Katja Hoyer is an Anglo-German historian. Her latest book is Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990.
It was a clear cold morning in January 1936 when Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler arrived at the luxurious Regina Palast Hotel in central Munich. He had come to pick up a group of businessmen for a day trip. Their destination: Dachau concentration camp. Nazi Germany’s first official camp had been set up by Himmler in March
When Volodymyr Zelensky told the German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier yesterday that he did not want to see him in Kyiv, it hit his delegation like a slap in the face. The political class in Berlin still underestimates the depths of mistrust caused by Germany’s Russia policy. Whether trust with Eastern Europe can be rebuilt will depend on
‘We are witnessing a turning point… the world is not the same anymore,’ said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz yesterday in a speech that will be remembered as the country’s biggest military shift since 1945. Staring down the barrel of Putin’s gun, Scholz announced a massive and immediate cash injection for Germany’s armed forces as well
‘The Russian invasion marks a turning point,’ said Olaf Scholz on Saturday as he announced that Germany would break its long-standing principle of not sending arms into conflict zones by delivering 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 Stinger missiles to Ukraine. ‘It is our duty to support Ukraine to the best of our ability,’ he explained.
The Chief of the German Army is angry. Alfons Mais’s words were coloured by evident frustration when he said that the Bundeswehr had been ‘caught with its pants down’ in the current crisis in Ukraine: ‘The options we can offer politicians to support the alliance are extremely limited’ Such outspoken political criticism is rare from
‘The EU is united and acting fast,’ said Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, as she condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. A new package of sanctions, swiftly agreed upon by EU member states, appeared to show von der Leyen was right. Yet in reality, the measures were disappointing: a number of Russian officials had
When German chancellor Olaf Scholz met Russian president Vladimir Putin yesterday, the visuals said it all. As he had done with Emmanuel Macron, Putin kept his visitor at arm’s length, or rather at five metres’ length. Sitting at opposite ends of the Kremlin’s infamous long table, the two men were as physically far away from
‘Germany has succeeded in levelling up where we have not,’ Boris Johnson claimed back in July last year, when talk of pork pie putsches lay far off in the future. But as the government unveils its levelling up plans today, the promise of a German-style investment package is unlikely to materialise. And that’s probably a
Amidst the heavy criticism of Germany’s lack of commitment in the Ukraine crisis, the German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock argued in a speech to the German parliament on Thursday that alliance systems were a bit like a football team. ‘You don’t need 11 centre-forwards who all do the same thing; you need 11 players who
‘If people like me do not proclaim their experiences for others to hear, then future generations will not learn the lessons of these, perhaps the darkest, moments of our history,’ said Freda Wineman, who survived Auschwitz and other Nazi concentration camps and dedicated much of her life after the second world war to sharing her
Germany’s navy chief, vice admiral Kay-Achim Schönbach, resigned over the weekend. His crime? Saying something out loud that many German politicians intrinsically believe: that the Russian president Vladimir Putin deserves ‘respect’. Schönbach also made the mistake of suggesting Ukraine would ‘never’ regain the Crimean peninsula from Russia, and calling Western fears about Russia invading Ukraine ‘nonsense’. As Germany’s government scrambled to
Ukraine’s list of demands towards Germany is straightforward: it wants Berlin to stand up to Russia. With tens of thousands of Russian troops stationed on Ukraine’s border, its plea is urgent. It is just a matter of time before this week’s Russian-American security talks in Geneva end in a diplomatic stalemate. When that happens, an invasion could be imminent. But
As Angela Merkel prepares to write her autobiography, ‘explaining her key decisions in her own words’, her successor has his hands full dealing with the decisions she did not make. Germany’s new chancellor Olaf Scholz has taken captaincy of a ship on a course to nowhere in particular. He is beginning to find out just
When the shrill air raid sirens blared their familiar warning cries over the city at 6.01 p.m. on 29 December 1940, Londoners thought they knew what was coming. Life under siege had taken on a strange sense of normality. They had been bombed systematically by the Luftwaffe for months and fully expected this to resume
Covid was probably the last thing on Angela Merkel’s mind as she listened to the East German pop tunes of her youth played by the Bundeswehr’s military band for her retirement ceremony last night. But a few hours earlier, the outgoing German chancellor had one last entry to make on her political will. No longer
By the end of winter, Germans will be ‘vaccinated, recovered or dead,’ according to the country’s health minister Jens Spahn. Yet as Germany battles another wave of Covid outbreaks with renewed restrictions, the outgoing Merkel administration is failing to inspire public confidence in the central government. In the city of Dresden, which usually hosts some of Germany’s
The 9 November is often called Germany’s Schicksalstag – Day of Fate. The date punctuates the fabric of the country’s calamitous search for a political identity like no other: from its origins as a constitutional monarchy, through democracy, dictatorship and division. As every year, today too marks a point of introspection for my compatriots. Let’s hope
Just after midnight last Sunday, around 50 vigilantes gathered in east Germany to ‘patrol’ the country’s border with Poland. They were there to stop illegal immigrants, armed as they did so with batons, a machete, a bayonet and pepper spray. They were discovered by local police forces, but a certain nervousness from the authorities was
If Joseph Stalin was right about one thing it was his assertion that ‘the death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic’. Numbers don’t inspire empathy. They don’t tell stories. Nothing exemplifies this principle better than the second world war. The deadliest armed conflict in human history killed an
Picture German troops marching in front of the Reichstag in Berlin. Their polished black boots hit the ground in rhythm with the drums. Night has fallen and the soldiers are carrying burning torches that cast an eerie glow over the spectacle. But these aren’t Nazis. This ceremony was held last Wednesday in honour of Germany’s
