This document summarizes key events in German history that occurred on or around November 9th, from the fall of the German Empire in 1918 to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. It notes that November 9th has become known as Germany's "day of destiny" due to historical moments like the founding of the Weimar Republic in 1918, Kristallnacht in 1938, and the opening of the Berlin Wall in 1989 all occurring on or near this date. It then provides more detail on events in 1848 related to Robert Blum and the failed revolution, as well as the political transition in Germany from November 9th to 11th in 1918.

1. The Uncanny Prominence of the Ninth of Novemberfrom the Fall of
the German Empire to the Fall of the Berlin Wall
Robert Blum, Martyr in the Cause of Establishing a Unified and Democratic
German Nation
November 9 has become widelyknown as Germany's Schicksalstag - dayof destin y-
particularlysince the openingof the Berlin Wall on that date in1989 when the recurrence of
events of historical moment on November 9 finallyearned widespread recognition as some
kind of phenomenon,for on the same dayin the year the beginningGerman Republicwas
proclaimed,Hitler and Ludendorffmounted an attempt to overthrowthe same republicand,
most ominously,the so-called Reichs-Kristallnacht tookplace in1938,this being the state-
organized destruction ofsynagogues and Jewish propertythat pointed the wayto the
Holocaust.Add to all this a less well-known date in German history,the execution of Robert
Blum in Viennain1848,which marked the crushingof the first opportunityfor the establishment
of a democraticframework within which German states could work together towards peace,
security and ultimate unity.
Robert Blum was born on November 10, 1807 in Cologne.His family circumstances were harsh
but after working in various trades he found secure employment in a theatre companyand then
scope for self-education and the developmentofwriting skills which included writingpoetry
dedicated to the cause of libertyand social justice.His political involvementbrought him into
leadingpositions within the movement towards politicaland constitutionalreform of the
German Confederationand promotedhim to the office of delegate to the Frankfurt Parliament
of 1848 held in the Paulskirche where he played a prominent and influentialrole.He was a
Radical Liberal in terms of the party-politicalspectrum ofthe times but he was in no sense an
extremist or demagogue.He eschewed Prussian ethnocentricmilitarism, recourse to violence
as a vehicle of protest and remained a Catholic,through one who rejected certain forms of rigid
authoritarianism and clerical intransigence.He went to Vienna duringan outburst or
revolutionaryfoment which provoked a severe counterrevolutionaryreaction.The regime
arrested Blum on charges of terrorist activityand despite his right to immunityas a delegate to
the Frankfurt Diet he was condemned to death and executed on the November 9. Can we
connect the dots between the historical occurrences noted above?The tragic failure of the bid
to reform the constitution ofthe German Confederationin 1848 set the scene for the chain of
events that led to world war, the rise of Hitler and the Holocaust.On the other hand,the
openingof the Berlin Wall brought the end of the Cold War but much remains to be done
before we can talk of the dawningof a new age.

2. From November the Ninth to November the Eleventh in 1918: The Three Days
that Changed Germany and the World Forever
On the ninth ofNovember 1918 Kaiser Wilhelm lost the position ofGermany's head of state
when Prince Max von Baden,the German Empire's last chancellor, transferred the powers of
his office to Friedrich Ebert,the leader of a three-partycoalition ofparties - his party,the SPD
(Social Democrats),the CatholicCentre Party and the German Liberal Party - which had attained
a dominant positionin the Reichstag. On the same day Philipp Scheidemann,a leadingmember
of the SPD, declared from a window of the Reichstag that the Kaiser had abdicated.The fact
that the Kaiser had not trulydone so made no difference. The German monarchywas over for
good . On the followingdayEbert received an unexpected phone call from General Wilhelm
Groener the head of the joint militarycommand structure that exercised authorityover the
German armed forces in the Kaiser's name, although the Kaiser was by now the Emperor in
name only.The war was not over, albeit onlya day off. but its end was imminent.The western
allies had made it clear that there would be no peace settlement as long as Wilhelm was still on
the throne, Groener made a surprisingproposal.The militarywould defend the prospective
government - on certain conditions,ofcourse, chief amongthem beingan acceptance that the
militaryshould retain independence from civil control and would thus pose 'a state within the
state.' The parties agreed that Ebert's provisional regime would drawup a constitutionthat
ensured that a future president could suspend the normal parliamentaryprocess ‘in the case of
need' as when a revolution threatenedor any situationarose that the President saw as
dangerous.
Was this deal a sensible arrangement or a pact with the devil that promised short-term benefits
but denied the attainment oflong-term goals? Clearlya new government would have to rely on
militarysupport ofsome kind in a period of massivechange and volatile politics with the radical
wing of the socialist movement under the direction of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg
lurchingtowards the Russian soviet model ofstate control.In one way or another the Kaiser,
von Hindenburg,Ludendorffand Groener himselfendorsedthe Ebert-Groener deal,though its
terms were not revealed to the publicuntil 1925. However, those named aboveinterpreted its
import in very different ways. To Ludendorffthe deal offered a chance to lumber the new
parliament with responsibilityfor expected reverses that Ebert and his coalition would
inevitablyhaveto suffer in their dealings with the western allies and when contendingwith
social unrest.Besides,the deal would also divert attention from the failure of von Hindenburg
and Ludendorffin the conduct of the war by pinningblame on certain 'traiterous elements'that
undermined the patrioticwar effort. The so-called 'stab-in-the back-myth' was alreadyin the
making. Groener himself,I contend,did not share in this cynical construction ifwe take his
subsequent career as a loyal servant of the Weimar Republicinto account.,in which role he did
his best to resist the inroads ofNazi influence.On the eleventh of November Matteas
Erzberger, the leader of the CatholicCentre party,signed the document that certified his
acceptance of the Armistice provisionson behalfofthe German nation and thus acknowledged

