Just to shakeup my memory.... What has Finland past or present done to make the World a better place ?

Both states developed very differently after WWII. I don't think you have two states in the Union that are as different as West and East Germany has been. Also, the US have been a very different state, migration-wise, than European states, european national self-understanding and defining of "identity" is very different than inamerican history. That is a difference you must take into account, although America is extremely vulnerable to constantly missing it - and then wondering why it's recipes that work in America do not work in other parts of the world as well.

Or in short: Germany or Europe are not Texas. :)

Texans are Texans and Germans are Germans. And some Texans were Germans!

Germans are engineers and I would have thought that they would have just engineered a unified Germany by now. If East Germany lacks development then by god, Develop it! Its a win, win situation. The east gets jobs the west get new industrial ground.

Maybe I am just too dern American to wrap my head around this.

Krauts? Please.

All I'm saying is that now 20 years after the unification things are still pretty bleak in the former East-Germany.

Finns weren't as over-joyed about the 'victory' that US claimed to have achieved. Much of former East-Europe and former Soviet area is in shambles because the various governments are either corrupt or inept to deal with things.

Or, and this is the worst scenario, the west never really wanted any successful livin' for them to begin with and is therefore actively pushing the former socialist nations further down. I mean, after all they lost, they should be robbed of the wealth and live in poverty like the slaves of the Roman era. That's what it looks like to me.

That isn't that simple. The economy in the east was totally run down. The companies were not designed to compete against each other. They either failed completely on the free market or had to be shut down because of environment and safety regulations (you did not have to see that you crossed the border to the DDR, you could smell it). Another thing is that a lot of western companies didn't see any reason for going to the east. The infrastructure was terrible and they were afraid that that the East-Germans were not used to work hard enough to compare to western workers (in socialism there was a right to have a job IIRC).

So far plenty of money has flown to the east but money alone doesn't solve the problem. The infrastructure has been vastly improved and several big factories were build in the East but even that is not enough.
Another problem is the rising of Nazism in some parts of the East. It definitely doesn't help to settle large international companies in those areas.

@OTH
I've never seen slaves that were given billions after billions of €.

Germans are engineers. That is like saying Americans are cowboys.

Some Germans are good engineers, but their knowledge since long is copied in other nations as well. and while some americans are cowboys indeed, other countries have farmers and cattle as well.

Economic realities were a bit harsher, we found out, than people 20 years ago imagined. not everything is possible to be realised in a desired way, just because it is wanted. The state cannot construct an economic system , he can only define and offer the framework in whioch economy unfolds. If the reality that is to be met is such that the framework of rules and defintions and invitations it offers does not attract investors and businessmen, then you cannot just wish it different. And this so far has been compensated, with varying success, by tremendous, incredible cashflow from West to East. Which is the reason why these stellar ammounts of money are not available for other purposes.

Reunification has proven to be hilariously expensive. they economic payoff from the effort do not compensate the investements, and it cannot be seen when it will do in the future. The better question is if it ever will do.

What is the richest state of the union? Texas? Maybe, I don't know for sure. Now compare it to let's say Montana, which I just learned is one of the poorest and economically most difficult terrains in the US (just have read a long piece of analysis and descriptionn about it that formed a whole long chapter in a book). Maybe the difference between the two states is not like the one between East and West Germans, neither in quality nor quantity, it is probably worse in Germany, but nevertheless - structural deficits and differences inside your system you have in the US, too. and lie us, you cannot just wish them away.

Hey, I am German, I can say that without being offended! :D
It is not different than us calling the British "Tommys" (if we had called them Charly, now that would have become one of history'S biggest jokes...)

Originally, this thread was about the reactions from Britain and France 20 years ago, and I mind you that not only did Mitterand line up with Thatcher who had some much more unpßolite things to say about Germany in 1989 and met Kohl with uptmost hostility, but - not mentioned in the articles since they completley ignored the American view of things - that Washington called in Moscow and asked them if they could intervene in Eastgermany to make things stop there so that control would not be lost over the situation.

Pretty much everybody - including ourselves - got simply overrolled by the speed by which events took place. In autumn 1989, I lft berlin and went to university in Osnabrück. I left a divided city, and five hours later I arrived in 450 km away Münster at my grandparents, as a first stop, which is 50 km SE of Osnbrück. there I was, having just left a sealed and dividec city - and my grandfather was greeting me five hours later with telling me in the door that the wall in Berlin had been opened in some places! Until then, we just had seen mass-escapes of Eastgermans making holiday in Hungary and pressing for being allowed to cross the border there. that it would end with the total collapse of the GDR, was not certain - and nobody saw it coming that quickly.

Seen that way, that there was panic in London, Paris and Washington, could be understood. as history has shown, it soon faded in just 2 or 3 months.

Oh yea, they robbed that money. You're right. Those bastards!

That doesn't make the situation any better though, for anyone. Now we know they take our money too. What do we do now?

Is there any point in your post?

How much money did Ukraine as a nation receive for the weapons that were taken/sold from it's armories to the western weapon merchants? How about the natural resources that Russia is forced to sell every year?

Like I said earlier, the west is actively keeping former East-Germany and other areas down.

Wow.. once again you have no idea what you are talking about and try to spin some stuff so that it fits your little world view.

Since you brought it up: What has the Ukraine to do with what is going on in the eastern part of Germany?

Do you really expect me to answer that BS?

Both were 'liberated' by the West. Mostly of everything of value and natural resources but hey, no promises were made.

Schroeder,

why not, I answered to your "BS".

I wish we had a "Do not feed the trolls" smilie