Germany–United Kingdom relations
Germany |
United Kingdom |
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Germany–United Kingdom relations, or Anglo–German relations, are the bilateral relations between the United Kingdom and Germany.
Relations were very strong in the Late Middle Ages, when the German cities of the Hanseatic League traded with England and Scotland.
Before the Unification of Germany in 1871, Britain was often allied in wartime with its dominant Prussia. The royal families often intermarried. Also, the House of Hanover (1714–1837) ruled the small Electorate of Hanover, later the Kingdom of Hanover, as well as Britain.
Historians have long focused on the diplomatic and naval rivalries between Britain and Germany after 1871 to search for the root causes of the growing antagonism that led to World War I. In recent years, historians have paid greater attention to the mutual cultural, ideological and technological influences.[1]
During the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815), Prussia was from some time a British ally and suffered for it; some of the other German states had supported France. Britain and Germany fought against each other in World War I and World War II. After Britain occupation of part of West Germany from 1945 to 1950, they became close allies in NATO, which continued after reunification. Both nations were active in the European Union, with Germany seen as its dominant nation and Britain a more reluctant member that never adopted the euro. In a referendum in 2016, Britain decided to leave the European Union.
Comparison
Germany | United Kingdom | |
---|---|---|
Population | 81,757,600 | 62,041,708 |
Area | 357,021 km2 (137,847 sq mi) | 244,820 km2 (94,526 sq mi ) |
Population density | 229/km2 (593/sq mi) | 246/km2 (637/sq mi) |
Capital | Berlin | London |
Largest city | Berlin – 3,439,100 (4,900,000 Metro), (Rhine-Ruhr 12,190,000 metro) | London – 7,556,900 (13,945,000 Metro) |
Government | Federal parliamentary constitutional republic | Unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy |
Official languages | German (de facto and de jure) | English (de facto); Welsh in Wales |
Main religions | 58% Christianity, 37% non-religious, 4% Islam, 1% other[2] | 59.3% Christianity, 25.1% non-religious, 7.2% unstated, 4.8% Islam, 1.5% Hinduism, 0.8% Sikhism, 0.5% Judaism, 0.4% Buddhism |
Ethnic groups | 91.5% German, 2.4% Turkish, 6.1% other[3] | 87% White (81.9% White British), 7.0% Asian, 3% Black, 2% Mixed, 0.9% Other (2011 Census) |
GDP (nominal) | €2.936 trillion (US$3.66 trillion) €35,825 per capita ($44,660) | £1.985 trillion (US$3.004 trillion), £27,805 per capita ($43,875) |
Expatriate populations | 297,000 German-born people live in the UK (2013 ONS estimate) | 250,000 British-born people live in Germany |
Military expenditures | €37.5 billion (US$46.8 billion) (FY 2008)[4] | £41 billion (US$65 billion) (FY 2009–10)[5] |
History
Shared heritage
English and German are both West Germanic languages. Modern English has diverged significantly after absorbing more French influence after 1066. English has its roots in the languages spoken by Germanic peoples from mainland Europe, more specifically various peoples came from what is now the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark, including a people called the Angles after whom the English are named. Many everyday words in English are of Germanic origin and are similar to their German counterparts, and more intellectual and formal words are of French, Latin or Greek origin, but German tends to form calques of many of these. English has become a dominant world language and is widely studied in Germany. German, in the 19th and the early 20th centuries, was an important language of science and technology, but it has now largely lost that role. In English schools, German was a niche language and much less important than French. German is no longer widely studied in Britain except at the A-level in secondary schools.[6]
Trade and Hanseatic League
There is a long history of trade relations between the Germans and the British. The Hanseatic League was a commercial and defensive confederation of merchant guilds, and is market towns dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe. It stretched from the Baltic to the North Sea in the 13th to the 17th centuries, and it included London. The main centre was Lübeck. it League facilitated trade between London and its numerous cities, most of them controlled by German merchants. It also opened up trade with the Baltic.[7]
Royal family
Until the late 17th century, marriages between the English and German royal families were uncommon. Empress Matilda, the daughter of Henry I of England, was married between 1114 and 1125 to Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor, but they had no issue. In 1256, Richard, 1st Earl of Cornwall, was elected King of Germany, and his sons were surnamed Almain. Throughout this period, the steelyard of London was a typical German business settlement. German mercenaries were hired in the Wars of the Roses.
Anne of Cleves was the consort of Henry VIII, but it was not until William III of England that a king of German origin came to reign, from the House of Nassau. The consort of his successor, Queen Anne was Prince George of Denmark, from the House of Oldenburg, who had no surviving children.