3. his country's defeat after over four years of horrendous warfare.In view of his assassinationon
August 28 in 1921 by agents of an ultra-nationalist paramilitarygroup,a successor of the
infamous Ehrhardt Brigade which had orchestrated the murders of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa
Luxembourgon the 15th of Januaryin 1919, he also signed his own death warrant.If any three
people became the chief objects of the most intense hatred in the minds of ultra-nationalistsat
the end of the Great War three candidates for this dubious honour standout:Karl Liebknecht,
Rosa Luxembourgand,yes, Philipp Erzberger,neither a socialist nor a Jew. Though swept up by
pro-war enthusiasm in 1914 he came round to the recognition that continued warfare proved
futile and injurious to the true interests of the sufferingGerman people.Ebert,who had enough
trouble on his hands anyway, must have felt slightlyrelieved that no member of his own party
would incur the odium that attached to any German who endorsed the Armistice's provisions,
however necessaryand however inevitable such a humiliationwas,even in the eyes of the
Kaiser, von Hindenburgand Ludendorff.
The Eber-Groener deal could not itselfhaveencouraged the culture of violence and intrigue
that marred not least the reputationofthe SPD itselfduring1919 and 1920 as its terms were
not made public,but those who led contingents ofthe Freikorps down the path of murder and
terrorism were under the impression that theycould continue their activities with impunity
when judges,soldiers and politicians turned a blind eye to their criminal pursuits.Gustav
Noske, the first minister of home security in the provisional government,sidedwith the forces
of reaction and brutal suppression rather than with workers and defenders of parliamentary
government as when the short-lived Kapp Putsch tookplace to be followed immediatelybythe
crushingof the Ruhr workers' rebellion with ruthless energy.The stresses caused by popular
resentment as the Versailles Treatywere made known,by the tensions ofa situationclose to
civil war and the spectre of the Rhineland's secession from Berlin frittered away the initial
advantages enjoyed bythe SPD-led 'coalition ofthe three colours of democracy, (blackfor the
CatholicCentre Party, red for the SPD and gold for the Free German Democrats (the colours
that composed the symbol of hope for a unified and democraticGermanysince 1848). In the
first election of the Weimar Republicthe SPD could now muster less than forty per cent of the
electorate's votes, which made it increasinglydifficult to form viable majorities in parliament,if
t all. Were the seeds of the Weimar Republic's decline and fall sown before its establishment,
perhaps even duringthe three-dayperiod of transitionfrom November the Ninth until to
November 11 and the end of what once went by the name of 'The Great War.'
From Rose Monday to Ash Wednesday in 1933
The term Hitler's 'Machtergreifung' suggests by the very use of the word meaning'seizure' that
Hitler became the dictator of Germanyin one fell swoop,possiblyin the course of an hour or a
day. In fact the series of events that led to Hitler's dictatorship were part of a process, not a
single event. I suggest that this process passed through three stages, each of which did begin on

4. a certain day, namely:The 30th of Januarywhen Reichs President Paul von Hindenburg
appointedAdolfHitler to the position ofReichs Chancellor.The 28th of February,when in
response to the outbreakof the Reichstag fire on the previous day,a 'state of emergency' was
instated byactivatingArticle 48 in the Weimar constitution,which withdrewthe core civil rights
so essential for the maintenance ofa democraticstate in Germany.Finallythe coup de grace,
the 23rd. of March when the Reichstag,now a rump after the Communist delegates had been
expelled from the chamber,passed the EnablingLaw. Though this did not abolish the Reichstag
altogether,it robbed the parliament ofall effective power and entitled Hitler to rule by decree
from then onwards. At the beginningof first stage in this threefold process Hitler addressed the
German nation in a radio broadcast and declared that he would make Germanygreat again by
takingmeasures to boost the German economyand build up its militaryforces without regard
to the terms of the Versailles Treaty.To the surprise and dismayto his prospectivecoalition
partner,Alfred Hugenberg, the leader of the German Liberal People's Party (DLVP), Hitler, on
the point ofreceiving the chancellorship,announced his intentionto dissolvethe Reichstagand
call for a general election to be held on the 5th of March. At this point Hugenberg threatened
to withdrawfrom the imminent coalition as he feared that his small party would be cut to
pieces by the fallout ofthe election on the 5th of March. He did overcome his misgivings,
however, on the expecattion that he and von Hindenburgcould always counter any effort on
Hitler's part to dominate the government.The DLVP held nine ministerial seats in new
government while only two fellowmembers of the National-Socialist Partywould join Hitler as
members of his cabinet.Hugenberg also calculated that Hitler needed the DLVP to achieve his
goal of beingable to dispense with parliamentarycontrol altogether bythe passingof the
EnablingAct,a provision anchored in the Constitutionofthe Weimar Republic,that could only
come into force if two thirds of delegates present in the chamber voted it in. In accord with the
motto "If you can't break a racket, join it,'' Hugenberg, alreadya highlyinfluentialpress baron
in his own right, relished the prospect of enhancinghis standingin the world of big business.
The coffers of the Nazi party were exhausted due to outlays required bytwo general elections
in 1932. Hermann Goering,the minister without portfolio in Hitler's cabinet also had a dab
hand in the art of wheelingand dealingwith the high and mightyin business and high finance
and thus was well qualified to playthe role of the Nazi's publicrelations man.Furthermore he
held the honorarytitle ofPresident of the Reichstag,a privilege awarded to the partywith the
most seats in parliament.This position allowed him the use of his official residence as a suitable
venue for 'the secret meeting of the 20th of February.'Before coming onto that subject,I point
to an ugly aspect of Goering's character that was at first obscured by his apparent affabilityand
charm. In a short time he would become the head of Prussian police force and this held the
lion's share of the aggregate of all police departments in Germany.In due course he founded
the Gestapo.The Nazis.abilityto control the police was reinforced by Wilhelm Frick, Minister of
the Interior in Hitler's cabinet.With full police backing Hitler was no longer solelydependent on
the involvement ofthe disreputable SA storm troopers in the work of intimidatingthose who
were readyto stand up to Hitler's demolitionofthe Weimar Republicand democraticrights.
Hitler had onlytwo Nazi colleagues in his cabinet but this smallness ofnumber was offset be

