German-French enmity
By the term Franco-German enmity that was in different sections of modern times described the hostile relationship that between Germans and Frenchmen from the era of Louis XIV. Until after the Second World War was.
The term is intended to demonstrate that the conflicts between the two countries of the so-called Reunionskriegen (in contemporary Germany "French predatory wars" known) about the Napoleonic Wars , the Napoleonic Wars , the Franco-German War of 1870-71 and the First World War until finally the Second World War II could not have been solved by peaceful means, but were based on quasi natural causes ( inheritance or inheritance ). The Élysée Treaty of January 22, 1963 ended this epoch of hostility in the relations between the two countries , which have since been characterized by a close friendship within the European Union .
term
etymology
The term hereditary enemy is generally used to denote an opponent who has been hated for several generations , ie an enemy “inherited” from one's ancestors . In Middle High German , erbevīnt mostly meant the devil . In this sense Martin Luther uses the term. From the 15th century the term was applied to the Turks , who were viewed as a permanent threat in the centuries-long Turkish wars and the conquest campaigns up to the royal seat of Vienna. In the 19th century it was transferred to Franco-German relations by Ernst Moritz Arndt (1769–1860) and thus introduced into the discourse of German nationalism .
Origin of the catchphrase in the 19th century
In historical reality , unlike the centrally controlled French monarchy, the Holy Roman Empire was shaped by particularism and the sovereignty of the individual states. Although there was a German king or emperor , there was no unified German foreign policy and therefore of course no unified Franco-German relations of a friendly or unfriendly kind. The prerequisites for this were only created when the German Empire was founded in 1870/1871. Nevertheless, under the impression of the Wars of Liberation , which in the years 1813/1814 produced an anti-Napoleonic alliance of European states, nationalist groups in Germany projected such a continuity of the antagonism and hostility between Germans and French into the past and interpreted every historical fact in relation to each other between France and "the Germans" in the sense of such postulated hostility. In his 1813 song, Ernst Moritz Arndt wrote Was ist des Deutschen Vaterland? Francophobia and hatred of neighbors have become established characteristics of German identity:
This is the German fatherland
where anger destroys the French trinkets ,
where every Frenchman is called an enemy,
where every German is called a friend.
That should be it! that's it!
It should be the whole of Germany!
Last but not least, many representatives of Romanticism were the carriers of such ideas , as they dreamed of a medieval empire and its renewal in the present. Associated with this was the praise of apparently "original German" values such as loyalty, diligence, profundity and willingness to fight, while the French (like the novels in general, which are pejoratively referred to as "Welsche") have negative traits such as indulgence, superficiality, exaggerated intellectualism, etc. subordinate. There was also a contradiction between the political ideals insofar as these German nationalists and conservatives saw the ideals of the French Revolution , especially democracy , as “un-German” and “alien” and instead opposed obedience and the spirit of submission as alleged virtues . The result was a worldview in which one saw a “Welsches” and a “German” “being”, which were diametrically opposed to one another and whose opposition was allegedly also proven in history. A prominent dissenting voice came from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , who wrote:
“I didn't hate the French, although I thanked God when we got rid of them. How could I, who only care about culture and barbarity , hate a nation that is one of the most cultured on earth and to which I owe a large part of my own education. In general, national hatred is a thing of its own. You will always find him strongest and fiercest at the lowest levels of culture. But there is a stage where it disappears completely and where one stands, as it were, above the nations [...] "
Historical image of the hereditary enemy thesis
The real relationship between the French and Germans has historically been very complex, so that tensions and wars, which on the German side never were fought by one nation, always only by individual states - often enough antagonistic to one another - with cultural fertilization and political alliances alternated and mixed.
Early and Middle Ages
In order to give the contrast as universal a character as possible, its beginning was postponed to as archaic an early period as possible, so that the principle of alleged hereditary enmity was already believed to be recognized in battles between Germanic peoples and the Romans . The sword of the Hermann monument , inaugurated in 1875, points west towards France. It was not taken into account that many Germanic tribes were enemies with each other and had little connection between them, least of all a “German identity”. This concept also ignores the fact that there has often been a Germanic-Romance synthesis.
This can also be shown in the formation of the Franconian Empire in the early Middle Ages . This is where the inconsistencies in the argument about Germans and Romans / French become particularly clear, as the representatives of a primordial antithesis saw, on the one hand, the formation of the Merovingian empire as a cultural achievement by the Germans, without actually being able to deny that this very empire also the predecessor of the later "arch opponent" France was. Even Charlemagne was recognized in this conception of history from the German side, despite the fact that he is considered ahistorical "Charlemagne" and the French as ancestor. The Carolingian partitions , which at that time were initially a purely private legal process for the right of inheritance in the royal family, were seen by the German Nationals of the 19th century as a manifestation of the aforementioned contradiction, although the West and East Franconian empires rather had to fight with foreign opponents and the sense of togetherness among each other as "Franconia" still dominated.
