For nearly 2,000 years, German history has been marked by two major features. First, important political, social, and religious differences have divided Germany. Even after the country's belated political unification in 1871, these divisions raised questions about whether Germany can be thought of as a single entity. The second major feature is Germany's exposed geographical position in the heart of central Europe. Without natural boundaries and overshadowed during much of its history by more powerful neighbors, Germany has been a frequent battleground. This geographical situation has made Germans highly conscious of the need for security. ANCIENT GERMANY When the Romans first attempted to conquer the German lands late in the 1st century BC, they found them inhabited by a variety of \TGermanic peoples\t, comprising perhaps 4 million individuals. Exact knowledge of their origins is lacking, but it seems likely that these tribes migrated from Scandinavia and the territory between the Elbe and Oder rivers between 1000 and 100 BC, displacing the \TCelts\t as they did so. These ancient Germans came as conquerors, but they quickly settled down to pastoral and agricultural pursuits. Their simple log houses were grouped into villages, and the nearby fields were owned and tilled communally. Tribal government was primitively democratic. Assemblies of freemen made all important decisions, except in times of war, when elected kings temporarily held unlimited power. The ancient Germans worshiped a variety of gods and goddesses, whom they viewed as powerful but not as omnipotent or eternal. Because these deities were thought to be capricious and vengeful, human and other sacrifices were made to propitiate them. Both before and after the arrival of the Romans, various Germanic tribes emigrated from Germany, impelled mainly by the very forces that had brought them there in the first place--overpopulation and scarcity of land. Some whole tribes, or large segments of them, found new homes; they included the Visigoths in Spain, the Vandals in North Africa, and the Angles and Saxons in England. Others, such as the Teutons and Cimbri, were defeated and destroyed. Hence, modern Germans are the descendants of only a few of the original tribes. The Romans, for all their efforts to conquer Germany between 12 BC and AD 16, met with only limited success. The Germans held their ground tenaciously, and Roman leadership varied in quality. In AD 9, German forces under \TArminius\t annihilated three Roman legions in the Battle of Teutoburg Forest. The Romans were able to avenge that defeat but not to consolidate their rule in most of Germany nor to establish the Elbe as their outermost European frontier. Instead, they fell back to a 480 km (300 mi) fortified border, called the limes, which extended from the Rhine to the Danube. The fact that only a small part of southwestern Germany came under Roman hegemony had far-reaching effects. Most of Germany experienced little or no contact with the civilizing influences of Greco-Roman culture. Political allegiances remained with local leaders and traditional customs and were not transferred to a common state with unified laws and administration. Moreover, a pattern of division between a Romanized west and a barbarian east was established; over the centuries this cleavage would reappear in a variety of political and religious forms. THE FRANKISH KINGDOM AND EMPIRE (481-919) As the German tribes overran the Roman Empire in the 5th century, one tribe, the \TFranks\t, expanded from its base in northwest Germany until it controlled territories stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to Bavaria and Thuringia in the east. The first great leader of the Franks, \TClovis\t (r. 481-511), established the \TMerovingian\t dynasty, which lasted until 751. Clovis forged his empire by combining conquest, murder, and intrigue with conversion to Christianity. The last was by no means least in importance, since the substantial power of the Christian clergy in Gaul (essentially modern France and Belgium) greatly facilitated the consolidation of Clovis's rule. Once Clovis himself had adopted Christianity and allied with the church, it was only natural for him and his successors to sponsor the activities of missionaries in the eastern reaches of his realm. Thus the Frankish kingdom began the merger of Roman, German, and Christian elements that was the foundation of medieval German culture. Charlemagne The decline of the Merovingian dynasty in the 8th century placed power in the hands of royal officials, one of whom, \TCharles Martel\t (r. 714-41), established a new line of Frankish kings. This \TCarolingian\t dynasty was named after its greatest figure, Charles I (r. 768-814), better known as \TCharlemagne\t. Charlemagne conquered still more lands in Germany, including Bavaria in the east and Saxony in the north. To the \TSaxons\t, particularly warlike and unruly, he gave the choice of death or conversion to Christianity. Charlemagne made additional conquests in Italy and Spain. When the pope crowned him emperor on Christmas day of the year 800, Charlemagne was recognized as master of a revived Roman Empire in the West. But this restoration was more nominal than real because the economic disintegration that had undermined the original Roman Empire made it difficult to create a centralized state in so vast a realm. Hence, Charlemagne's traveling inspectors, called missi dominici ("the king's emissaries"), were able to provide only minimal administrative control over local officials. This partial restoration and extension of political order was accompanied by a rebirth of interest in learning, which has been called the Carolingian Renaissance. To his palace at \TAachen\t in northwest Germany, Charlemagne brought scholars from all over Europe for the purpose of setting educational standards for the empire's monastery schools. The most important of these