Thomas Johnson

“The trauma of the First World War can be compared to that of the Thirty Years’ War, which had begun exactly 300 years earlier. A collective catastrophe that would fuel a shared sense of national defiance.”
― Katja Hoyer, Blood and Iron: The Rise and Fall of the German Empire 1871–1918

“Thus Flottenpolitik and Weltpolitik gained Germany a small array of colonies and the second-largest navy in the world in exchange for diplomatic isolation and looming economic catastrophe.”
― Katja Hoyer, Blood and Iron: The Rise and Fall of the German Empire 1871–1918

“As Bismarck describes in the Kissingen Dictation, this incident proved once and for all that there was absolutely no diplomatic room for Germany to expand beyond its current reaches. The nightmare of coalitions, and the attendant two-front war, would mean the destruction of the Reich and no expansion of territory was worth that risk. If only Wilhelm II had read and understood the old chancellor’s words.”
― Katja Hoyer, Blood and Iron: The Rise and Fall of the German Empire 1871–1918

“In 1875, civil marriages were introduced as the only legal form. A couple could still get married in a church but only after they had had a state ceremony to make the marriage official in law. This shows very clearly that the Kulturkampf was not a mere measure to restrict Catholic political activity, but it was indeed a battle over spiritual and moral authority in Germany.”
― Katja Hoyer, Blood and Iron: The Rise and Fall of the German Empire 1871–1918