In 1714, George I, a German-speaking Hanoverian prince of mixed British and German descent, ascended to the British throne, founding the House of Hanover.[8] For over a century, Britain's monarchs were also rulers of Hanover (first as Prince Electors of the Holy Roman Empire and then as Kings of Hanover). There was only a personal union, and both countries remained quite separate, but the king lived in London. British leaders often complained that Kings George I and George II, who spoke barely any English, were heavily involved in Hanover and distorted British foreign policy for the benefit of Hanover, a small, poor, rural and unimportant country in Western Europe.[9] In contrast, King George III never visited Hanover in the 60 years (1760-1820) that he ruled it. Hanover was occupied by France during the Napoleonic Wars, but some Hanoverian troops fled to England to form the King's German Legion, a unit in the British army of ethnic Germans. The personal link with Hanover finally ended in 1837, with the accession of Queen Victoria to the British throne. The semi-Salic law prevented her from being on the throne of Hanover since a male relative was available.
Every British monarch from George I to George V in the 20th century took a German consort. Queen Victoria was raised under close supervision by her German-born mother, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld and married her first cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in 1840. Their daughter, Princess Victoria, married Prince Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia in 1858,who became Crown Prince three years later. Both were liberals, admired Britain and detested German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, but Bismarck had the ear of the elderly German Emperor Wilhelm I, who died in 1888. Friedrich Wilhelm now became Emperor Fredrich III until he died only 99 days later, and Princess Victoria became Empress of Germany, Fredrich he died after only 99 days on the throne. Her son became Emperor Wilhelm II and forced Bismarck to retire two years later.[10]
Wilhelm II
Wilhelm, the grandson of Queen Victoria, had a love-hate relationship with Britain. He visited it often and was well known in its higher circles, but he recklessly promoted the great expansion of the Imperial German Navy, which was a potential threat that the British government could not overlook. A humiliating crisis came in the Daily Telegraph Affair of 1908. While on an extended visit to Britain, the Kaiser gave a long interview to the Daily Telegraph that was full of bombast, exaggeration and vehement protestations of love for Britain. He ridiculed the British populace as "mad, mad as March hares" for questioning the peaceful intentions of Germany and its sincere desire for peace with England, but he admitted that the German populace was "not friendly" toward England. The interview caused a sensation around Europe, demonstrating the Kaiser was utterly incompetent in diplomatic affairs. The British had already decided that Wilhelm was at least somewhat mentally disturbed and saw the interview as further evidence of his unstable personality, rather than an indication of official German hostility.[11] The affair was much more serious in Germany, where he was nearly unanimously ridiculed. He thereafter played only a nominal or symbolic role in major state affairs.[12]
The British Royal family retained the German surname von Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha until 1917, when, in response to anti-German feelings during World War I, it was legally changed to the more British name House of Windsor. In the same year, all members of the British Royal Family gave up their German titles, and all German relatives who were fighting against the British in the war were stripped of their British titles by the Titles Deprivation Act 1917.
Intellectual influences
Ideas flowed back and forth between the two nations.[1] Refugees from Germany's repressive regimes often settled in Britain, most notably Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Advances in technology were shared, as in chemistry.[13] Over 100,000 German immigrants also came to Britain. Germany was perhaps one of the world's main centres for innovative social ideas in the late 19th and the early 20th centuries. The British Liberal welfare reforms, around 1910]], led by the Liberals Asquith and Lloyd George, adopted Bismarck's system of social welfare.[14] Ideas on town planning were also exchanged.[15]
Imperial Germany
Rapid German economic growth
Germany, which was unified in 1871 after it had defeated Denmark, Austria and then France, now became the economic, military and diplomatic powerhouse under Bismarck. Very rapid growth took place in heavy industry, coal, steel, chemicals and railways. Its domestic economy rivalled Britain by 1890, but its international trade and finance was smaller. Germany's overseas empire was later and far behind Britain's.