As for the Roman-German Empire , German nationalists of the 19th and 20th centuries saw in its emperors a kind of ancestral line that could be continued into their time; the most famous Ottonian kings, Heinrich I and Otto I , were seen as further founding fathers of the “First Empire”. What is disregarded here is that from the beginning there were sometimes violent reactions from the high nobility against royal rule, an image that did not fit into the alleged harmony between the king / emperor and the "German people" and loyalty to allegiance. Instead, the political reality of the High Middle Ages saw the gradual transformation of the old tribal duchies into secular and spiritual territorial states , which granted the king or emperor a merely formal priority; The electors, as the most powerful of the princes in the empire, left no doubt that the king was appointed by them and could consequently be deposed at any time. The situation is different in France, where the king succeeded in asserting himself against his vassals and establishing a centrally controlled monarchy, i.e. a form of government that the German conservatives of the 19th century imagined for the German Middle Ages, but where they were just now did not exist. Incidentally, the relationship between Germans and French in the Middle Ages was characterized by good neighborliness: Crusades were waged together , wars against each other were rare - in 1124 Emperor Heinrich V marched against France, in 1214 the German Guelphs were defeated by the Capetians in the Battle of Bouvines beaten. These were mainly dynastic battles in which the respective peoples had little part. The Gothic cathedral art was originally a French product, which did not prevent the German patriots of the 19th century from seeing a symbol of Germanism in the completion of the Cologne Cathedral after 700 years.
Early modern age
In the Renaissance , humanists and reformers struck German tones that were essentially directed against the dominance of the Roman, ie “Welschen”, church. At the same time, however, there were decisive cultural fertilizations again through the novels, for example in painting and music. Especially the first linguistic societies in Germany, which formed after 1600, were closely based on comparable Italian and French models, although their declared aim was to protect the German language from " foreign infiltration " by mostly French foreign words ( language purism ). Preciousness and the search for foreign words were often criticized, but at the same time the emerging absolutism of the Bourbons also served German princes as a model worth emulating.
The Habsburg-French antagonism has been an essential component of European politics since the 16th century . The attempts by France to move its border to the east were less a national matter than one of dynastic opposition. Although there were also numerous German princes on the side of Habsburg, the Fronde , the course of the Thirty Years War , the first Confederation of the Rhine and the alliance between Kurköln and Bavaria and France in the 17th and 18th centuries show that the question does not refer to a national conflict between Germany can reduce against France. The Hohenzollerns in Brandenburg were also often, as aspiring competitors of the Habsburgs, allies of France and were quite open to cultural influences that came from there. For example, Frederick II , who was popular with the advocates of a nationalist ideology, was strongly influenced by French culture, spoke French better than German and preferred to interact with a Voltaire and Maupertuis than with the poets of the German Enlightenment .
The French Revolution formed a decisive turning point, which endangered the monarchical principle in Europe and thus also challenged the princes within the empire, who initially had nothing of equal value to oppose the troops fighting for their ideals of freedom. At the beginning, the revolution was welcomed by many German intellectuals, but soon, and in the so-called French era, the initial hopes gave way to disillusionment. With the French expansion under Napoleon, large areas were occupied by French troops, the second Confederation of the Rhine was formed, and the Holy Roman Empire ended. Under French pressure there were reforms such as the liberation of the peasants , civil legal codifications , civil equality for Jews and urban self-government; Some German princes also benefited from the French intervention, as they were granted ranks and territorial expansions for their good behavior within the scope of the main Imperial Deputation. But what was felt above all was the humiliation caused by the military defeats. The wars of liberation can therefore not least be interpreted as a compensation for this humiliation, in the wake of which the myths of an alleged hereditary hostility also came about.
Hereditary enmity theory and its effect on politics
From 1815
Nevertheless, these increasing tendencies of German nationalism in the age of the Restoration after 1815 did not determine politics for a long time, since the monarchs wanted a pacification of Europe, whereby national emotions, which were not compatible with the sovereignty of the individual states of the German Confederation, could only disturb . This was one of the main reasons why the 1848 revolution in Germany failed, as it threatened to break up the established system of solidarity between monarchs. This system included France within the European framework, even if the bourgeoisie was stronger there and could enforce more far-reaching freedom rights (see July Revolution of 1830 and March Revolution of 1848).
Rhine crisis
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The Rhine crisis of 1840 was triggered by French claims on the entire left bank of the Rhine , which were asserted as a diversionary maneuver in a foreign policy crisis. In Germany this sparked protests, Rhine songs were composed, of which “ Die Wacht am Rhein ” is best known. The Deutschlandlied was also created against this background.