5. the strategicsignificance of the mandates theyheld.However, Hitler did not want to shake von
Hindenburgand Hugenberg out of their complaisant beliefthat he posed no great danger to
their interests.Indeed,at this juncture Hitler could not afford to blatantlyaffront the
sensitivities ofprospectivevoters in the middle ground between the extremes of right and left.
For much the same reason he had toned down the more frenzied expressions ofanti-Semitic
hostilityin the two 1932 election campaigns.
SA operatives were alreadyundertakingcovert operationsagainst members of the Communist
partyand vocal defenders of democracy but they had to tread warily when dealingwith Konrad
Adenauer,the mayor of Cologne.On the 17th of February Hitler visited Cologne to attend a
local gatheringof the Nazi party.An SA contingent placed swastika symbols alongthe sides of
the Deutz Bridge that connected the old city of Cologne to Deutz, originallya separate town on
the right bank of the Rhine.Adenauer ordered the removal of the offendingflags on legal
grounds as Hitler's visit was occasioned by a matter of concern to the Nazi partybut not to the
German nation as a whole.Hitler, though infuriated bywhat to him was an act of outright
defiance, hesitated to call upon the SA to deal with Adenauer in the customaryway. It was only
in the followingMarch that Adenauer was forced to leave Cologne under the threat of a
belated strike by the SA, and onlyon the 17th of June that he was finallydismissed from his
office. Cologne and the surroundingRhineland and region ofWestphalia were areas where the
National Socialists came off worst in the 1932 general elections, gainingas little as about 20 %
of the total vote.Joseph Goebbels,a Rhinelander himself,was particularlysensitiveto the
mood in his nativeregion and would later advise against the use of brutal force against the
Archbishop ofMuenster,Clemens August Grafvon Galen,after his moral influence had curbed
(but not fullyextinguished)the Nazi's use of euthanasia and forced sterilizationagainst
mentallyor physicallyhandicapped German children.It is now Mondaythe twentieth of
February,the date of a secret meetingattended byHermann Goering,Hitler himselfand
twenty prominent and highlyinfluential representativesofGerman industryand its bankingand
financial sectors.They owned or directed companies with prestigious names that included
Krupp,Siemens, IG Farben,Opel and Telefunken and theyheld many a purse string in their
hands as a result. The purpose of the meeting was quite simplythat of raisingfunds for the
benefit of the Nazi partyto the tune of three million Reichsmark,as suggested at the end of the
meeting. In fact the sum of all donations amounted to 'only'2,07,100 Reichmarks,which may
have been a disappointment to some, though not to Joseph Goebbels.He rejoiced on hearing
news of the success achieved by the fundraisingoperation and lookedforward to the
replacement of the drab furnishings and decor of his headquarters bysomethingmore
impressiveand dignified.Hitler,dressed like an business executivein a smart well tailored suit,
delivered a lengthyspeech which included an assurance that he fullyrespected the principle of
the inviolabilityofprivate propertyand a promise to invest heavilyin the manufacture of
armaments,in miningand civil engineering,as in the industrialconcerns and companies
governed by members of his audience.Furthermore,he emphasized his hostilityto the
Communist party,which he intended to crush completelyGustavKrupp endorsed the contents

6. of Hitler's speech and welcomed Hitler's affirmation concerningthe sanctityof private property
and capitalist enterprise.Finally,the participants were given details ofthe ways and means of
making their respectivecontributions.Some of the companies represented at the secret
meeting would in later years involvethemselves in the exploitation ofslavelabour and,in the
case of a subsidiaryfirm owned by IG Farben,the productionofZyklon B, supposedlyfor use as
'a pesticide.'In such cases there was no longer a place for making excuses based on the
argument that there was no way for anyone foresee the evils Hitler and the Nazis had in store.
We now come to second and most decisive stage of Hitler's Machtergreifung.It began on the
27th of Februaryin reaction to the Reichstag fire that occurred after nightfall,but what
happened duringdaylighthours on that day?Not that much unless you happened to be in the
area of Cologne.It was Rose Mondayafter two years of economic paucitywhen the festivity
had to be cancelled.The same daymarked the beginningof the month of Adar in the Jewish
religious calendar. The highpoint ofthis month is the festival of Purim that commemorates the
dramaticevents recorded to the bookof Esther in the Bible.The narrativeofthis book tells of a
wicked plot against the Jews of Persia. Haman,the instigator ofthis plot.laid plans to destroy
the entire Jewish communityon an appointeddaybut this evil design was thwarted by Esther,
the king's beloved consort and a Jewess. The story is widelyheld to be the first case in history
of an attempt to eradicate all Jews by perpetratinga holocaust.We now turn our attention to
an event that occurred after nightfall on the 27th of February, the infamous conflagrationthat
signaled the end of the Weimar Republicand the beginningof Hitler's rule.
Around nine o'clockp.m. people began noticingindications offire within the Reichstag
building.The police and fire brigade were dulynotified.Goeringwas at the scene very early
when the police arrested a youngDutchman,Marinus van der Lubbe, on a charge of arson.Van
der Lubbe admitted that he had laid the fire and added that he had done so out of his personal
convictions as a convinced Communist without the assistance or encouragement of
accomplices.The very mention ofthe word 'Communist'was enough to prompt Goeringto
assert that the entire Communist partywas behind a conspiracyto burn down the Reichstag
and unleash a Communist revolution.He omitted anyreference to van der Lubbe's denial that
he had any accomplices.If these didn't exist Goeringwould have to invent them. Three
Bulgarian Communists were accused of aidingvan der Lubbe on the night of the 27th. of
Februarybut when van der Lubbe's case came up for trial before the Supreme Court in
September 1933 the presidingjudge found insufficient evidence to find the Bulgarian
defendants guilty.This verdict so angered Hitler that the infamous Volksgericht (People'Court)
was established for the purpose ofdealingwith so-called 'political crimes.'Short of a
forensicallybased legal foundation for assertingthat the Communist Partyin toto had
instigated the fire, Hitler claimed as though in a flash of inspired insight that the fire was a
message from heaven to the effect that 'the Communists'were about to launch a massive
attack against the state and the German people.It was dangerous for anyone else to claim the
authorityofpropheticinsight when makinga pronouncement on the Reichstagfire. A certain
self-proclaimed mysticforesaw a 'great blaze' in the area of the Reichstag before the fire