Diplomacy
The British Foreign Office had been poorly served by a series of ambassadors, who provided only superficial reports on the dramatic developments of the 1860s. That changed with the appointment of Odo Russell (1871-1884), who developed a close rapport with Bismarck and provided in depth coverage of German developments.[16]
Britain gave passive support to the unification under Prussian domination for strategic, ideological and business reasons. The German Empire was considered a useful counterbalance on the Continent to both France and Russia, the two powers that worried Britain the most. The threat from France in the Mediterranean and from Russia in Central Asia could be neutralised by a judicious relationship with Germany. The new nation would be a stabilising force, and Bismarck especially promoted his role in stabilising Europe and in preventing any major war on the continent. British Prime Minister Gladstone, however, was always suspicious of Germany, disliked its authoritarianism and feared that it would eventually start a war with a weaker neighbour.[17] The ideological gulf was stressed by Lord Arthur Russell in 1872:
- Prussia now represents all that is most antagonistic to the liberal and democratic ideas of the age; military despotism, the rule of the sword, contempt for sentimental talk, indifference to human suffering, imprisonment of independent opinion, transfer by force of unwilling populations to a hateful yoke, disregard of European opinion, total want of greatness and generosity, etc., etc."[18]
Britain was looking inward and avoided picking any disputes with Germany but made it clear, in the "war in sight" crisis of 1875, that it would not tolerate a pre-emptive war by Germany on France.[19]
Colonies
Bismarck built a complex network of European alliances that kept the peace in the 1870s and 1880s. The British were building up their empire, but Bismarck strongly opposed colonies as too expensive. When public demand finally made him, in the 1880s, grab colonies in Africa and the Pacific, he ensured that conflicts with Britain were minimal.[20]
Improvement and worsening of relations
Relations between Britain and Germany improved as the key policymakers, Prime Minister Lord Salisbury and Chancellor Bismarck, were both realistic conservatives and largely both agreed on policies.[21] There were even several proposals for a formal treaty relationship between Germany and Britain, but they went nowhere, as Britain preferred to stand in what it called "splendid isolation."[22] Nevertheless, a series of developments steadily improved their relations down to 1890, when Bismarck was pushed out by the aggressive Wilhelm II. In January 1896 he escalated tensions with his Kruger telegram, congratulating Boer President Kruger of the Transvaal for beating off the Jameson raid. German officials in Berlin had managed to stop the Kaiser from proposing a German protectorate over the Transvaal. In the Second Boer War, Germany sympathised with the Boers. In 1897 Admiral Tirpitz became German Naval Secretary of State and began the transformation of German Navy from small, coastal defence force to a fleet that was meant to challenge British naval power. Tirpitz calls for Riskflotte (Risk Fleet) that would make it too risky for Britain to take on Germany, as part of wider bid to alter the international balance of power decisively in Germany's favour.[23] At the same time, German Foreign Minister Bernhard von Bülow called for Weltpolitik (World politics). It was the new policy to assert its claim to be a global power. Bismarck's conservativism was abandoned, as Germany was intent on challenging and upsetting international order.[24]
Thereafter relations deteriorated steadily. Britain began to see Germany as a hostile force and moved to friendlier relationships with France.[25]
Coming to power in 1888, the young Wilhelm dismissed Bismarck in 1890 and sought aggressively to increase Germany's influence in the world. Foreign policy was controlled by the erratic Kaiser, who played an increasingly-reckless hand[26] and by the leadership of Friedrich von Holstein, a powerful foreign minister.[27]
He argued that a long-term coalition between France and Russia had to fall apart, Russia and Britain would never get together and Britain would eventually seek an alliance with Germany. Russia couldd not get Germany to renew its mutual treaties and so formed a closer relationship with France in the 1894 Franco-Russian Alliance since both were worried about German aggression. Britain refused to agree to the formal alliance that Germany sought.
Since Germany's analysis was mistaken on every point, the nation was increasingly dependent on the Triple Alliance with Austria-Hungary and Italy. That was undermined by the ethic diversity of Austria-Hungary and its differences with Italy. The latter, in 1915, would switch sides.[28]
Naval race
The British Royal Navy dominated the globe in the 19th century, but after 1890, Germany attempted to achieve parity. The resulting naval race heightened tensions between the two nations.[29][30]
The German Navy, under Tirpitz, had ambitions to rival the great British Navy and dramatically expanded its fleet in the early 20th century to protect the colonies and to exert power worldwide.[31] Tirpitz started a programme of warship construction in 1898. In 1890, Germany traded the strategic island of Heligoland in the North Sea with Britain in exchange for the Eastern African island of Zanzibar, where it proceeded to construct a great naval base. The British, however, were always well ahead in the naval race and introduced the highly-advanced Dreadnought battleship in 1907.[32]
Two Moroccan crises
In the First Moroccan Crisis of 1905, there was nearly war between Germany against Britain and France over a French attempt to establish a protectorate over Morocco. The Germans were upset at not being informed. Wilhelm made a highly-provocative speech for Moroccan independence. The following year, a conference was held in which all of the European powers except Austria-Hungary (now little more than a German satellite) sided with France. A compromise was brokered by the United States for the French to relinquish some of their control over Morocco.[33]
In 1911, France strongarmed itself into seizing more control over Morocco. German Foreign Minister Alfred von Kiderlen-Waechter was not opposed to that if Germany had compensation elsewhere in Africa, in the French Congo. He sent a small warship, made saber-rattling threats and whipped up anger by German nationalists. France and Germany soon agreed on a compromise, with France gaining control of Morocco and Germany gaining some of the French Congo. The British cabinet, however, was angry and alarmed at Germany's aggressiveness. Lloyd George made a dramatic "Mansion House" speech that denounced the German move was an intolerable humiliation. There was talk of war until Germany backed down, and relations remained sour.[34]
Start of World War I
The Liberal Party was sympathetic to Germany or at least wanted Britain to have good relations. The Conservative Party was very hostile to Germany as a threat unless the British Empire was aggressively protected. The emerging Labour Party and other socialists denounced war, as a capitalist device to maximize profits.
