How To Understand Germany’s Policy Toward Ukraine

By H. David Baer on August 28, 2023 • ( 0 )

I recently published this article on Germany in The Bulwark. Although the occasion is the war in Ukraine and criticisms of German foreign policy, in many ways the article is about German history. I offer an interpretive sketch of German history from the Thirty Years’ War to the present day – which explains everything! If you’re interested in Central Europe, this article might be for you!! Here’s an excerpt:

For centuries, European history has been shaped by what we might call the “German question”: How to give the German people political representation, and whether to organize them into a nation-state. The question has never admitted of a single or definitive answer, but it constitutes a recurring dynamic of German history. The best way to understand Germany’s international conduct is as an ongoing effort to balance the permanent challenges inherent in the German question. This applies even to German policy toward the war in Ukraine. To see how clear thinking about the German question can help us to better understand Germany’s role in the Ukraine crisis today, let’s begin with a brief sketch of modern German history.

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