7. actuallybroke out.The man in question had assumed the identityofa Dane with name of Erik
Jan Hanussen.Hitler was impressed byhis aura of spiritualityand learned from him useful
techniques in speech deliveryand quasi-theatricalgesturing.When Hanussen could no longer
conceal his Jewish origins he was ejected from Nazi circles and assassinatedbya death squad.
Had he heard too much on the grapevine or was he reallyable to tell the future?It is strange
how revolutionarytimes produce sinister figures like Joseph Balsamo,Rasputinand Hanussen.
On the followingdayPresident Paul von Hindenburgaccepted Goering's assertion that the fire
was the work of the Communists uncriticallyand without demur.His signature headed those of
Hitler and Wilhelm Frick on the document that abrogated parts of the Weimar constitution that
were supposed to safeguard basichuman rights.The question as to who really started the fire
has never found an incontestable answer but if one is guided by the principle indicatedbythe
Latin tag 'Cui bono'(who has the most to gain),one may well suspect that Goeringhad a hand
in the matter of the Reichstag fire, directlyor indirectly.
On the 28th of FebruaryPaul von Hindenburgauthorized the introduction ofwhat came to be
known as the ReichstagFire Decree. Under its provisions essential civil rights were annulled,
namelyhabeas corpus,freedom of the press, freedom of publicassemblyand protection from
arbitraryarrest.On March the 3rd.one of the first to fall victim to the new order was Ernst
Thaelmann the leader ofthe Communist Party,who became an early inmate of the newly
created mode of detention,the concentrationcamp.The Communists could still take part in
the election on March 5 but onlyin keepingwith a ployto weaken the SPD. After the election
Communist delegates were denied entry to parliamentarysessions,which after the fire were
held in an opera theatre.The scene was now set for the inauguration ofthe third stage of
Hitler's Machtergreifung.
On 23 March the Reichstag voted away its legitimacyas Germany's legislativebodyIn
accordance with article 48 of the Weimar Constitution.This stipulated that a two thirds
majorityof votes cast by deputies in the chamber permitted the chancellor to rule by decree
without deference to a Reichstagthat had nowbecome a mere platform for inconsequential
speeches and an organ of propaganda.The majorityoftwo thirds was made possible bythe
exclusion ofall Communist deputies and the fact that the SPD could not muster enough votes
to blockthe passingof the Enablingdecree.Even the Centrum party voted for the measure in a
tide of anti Communist panic,some of its delegates not wishingto rock the boat when the
prospect of the Reichskonkordatbetween the Vatican and the German Reich was very much in
their minds.As from the end of March anti-Jewish measures limitingaccess to schools,the
learned professions,government posts and medical facilitiescame into effect On the rare
occasion that von Hindenburgobjected to Nazi intrusions into civil life he reversed a decree
that retracted from Jewish veterans medals bestowed on them in recognition their acts of
valour duringthe First World War. The SA began harassingJewish store shopkeepers bysuch
acts as daubingthe slogan 'Don't buy Jewish goods'on shop windows.By July 14th the regime
had eliminated the last tokens of democracy in Germany,dissolved trade unions and all non-
Nazi political parties and youth organizations.One institutionstill remained outside the total

8. control of Hitler and the Nazis - the army headed by one of Hitler's most determined
adversaries General Kurt von Schleicher,Hitler 's immediate predecessor in the office of
chancellor.Hitler and von Hindenbergwere aware of the danger that the militarycould stage a
coup d'etat,especially as it resented the freedom of action accorded to the SA seen as a private
army of its own. Hitler waited until June 30th. in 1934 before killingtwo birds with one stone by
arrestingand executingthe leadership ofthe SA in the course of ‘the Night of the Long Knives’
and also by orderinga death squad to assassinate Schleicher.After the death of President von
Hindenburgin 1934 Hitler reached the pinnacle ofpower by becoming the Fuehrer and in that
capacityhe was both chancellor and head ofstate. All members of the armed force were
obliged to swear an idolatrousoath ofunconditional obedience to Hitler in person.The
Machtergreifungwas now complete.
The Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938
On the ninth ofNovember in 1938 an event tookplace that pointed forward to the extinction of
six million lives ofthose whose only offense was being Jewish. This event has gone down in
historyas the Kristallnacht,the night of shattered glass.Ostensiblythe violence perpetrated
against the Jewish communityin in Germany was an expression ofpopular rage,Volkszorn in
the parlance ofstate propagandain reaction to the assassinationofa German diplomat Ernst
vom Rath after a a youngJewish male named Herschel Grynszpan had shot and killed him in
the German embassy in Paris in an act of revenge for the deportation ofhis parents from
Germanyto Poland.
The event gives me cause to review the historyof hostilitytowardsJews since the early days of
the German Empire after its foundation in 1871 and the role played by Wilhelm Marr, who
initiated the era of modern anti-Semitism and even formulated this term in furtherance ofhis
pernicious aims..
The foundation ofthe German Empire in 1871 promised a bright new era for the Jews living
within its boundaries.The process of emancipationof the Jewish populationhad reached a
happy conclusion in the final year of the North German Confederationjust before the complete
unification ofGermanyin 1871, in the securement of which Jewish bankers and financiers
played no small part. Chancellor Otto von Bismarck owed his success as the chief agent of
German unityin large part to his Jewish advisors and aides in the runningofhis financial affairs
and the conduct of diplomaticnegotiations.
Barely ten years later in 1879 Jews in Germanyfaced a sudden and frighteningnewform of
anti-Jewish hostilitywhen Wilhelm Marr published a bookentitled 'Der Sieg des Judenthums
über das Germanenthum'(The Victoryof Judaism over Germanism).He appended to this title a
statement that his arguments were based on a scientific,not a religious premise, hence the

