First published in 1977 by Pearson Education Limited
Second Edition 1993
Second impression 1993
Published in 2014 by Routledge
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John Hiden 1977, 1993
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ISBN 978-0-582-08722-4 (pbk)
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Hiden, John
Germany and Europe, 19191939/John Hiden. - 2nd ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-582-08722-8 (PPR)
1. EuropeRelationsGermany. 2. GermanyForeign relations
-Europe. 3. GermanyForeign relations19191933. 4. Germany
-Foreign relations1933-1945. I. Title.
D727.H44 1933
327.4304- dc20
92-21845
CIP
The literature on German foreign policy between the two World Wars is, naturally, even more extensive than it was when the first edition of this book appeared in 1977. Yet the reasons then given for publishing an analysis covering the interwar period as a whole remain valid. The variations in the scholarly treatment of the different areas and eras of German foreign policy after 1919 are still noticeable; some of the gaps in coverage, particularly concerning the Baltic states and other parts of Eastern Europe, have been closed since 1977, but others remain; the then patchy treatment of key aspects of GermanBritish and GermanFrench relations has been improved, but more needs to be done.
I have been persuaded to offer a revised edition of the book, integrating new work since 1977, largely because there is still no comparable short account in English which analyses the interwar period as a whole from the German side. Much of the foreign-language literature where debates on German foreign policy have taken place cannot even be used by many English students. The absence of a concise overview of the 1920s, which I remarked upon in 1977, has admittedly been partly remedied for English readers, notably by Marshall Lee and Wolfgang Michalka.
The balance of literature is still, as it was in 1977, heavily tilted towards coverage of German policy during the 1930s, where the
I made the point in the first edition of the book that I was anxious to give roughly equal weight to the 1920s and 1930s. In the first place the decision saved me from having to give my own blow-by-blow account of the last years of peace and spared me from competing with the many excellent studies of the immediate origins of war, of which the most impressive now is that by D.C. Watt. Secondly, and more importantly, it enabled me to treat the study of the Weimar Republic and its foreign policy as valuable in its own right, rather than as a prelude to the Third Reich. Mild issue was taken with the marked tendency at the time, above all of German historians, to emphasise at the expense of more benign but no less important traits in German foreign policy the continuity of aggression from Bismarck to Hitler.
My original concern to bring out the positive and not just the all too obvious negative aspects in twentieth-century German foreign policy has been deepened by the momentous event of German reunification. Initial media and public reactions to this were often characterised, in Britain particularly, by sensationalist speculation about likely new German threats to Europe. The dispassionate study of the policies of the former Federal Republic provided no evidence to substantiate such fears, which arose from viewing Germany through the prism of the Third Reich, rather than from any balanced historical assessment.
Because the process of German reunification overlapped with the decline and ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union and the beginnings of reconstruction in East Europe, the familiar siren songs also sounded, about the inherent menace of German economic domination in Eastern Europe. In reality, German economic penetration of Eastern Europe is not in itself threatening, a point obscured by memories of the Third Reichs rule there. Nothing could be more unlike that than the current German quest to find, with the European Community (EC), a suitable role in the massive task of rebuilding in the states of East Europe and the members of the Commonwealth of Independent States, as well as their reintegration into a wider European order. And it is this venture which conjures up, however faintly, echoes of the foreign policy developments slowly emerging during the short lifetime of the Weimar Republic.
My gratitude to former colleagues at Aberdeen University, where I first wrote this book, remains. Since then I have also enjoyed the many benefits of working in the Department of European Studies at Bradford University. Not least of these has been the opportunity to travel and research widely in West and East Europe, as well as contact with students, all of whom speak at least one foreign language. The gains for a teacher of European history are self-evident. Countless discussions of German history with my students have played their part in shaping my own work, including the changes to this new edition.
My biggest debt remains to Juliet, Hugo and Jessica. I am still some way from discharging this.
M. Lee, W. Michalka, German Foreign Policy 19171933. Continuity or Break? (Leamington Spa, 1987).
P. Krger, Die Aussenpolitik der Republik von Weimar (Darmstadt, 1985).
W. Carr, Arms Autarky and Aggression. A Study in German Foreign Policy 19331939 (London, 1972); K. Hildebrand, The Foreign Policy of the Third Reich (London, 1973); I. Kershaw, The Nazi Dictatorship. Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation
