(Published in GralsWelt 35/2005)
On May 8, 2005, sixty years will have passed since the unconditional surrender of the German Wehrmacht and the most devastating defeat in German history. But the German trauma is far from over.
Where are we today A critical analysis.
It was the second world war lost in a quarter of a century and, on top of that, the biggest war of all time, awakening and deepening the traumatic experiences of the humiliating armistice of 1918.
Because the First World War was the primary misfortune for Europe in the 20th century. Exaggerated nationalism, envy of competition, overarming and inability of all those responsible - not just Germany - unleashed him.
With the peace order that followed the First World War, the decline of Europe from the top of the world and the end of colonialism began. Unjust peace treaties dictated by greed and hatred (Versailles, St. Germain, Sèvres, Trianon, etc.) set the course for the Second World War and caused unsolved problems to this day, for example in the Middle East.
After World War I, Germany's economy was shattered by a monetary devaluation of unprecedented proportions, and unpayable reparation demands by the victorious powers imposed poverty for generations. A brief period of recovery for the world economy in the "Golden Twenties" ended in the Great Depression of 1929, which plunged even the wealthy United States into its deepest crisis since the Civil War. Germany, still suffering from the consequences of the war, was severely shaken, and the conditions for the success of right-wing extremism were created. (Cf. "Weimar didn't have to fail")
Sixty years ago, after the Second World War, the dismayed Germans then had to grapple with their recent history and wonder what had happened in twelve terrible years, from 1933 to 1945, and to what extent each of them contributed to the worst catastrophe in Germany Contributed to history and may have been personally guilty.
There were many reasons for the rise of National Socialism made possible by the failure of the Democrats; but no excuse that a high-class civilized people allowed themselves to be carried away so completely by militaristic, chauvinistic and racist ideologies.
How could the democratically elected parliament of the Weimar Republic - including Konrad Adenauer (1876-1967) and Theodor Heuss (1884-1963) - issue Chancellor Hitler with a blank power of attorney on March 23, 1933 (called the Enabling Act), which it granted the National Socialist Rule made it possible almost overnight to eliminate the civil liberties in Germany that had been fought for over centuries?
Incapable of reform due to the trauma?
Today, two generations after the second major catastrophe of the 20th century, it is still difficult for a German to come up with an objective picture of recent German history.
I have the impression that the history of the past century has left a deep trauma in almost every German, whose coming to terms with it despite the Nuremberg Trials, denazification, re-education, research and publicizing the Nazi atrocities, a democratic new beginning, considerable reparations and a functioning democracy, still is not completed.
This trauma makes our country incapable of reform in the present. The governments behave as if paralyzed, and the parties indulge in shameful party-political hiccups instead of tackling problems, following the inglorious example of the Weimar Republic. And the voters want - instead of the willingness to cheerfully grab hold of things - with general complaints, as far as possible, leave everything as it was. They seem to be afraid of political reforms and clear decisions, so that politicians can always talk themselves out of the lack of "political enforceability" when once again an overdue reform (just think of the "major tax reform" and the urgently needed "pension reform") ) is talked to death before really thought about it.
But life is change, and not only in nature, and creation and development are life-friendly for society, not rigidity!
When the cities lay in ruins after 1945, the state order only existed in a rudimentary form, people were starving and freezing, 12 million displaced persons (of whom 2 million perished while fleeing) had to be integrated, there was little time to lament, to make demands to the authorities , Government, state, which themselves were largely powerless and helpless. One could be grateful that the occupying powers were able to maintain a minimum of order and security.
Back then everyone had to lend a hand, support one another, clear away rubble, start over, build up, help themselves as best they could! After a few years, which were initially almost hopelessly difficult, things progressed and there was even a spirit of optimism.
Why is that no longer possible today? Is it due to a young generation that has experienced nothing but economic growth, innovations, innovations and upswing, aspirations, and hollow political slogans?
Lawsuit for Germany
I complain about Germany.
Not because it's defeated, dismembered, disempowered,
I complain because it reveals its essence
because it betrays its soul.
I complain about Germany
because it forgets its origin,
about that Germany
where a word another word
Right right, loyalty loyalty, betrayal was betrayal,
where corruption was alien and opportunism was contemptible,
where duty was higher than pleasure.
I am not complaining
for a dreamed, unprecedented country,
but an experienced one
what in the empire, the Weimar republic
and despite everything in the Third Reich and afterwards
was still there
and only now, year after year, disappears.