The greater degree of freedom in France also inspired German intellectuals like Buchner and Heine that the "deutschtümelnden" and "anti-French minded" romantics and those who sang a German unit, a Republican counter set perspective, and it also points of contact with the early labor movement was that understood itself as international from the beginning and therefore opposed a certain resistance to "anti-French" resentment.
"Revenge for Sadova!"
In the Battle of Königgrätz in 1866, during the German War, the Prussian troops met the armies of the Austrians and Saxons in the Bohemian village of Sadová , who were defeated in the course of the battle. Prussia then became the leading power in the German Confederation, and Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck implemented the small German solution . The Paris of the Second Empire disapproved of the fact that the quick victory had prevented France from participating in the war and that instead of the usual German fragmentation, a powerful, united neighbor was now forming under Prussian supremacy on the eastern border. In order to prevent Prussia from further unifying Germany, the catchphrase “Revanche pour Sadowa!” (“ Revenge for Sadowa !”) Soon came up. This opened another chapter in the Franco-German hereditary enmity. The aim was to nip the new neighbor in the bud. The French declaration of war on the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71 followed in 1870 .
Franco-German War 1870/71
see main articles Franco-German War , Peace of Frankfurt and Welfenfonds
A turning point arose, however, as a result of Bismarck's policy of unifying the Germans from above through the Prussians. By relying entirely on Prussia's military strength, it was possible to initially throw Austria out of the race in the war of 1866 over the question of how to shape the German nation-state; on the other hand, a little later in 1870/1871, Bismarck provoked the conflict with France Bismarck knew the German conservatives, who saw the French as the “hereditary enemy”, behind them. This hostility was also fueled by King George V of Hanover, who fled to Paris (after the annexation of his Kingdom of Hanover in the German War in 1866). He did not want to accept the loss of his kingdom and stoked hatred against Prussia in France .
Bismarck took advantage of these circumstances for the establishment of the German Empire , with large circles in the German Empire being prepared to accept the continuing lack of freedom rights in order to gain national unity and who, in their eyes, treated everything “non-Germans” with a triumphant attitude, as they did for the Wilhelminism was typical. Territorial hostility manifested itself in the forced transfer of Alsace-Lorraine by Bismarck and its transformation into an empire of Alsace-Lorraine . The rulers in this region had more or less voluntarily attached their areas of power to France in the course of the 17th and 18th centuries. As one of the few German politicians, August Bebel protested in a famous parliamentary speech in the North German Reichstag on November 26, 1870 against the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine, pointing out the likely long-term burden on the relationship between the two countries. In fact, the establishment of the "Reichsland" caused violent revanchism among the French , and relations between the two states were permanently poisoned. The Hermannsdenkmal , whose sword faces west, is also striking .
“France is deeply complicit in the conflict that has brought two powerful nations up against each other. It was France who prepared it for a long time and made it almost inevitable by misjudging the living conditions of Germany and opposing the necessary and legitimate German unity with silent hostility. (...) How difficult it was for France to become an equal among equal nations! How painful it was to no longer be the great nation but just one great nation! [...] "
It was not without reason that several strategic lines were built at this time , in particular the Berlin – Metz cannon railway .
First World War
Another confrontation between Germany and France arose from the conditions of the age of imperialism . The nation-states not only had conflicting interests in Europe, but also clashed worldwide through the formation of the colonial empires. If France was initially in opposition to Great Britain, the foreign policy of the German Empire under Kaiser Wilhelm II ensured that Germany was alienated from Great Britain and therefore stuck to its last ally Austria-Hungary all the more, in “ loyalty to the Nibelungs ”. It was precisely this alliance that embroiled Germany in the First World War, as the Habsburgs made opponents of Serbia and its ally Russia in the Balkans. France was meanwhile firmly on the side of the British, so that the Germans saw themselves threatened again by the alleged hereditary enemy, without wanting to acknowledge their own share in the situation. There was a four-year battle in the trenches of northern France, whereby the battles for Verdun , which claimed many hundreds of thousands of deaths on both sides in a few months, became a symbol of an apparently ancient struggle between two peoples, but in reality through the senseless mass human sacrifices could also be the starting point for wishes for reconciliation. Germany lost the war, and many Germans saw the Versailles Peace Treaty as a renewed military and political humiliation that encouraged a new myth to be formed; one persuaded oneself to have actually been "undefeated in the field" ( stab in the back legend ), and saw the German November Revolution of 1918, in which, supported by the workers and glorified by them and the communists , the abolition of the Prussian monarchy and with it modern political freedoms were won as a betrayal of (supposedly) original German principles.