9. accent on the 'Semitic' aspect of the subject under discussion.Though the term found its
original place in the domain of philologyMarr, who probablycoined,and certainlypopularized,
the word ‘anti-Semitic,’wished to make the term indistinguishable from 'race.' As members of
an alien 'race' Jews could never livein accord with Germans and other Europeans.
Marr effectively broadened the base for his attackagainst Jews in a manner that did not make
his argument dependent on anyone strand of anti-Jewishness,whether religious,philosophical
or economic. He argued that from Roman times the Jews had posed a distinct ethnicgroup that
understood itselfto be the victims of oppressionbya surrounding majorityand therefore under
the necessityto outwit and undermine the forces that were against it. Strangelyenough,Marr
did not admit to nurturinganypersonal animosityto Jews, whom he admired in a strange kind
of way for their resourcefulness,but ifJews were able to defend their vital interests,so were
the Germans.Marr concluded that Germans had to defend themselves from overbearing
Jewish control of the press,bankingand centres of cultural influence ifthey were to retain their
identity as a people and nation.He founded the Anti-SemiticLeague as a means of popularizing
his position and givingthis political backbone.In this regard he did not make much headway
personallybut he did succeed in promotingthe word 'anti-Semitic’among those who were well
placed to wield great influence, notablythe imperial court chaplain, AdolfStoecker,and the
noted nationalisthistorian Heinrich von Treitschke, not to forget those who organized the so-
called ‘anti-Semiticpetition’that garnered tens ofthousands ofsignatures.Treitschke’s
decision to urge universitystudents to add their signatures to the petition enraged the great
historian Theodor Mommsen,a doughty.defender of minorities in the German empire.
Thus the advocates of anti-Semitism fell into distinct groups,the one headed bya leading
churchman on the basis of Christian beliefs combined with a patronizingattitude to the working
class, the one furthered by Heinrich von Treitschke in the academic world and the group
composed of so-called 'Radau-Antisemiten'(anti-Semitichooligans)that arose from Marr's anti-
Semitic league.Indeed,there was an extreme case of anti-Semiticviolence when a synagogue
in the region of Saxonywas destroyed by fire. The course of anti-Semiticactivism advocated by
the emergent anti-Semiticmovements varied.Marr pleaded for the exclusion ofJews from
German life altogether,implicitlytheir expulsion therefore.Treitschke insisted on the
banishment ofJews from participatingin all forms of officialdom and from positionsof
influence in education and the higher professions.These demands headed the anti-Semitic
petition.At this time we also see the emergence of political partiesthat sought entryinto the
Reichstagunder the banner of anti-Semitism.Such parties
continued to be represented in the Reichstagthroughout the remainder ofthe German
Empire's duration but with little effect in statistical terms,gainingat most 3 percent of the
electorate's votes. Takinga wider view, we note that the anti-Jewish measures advocated by
Marr, Stoecker and others rehearsed stages in the Nazi’s agenda for eliminatingthe Jews in the
followingcentury.

10. Strange as it may seem Marr had not always been a radical exponent ofhostile views directed
against Jews. Back in 1862 he publisheda bookentitled 'Der Judenspiegel'(Mirror to the Jews).
For the main part it presented an unfriendlysurveyof the Hebrew Bible with the intent of
adducingevidence of Jewish moral failures and devious characteristics.Thus Joseph becomes a
grain hoardingcartel boss and King David a maraudingbrigand.It concludes,however,that
Jews were perfectlyentitled to enjoy most common benefits from living in Prussia and
elsewhere as long as they did not have a hand in government and civic administration.He
couched his arguments in socio-economicterms much as Karl Marx had done in 1842 when he
published‘The Jewish Question.’Marx contested the position taken byBruno Bauer on Judaism
which advocated the extinction ofJudaism alongwith that of religion per se. Marx was not so
dogmaticon that point and pleaded that Jews as human beings should not be singled out for
persecution.There is a remarkable contrast between the relativelyrestrained attitude to Jews
as evinced in 'Der Judenspiegel'and the radical call for the total suppression ofJudaism in 1879.
What explains this?
A new ingredient entered Marr's anti-Semitism that was absent in 'Der Judenspiegel,in a word
'race' The word lay at the centre of the thesis put forward by Joseph Arthur de Gobineau in 'An
Essay on the InequalityofRaces' in 1855. In this he wished to rebuffthe central ideals of the
French Revolution and replaced them bya new triad:supremacy,inequalityand division.The
14th of July marked not onlythe fall of the Bastille but also his own birthday,a quirkthat
prompted him to observe that even opposites meet at times, In his scheme of thought the
white Aryans posed the highest form of humanityabovethe Black and Asian races. He
denounced the mixture of races as a source of degeneracy. Only the pure NordicAryans located
in Germanywere entitled to claim the status of'the master race. The greater the contamination
of Aryan blood by inferior races, the lower the resultingprogenyon the racial scale.
Gobineau's ideas seeped into the mainstream ofEuropean culture and left traces even in
poetry.Baudelaire's poem 'Cain et Abel' introverts the storyof the brothers in the Bible to so as
to present ‘the race of Abel’as a symbol of upper-class domination and the ‘race of Cain’as a
symbol of the oppressed lower class. One might also drawinto this dark circle of thought the
poet’s reference to a conspiracyto exterminate ‘the Jewish race.’ It is not clear at what time
the spirit of Gobineau’s racist theoryentered the soul of Wilhelm Marr. I would suggest around
the time of the creation of German empire and just before the outbreakof the first economic
crisis to hit the Reich when it came in 1873.This event moved Marr to write a pamphlet blaming
the Jews for causingthe crisis. On this occasion Marr's polemics it not have much impact on the
general political climate.Other matters were then uppermost in people's minds such as
migration and Church-State relations.Besides,Bismarckowed his great successes in war and
peace to the advice and financial expertise ofhis Jewish banker,Gerson von Bleichroeder.The
houses of Rothschild and Oppenheimer helped from time to time as well.