In 1907, the leading German expert in the Foreign Office, Eyre Crowe, wrote a memorandum for senior officials that warned vigorously against German intentions.[35] Crowe argued that Berlin wanted "hegemony... in Europe, and eventually in the world". Crowe argued that Germany presented a threat to the balance of power like that of Napoleon. Germany would expand its poet unless the 1904 Entente Cordiale, with France, was upgraded it to a full military alliance.[36] Crowe was taken seriously, especially because he was born in Germany.
In Germany, left-wing parties, especially the Social Democratic Party of Germany, in the 1912 German election, won the most seats for the first time. German historian Fritz Fischer famously argued that the Junkers, who dominated Germany, wanted an external war to distract the population and to whip up patriotic support for the government.[37]
Other scholars, like Niall Ferguson, think that German conservatives were ambivalent about a war and that they worried that losing a war would have disastrous consequences and that even a successful war might alienate the population if it was long or difficult.[38]
In explaining why neutral Britain went to war with Germany, Paul Kennedy, in The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860-1914 (1980), argued Germany had to become economically more powerful than Britain. Kennedy downplayed the disputes over economic trade and imperialism. There had long been disputes over the Baghdad Railway which Germany proposed to build through the Ottoman Empire. An amicable compromise on the railway was reached in early 1914 so it played no role in starting in the summer crisis. Germany relied time and again on sheer military power, but Britain began to appeal to moral sensibilities. Germany saw its invasion of Belgium as a necessary military tactic, and Britain saw it as a profound moral crime, a major cause of British entry into the war. Kennedy argues that by far the main reason for the war was London's fear that a repeat of 1870, when Prussia led other German states to smash France, would mean Germany, with a powerful army and navy, would control the English Channel and northwestern France. British policymakers thought that would be a catastrophe for British security.[39]
In 1839, Britain, Prussia and the Netherlands agreed to the Treaty of London that guaranteed the neutrality of Belgium. Germany violated that treaty in 1914, with its chancellor calling the treaty a "scrap of paper". That ensured that Britain declared war.[40]
Allied victory
The great German offensive on the Western Front in spring 1918 almost succeeded, but the British and French pulled back, opening up the battlefield to frustrate that last-ditch German plan. By summer 1918, American soldiers were arriving on the front at 10,000 a day, but Germany was unable to replace its casualties and its army shrank every day. A series of huge battles in September and October produced sweeping Allied victories, and the German High Command, under Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, saw it had lost and told Wilhelm to go into exile.
In November, the new republic negotiated an armistice, which was a disguised surrender, because the Fourteen Points of US President Woodrow Wilson were more lenient than the terms that were wanted by the Allies. Allied forces occupied and disarmed Germany, stripped it of its war gains and colonies and destroyed its navy. By keeping the food blockade in place, the Allies were determined to starve Germany until it agreed to peace terms.[41][42]
In the 1918 election, only days later, British Prime Minister Lloyd George promised to impose a harsh treaty on Germany. At the Paris Peace Conference in early 1919, however, Lloyd George was much more moderate than France and Italy, but he still agreed to force Germany to admit starting the war and to pay the entire cost of the Allies in the war, including veterans' benefits and interest.[43]
Interwar
In 1920 to 1933, Britain and Germany were on generally good terms, as shown by the Locarno Treaties[44] and the Kellogg–Briand Pact, which helped reintegrate Germany into Europe.
At the 1922 Genoa Conference, Britain clashed openly with France over the amount of reparations to be collected from Germany. In 1923, France occupied the Ruhr industrial area of Germany after Germany defaulted in its reparations. Britain condemned the French move and largely supported Germany in the Ruhrkampf (Ruhr Struggle) between the Germans and the French. In 1924, Britain forced France to make major on the amount of reparations Germany had to pay.[45]
The US later resolved the reparations issue. The Dawes Plan (1924-1929) and the Young Plan (1929-1931), sponsored by the US, provided financing for the sums that Germany owed the Allies in reparations. Much of the money returned to Britain, which then paid off its American loans. From 1931, German payments to Britain were suspended. Eventually, in 1951, West Germany would pay off the World War I reparations that it owed to Britain.[46]
With the coming to power of Hitler and the Nazis in 1933, relations worsened. In 1934, a secret report by the British Defence Requirements Committee called Germany the "ultimate potential enemy" and called for an expeditionary force of five mechanised divisions and fourteen infantry divisions. However, budget restraints prevented the formation of a large force.[47]
In 1935, the two nations agreed to the Anglo-German Naval Agreement to avoid a repeat of the pre-1914 naval race.[48]
By 1936, appeasement was British effort to prevent war or at least to postpone it until the British military was ready. Appeasement has been the subject of intense debate for 70 years by academics, politicians and diplomats. Historians' assessments have ranged from condemnation for allowing Hitler's Germany to grow too strong to the judgement that it was in Britain's best interests and that there was no alternative.
