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We are often told that the war in 1945 was what caused the destruction of many old European city centers. In reality the destruction had started far earlier, in the 1920s with many "progressive" (and socialist) architectural creations. Here Potsdamer Platz, Berlin, 1914 to 1932. 
Another good example is the Mossehaus (a newspaper building) in Berlin. Damaged during the Spartacist (communist) uprising in 1919, it was rebuilt by Mendelsohn in 1921-23. Erich M was a particularly sinister architect, but modernist infighting meant the US was spared his works.
Erich Mendelsohn did do one thing for the US, he designed a "model" full scale replica of a typical German working class neighborhood, to test the effects of napalm, bombs, WP, anthrax and poison gas attacks on modern architecture and civilian populations. theguardian.com/artanddesign/2…
Another highly interesting thing visible in photos of Potsdamer Platz: the anti-human, visually disturbing focus on the horizontal over the vertical (in nature good things grow upward, bad things sideways), a "need for speed". Today all cities are dominated by horizontal bldgs.
This "biophilia" (an inherent human love for biological shapes and things) is the reason why many of the early skyscrapers in New York (they are dominated by vertical lines) "feels" so much better than the newer (oddly horizontal) skyscrapers dominated by horizontal lines.
The best architects today are aware of the need to break up the horizontal in buildings, even when tasked to create them. Baker Street Bldg by Quinlan Terry is a good example: it looks like several different houses, but is actually just one giant landscraper of corporate offices.
Historically humans have always strived to emphasize the vertical in buildings because it is fitting to us. Here 16th century townhouses. Compare with a 21st century modernist townhouse, where everything is horizontal. Compare how even the trees have been pruned differently!