11. KONRAD ADENAUER, 'DER ALTE'
The first political joke I learned in Germany:Adenauer to grandchild:What do you want to be
when you're grown up,dear child?Answer: Federal Chancellor, Granddad.Adenauer:But we
alreadyhavea Federal Chancellor, don't we? Konrad Adenauer was born in 1876. In his
childhood he experienced life in Germanyduringthe heydayof Bismarck's power and influence.
In his youth he witnessed the fall of Bismarck and the arrival of an age of militarypomp and
Prussian glory under the reign of Wilhelm II. In his prime of life the First World War broke out.
At 45 he found himselfin the midst of an acute social and economic crisis at very heart of his
nativeRhinelandwhen urban warfare was raging in the Ruhr area. No wonder he contemplated
the secession of the Rhineland from the rest of Germany where in his opinion Prussianism held
an all too dominant influence.Now into his earlyfifties and the long-time mayor of Cologne, he
defied Hitler by orderingthe removal of swastika flags strungalongthe Deutzer Bridge over the
Rhine.On reaching a pensionable age he languished in a concentration camp.To cut a long
story short,it was onlyat the age of 73, when those blessed with the attainment ofa ripe old
age should enjoythe pleasures of retirement,that Adenauer became the first chancellor of the
Federal Republicof Germany,the occasion that launched him into world fame and thus earned
him a permanent place in worldwide publicconsciousness.Nor did his progress end there.At
84, President Biden take note, he ran for the office of Federal Chancellor in the first general
election to be held in West Germanyafter the war. Does Adenauer deserveonlypraise and
honour in other matters?With political opponents,and even with close political associates,he
could prove peevish not to sayvindictiveat times,as in the case with his dealings with Ludwig
Erhard,the finance minister to whom manyattribute the success of 'the German economic
miracle.' Perhaps he unwittinglyinternalizedpreciselythose elements ofPrussianism that he so
keenly opposed.Does Adenauer deserveonlypraise and honour in other matters?He is more
vulnerable to criticism for things he did in his pre-war years, his willingness to abandonthe
Rhineland to the French sphere of influence, his readiness to countenance tactical alliances
between his Center Party and the National Socialists in the vain hope that shared responsibility
would somehowtame the Nazis, but even Heinrich Bruenning,as leader of the Center Party,
was also prepared to go so far. The events that attend Hitler's Machtergreifung,his seizure of
power, includingthe issue of his order to pull down the swastika flags mentioned earlier
disabused Adenauer ofanynotion that there could be anykind of political dialogue with the
Nazis.Then there is the reproach that Adenauer was bigoted when dealingwith Prussians and
even Protestants and non Catholics in general.True, he did not want to open the Center Party
to the membership of non Catholics,nor was he ready to cooperate with GustavStresemann,
by no means a typical 'Prussian.' and his Liberal Party despite the latter's great contribution to
improved relations between Germanyand its former enemies.After the war Adenauer made
up for his former frostiness with political opponents,whether Socialist,Communist or simply
'Prussian.'The newly formed CDU imposed no limitations to membership and candidacy.
Adenauer tooka bold step when meeting the leadership ofthe Soviet Union to negotiate the

12. release of the remainingGerman prisoners ofwar in the Soviet state. Did Adenauer have
reservations about encouragingGerman re-unification?Yes,but out of the recognition that a
premature re unificationbefore definingthe Federal Republic's status with the Western
alliance, would lead his nation into a state of mishmash and contentionbetween conflicting
political forces.Subsequent events proved him right as East German regions became states
within the existent framework of the Federal Republicwithout confrontinginsurmountable
obstacles,difficult enough as these were. I do not think,however that Adenauer would have
been so sanguine about Berlin,the former Prussian capital,becomingthe centre of a reunified
Germany.Having rejected his early secessionist leanings duringthe Weimar Republic,Adenauer
at least assured that his Rhineland would be the political and cultural hub ofWest Germanyin
preference to Frankfurt am Main,the leadingcontestant for this role.He would have preferred
to see a smaller and closely knit European Union based on the Franco-German accords much
after the model proposed byGeneral de Gaulle, instead ofthe arguablybloated and discordant
European Union ofthe present day. De Gaulle also warned against unnecessarilybeingat
loggerheads with the Russians and against beingover-reliant on the United States in matters of
vital interest.It seems that Donald Rumsfeld's "New Europeans'havetaken over, and however
understandable their anger with their Russian neighbours on account of their historic
grievances, intemperance and unrelentingire provide no safe guidance through the present
perilous times.
Back to the Ninth of November: 1989, the Fall of the Berlin Wall and Remaining
Questions about the State of Germany and the World“
We have the fairy tales by heart”(Dylan Thomas ) Those old enough will recall the euphoria
which tookhold not onlyamong Germans but throughout the world on that day, the ninth of
November in 1989, when the wall dividingwest and east Berlin “came tumblingdown
”metaphoricallyspeaking.A new world was about to arise.The forces of democracy and
enlightened capitalism were triumphant over doctrinaire Soviet communism.Thankyou Mr.
Gorbachev,Margaret Thatcher,Helmut Kohl and the longsufferingand courageous citizens of
eastern Europe.The good news spread to the Middle East. Suddenly,Iremember it well, Israeli
Jews trusted PalestinianArab taxi drivers to take them as passengers over long distances.
Germanywas “the happiest nation”in the world and all because an East Berlin functionary
made an announcement for which he had no official backing to the effect that East Berliners
could visit West Berlin that very evening.A similar hastyact of making a statement that should
have been cleared by the relevant authorityalso occurred on the ninth ofNovember when
Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed the newGerman Republicin 1918.The breathtakingend ofthe
Cold War was not the end of the story. So Kiplingwas wrong after all when declaringthat “East
is East and West is West and ne’er the twain shall meet.“ The chasm separatingEast and West
since the era of Constantine was no more. Russia was part of Europe again,just as General
Charles de Gaulle had so forcefullyadvocated.Russia would surelyknow her place as a
moderatelypowerful and influential nationthat would havemuch to gain by beinga