scholars, \TAlcuin\t, had left his native England to supervise Charlemagne's own palace school. One of Alcuin's Frankish pupils, Einhard (c.770-840), wrote a biography of his emperor that is a major source of our knowledge of the period. Other Carolingian scholars copied classical manuscripts in a more modern form of writing, the Carolingian minuscule, thus preserving these works for future generations (see \TCarolingian art and architecture\t). Civil War and Disruption These promising developments were slowed or even, in some cases, reversed after Charlemagne's death. Not only did his empire rest almost entirely on the force of his own personal genius, but he himself had stipulated that his lands should be divided among his heirs after his death, according to the long-standing German tradition. The result was almost a century of civil war among the heirs and the eventual emergence (870) of two Frankish kingdoms, that of the West Franks (France) and that of the East Franks (Germany). The general political chaos of these decades was complicated by invasions of barbarian \TVikings\t and \TMagyars\t. Central government became all but impossible, and the great landed nobles of the realm asserted their local powers. \Tfeudalism\t took hold in most of Germany as a means of preserving a modicum of law and order. MEDIEVAL GERMANY (911-1517) The last Carolingian king of the East Franks was Louis the Child (r. 899-911). On his death (911), \TLotharingia\t (Lorraine) was the only East Frankish duchy to transfer its allegiance to the Carolingian king of the West Franks. The dukes of \TBavaria\t, \TFranconia\t, \TSaxony\t, and \TSwabia\t--the other so-called stem duchies--initially elected the duke of Franconia king of Germany as \TConrad I\t. In 919, however, they turned to the house of Saxony as their best defense against the Magyars. Saxon, Salian, and Hohenstaufen Dynasties The first two Saxon kings, \THenry I\t and his son, \TOtto I\t, were able to reassert the strength of a centralized monarchy. They stopped the Magyar onslaught and expanded German holdings into Eastern Europe--the so-called \TDrang nach Osten\t. Working closely with the church, they also established effective administrative machinery that succeeded in keeping the ambitious rival German dukes in line. Equally important in controlling the other dukes was the Saxon kings' claim to the title of Holy Roman emperor. When Otto I founded the \THoly Roman Empire\t in 962, he gained both a powerful ally in the papacy and new sources of taxes in northern Italy. To maintain these advantages, however, his successors were frequently obliged to preoccupy themselves with Italian affairs instead of attending to matters at home. Early in the 11th century, the Saxon line of monarchs died out, and the German princes began to elect a series of Salian (Franconian) kings. Of these, \THenry III\t (r. 1039-56) brought imperial control over the church to its pinnacle, deposing three rival popes in 1046 and nominating four popes in succession. His successor, \THenry IV\t, however, faced a resurgent papacy, which not only resisted lay control of the church but also did so in alliance with the German princes, who sought to win back the powers taken from them by the kings. This struggle, usually called the \Tinvestiture controversy\t, lasted until 1122 and ended essentially in victory for the papacy and the German nobility. The German king's powers over the church and the great German princes were gravely weakened, and the process of feudalization in Germany was accelerated. The \THohenstaufen\t dynasty increased the power of the monarchy briefly. First elected to the throne in 1138, the Hohenstaufens held it, despite vigorous challenge from the rival \TWelf\t family, until 1254. The dynasty's greatest figure, \TFrederick I\t (r. 1152-90), known as Barbarossa, chose to work within the feudal structure as a partner of the great princes. Although he acquired the valuable province of Burgundy by marriage and subdued most of Italy by force, his successors were overwhelmed by a resurgent papal-aristocratic alliance and by French and English intervention. Only the brilliant \TFrederick II\t (r. 1212-50) was able to restore a measure of order, but he was so absorbed in Italian affairs that he neglected Germany. Hence, at a time when England and France were being welded into modern nation-states, Germany fell once more into the hands of regional princes. There were sufficient intervals in this turbulent age to permit some economic progress and cultural achievement. Cities and commerce made a solid comeback, and by the end of the period there were no fewer than 1,600 cities and towns of varying size in Germany, many of them crowned by impressive Romanesque cathedrals. The early 13th century was also the peak of the medieval German court epic, represented most notably by \TWolfram von Eschenbach\t, and of Minnesang, or lyric love poetry, whose great genius was \TWalther von der Vogelweide\t. Consolidation of Princely Rule None of Frederick II's successors was able to regain the imperial powers that had been usurped by the German princes. The period immediately following Frederick's death--the so-called Interregnum--was one of particular chaos. During this period the Hohenstaufen were finally extinguished, and foreign princes contested for the imperial title. In 1273, \TRudolf I\t of the house of \THabsburg\t was elected king. The German princes were suspicious of Habsburg territorial ambitions, however, and elected a series of kings from other dynasties in succession to Rudolf. One of these kings, \TLouis IV\t (r. 1314-46) of the Bavarian house of \TWittelsbach\t, had to fight off a challenge from a Habsburg antiking, Frederick the Fair (c.1286-1330; r. 1314-26). Consistently opposed by the papacy, Louis rallied the support of the German princes for his 1338 declaration asserting the authority of these princes to elect the emperor without confirmation by