The idea that East Germany was annexed by West Germany and that 1990 was not a reunification has a wide range of political meanings depending on what exactly is the target of the critique - short thread:

https://twitter.com/giulio_mattioli/status/1524315484178497536

The basis for reunification was the March 1990 election of a center-right bloc allied to the West German CDU that signed the Unification Treaty dissolving the GDR and making its territory into new provinces of the Federal Republic based on Art. 23 of the West German Basic Law.

Germany's seemingly byzantine arms export licensing regime that continues to bind those abroad they have sold weapons to, has been under scrutiny lately for delaying aid to Ukraine. This origins of this system has a long history, well before WWII... (1) In the late 19th Century, Germany was a major exporter of arms to colonial regions. Military surplus and obsolete arms were sold off via middlemen to peoples in the hinterlands of rival imperial powers. (2)

I am curious how histories of NGOs are going to be reframed now that the Taliban has regained control of Afghanistan. 20 years ago, they were widely seen as the driver of international development and cosmopolitain moral progress, based on supposed triumph in late Cold War. The sheen on international NGOs was already diminishing from its 1990s highas they were also tied to the flailing legitimacy of the humanitarian intervention paradigm that arose from that same era.

#GDR #OTD 1990 – The long transition between the Fall of the Wall and the first competitive elections in East Germany continues (1) #GDR #OTD 1990 Demo at Alexanderplatz by craftsmen (Handwerker) demanding market liberalization. (2)

As much as the Social Democrats are often seen as the political equals of the Christian Democrats in German politics (at least historically), the SPD has only had two elections with a higher percentage of the vote - 1972 and 1998. In 1972, Willy Brandt led the SPD to its best results of the post-war with 45.8%. Brandt was able to expand from its Ruhr and northern urban base and even had directly elected seats in the CDU/CSU-dominated south.

There is a meme circulating that Hitler de-funded the police so that the SA and other Nazi party paramilitaries could take over. This is false. The police embraced the Nazi takeover and paramilitaries took on the role of auxiliary police force in support of Nazi rule. After the Nazi rise to power in 1933, Hermann Goering was placed in charge of the police, but this was not resisted by rank and file. Police and Nazi paramilitaries merged together to form part of an integrated apparatus of security and oppression. From KL by Nikolaus Wachsmann:

How the German parties are marking #TagDerBefreiung on twitter: First off the CDU/CSU describing it neutrally as 75th anniversary of the end of the war and emphasizing a need to remember. The SPD describing May 8th as #TagDerBefreiung and declaring "Never again Fascism." Specifically mentioning Nazi tyranny and genocide.

For all of those who continue to have absorbed the legend of Rommel the "worthy adversary" from late-night History Channel documentaries: Erwin Rommel was a terrible person who facilitated genocide and wasn't actually involved in the plot against Hitler. A brief thread on how the Rommel legend was purposefully crafted by Americans and West Germans in the post-war:

https://twitter.com/HistoryNed/status/898451181550395392

What is the historically most significant November 9th in 20th century German history? November 9, 1918 - Philipp Scheidemann proclaims the German Republic and Karl Liebknecht proclaims the Free Socialist Republic of Germany

#GDR #OTD 1957 – Production of Trabant P-50 begins at the VEB Sachsenring Automobilwerke in Zwickau. (1) The Trabant had a two-cylinder, two-stroke engine with only five moving parts and a body primarily created from Duroplast – a plastic strengthened with resin and fibers. (2)

#GDR #OTD 1989 – Between 500,000 and a million people attend Alexanderplatz Demonstration in East Berlin (1) New Forum and several artist groups organized the Alexanderplatz Demonstration to demand political reforms (2)

#GDR #OTD 1973 – Cornerstone of the Palace of the Republic – Palast der Republik – laid in East Berlin. (1) Construction of the East Berlin Palast der Republik was completed in 1976; it opened in April that year. (2)

#GDR #OTD 2015 – Death of Günter Schabowski - best known for accidentally opening the Berlin Wall in 1989 (1) Günter Schabowski began his career as a journalist working his way up to editor of Neues Deutschland, the Socialist Unity Party (SED) newspaper (2)

#GDR #OTD 1946 – Elections held in occupied Berlin – Soviet Zone Socialist Unity Party (SED) pitted against Western Social Democrats (SPD) for 1st time. (1) Coerced merger of Communists (KPD) and SPD in 1946 created Socialist Unity Party (SED), but only in the Soviet Zone of Occupation. (2)

The head of the Christian Democratic Union Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer described yesterday's far-right murder of two people in Halle on Yom Kippur as an "Alarm Bell" (Alarmsignal), but there have been many more before this. A thread:

https://twitter.com/Tagesspiegel/status/1181965035398144000

In 2011, the National Socialist Underground (NSU) terror cell was uncovered. From 2000-6 they murdered 9 people of Turkish, Kurdish and Greek heritage as well as a Police Officer. The group was responsible for bombings in Nuremberg and Cologne.

#GDR #OTD 1990 – The German Democratic Republic ceases to exist. (1) Here are celebrations of German unification at the Bundestag in Berlin #otd in 1990. By contrast, an anti-unification demonstration in Frankfurt. (2)

#GDR #OTD 1953 – The paramilitary “Combat Groups of the Working Class” - Kampfgruppen der Arbeiterklasse - is established in East Germany (1) The Combat Groups created after 1953 uprising as a volunteer militia, recruited from factories and workplaces (2)

#GDR #OTD 1990 – Miners occupy the “Mommel” mine shaft in Trusetal, East Germany to protest closures and layoffs (1) Werra Mine in 1974 - Kali Kombinat mining a major East German employer esp. in Harz mountains - (2)

#GDR #OTD 2010 – Death of East German artist, peace activist and dissident Bärbel Bohley (1) Bohley trained as a painter; Käthe Kollwitz was inspiration; became a leading member of the peace movement (2)

This is a major problem with human rights as a form of politics: it's regularly appropriated by people with agendas you oppose. chronicle.com/article/How-Mi… This is addressed to pretty much everyone: post-war liberals were upset by people claiming human rights for anti-colonialism rather than anti-communism. Conservatives regularly claimed they have been hijacked by communists. The left says they are misused by liberal imperialists.

Is there anyone currently working at the British Library who could possibly make a copy of a letter I found in snippet view on Google Books? Would be happy to trade for copying favour at a Berlin institution.