At the time, the concessions were very popular, especially the Munich Agreement in 1938 of Germany, Britain, France and Italy.[49]
World War II
Germany and Britain fought each other from the British declension of war, in September 1939, to the German surrender, in May 1945.[50][51] The war continues to loom large in the British public memory.[52]
At the beginning of the war, Germany crushed Poland. In spring 1940, Germany astonished the world by quickly invading the Low Countries and France, driving the British army off the Continent and seizing most of its weapons, vehicles and supplies. War was brought to the British skies in the Battle of Britain in late summer 1940, but the aerial assault was repulsed, which stopped Operation Sealion, the plans for the invasion of Britain.
The British Empire was standing alone against Germany, but the United States greatly funded and supplied the British. In December 1941, United States entered the war against Germany and Japan after the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan, which also later overwhelmed British outposts in the Pacific from Hong Kong to Singapore.
The Allied invasion of France on D-Day in June 1944 as well as strategic bombing and land forces all contributed to the final defeat of Germany.[53]
Since 1945
Occupation
As part of the Yalta and Potsdam agreements, Britain took control of its own sector in occupied Germany. It soon merged its sector with the American and French sectors, and that territory became the independent nation of West Germany in 1949. The British played a central role in the Nuremberg trials of major war criminals in 1946. In Berlin, the British, American, and French zones were joined into West Berlin, and the four occupying powers kept official control of the city until 1991.[54][55]
Much of Germany's industrial plant fell within the British zone and there was trepidation that rebuilding the old enemy's industrial powerhouse would eventually prove a danger to British security and compete with the battered British economy. One solution was to build up a strong, free trade union movement in Germany. Another was to rely primarily on American money, through the Marshall Plan, that modernised both the British and German economies, and reduced traditional barriers to trade and efficiency. It was Washington, not London, that pushed Germany and France to reconcile and join together in the Schumann Plan of 1950 by which they agreed to pool their coal and steel industries.[56]
Cold War
With the United States taking the lead, Britain with its Royal Air Force played a major supporting role in providing food and coal to Berlin in the Berlin airlift of 1948–1949. The airlift broke the Soviet blockade which was designed to force the Western Allies out of the city.[57]
In 1955 West Germany joined NATO, while East Germany joined the Warsaw Pact. Britain at this point did not officially recognise East Germany. However the left wing of the Labour Party, breaking with the anti-communism of the postwar years, called for its recognition. This call heightened tensions between the British Labour Party and the German Social Democratic Party (SPD).[58]
After 1955, Britain decided to rely on relatively inexpensive nuclear weapons as a deterrent against the Soviet Union, and a way to reduce its very expensive troop commitments in West Germany. London gained support from Washington and went ahead with the reductions while insisting it was maintaining its commitment to the defence of Western Europe.[59]
Britain made two applications for membership in the Common Market (European Community). It failed in the face of the French veto in 1961, but its reapplication in 1967 was eventually successful, with negotiations being concluded in 1972. The diplomatic support of West Germany proved decisive.
In 1962 Britain secretly assured Poland of its acceptance of the latter's western boundary. West Germany had been ambiguous about the matter. Britain had long been uneasy with West Germany's insistence on the provisional nature of the boundary. On the other hand, it was kept secret so as not to antagonise Britain's key ally in its quest to enter the European Community.[60]
In 1970 the German government under Willy Brandt, the former mayor of West Berlin, signed a treaty with Poland recognizing and guaranteeing the borders of Poland.
Reunification
In 1990, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at first opposed German reunification but eventually accepted the Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany.[61]
Since 1945 Germany hosts several British military installations in Western part of the country as part of British Forces Germany. Both countries are members of NATO, and share strong economic ties. David McAllister, the former minister-president of the German state of Lower Saxony, son of a Scottish father and a German mother, holds British and German citizenship. Similarly, the leader of the Scottish National Party in the British House of Commons, Angus Robertson is half German, as his mother was from Germany. Robertson speaks fluent German and English.