Friedrich Franz von Unruh (1893-1986)By the way, if someone thinks these statements are too "right-wing", one more note: Friedrich Franz von Unruh was no National Socialist. Rather, his wartime experiences made him a pacifist. Before 1933, as a writer, he issued an urgent warning against Hitler (his brother fled abroad). The fact that he himself remained undisturbed in the Third Reich is probably due to the fact that, as a seriously wounded officer in World War I, he could count on some consideration. In 1975 he received the Great Cross of Merit of the FRG.
Literature: Friedrich Franz von Unruh, "Klage um Deutschland", Hohenstaufen Verlag, Bodman Bodensee, 1973.
The 60s - a catastrophic turning point?
Or did the “German trauma” fully hit in the 1960s, when a turning point was initiated in politics and science that can now be described as catastrophic?
Since then, due to the ideologically based “reforms”, most of our schools and universities have slipped into the second class: For example, who still knows today that well into the 20th century, 30 percent of all scientific publications published worldwide were in German?
Since then, the foolish doctrine of "continuous economic growth" has been in force - an impossibility under natural law. (See. "More, always more, even more")
Since then, the aim has been to test “the resilience of the economy” with steadily increasing taxes and duties, and the state and authorities to operate as if they had unlimited funds at their disposal for all time (and not only in Germany, but in many other countries).
Since then, debts have been piled on top of debts that are supposedly easy to repay due to "continued economic growth".
Since then, governments have been propagating "reforms" that will burden the state with continuously increasing costs for an unlimited period of time, whereby one misses forward-looking planning - or someone wants to deny, for example, that today's, perhaps soon unsolvable problems of pension insurance were foreseeable for a long time due to population dynamics ?
Are the reasons for our current situation in the twisted worldview mix of Marxism, Freudian psychology and nonsensical theories (such as the milieu theory) with which a few “modern” professors from the “Frankfurt School” triggered the “1968 revolution”?
Have the so-called "68 revolutionaries" misdirected by their university lecturers, today often themselves in office and dignity, actually clouded an entire generation to such an extent that it can no longer make effective decisions due to the sheer ideology and politics?
Was this "68 Revolution" - which in my opinion was largely a press act - an initial spark for the hatred of parents and grandparents who were held responsible for the Nazi terror, even for the hatred of Germany and everything German ?
Worst of all has been an apparently unstoppable moral decline since then.
Politicians now seem to have accepted that corruption and democracy are brothers and sisters, and are accepting an unbearable percentage of the unemployed. Even the harsh criticism of the Federal President rebounds ineffectively against politicians who can only recognize mistakes in their political opponents.
The judiciary sometimes seems to protect criminals and overlook or even humiliate crime victims. Drug trafficking, criminal clans and organized crime are more and more accepted as a "social phenomenon", as is AIDS.
The economy only knows profit maximization and refers to the location conditions created by politicians. However, these are designed in such a way that undeclared work and tax evasion are viewed by many as an “act of self-defense”; after all, in their opinion, only the small, weak and stupid pay their taxes obediently, the rich and powerful elegantly evade this obligation. (How did the Baron von Rothschild say? “Ignorance of tax laws does not protect against paying taxes; knowledge does”).
Managers who look back on a series of failures, who can hardly think of anything constructive, and who are proud of the fact that jobs have been “rationalized”, see self-service shops for board members and supervisory boards in the stock corporations. So dominate "Group egoism" and "Extortionate lobbying" (Federal President Rau in May 2004).
The churches have not yet been able to come to terms with the fact that they have all but lost their status as moral authorities. Now they oscillate between Christian ethics, commitment to the poor and the disadvantaged and problem areas such as birth control, genetic manipulation, recognition of gay marriage, gender issues, multiculturalism, the integration of foreigners and the spread of fundamentalist Islam.
The population looks on helplessly, shows pessimism and fear of the future, for example in refusal to consume, but most clearly in the number of children: Here, Germany ranks last among the members of the UN; but children are the future, and a country without children has no future!
To stand by and watch the decline?
Will someone soon notice where the journey is going? Hopefully, there will soon be a powerful push from our own strength that shows us that we are still able to act, that we are still a functioning economy and society, a people who are willing and able to perform?
Are we waiting for a miracle? Or do we watch the ongoing decline inactive - in the expectation that the Germans will always return to their traditional virtues when their nation has collapsed, like after the Thirty Years' War, like after 1806 and like after 1945?
Does it have to happen again within a few decades?
You can also read the article “A Prophet of the Age of the Masses” in “Short, Concise, Curious” on page 408, and especially the chapter “Limitation of freedom by the bureaucracy”, as well as the articles under “Economic and social affairs” "Everything was better before." and "Intelligence ticks left".