13. cooperativeand pliant partner ofthe West, which entertainedno aggressive or hostile designs
to curtail Russia’s legitimate needs.Russia’s concessionson the status of Berlin and its realistic
acceptance of its diminished role in Eastern Europe deserved a measure of gratitude.Russia’s
retreat would not invite NATOto move into the province formerlydominated bythe Soviet
Union and perish anythought that NATOwould adopt an adversarial posture against Russia
herself! Moscow, in anycase, had too much chew on to thinkof reviving its past glory as the
victor over Napoleon and Hitler.Everybodywas invited to the great celebration ofrebirth,or
almost everyone.One fairy was not on the invitationlist,and that fairywas History. It was
wrong to slight her, as subsequent events were to prove. Mind you, this oversight was
altogether understandable at the time as it was generallyassumed in those days that History
had taken ill and was probablydead already.Notable academics and highlyregarded pundits
said so and they were surely the ones to know. On October the third 1990 Germanywas
reunited.In the April of that year I remember drivingwith a friend to East Germanyin the
springof 1990. It was eerie. Everythingseemed to be suspended in a state of limbo.The
massivesystem of high fences and barriers dividingthe two parts of German bore witness to
the futilityoftrying to hold backthe tide of history.We stopped for a moment at the check
point where an officer with a distant dazed lookcasuallybeckoned us to move on without so
much as a glance at our papers.We visited Weimar and Jena,where as former students of
German literature we delighted in visitingGoethe’s house and other locationslinked to the life
and work of Goethe and Schiller.A short drive to the site of the Sachsenhausen concentration
camp changed our mood understandablyenough.Those iron word welded into the main
gate:“Jedem das Seine: (”To everyone accordingto his lot") History again.We managed to
benefit from the highlyfavorable exchange rate of five East German marks to one
Deutschmark,privatelyof course. Only one person I met was unhappyat the prospect of
reunification.At Jena and Weimar the vista presented by beautiful architecturein the classical
style found no olfactoryequivalent in the ubiquitousand penetratingstench produced bythe
fuel of East Germany’s answer to the people’s car, the Trabant..Problems started to arise very
early and it was obvious theywould.It was not going to be easy to unite two populations, the
one schooled in economicfreedom and the Western sense of democracy, the other subject to
the restraints ofMarxist ideologyas applied bya secretive and oppressivepolitical elite.Then
The structures of industryand administrationwere different in fundamentalrespects.Here was
no time to waste evidently,standingidlyby while evolutionaryforces would graduallydo their
work. The East-Markachieved paritywith the Deutschmarkon a one to one basis.How
wonderful,or so it seemed to a great manyEast German citizens who had amassed fat savings
accounts.Apart from saving it,what else was there to do with what was to all intents and
purposes funnymoneyin a hermeticallyenclosed economywhere prices, wages and rents were
pegged at artificiallylowrates and stringent controls were in place banninggenuine
convertibilityand purchasingpower on the open market? Corn in Egypt! What a windfall! There
was helicopter cash too to the tune of a hundred Deutschmarks per citizen.You could now get
real moneyin exchange of your East-Marks.The result was - unsurprisinglyenough –a
short lived but massivebinge.What seemed so good to consumers was poison for the greater