In 1996, Britain and Germany established a shared embassy building in Reykjavik. Celebrations to open the building were held on 2 June 1996 and attended by the British Foreign Minister at the time, Malcolm Rifkind, and the then Minister of State at the German Foreign Ministry, Werner Hoyer, and the Icelandic Foreign Minister Halldór Ásgrímsson. The commemorative plaque in the building records that it is "the first purpose built co-located British-German chancery building in Europe".[62]
Twinnings
- Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and Regensburg, Bavaria
- Aberystwyth, Ceredigion and Kronberg im Taunus, Hesse
- Abingdon, Oxfordshire and Schongau, Bavaria
- Amersham, Buckinghamshire and Bensheim, Hesse
- Ashford, Kent and Bad Münstereifel, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Barking and Dagenham, London and Witten, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Barnet, London and Tempelhof-Schöneberg, Berlin
- Barnsley, South Yorkshire and Schwäbisch Gmünd, Baden-Württemberg
- Basingstoke, Hampshire and Euskirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Bath, Somerset and Braunschweig, Lower Saxony
- Bedford, Bedfordshire and Bamberg, Bavaria
- Belfast and Bonn, North Rhine Westphalia
- Beverley, East Riding of Yorkshire and Lemgo, North Rhine Westphalia
- Biggleswade, Bedfordshire and , Erlensee, Main-Kinzig-Kreis
- Birmingham and Frankfurt, Hesse
- Blackpool and Bottrop, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Bolton, Greater Manchester and Paderborn, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Bracknell, Berkshire and Leverkusen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Brentwood, Essex and Roth bei Nürnberg, Bavaria
- Bristol and Hanover, Lower Saxony
- Bromley, London and Neuwied, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Cambridge, Cambridgeshire and Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg
- Cardiff, South Glamorgan and Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg
- Carlisle, Cumbria and Flensburg, Schleswig-Holstein
- Chelmsford, Essex and Backnang, Baden-Württemberg
- Chester, Cheshire and Lörrach, Baden-Württemberg
- Chesterfield, Derbyshire and Darmstadt, Hesse
- Christchurch, Dorset and Aalen, Baden-Württemberg
- Cirencester, Gloucestershire and Itzehoe, Schleswig-Holstein
- Cleethorpes, North East Lincolnshire and Königswinter, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Colchester, Essex and Wetzlar, Hesse
- Coventry, West Midlands and Dresden, Saxony, and Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein
- Crawley, West Sussex and Dorsten, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Darlington, County Durham and Mülheim an der Ruhr, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Derby, Derbyshire and Osnabrück, Lower Saxony
- Dronfield, Derbyshire and Sindelfingen, Baden-Württemberg
- Dundee and Würzburg, Bavaria
- Ealing, London and Steinfurt, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Edinburgh and Munich, Bavaria
- Elgin, Moray and Landshut, Bavaria
- Ellesmere Port, Cheshire and Reutlingen, Baden-Württemberg
- Enniskillen, County Fermanagh and Brackwede, Bielefeld, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Epping, Essex and Eppingen, Baden-Württemberg
- Exeter, Devon and Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Hesse
- Felixstowe, Suffolk and Wesel, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Glasgow and Nuremberg, Bavaria
- Glossop, Derbyshire and Bad Vilbel, Hesse
- Gloucester, Gloucestershire and Trier, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Greenwich, London and Reinickendorf, Berlin
- Guildford, Surrey and Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg
- Halifax, West Yorkshire and Aachen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Hammersmith and Fulham, London and Neukölln, Berlin
- Hartlepool, County Durham and Hückelhoven, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Havering, London and Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Hemel Hempstead and Dacorum, Hertfordshire and Neu Isenburg, Hesse
- High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire and Kelkheim, Hesse
- Hillingdon, London and Schleswig, Schleswig-Holstein
- Inverness, Scotland and Augsburg, Bavaria
- Kendal, Cumbria and Rinteln, Lower Saxony
- Kettering, Northamptonshire and Lahnstein, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Kidderminster, Worcestershire and Husum, Schleswig-Holstein
- Kilmarnock, Ayrshire and Kulmbach, Bavaria
- King's Lynn, Norfolk and Emmerich am Rhein, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Kirkcaldy, Fife and Ingolstadt, Bavaria
- Knaresborough, North Yorkshire and Bebra, Hesse
- Lancaster, Lancashire and Rendsburg, Schleswig-Holstein
- Leeds, West Yorkshire and Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Leicester, Leicestershire and Krefeld, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Leven, Fife and Holzminden, Lower Saxony
- Lewisham, London and Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, Berlin
- Lichfield, Staffordshire and Limburg an der Lahn, Hesse
- Lincoln, Lincolnshire and Neustadt an der Weinstraße, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Littlehampton, West Sussex and Durmersheim, Baden-Württemberg
- Liverpool and Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia
- London and Berlin
- Luton, Bedfordshire and Bergisch Gladbach, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Manchester and Chemnitz, Saxony