1933-1945
This was the soil that the National Socialists exploited in their favor, who followed on from the belief in the German-French hereditary enmity. The calls for a “revenge” became loud, and immediately after the National Socialist “ seizure of power ” the forced militarization of Germany began with the armament of the Wehrmacht , whereupon the demilitarized Rhineland was occupied in 1936 . After the neighboring states in Europe watched the establishment of the reign of terror in Germany largely inactive, Hitler unleashed World War II in 1939, whereby the initial lightning victories seemed to promise a quick victory. Hitler's ideology of living space did not envisage an occupation of France, so that the primary war aims were met first and the so-called seat war was waged in the west . The occupation of France in May 1940 then took place for strategic reasons, in order to secure the German Reich in the west against a possible invasion before the Russian campaign began. France, which had declared war on Germany under pressure from the United Kingdom, was defeated by the German Wehrmacht within a month. The north of France was occupied by the Germans, while after the end of the Third French Republic, the German-friendly Vichy France established itself in the south . In contrast to 1871, the occupied Alsace-Lorraine was not formally annexed this time in order to emphasize the purely technical character of the occupation of France. The policy of the nationalist Marshal Pétain , who hoped for a world power status for France at the side of National Socialist Germany and turned against the former ally England (Vive la France, mort à l'Angleterre) , was supported by the majority of the French , Charles de Gaulle's position , who from London called for resistance against the occupiers and advocated an independent great power policy for France on the side of the Western powers , initially received little sympathy. As the repression on the part of the German occupiers increased, public opinion turned against Pétain and the Germans, and the activities of the Resistance increased. After the successful landing of the Allies on the Normandy coast in 1944, France was liberated after a few months and received the status of an occupying power or one of the big four .
After both world wars, a railroad car played a major role in the Compiègne clearing .
The end of "hereditary enmity": after 1945
In view of the now total destruction of Europe and the defeat of Germany, there was hardly any room for nationalist thoughts; rather, there was largely disillusionment in Germany, but at the same time it became clear that the idea of Franco-German hereditary enmity was a fateful misconception and the future was only successful could lie in a common Europe of democratic states, where Germany and France, given their size, had to play a decisive role. This was underlined , for example, with a large number of town twinning agreements .
literature
- Charles Bloch: From hereditary enemy to partner: Franco-German relations before and after the Second World War. In: Yearbook of the Institute for German History. Vol. 10, 1981, ISSN 0334-4606 , pp. 363-398.
- Franz Bosbach (Ed.): Feindbilder. The representation of the opponent in political journalism in the Middle Ages and modern times (= Bayreuth historical colloquia. Vol. 7). Böhlau, Cologne et al. 1992, ISBN 3-412-03390-1 .
- Karen Hagemann : For love of the fatherland. Love and hate in early German nationalism: hatred of the French. In Birgit Aschmann (Ed.): Feeling and Calculation. The influence of emotions on 19th and 20th century politics. Steiner, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-515-08804-0 , pp. 101-123, web resource .
- Thomas Höpel: The Franco-German border area: border area and nation building in the 19th and 20th centuries. In: Institute for European History (Mainz) (Ed.): European History Online . 2012 (accessed December 17, 2012).
- Michael Jeismann : The fatherland of the enemy. Studies on the national enemy concept and self-image in Germany and France 1792–1918 (= language and history. Vol. 19). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-608-91374-2 (also: Bielefeld, University, dissertation, 1990/1991).
- Franz Knipping, Ernst Weisenfeld (ed.): An unusual story. Germany - France since 1870. Europa-Union-Verlag, Bonn 1988, ISBN 3-7713-0310-9 .
- Stefan Martens (Ed.): From “Erbfeind” to “Renewer”. Aspects and motives of the French policy towards Germany after the Second World War. (Supplement to Francia, 27). Thorbecke, Sigmaringen 1993, ISBN 3-7995-7327-5 ( online at perspectivia.net ).
-
Heinz-Otto Sieburg : Germany and France in the historiography of the 19th century. 2 volumes. Steiner, Wiesbaden 1954-1958;
- Volume 1: (1815–1848) (= publications of the Institute for European History Mainz. Vol. 2). 1954;
- Volume 2: (1848–1871) (= publications by the Institute for European History Mainz. Department: Universal History. Vol. 17). 1954.
supporting documents
- ↑ Hereditary enemies - hereditary friends . In: Website of the Deutsch-Französchen Institute (PDF, page 81).
- ↑ Erich Bayer (ed.): Dictionary of history. Terms and technical terms (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 289). 4th, revised edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-520-28904-0 , p. 126.
- ↑ Quoted from Erbfeind. In: Etienne François , Hagen Schulze (ed.): German places of memory (= Beck'sche series. Vol. 1813). Volume 1. C. H. Beck, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-406-59141-9 , p. 389.
- ↑ Talk online
- ↑ Deutschlandfunk - calendar sheet "Why did they kill Jaurès?" Retrieved on December 3, 2019 (German).