the pope. \TCharles IV\t (r. 1347-78) of the house of Luxemburg, formally acknowledged the principle of elective monarchy with the \TGolden Bull\t, of 1356, which regularized elections by naming seven electors: the archbishops of Mainz, Trier, and Cologne, the duke of Saxony, the margrave of Brandenburg, the count palatine of the Rhine, and the king of Bohemia. Far from endorsing or deliberately encouraging disorder, the Golden Bull accepted the political realities of an age in which unified monarchy had become impossible in Germany. Real power rested with the princely and ecclesiastical states, the imperial free cities, and the imperial knights. Rise of the Habsburgs If the imperial title had lost much of its significance, it remained valuable to the ambitious Habsburgs as a symbol of sovereignty. From 1438, members of the ruling dynasty of \TAustria\t were elected Holy Roman emperors, with only one short break (1740-45), until the empire's dissolution in 1806. Acquiring Burgundy, the Low Countries, Spain, and much of Italy by marriage, they came closest to restoring full dignity to the imperial crown. The ablest of the early Habsburgs, \TMaximilian I\t (r. 1493-1519), decreed "Eternal Peace" in 1495 in order to control the unruly imperial knights and restore order in his divided realm. He also created an imperial court of justice (Kammergericht) to help enforce his decrees. The German princes, jealous of their powers and still fearful of Habsburg ambitions, responded by demanding an imperial governing council (Reichsrat) to control imperial policies. As constituted in 1500, it included several of the great princes and representatives of the imperial free cities. It did not, however, evolve into an effective organ of representative government. The princes were more interested in hamstringing the emperors than they were in assuming the burden of statesmanship, and the additional divisions generated by the Reformation overwhelmed the council and left Germany as fragmented as ever. But political fragmentation did not retard growth in other areas. Germany's economic advances since the Middle Ages and its recovery from the calamity of the Black Death (1347-50; see \Tbubonic plague\t) were best mirrored in the prosperity of the great cities. Not least among them were the great northern trading cities that banded together into the \THanseatic League\t, centered in \TLubeck\t. The expansion of trade, commerce, and industry in the 15th century was paralleled by major technological development, most notably the invention of movable type, attributed to Johann \TGutenberg\t of Mainz. The printing press had a major cultural impact on the succeeding era, which was also distinguished by the achievements of artists such as Albrecht \TDurer\t, Hans \THolbein\t the Younger, Lucas \TCranach\t, and Matthias \TGrunewald\t. RELIGION AND ABSOLUTISM (1517-1789) On Oct. 31, 1517, Martin \TLuther\t nailed to a church door in Wittenberg his 95 theses condemning the sale of \Tindulgences\t by the Roman Catholic church. This event is usually taken to mark the beginning of the Protestant \TReformation\t. The Reformation Luther's revolt against what he regarded as abuses by the Roman Catholic church swiftly became entangled in larger political and social issues. The peasants of much of Germany, chafing under the oppressive rule of aristocratic landowners, drew some unwarranted political conclusions from Luther's religious independence and rose in the revolt known as the \TPeasants' War\t in 1524. The revolt was suppressed, with Luther's help, but religious and social radicalism lived on in the \TAnabaptist\t sects. Still more important were the political uses to which the higher orders of the empire put \TLutheranism\t. Always on the lookout for ways to strengthen their hand against the staunchly Catholic emperor and covetous of the church's property, tax powers, and legal jurisdiction, many of the German princes enthusiastically embraced the Protestant religion. Emperor \TCharles V\t (r. 1519-56) found himself confronted simultaneously with a revolt by the Lutheran princes and free cities, organized into the League of Schmalkald, and a massive Turkish invasion of southeastern Europe. After a long and desperate struggle, the religious wars ended in a stalemate with the Peace of Augsburg (1555; see \TAugsburg, Peace of\t), which in effect recognized Lutheranism as the religion of most of northern and central Germany. Although the settlement was a great victory for Protestantism, it helped to perpetuate and intensify Germany's political disintegration. Thirty Years' War The Peace of Augsburg did not solve Germany's basic political and religious problems and hence could be nothing more than a truce. It had called for the maintenance of the religious and political status quo of 1555, but Lutheranism and \TCalvinism\t, a rival Protestant sect, continued to make progress in Germany--to the horror of Catholic princes and church leaders. Nor had the Habsburg emperors given up their goal of making the Holy Roman Empire into a modern, unified state. These conflicting developments produced the \TThirty Years' War\t (1618-48), a series of four related wars. In it the Protestant states barely held their own, although they were aided by the acquisitive Swedes and by the French, who wanted to undermine their great rivals, the Habsburgs, by keeping Germany divided and weak. When hostilities were ended by the Treaty of Westphalia (1648; see \TWestphalia, Peace of\t), devastated Germany was still torn hopelessly apart, a collection of more than 300 virtually sovereign states without effective central government. Rise of Brandenburg-Prussia Although a few of these states, such as Bavaria and Saxony, achieved a measure of wealth and power, the state that was ultimately to unify Germany arose from unpromising beginnings. \TBrandenburg\t, in origin a small march (military frontier) state created on lands conquered from