- Margate, Kent and Idar-Oberstein, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Middlesbrough, North Yorkshire and Oberhausen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire and Bernkastel-Kues, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Motherwell, Lanarkshire and Schweinfurt, Bavaria
- Newcastle upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear and Gelsenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Northampton, Northamptonshire and Marburg, Hesse
- Norwich, Norfolk and Koblenz, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Nottingham, Nottinghamshire and Karlsruhe, Baden-Württemberg
- Nuneaton and Bedworth, Warwickshire and Cottbus, Brandenburg
- Oakham, Rutland and Barmstedt, Schleswig-Holstein
- Oxford, Oxfordshire and Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Paisley, Renfrewshire and Fürth, Bavaria
- Perth, Perth and Kinross and Aschaffenburg, Bavaria
- Peterlee, County Durham and Nordenham, Lower Saxony
- Portsmouth, Hampshire and Duisburg, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Potton, Bedfordshire and Langenlonsheim, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Reading, Berkshire and Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Richmond upon Thames, London and Konstanz, Baden-Württemberg
- Rossendale, Lancashire and Bocholt, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent and Wiesbaden, Hesse
- Sheffield, South Yorkshire and Bochum, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Skipton, North Yorkshire and Simbach am Inn, Bavaria
- Solihull, West Midlands and Main-Taunus-Kreis, Hesse
- South Tyneside, Tyne and Wear and Wuppertal, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Spalding, Lincolnshire and Speyer, Rhineland-Palatinate
- St. Helens, Merseyside and Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg
- Stafford, Staffordshire and Dreieich, Hesse
- Stevenage, Hertfordshire and Ingelheim am Rhein, Bielefeld, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Stockport, Greater Manchester and Heilbronn, Baden-Württemberg
- Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire and Erlangen, Bavaria
- Sunderland, Tyne and Wear and Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Sutton, London and Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, Berlin, and Minden, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Swansea, West Glamorgan and Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg
- Todmorden, West Yorkshire and Bramsche, Lower Saxony
- Torbay, Devon and Hamelin, Lower Saxony
- Thurso, Caithness and Brilon, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Truro, Cornwall and Boppard, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Uckfield, East Sussex and Quickborn, Pinneberg, Schleswig-Holstein
- Waltham Forest, London and Wandsbek, Hamburg
- Ware, Hertfordshire and Wülfrath, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Waterlooville, Hampshire and Henstedt-Ulzburg, Schleswig-Holstein
- Wellingborough, Northamptonshire and Wittlich, Rhineland-Palatinate
- Weston-super-Mare, North Somerset and Hildesheim, Lower Saxony
- Weymouth, Dorset and Holzwickede, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Wokingham, Berkshire and Erftstadt, North Rhine-Westphalia
- Workington, Cumbria and Selm, North Rhine-Westphalia
- York, North Yorkshire and Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia
See also
- Timeline of British diplomatic history
- France–Germany relations
- Anglo-German Fellowship
- German migration to the United Kingdom
- Anglo-Prussian alliance
- Centre for Anglo-German Cultural Relations
- British Forces Germany
- Two World Wars and One World Cup
References
- 1 2 Dominik Geppert and Robert Gerwarth, eds. Wilhelmine Germany and Edwardian Britain: Essays on Cultural Affinity (2009).
- ↑ Religionszugehörigkeit, Deutschland Archived 25 December 2015 at the Wayback Machine., fowid.de (in German)
- ↑ CIA. "CIA Factbook". Retrieved 2010-06-28.
- ↑
- ↑ The Top 15 Military Spenders, 2008
- ↑ Sylvia Jaworska (2009). The German Language in British Higher Education: Problems, Challenges, Teaching and Learning Perspectives. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. p. 66ff.
- ↑ James Westfall Thompson, Economic and Social History of Europe in the Later Middle Ages (1300–1530) (1931) pp. 146–179.
- ↑ Philip Konigs, The Hanoverian kings and their homeland: a study of the Personal Union, 1714-1837 (1993).
- ↑ Jeremy Black, The Continental Commitment: Britain, Hanover and Interventionism 1714-1793 (2005).
- ↑ Catrine Clay (2009). King, Kaiser, Tsar: Three Royal Cousins Who Led the World to War. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 7–8.
- ↑ Thomas G. Otte, "'The Winston of Germany': The British Foreign Policy Élite and the Last German Emperor." Canadian Journal of History 36.3 (2001): 471-504.
- ↑ Christopher M. Clark, Kaiser Wilhelm II (2000) pp. 172-80, 130-38.
- ↑ Johann Peter Murmann, "Knowledge and competitive advantage in the synthetic dye industry, 1850-1914: the coevolution of firms, technology, and national institutions in Great Britain, Germany, and the United States," Enterprise and Society (2000) 1#4, pp. 699–704.
- ↑ Ernest Peter Hennock, British social reform and German precedents: the case of social insurance, 1880-1914 (1987).
- ↑ Helen Meller, "Philanthropy and public enterprise: International exhibitions and the modern town planning movement, 1889–1913." Planning perspectives (1995) 10#3, pp. 295–310.
- ↑ Karina Urbach, Bismarck's Favourite Englishman: Lord Odo Russell's Mission to Berlin (1999) Excerpt and text search
- ↑ Karina Urbach, Bismarck's Favorite Englishman (1999) ch 5
- ↑ Klaus Hilderbrand (1989). German Foreign Policy. Routledge. p. 21.