14. part of East German industry(which,all things considered,had done okaydespite the burden
laid on it by the Soviet Union). Totallyuncompetitivewith West German industryon the one-to-
one basis mentioned above,segments ofEast German industrywere palmed off “for an apple
and an egg” as a common phrase in German goes ,to astute Western bargain hunters,some of
whom might be more pertinentlydescribed as unscrupulous exploiters and predators.East
Germanyhad a good side too, particularlyin providingfor free preschool care of children,a
great benefit to working mothers.All that went by the wayside.The United Germanydid retain
from East Germany a handytrafficsign, a green arrowpointingto the right allowingtraffic to
take a turn when the lights stood at red. Too many young people in former East Germanymay
have understoodthis as a subliminal message in the wrong way. The man most widely reputed
to havebeen the architect of German unitywas Hans-Dietrich Genscher,popularlyknown as
“Genschman,”depicted in caricatures as a figure rollinginto one elements drawn from Batman,
Superman and Grandpa,an elderlybenign vampire that figured in “The Munsters,”a popular TV
series, in recognition of his large pointed ears.Like Talleyrand years before him, Genscher as
West Germany’s Foreign Secretary was sure to turn up at many a major international
conference or summit meeting on the winningside regardless of changes in government.His
most characteristicarticle of clothingwas his yellow V-neck pullover declaringhis allegiance to
the Free Democratic Party, the FDP, with its liberal economicagenda.Though small in terms of
its command of seats in the Federal Diet, it exercised totallydisproportionate decision-making
powers by beingthe slight weight that tipped the scales, thus decidingwho would govern for
the next four years. As Home Secretary and later Foreign Secretary Genscher himselfheld the
levers of Party, the FDP, with its liberal economicagenda.Though small in terms of its
command of seats in the Federal Diet, it exercised totallydisproportionate decision making
powers by beingthe slight weight that tipped the scales, thus decidingwho would govern for
the next four years. As Home Secretary and later Foreign Secretary Genscher himselfheld the
levers of power like no other,even the Chancellor.In effect he was the kingmaker –or unmaker.
Some have surmised that Genscher in his competence as Home Secretary was somewhat
lackadaisical in efforts to alarm WillyBrandt about the danger of retainingGünter Guillaume, a
suspected East German spy, as his personal aide in the chancellery.The Guillaume affair led to
Brandt’s resignation in November 1974. There was, however, no shadowof doubt in 1982 that
Genscher in league with Count Otto von Lambsdorffdeserted Helmut Schmidt in support of
Helmut Kohl,who had lodged a constructivevote of no confidence at the Federal Diet in the
November of 1982.Genscher pleaded that throughoutall the vagaries of politics he had only
the true interests of the German people at heart.He was born in the vicinityof Halle on the
eastern side of Germanyand emigrated to the Federal Republicin 1952.With this background
he was well placed to understandattitudes that prevailedin both parts ofGermany as he
labored to reconcile their differences.Furthermore,he was a skilled negotiator on the public
stage and a shrewd wheeler dealer behind the scenes. Always at the right place at the right
time, he played a cardinal role in guidingdevelopments in 1989 that culminated in the fall of
the Berlin Wall.Of course, there were others who deserve the title of an architect of German
unity,Egon Bahr,WillyBrandt and Helmut Kohl,but Genscher, if anyone, remained the

15. architect of German unity.Strange then that in 1991 the same man unleashed the process that
led inexorablyto the dismemberment ofYugoslavia.Whydid the unityof one nation haveto
entail the dismemberment ofanother?Genscher explained this paradox quitesimply.German
unitywas based on the universal principle that everypeople had the right to establish its
independence and sovereign nationhood.What was true for Germans was equally true for
Slovenians,Croats and Bosnians.To begin with at least,Germany’s allies and friends in the EC,
the USA and the United Nations were not quite so sanguine as Genscher himselfabout
recognizingSlovenia and Croatia byChristmas in 1991,that is to say, before the establishment
of a general internationallyagreed frameworkfor the settlement ofthe Yugoslavian question
scheduled for discussions to take place in the followingyear. Forebodings oftroubles ahead
were entertained byLord Carrington and Warren Christopher,who later referred darklyto
“Genscher’s war.” The real crunch came with Bosnian independence in the March of 1992.
Croatia and Slovenia were relativelywell defined entities in terms of cultural and religious
homogeneity.Bosnia was not,as the very mention of the word ‘Sarajevo’broadcasts to all and
sundry.But Sarajevo was for historybooks,beingno longer relevant for the purposes ofthe
new age. Yugoslavian diplomats,correctlyenough,pointed out that the provinces ofYugoslavia
were subject to a constitution that allowedfor the secession of any province on the condition
that this was approved byall the other provinces of the nation.It nowmeant that national
constitutions could be overruled bya caucus of powerful nations,not just by the United
Nations,ifany portion ofthe populace legitimized their wish for independence on the basis of a
referendum.The significance of this precedent was not lost on the Russian president years
later.It is right and proper to condemn the cruel and inhuman actions ofrabid nationalists,tin
pot dictators and war criminals,but such harsh criticism is best voiced by those who have had
no part in creating the conditions under which the same atrocities theyso vociferously
condemn are predictable and next to inevitable.The aftermath:the briefest summary.When
we compare the situationin the Balkans in 1991 with the state of affairs in that area in 1999.
we may well wonder at the radical changes that occurred in the meantime. "The West,"by
which I mean the USA, Britain,France and Germany,had become aggressively hostile to
Serbia.-Yugoslavia,the former allyof these countries,except for Germanyof course, duringthe
world wars of the twentieth century. No doubt,Serbia Yugoslavia had incurred the
understandable wrath ofits opponents byits inflictingor condoningatrocities again
defenceless civilians,though the Serbs were not the onlyones to do so. Even so, we note a
certain asymmetry between the punishmentmeted out to Serbia and the official justification
for this punishment.Take Kosovo.The motive behind the decision to separate the Kosovo from
Serbia was to protect innocent civilians at a certain crucial juncture in the Balkan conflict but
this separation was permanent and irreversible. The bombardment ofBelgrade by NATO
certainlystruck the Russians as a provocation,but not onlyRussians were taken aback by so
drastica measure. Takinga broad view of the situationat this time we can see the final stage of
the Balkan war as part of a wider process involvingmilitaryintervention ostensiblyfor the sake
of a humanitarian cause that also happenedto bringabout the fall of a regime, a notable case
of this phenomenon beingthe overthrowof Colonel Gaddafi.Such interventions produce an

16. asymmetric effect in that the largelypredictable aftermath ofsuch interventions produces at
least as much sufferingas they were intended to prevent,if not very much more. From the
point of view of ordinarycitizens in Europe and America precipitate militaryinterventions of
the kind mentioned aboveare counterproductive,to saythe least.Guido Westerwelle, the
German Minister of Foreign Affairs,was harshlycriticized for not wholeheartedlybacking
Germany's NATO allies duringthe campaign against Gaddafi.NATOsolidarity:good,
suppressingqualms ofthose whose conscience leads them to uphold firm principles.