the Slavs on the north German plain in the 13th century, began to expand under its vigorous \THohenzollern\t rulers in the 17th century. Its most important early acquisition was the duchy of \TPrussia\t, which had been conquered by the \TTeutonic Knights\t in the 13th century and secularized in 1525; Prussia passed by inheritance to the margrave of Brandenburg in 1618. The territories of Brandenburg were further augmented by the Treaty of Westphalia. The most prominent of the early Hohenzollern rulers were \TFrederick William\t, elector of Brandenburg (r. 1640-88), and his grandson \TFrederick William I\t (r. 1713-40), king of Prussia (the rulers of Brandenburg-Prussia had assumed the title "king in Prussia" in 1701). They built an army that was far larger than those of other states of comparable population. Their purpose was defensive because Prussia had suffered hideously during the Thirty Years' War. However, King \TFrederick II\t (r. 1740-86), later called the Great, used the army to expand Prussia's borders. As a result of the war of the \TAustrian Succession\t (1740-48) and the \TSeven Years' War\t (1756-63), Frederick won the valuable province of \TSilesia\t from Austria. He also participated (1772), with Russia and Austria, in the first of three successive partitions of Poland (see \TPoland, Partitions of\t). Like the other so-called enlightened despots of the 18th century, Frederick used authoritarian methods to modernize his government and society; he did not, however, go so far as to antagonize the powerful Prussian nobles, known as \TJunkers\t. When Frederick died, Prussia was the largest and most significant northern state in divided Germany. Austria, with its imperial Habsburg dynasty, was still considered the dominant German state. However, its wars with Prussia had revealed serious weaknesses, and the centralizing reforms of \TMaria Theresa\t and her son, emperor \TJoseph II\t, another enlightened despot, antagonized some of the Habsburgs' disparate subjects. These often chaotic years of religious and dynastic struggles caused German economic and cultural life to decline, although the astronomy of Johannes \TKepler\t and the novel Simplicissimus (1669; Eng. trans., 1924) by Hans Jakob von \TGrimmelshausen\t were significant exceptions. Partial recovery during the 18th century helped to produce magnificent \Tbaroque art and architecture\t and the equally monumental baroque and classical music of Johann Sebastian \TBach\t, Wolfgang Amadeus \TMozart\t, and Franz Josef \THaydn\t. NATIONALISM AND UNIFICATION (1789-1871) During the wars of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic period, Germany was conquered by the French. The chief impact of this conquest was to instill a sense of unity and nationalism in the German people. Even before the French intrusions, Johann Gottfried von \THerder\t had popularized German nationalism, urging Germans to cast off their servile imitation of the French. The humiliation of outright domination by French overlords, however, crystallized into the determination to free and unite Germany. Prussia, although defeated by \TNapoleon I\t, carried out drastic military and social reforms and ultimately led the other German states in the victorious War of Liberation against the French in 1813. (See \TFrench Revolutionary Wars\t; \TNapoleonic Wars\t.) German Confederation The dreams of German patriots were smashed by the peacemakers at the Congress of Vienna (1814-15; see \TVienna, Congress of\t). They restored most of the major princes while retaining Napoleon's simplified structure of only about three dozen, instead of three hundred, states. These states were bound loosely together in the \TGerman Confederation\t. Like the Holy Roman Empire, which Napoleon had dissolved in 1806, the Confederation was dominated by the Habsburgs, who now called themselves emperors of Austria. For the time being, Prussia took a back seat, contenting itself with instituting (1834) the \TZollverein\t, a tariff union that included most of the German states. In the following decades the forces of entrenched conservatism, seemingly personified by the Austrian foreign minister Klemens von \TMetternich\t, were increasingly challenged by liberal ideas drawn from the French revolutionary example and by nationalism. Demands for change and an economic depression combined to produce the \TRevolutions of\t 1848. Liberal concessions were granted in virtually all the German states, and representatives were elected to a national convention, the \TFrankfurt Parliament\t, to unite Germany and provide it with a liberal constitution. However, divisions among the revolutionaries and the dogged opposition of conservative Prussia, whose king, \TFrederick William IV\t, contemptuously refused to rule over a united German constitutional monarchy, caused the revolution to collapse in 1849. Bismarck's Unification of Germany The cause of German nationalism was taken up again in 1862 by Prussia's new minister-president, Otto von \TBismarck\t. A conservative Prussian patriot, he was determined to steal the nationalist issue from the liberals and assure Prussian leadership in a united Germany. In a series of three wars, in each of which he managed to make his adversary appear the aggressor, he eliminated first Danish, then Austrian, and finally French influence from Germany. The war against Denmark (1864), fought in alliance with Austria, resulted in the Danish cession of \TSchleswig-Holstein\t. A quarrel over the administration of the ceded territory gave Bismarck his pretext for attacking and defeating Austria in the \TSeven Weeks' War\t (1866). With Austria carefully excluded from German affairs, Bismarck formed (1867) the North German Confederation, uniting the northern German states under a federal government dominated by Prussia. Three years later, during the \TFranco-Prussian War\t (1870-71), the southern German states agreed to join the federation, and on