There's no great surprise as to why Germany made such a mess of things in the twentieth century

There's no great surprise as to why Germany made such a mess of things in the twentieth century. It had been forged in a hurry by Otto von Bismarck, an eccentric political genius, towards the end of the nineteenth century, and the entire structure of the German government was a rather haphazard system solely designed to accommodate Bismarck himself. Naturally, it didn't function terribly well at all, after Bismarck's dismissal and death. True, Kaiser Wilhelm II did well enough for 25 years, but, then the entire nation collapsed like a house of cards during WWI, a war that certainly should and could have been avoided. Then Germany floundered around for twenty years, trying out different political systems rather awkwardly, before launching an ever more catastrophic and self-destructive apocalypse on itself and the world as a whole. Why should we be surprised that the highly cultured, civilized and, for the most part, rather peaceful people of Germany should have descended into Hell as a nation, given that they had never been a nation before, and had no idea whatsoever how to be one? What is astonishing about the fact that forcing a people who had never been a large nation before, rather suddenly into the responsibilities of a large and powerful nation, should have failed abysmally and totally? I suppose this is simply another example of the unfortunately rather generally applicable principle, anything that can go wrong, will. If you don't know exactly how to do something from extensive, hard experience, you will do it disastrously badly. And, if an entire people have no particular experience in functioning as a nation, they will be totally incapable of doing so, and will do immense damage to themselves, and everyone they deal with. #history #philosophy #philosophyofhistory #Germany #wwi #wwii #metaphysics