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Adenauer and Rhenish Separatism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Extract

Adenauer's role during the Rhineland occupation after the First World War has been the subject of bitter controversy. His critics, whether Nazi, Communist, or Socialist, have depicted him as a “Rhenish separatist” devoid of German patriotism and willing — perhaps even eager to — collaborate with France at the expense of national unity; parallels were often drawn between his alleged eagerness to create an independent West German Republic allied to France in 1919 and 1923, and his alleged indifference to the cause of German reunification after 1949. His foes depicted him steadily in the 1950's as a Prussophobe-Rhenish provincialist who preferred alliance with the Western Powers to any unification of Germany which might require the loosening of NATO ties.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1967

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References

* As the readers of this journal know Professor Klaus Epstein has been a frequent contributor to the Review of Politics. The Editors of the Review join with the rest of the academic community in lamenting the tragic death of this brilliant young scholar. The quality of Professor Epstein's mind, his sheer intellectual power and extraordinary industry shall be sorely missed by all of the readers of this journal.

1 Karl Dietrich Erdmann, Adenauer in der Rheinlandpolitik nach dem ersten Weltkrieg (Stuttgart, Ernst Klett Verlag, 1966) 386 pp.Google Scholar