Jan. 18, 1871, the Prussian king \TWilliam I\t was crowned emperor of a new German Reich at Versailles. In the name of Prussian authoritarianism and militarism, and with "blood and iron" tactics, Bismarck had succeeded where the German liberals had failed. Overwhelmingly eclipsed by the turn of events, most liberals hastened to make their peace with Bismarck. Germany was united, but its political maturation had been drastically retarded. The years of growing German national consciousness were also great ones for German culture. Classical idealism reached its highest expression in the poetry and drama of Johann Wolfgang von \TGoethe\t and the music of Ludwig van \TBeethoven\t. Lasting influence on the development of philosophy was exerted by G. W. F. \THegel\t, while romantic music found two of its geniuses in Robert \TSchumann\t and Richard \TWagner\t. IMPERIAL GERMANY (1871-1918) Bismarck fastened an appropriately authoritarian political structure on the newly formed nation. The German Empire retained the constitution he had created for the North German Confederation. It provided for a democratically elected parliament, the \TReichstag\t, but granted it only the limited powers of fiscal appropriation and debate. Germany was organized on a federal basis, with certain powers reserved to the states. But in the national government, real power lay with the Prussian king, who was also the German emperor (Kaiser), and his advisors. As long as William I ruled (until 1888), his chancellor, Bismarck, was given his way on virtually every issue. Bismarck's Rule In order to manipulate the Reichstag, Bismarck formed coalitions of parties that were based at least as much on opposition to real or imagined internal enemies as on concrete political issues. At first he allied with his former foes, the liberals, to encourage the growth of industrial and commercial capitalism in Germany. Simultaneously, he fought the large Roman Catholic minority and its political arm, the Center party, as enemies of the new state. This campaign, known as the \TKulturkampf\t, produced only short-term benefits since the Catholics, assisted by some non-Catholics, resisted doggedly. Bismarck ended the Kulturkampf in 1878 only because he wanted to run Germany with the help of new partners, the conservatives. He had concluded that the best way to deal with a severe economic depression was to protect German industry and agriculture with tariffs, a policy more acceptable to conservative than to liberal minds. The enemy, too, changed. This time it was Germany's mildly Marxist party, the Social Democratic party (SPD), that represented the growing industrial working class. In the 1880s, Bismarck had the SPD outlawed as subversive and tried to win over the German workers with the world's first comprehensive social security system. However, he was no more successful in suppressing the socialists than he had been with the Catholics. By 1890 he had lost control of the Reichstag and was contemplating the use of force to overturn the constitution when the new emperor compelled him to resign. Bismarck's foreign policy was far sounder than his domestic politics. Convinced that Germany had all the territory it needed, he promoted European stability by isolating France and diverting its attention to colonial expansion overseas. He won important allies for Germany by the \TTriple Alliance\t with Austria and Italy (1882) and the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia (1887). He endorsed a policy of German colonial expansion only belatedly and halfheartedly, and then mainly to secure support for his domestic policies from nationalists and from industrial and commercial interests. William II's Policies William I was succeeded briefly by his son \TFrederick III\t and then by his grandson \TWilliam II\t (r. 1888-1918). The young William appreciated neither Bismarck's assumption that only Bismarck could govern Germany nor his heavy-handed attempts to bludgeon minorities into submission. After forcing the Iron Chancellor to retire (1890), the new emperor attempted to dominate German politics himself even though he did not possess the intelligence and emotional stability necessary to do so. William seriously attempted to conciliate the German working class, dropping the anti-socialist laws and extending the social security system. But he would not make concessions to the idea of political democracy, stubbornly resisting demands by the SPD and middle-class liberals for reform of Prussia's old, undemocratic constitution and for the granting of real powers to the Reichstag. The growth of reform sentiment and outrage over William's frequent blunders produced all the ingredients for a constitutional confrontation on the eve of World War I. Not the least of the reformers' complaints concerned William II's inept foreign policy, in which he was guided by the foreign office official Friedrich von \THolstein\t and by Bernhard von \TBulow\t, who became foreign secretary in 1897 and chancellor in 1900. Unsure of his ability to maintain alliances with both Russia and Austria in view of their rivalry in the Balkans, the emperor opted for Austria and let the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia lapse in 1890. Four years later, France concluded an alliance with Russia. Then, instead of behaving with appropriate caution, William followed the advice of Admiral Alfred von \TTirpitz\t in launching a naval arms race with Britain. He also plunged into colonial adventures and thus further antagonized both Britain and France. By 1909, when Bulow was succeeded as chancellor by the more sober Theobald von \TBethman\t-HOLLWEG, Germany had only one reliable ally, Austria-Hungary. These serious flaws were less apparent at the time than they might otherwise have been because of imperial Germany's dazzling economic, scientific, and cultural achievements. Encouraged by government subventions and the close collaboration of bankers and industrialists, Germany experienced most of its economic growth between 1870 and 1910. Although German industrialization had gotten underway long after Britain's, by 1910 German steel production was more than twice that of Britain. German science and technology, supported by a sophisticated university system, came to be regarded as the world's best. At the same time, the early novels of Thomas \TMann\t, the late romantic music of Johannes \TBrahms\t and Richard \TStrauss\t, and the apocalyptic philosophy of Friedrich \TNietzsche\t helped maintain Germany's reputation as a major cultural center. World War I These signs of vitality suggested that Germany might peacefully have solved its political and social problems over a period of time. However, its defeat in \TWorld War I\t denied it that possibility. Excessively eager to support its ally Austria in a dispute with Russia over Serbia, Germany helped precipitate war in 1914 by sending an ultimatum to Russia and, when it was rejected, declaring war on both Russia and France, in accordance with the rigid war plan devised by Alfred von \TSchlieffen\t. Most Germans, even the SPD, supported the war effort at first, but their mood began to change when no swift victory could be won and terrible food shortages developed. Increasing numbers of them wondered whether the government was more interested in conquests than in a fair peace treaty. When, in November 1918, it was obvious that Germany had to sue for peace, the German people rose in revolt against their leaders. Even the German generals pressed for the emperor's abdication. William went into exile in the Netherlands, and the Social Democrats took over the government, proclaimed a republic, and brought the war to an end. WEIMAR AND NAZI GERMANY (1918-45) It is one of the great tragedies of modern history that Germany's first encounter with democratic government was associated with defeat and misery. The Social Democrats, accepting the support of the army in order to maintain order, suppressed several Communist revolts, including the regime of Kurt \TEisner\t in Bavaria. Early in 1919 a freely elected constituent assembly met in Weimar to write a constitution giving direct governing power to the Reichstag. SPD leader Friedrich \TEbert\t was named president of the new Weimar Republic, and Philipp \TScheidemann\t formed a coalition government of the SPD, the Center party, and a liberal group. This government soon resigned rather than sign the Treaty of Versailles, the vindictive settlement imposed by the \TParis Peace Conference\t. However, Germany really had no choice. In June 1919 the Weimar Assembly voted to comply with the treaty, which deprived Germany of large amounts of land, people, and natural resources and forced it to pay enormous \Treparations\t. Crisis and Recovery The attempt to root parliamentary democracy in Germany was beset from the beginning by grave problems. There were so many political parties--at least six major and many more minor ones--that it was hard to form stable coalitions for effective government. Militant minorities--the Communists on the far left and monarchists and racists on the opposite extreme--sometimes resorted to force in efforts to overturn the republic. Notable among these efforts was the \TMunich Putsch\t of 1923, in which the tiny National Socialist party led by Adolf \THitler\t made a somewhat farcical attempt to seize power in Bavaria. The continuing unrest made the national government even more dependent on the basically conservative army. The year 1923 was one of major crisis. The payment of reparations, in both cash and kind, had placed an enormous strain on a country already bankrupted by more than four years of war. As inflation had mounted Germany had suspended payment in 1922, provoking the French to occupy the Ruhr area in January 1923. Workers in Ruhr mines and factories resisted by striking, but such resistance contributed to inflation, which brought on economic collapse. The situation was saved in November 1923 when the ablest of Germany's republican politicians, Gustav \TStresemann\t, introduced a new currency and improved Germany's relations with the western nations, paving the way for foreign loans and a more reasonable schedule of reparations payments. During the later 1920s, therefore, the German economy revived, and politics settled down. Also, during those years, a remarkable avant-garde culture blossomed in Germany, extending from the epic theater of Bertolt \TBrecht\t, to the \TBauhaus\t school of functional art and architecture, to the relativity physics of Albert \TEinstein\t, and to the existential philosophy of Martin \THeidegger\t. This new Germany was cut down in its infancy by the onset of the \TDepression of the 1930s\t and the Nazi seizure of power. Depression conditions once more radicalized politics and so divided the parties in the Reichstag that parliamentary government became all but impossible. From 1930 on, government functioned by emergency decree. The Communists profited briefly from this radicalization, but the main beneficiary was Hitler's National Socialist, or Nazi, party, which had the twin attractions of appearing to offer radical solutions to economic problems while upholding patriotic values. By 1932 it was the largest party in the Reichstag. The following year President Paul von \THindenburg\t appointed Hitler chancellor after allowing himself to be convinced by generals and right-wing politicians that only the Nazi leader could restore order in Germany and that he could be controlled. Nazi Dictatorship Most Germans who supported Hitler during his rise to power did so out of desperation, scarcely knowing what he planned to do. They received much more than they had bargained for. After half-persuading, half-coercing the Reichstag to grant him absolute power, Hitler lost no time in founding a totalitarian state, known unofficially as the \TThird Reich\t--supposedly in the tradition