, in what historians have described
as a “blank check”.
At the time Serbia was an ally of Russia, so when Austria declared war on Serbia, Russia
began to mobilise their army to support them.
Germany ordered Russia to stop, and when they refused, Germany declared war on Russia.
When France mobilised their army in support of Russia, Germany declared war on them too.
Despite the Triple Alliance, Italy declared itself neutral, claiming the alliance was
only for defensive purposes.
Germany tried to flank the French via Belgium, who were neutral.
This invasion violated the Treaty of London and caused the Great Britain to declare war
on Germany... and the conflict that the Germans thought would be contained to the Balkans
escalated into the First World War.
The Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, but of course they were ultimately
defeated, with several more countries joining in on the war on the side of the Allies.
Germany lost a lot of land in the following peace treaties, and their economy was devastated.
The Empire was also overthrown by a revolution which began before WWI had even finished,
and Germany became a republic.
The republic was a failure though due to its crippled economy and war reparations that
they were unable to pay.
The Republic printed money to pay for its debts and Germany suffered immense hyperinflation.
The stock market crash in 1929 led to the Great Depression, which hit Germany especially
hard.
With things looking bleak for the German Republic, this paved the way for rise to power of the
National Socialist German Workers' Party - or as they’re much more commonly known, the
Nazi Party.
The topic of the German Question came up again during the reign of the Nazis when in 1938
Austrian-born Adolf Hitler pursued his dream of a Greater Germany, and Austria was annexed
to Third Reich, despite the fact that this was strictly forbidden by the Treaty of Versailles.
With Hitler’s invasion of Poland, this sparks the Second World War, and of course results
in, once again, defeat for Germany.
Once again, Germany loses some of their territory, and is forced to pay war reparations.
So this is when the division of Germany happened, in the aftermath of WWII.
Germany was occupied by the Allied Powers of Britain, France, the United States, and
the Soviet Union, with the city of Berlin also divided between the 4 of them.
The division was temporary, but became much more permanent due to external factors.
The political tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union caused strained
relations between East and West, which started in the years following their joint victory
in WWII, with the Soviets trying to spread communism, and the USA trying to contain it.
Both countries actively supported opposite sides of civil wars and conflicts throughout
the world, with the most notable examples being the Korean War, the Chinese Civil War,
and the Vietnam War, but also numerous conflicts throughout Africa, the Middle East, Europe,
and Latin America.
The Berlin Blockade was the first major crisis of the Cold War, when the Soviets blocked
access from Western controlled parts of Germany into Berlin.
The Blockade was a response to the introduction of the Deutsche Mark by the Western Allies.
Germany was a central part of the Cold War tensions, and was quite literally the border
between East and West, forming a large part of the so-called Iron Curtain which divided
the opposing ideologies.
In 1949, relations completely broke down and any hope of a joint administration for the
whole of Germany were gone.
The British, American, and French controlled regions merged together to form the Federal
Republic of Germany, commonly referred to as West Germany, while the Soviet controlled
Germany became the German Democratic Republic, commonly known as East Germany.
West Germany had free elections while East Germany had a one-party communist state.
The West was sufficiently more affluent, and many Germans on the Eastern side emigrated
to the Western side.
The Soviets later sought to stop this with the construction of the Berlin Wall which
began in 1961.
In 1955, West Germany joined NATO, and East Germany joined the Warsaw Pact, as the divide
between East and West grew larger as Cold War tensions grew stronger.
Both countries became members of the United Nations in 1973.
As time went on, East Germany suffered numerous issues, primarily due to economic failure
and political unrest.
The ultimate collapse of East Germany and reunification of Germany was caused by the
revolutionary waves which took place throughout Europe in the late 1980s, along with less
political intervention by the Soviet Union, who were experiencing economic stagnation.
The revolutions of 1989 changed the entire political landscape of Europe and beyond,
as communism began to fall, and the Cold War came to an end.
There were political revolutions in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, and of course
Germany.
The first crack in the Iron Curtain happened in Hungary when officials began to remove
the electrified barbed-wire fence along the border with Austria.
This caused thousands of East Germans to flee to West Germany.
Peaceful revolutions took place throughout Germany in 1989 and 90, as calls for open
elections and freedom of travel were demanded.
East German leader Erich Honecker was keen to continue the communist regime, and asked
the Soviet Union to intervene, but Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev refused, as he sought
political reform, through his policy of openness and transparency.
The Soviets had adopted the so-called Sinatra Doctrine which allowed the Eastern Bloc countries
to decide their own fate.
Thousands continued to flee East Germany to Czechoslovakia and Austria, which became problematic
due to the sheer volume of people.
So on November 9th, 1989, in a historic speech made by Günter Schabowski, East Germany’s
borders were opened to everyone.
Thousands of East Germans gathered at the border that very night the speech was made,
and after some initial confusion, were allowed to cross into West Germany by the border guards.
People from both sides of the barrier climbed the wall in celebration, as a country divided
for forty years was on the cusp of being unified.
The actual destruction of the wall also began that very same night, and lasted for several
weeks after.
Initially started by citizens chipping away at the wall creating holes.
And later, bulldozers and cranes tore down the wall while being cheered on by crowds
which gathered to watch.
Small sections of wall still remain to this day, and serve as a memorial to the city which
was once divided.
The fall of the Berlin Wall marks the symbolic reunification of Germany, and the actual official
process was somewhat of a formality.
East Germany had its first free elections in March of 1990, with an overwhelming victory
for the Alliance for Germany coalition.
Unification happened more quickly than might have been expected as East Germany’s economy
began to fail.
The process of unification lasted about a year and officially went into effect on the
3rd of October, 1990, with East Germany being dissolved and joining West Germany.
The anniversary of this day is celebrated as a national holiday in Germany as The Day
of German Unity.
A unified Germany was not actually something that was universally welcomed by the West.
In fact, in 1989, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher famously remarked to her European
Community allies - “We defeated the Germans twice!
And now they're back!”
The French also had strong reservations and worried how reunification might affect the
balance of power in Europe.
Of course today, Germany is a strong ally of both the UK and France, and any fears of
a so-called Fourth Reich were quickly abandoned after reunification.
Nearly three decades on from the fall of the Berlin Wall, and although Germany is very
much a unified country, and has been for some time… there are still very real differences
between what used to be East and West Germany.
Eastern states of Germany are significantly less well off financially than Western states,
and suffer greater levels of unemployment.
Some lingering cultural differences also remain, although seem to be becoming less pronounced
as the years go on.
Germany is a country that was unified, divided, and reunified, while losing two world wars
in the process, all within the space of 120 years.
A lot has happened in Germany’s recent history.
A history which, of course, has one of the darkest times in all of human history, which
will never, and should never, be forgotten.
To Germany’s credit, they do not shy away this history, and instead, fully embrace it
as abhorrent and fundamentally wrong.
Today, Germany is country that has managed to become both a successful and influential
country, with a strong economy, a booming tourism industry, and is world renowned for
its quality cars, beer, Oktoberfest, and of course its pretty amazing football team!
Germany is country which, despite its past, has an incredibly bright present and indeed
future as well.
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