Germany's ascent as a primary military power in Europe was cemented during and after the Franco-Prussian War, which began in 1870. This was a war between the Second French Empire under Napoleon III and the North German Confederation under the Kingdom of Prussia. The war was mostly fought in the latter half of 1870, and after the siege of the French city of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, during which the French Emperor Napoleon III was captured by Prussia, the Second French Empire was effectively gone; France formed a "Government of National Defense" and fought on for a few months, but after Paris was besieged by German forces, France surrendered in January of 1871.
The North German Confederation, joined by the states of Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt, formed for the first time a united German nation-state, under Prussia's king WIlhelm I, who became Kaiser Wilhelm I, and Chancellor Otto von Bismarck. Germany would remain one of, if not the, dominant military power in Europe until the end of the Great War, and again from the mid-1930s to 1945.
Since then, not so much. But Germany's current Chancellor Friedrich Merz is, it seems, determined to make Germany once more Europe's most powerful conventional military nation.
Have we seen this film before?
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz pledged to turn the Bundeswehr into the strongest conventional army in Europe by giving it all the financial resources it needs to become so. Merz also said he would introduce a new volunteer military service.
"Strength deters aggression. Weakness, on the other hand, invites aggression," Merz said in his first statement to the Bundestag as chancellor, laying out his coalition government's priorities, Die Zeit reported.
Chancellor Merz isn't wrong. He is no doubt looking east, to Tsar Vladimir I's Russia and the aggression of the Russian leader. While Putin is unlikely to want to take on NATO, even now, Russia faces many problems, not least of which is a demographic catastrophe that threatens the very existence of the Russian people in a few more generations; it's often hard to predict what a desperate dictator might do.
Germany's military is already one of the higher-ranked forces in NATO.
For overall military power, the Global Firepower index ranks Germany third in the European Union (EU) behind Italy in second and France at the top. Within NATO, Germany ranks sixth in the military power index, behind Turkey in fourth, France in third, the U.K. in second, and the U.S. in first place.
As far as the EU rankings go, students of history might note that in 1939, France was generally considered the greatest military power on the Continent, and we all know how that turned out.
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Of course, this isn't 1939, and Germany, while they are moving Bundeswehr troops to cover NATO's eastern flank, isn't planning to try to take Moscow again. It didn't work out all that well for them last time, just as it didn't work out well for Napoleon Bonaparte in 1812. But they are clearly concerned that Tsar Vladimir I may have designs on more territory adjoining the Russian frontier.
This is, however, primarily Europe's problem, and it's good to see at least one European nation starting to take more responsibility for its defense. Germany isn't the militaristic state it was in 1870, 1914, or 1939. They aren't about to suddenly blitzkrieg across the continent. But they clearly recognize that Russia is once more a concern for Western Europe, and in that, they probably have good reason to think so.
We had a little break from this sort of thing at the end of the Cold War. But now, mankind's oldest game is starting up again, and the nations of Europe are once more looking to start building their armies. Germany may well be rediscovering their old martial tradition, and that's not necessarily a bad thing.
This seems appropriate.
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