of the Holy Roman Empire and the unified German Empire set up by Bismarck. When confronted by demands from Storm Trooper (SA) leader Ernst \TRoehm\t and others for a second revolution that would make good on Nazi claims to socialist ideals, Hitler purged Roehm and his associates on the weekend of June 30, 1934. Four years later, he forced out two of the top generals on trumped-up charges in order to assure himself of full control of the expanding German armed forces. Thanks to a ruthless secret police (the \TGestapo\t) and a \Tconcentration camp\t system under the direction of SS (Schutzstaffel) leader Heinrich \THimmler\t, known enemies of Nazism were put away and potential ones terrorized. (See also \Tnazism\t.) Hitler's virulent racism gave rise to a cruel system of anti-Semitism. The Nuremberg Laws of September 1935, which deprived Jews of most civil rights, were supplemented by other measures designed to rid Germany of Jews. These measures were to culminate in a policy of deliberate extermination during World War II, taking the lives of approximately 6 million European Jews. More immediately, however, a concerted state program of ending unemployment with public works projects and a restoration of business confidence produced remarkable economic recovery in Germany. Joseph \TGoebbels\t's efficient propaganda ministry controlled the media to assure that Hitler would be viewed as a genius and Nazi Germany as the best of all possible worlds. Given this combination of coercion, achievement, and thought control, it is perhaps not surprising that there was little resistance, aside from limited opposition from some elements in the churches and the army. World War II Hitler's foreign policy goals were determined by his belief that Germany was overpopulated and needed to conquer Europe in order to secure Lebensraum (living space) in Poland and Russia. Concealing his real goals before 1939, he hoodwinked Europe's diplomats into appeasing him with concessions--as at the \TMunich Conference\t of 1938. The 1936 remilitarization of the Rhineland, from which troops had been banned by the Versailles treaty; the annexation of Austria (the so-called Anschluss) in 1938; and the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia in 1938-39 were all accomplished without effective interference by the other European powers. When Britain and France finally declared war (Sept. 3, 1939) after the German invasion of Poland, Hitler found himself involved in war on a much larger scale than he had expected and for which Germany was not adequately prepared. A series of initially successful Blitzkriege (lightning campaigns) against Poland (1939), western Europe (1940), and the \TUSSR\t (1941) made him temporary master of most of Europe. But, unable to destroy Britain and Russia, Hitler found himself confronted by an overwhelmingly powerful enemy coalition, including (after December 1941) the United States. Germany's main European ally, Fascist Italy, soon collapsed, and its Asian ally, Japan, fought an essentially independent war. The German collapse began in mid-1944 when the Allies invaded France and strategic bombing began to reduce German armament production. When Hitler committed suicide in Berlin in April 1945, Germany was largely in ruins and at the mercy of the countries it had ravaged. (See \TWorld War II\t.) GERMANY SINCE 1945 The victorious Allies managed to agree to give most of eastern Germany to Poland and the \TUSSR\t, to divide what was left into four zones of occupation, and to try the major Nazi war criminals before an International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg (see \TNuremberg Trials\t). However, they could not agree on whether or how to reunite the four occupied zones. As \Tcold war\t tensions grew, stimulated in part by the German situation itself, the temporary dividing line between the Soviet zone in the east and the British, French, and U.S. zones in the west hardened into a permanent boundary. In 1949, shortly after the Western powers permitted their zones to unite and restore parliamentary democracy in the Federal Republic of Germany, the Soviets installed a puppet regime of German Communists in the east, creating the German Democratic Republic. West Germany Any possibility that the \TUSSR\t might have permitted the reunification of a neutral Germany in the 1950s, as it did in Austria, was thwarted by Konrad \TAdenauer\t, West Germany's chancellor (prime minister) from 1949 to 1963. Head of the conservative Christian Democratic party, Adenauer was deeply suspicious of Soviet intentions and preferred the closest possible ties with Western Europe and the United States. He guided the Federal republic of Germany into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1955, and into the process of Western European integration that culminated in the formation of the European Economic Community in 1958. Claiming that only West Germany represented the true wishes of all the German people, Adenauer refused to recognize the Soviet-dominated German Democratic Republic or maintain diplomatic relations with any country that did. The West German chancellor skillfully exploited cold war tensions in order to win sovereignty and the right to rearm for his country. Adenauer's government also brought about an impressive economic recovery with a modified form of free-enterprise capitalism. Businesses and industries were largely private, but high taxes helped pay for rebuilding programs and an impressive network of social services. Economic recovery enabled West Germany to provide a home for more than ten million ethnic German refugees who in 1945 had fled from Soviet armies or been expelled from Poland, Czechoslovakia, and other Eastern European countries. The West German constitution functioned smoothly under Adenauer, convincing many Germans that parliamentary democracy was compatible with order and prosperity. The constitution banned neo-Nazi parties, and it denied representation in the Bundestag (legislature) to parties that gained less than five percent of the vote in elections, which discouraged extremist groups of all kinds. A "codetermination" law passed in 1951 provided workplace democracy by giving employees a share in the management of large concerns. Although Adenauer was committed to preserving the democratic order, his personal authoritarian style in dealing with his colleagues led to his ouster in 1963. His conservative policies were carried on by two Christian Democratic successors, Ludwig \TErhard\t, who was chancellor from 1963 to 1966, and Kurt Georg Kiesinger (1966-69). The Bundestag elections of 1969 signaled a significant turn in West German politics. For the first time, the Social Democrats were able to form a government. After having been excluded from power for many years, the SPD had abandoned its advocacy of Marxist economics and German neutrality, chosen an attractive leader in West Berlin's mayor Willy \TBrandt\t, and accepted junior partnership in Kiesinger's government to prove it was a moderate party capable of governing in the interest of all Germans. Although Brandt became chancellor in 1969, he was restrained from making important domestic changes by the SPD's coalition partner, the more conservative Free Democratic party. Brandt's chief innovation was his Ostpolitik, or policy toward West Germany's eastern neighbors. Abandoning claims to territories lost to Poland and the \TUSSR\t, the Federal Republic signed treaties with both countries recognizing the new borders established at the end of World War II. Another treaty with East Germany amounted to reciprocal recognition of the two German states. In the short term, Brandt's Ostpolitik promoted a relaxation of tensions in Central Europe that enabled West Germans to visit friends and relatives in the East and both Germanies to enter the United Nations. In the long term that relaxation made German reunification a possibility. The discovery of an East German spy in Willy Brandt's administration led him to resign in 1974 in favor of fellow Social Democrat Helmut \TSchmidt\t. Schmidt continued to pursue moderate domestic policies and Ostpolitik, as did the Christian Democrats when they returned to power under Helmut Kohl in 1982. As was true in most other European parliamentary democracies, no great gulf separated the leading parties in West German political life. Neither the Christian Democrats nor the Social Democrats wanted to jeopardize the Federal Republic's booming capitalist economy, its improving relations with its eastern neighbors, and its acceptance as a leading partner in the European Community and the Western alliance. With this postwar revival of free political life came renewed cultural creativity. The novels of Heinrich \TBoll\t and Gunter \Tgrass\t, the films of Werner \THerzog\t, Rainer Werner \TFassbinder\t, Wim Wenders, and Volker Schlondorff, and the music of Karlheinz \TStockhausen\t won worldwide recognition. East Germany The German Democratic Republic experienced a more difficult history. Economically exploited by the Soviet Union throughout its existence, East Germany's highly centralized and repressive Communist system always lagged behind West Germany. The unpopular dictator Walter \TUlbricht\t was dependent on the Soviet occupation army and used it to quell a popular uprising in 1953. In 1961 the flight of hundreds of thousands of his best workers from East to West Berlin forced Ulbricht to erect the \TBerlin Wall\t in an attempt to stem the flow of outward migration. Things did not improve when Erich \THonecker\t succeeded Ulbricht in 1971. Pressures for change were felt only in 1989, when reforms in Poland, Hungary, and the Soviet Union encouraged more than 200,000 East Germans to emigrate to the West via Czechoslovakia and Hungary, and many more to demonstrate for democratic reforms at home. With the \TUSSR\t no longer willing to intervene and save it, the Communist government collapsed and the Berlin Wall was opened in November 1989. This paved the way for the unification of the two German states under the West German constitution on Oct. 3, 1990. The costs of bringing the faltering economy of East Germany in line with the West promised to be enormous, but the great prosperity of the former West Germany gave cause for optimism on that score. For the first time since 1933, the German people lived together in freedom and unity, this time under conditions that were vastly more favorable than those that had prevailed under the Weimar Republic. Donald L. Niewyk Bibliography: Barraclough, Geoffrey, The Origins of Modern Germany, 2d ed. (1947; repr. 1966); Berghahn, Volker, Modern Germany, 2d ed. (1987); Bracher, Karl Dietrich, The German Dictatorship, trans. by Jean Steinberg (1970); Calleo, David, The German Problem Reconsidered: Germany and the World Order, 1870 to the Present (1978); Craig, Gordon A., Germany, 1866-1945 (1978); Detwiler, Donald, Germany: A Short History, 2d ed. (1989); DuBoulay, F. R. H., Germany in the Late Middle Ages (1983); Hampe, Karl, Germany Under the Salian and Hohenstaufen Emperors, trans. by Ralph Bennett (1973); Holborn, Hajo, The History of Modern Germany, 3 vols. (1959-69); Mann, Golo, The History of Germany Since 1789, trans. by Marion Jackson (1968); Orlow, Dietrich, A History of Modern Germany, 1871 to the Present (1987); Pinson, Koppel S., Modern Germany: Its History and Civilization, 2d ed. (1966); Reinhardt, Kurt F., Germany: 2000 Years, 2 vols., rev. ed. (1961); Sheehan, James J., German History, 1770-1866 (1990); Simon, Walter M., Germany (1966); Stern, Fritz, Dreams and Delusions: The Drama of German History (1987); Thompson, James W., Feudal Germany, 2 vols. (1928; repr. 1962); Turner, Henry Ashby, Jr., The Two Germanies Since 1945 (1987). See also: \TEurope, history of\t; \TGerman art and architecture\t; \TGerman and Austrian music\t; \TGerman literature\t; \TGermany\t.