- ↑ Paul M. Kennedy, The Rise of Anglo-German Antagonism 1860-1914 (1980) pp. 27-31
- ↑ Edward Ross Dickinson, "The German Empire: an Empire?" History Workshop Journal Issue 66, Autumn 2008 online in Project MUSE, with guide to recent scholarship
- ↑ J. A. S. Grenville, Lord Salisbury and Foreign Policy: The Close of the Nineteenth Century (1964).
- ↑ John Charmley, "Splendid Isolation to Finest Hour: Britain as a Global Power, 1900–1950." Contemporary British History 18.3 (2004): 130-146.
- ↑ William L. Langer, The diplomacy of imperialism: 1890-1902 (1951) pp 433-42.
- ↑ Grenville, Lord Salisbury, pp 368-69.
- ↑ Schmitt, England and Germany, 1740-1914 (1916) pp 133-43.
- ↑ On his "histrionic personality disorder", see Frank B. Tipton, A History of Modern Germany since 1815 (2003) pp 243–245.
- ↑ Röhl, J.C.G. (Sep 1966). "Friedrich von Holstein". Historical Journal. 9 (3): 379–388. doi:10.1017/s0018246x00026716.
- ↑ Raff, Diethher (1988), History of Germany from the Medieval Empire to the Present, pp. 34–55, 202–206
- ↑ Paul Kennedy, The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism 1860–1914 (1980).
- ↑ Peter Padfield, The Great Naval Race: Anglo-German Naval Rivalry 1900-1914 (2005)
- ↑ Woodward, David (July 1963). "Admiral Tirpitz, Secretary of State for the Navy, 1897–1916". History Today. 13 (8): 548–555.
- ↑ Herwig, Holger (1980). Luxury Fleet: The Imperial German Navy 1888–1918.
- ↑ Esthus, Raymond A. (1970). Theodore Roosevelt and the International Rivalries. pp. 66–111.
- ↑ Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 (2012) pp 204-13.
- ↑ see Full Text: Crowe Memorandum, January 1, 1907.
- ↑ Jeffrey Stephen Dunn (2013). The Crowe Memorandum: Sir Eyre Crowe and Foreign Office Perceptions of Germany, 1918-1925. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 247.
- ↑ Fritz Fischer, Germany's Aims in the First World War (1967).
- ↑ Ferguson, Niall The Pity of War (1999)
- ↑ Kennedy, The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860-1914, pp 464–470.
- ↑ Martin Gilbert (2004). The First World War: A Complete History. Macmillan. p. 32.
- ↑ Nicholas Best, Greatest Day in History: How, on the Eleventh Hour of the Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month, the First World War Finally Came to an End (2008).
- ↑ Heather Jones, "As the centenary approaches: the regeneration of First World War historiography". Historical Journal (2013) 56#3 pp: 857–878.
- ↑ Manfred F. Boemeke et al., eds. (1998). The Treaty of Versailles: A Reassessment after 75 Years. Cambridge U.P. p. 12.
- ↑ Frank Magee, "Limited Liability? Britain and the Treaty of Locarno", Twentieth Century British History, (Jan 1995) 6#1, pp. 1–22.
- ↑ Sally Marks, "The Myths of Reparations", Central European History, (1978) 11#3, pp. 231–255.
- ↑ Thomas Adam (2005). Germany and the Americas: O-Z. ABC-CLIO. pp. 2:269–72.
- ↑ Keith Neilson; Greg Kennedy; David French (2010). The British Way in Warfare: Power and the International System, 1856-1956: Essays in Honour of David French. Ashgate. p. 120.
- ↑ D.C. Watt, "The Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935: An Interim Judgement", Journal of Modern History, (1956) 28#2, pp. 155–175 in JSTOR
- ↑ Frank McDonough, Neville Chamberlain, Appeasement and the British Road to War (Manchester University Press, 1998).
- ↑ E.L. Woodward, British foreign policy in the Second World War (HM Stationery Office, 1962)
- ↑ Jonathan Fenby, Alliance: the inside story of how Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill won one war and began another (2015).
- ↑ Geoff Eley, "Finding the People's War: Film, British Collective Memory, and World War II." American Historical Review 106#3 (2001): 818-838 in JSTOR.
- ↑ Richard Bosworth and Joseph Maiolo, eds. The Cambridge History of the Second World War: Volume 2, Politics and Ideology (Cambridge UP, 2015).
- ↑ Barbara Marshall, "German attitudes to British military government 1945-47," Journal of contemporary History (1980) 15#4, pp. 655–684.
- ↑ Josef Becker, and Franz Knipping, eds., Great Britain, France, Italy and Germany in a Postwar World, 1945-1950 (Walter de Gruyter, 1986).
- ↑ Robert Holland, The Pursuit of Greatness: Britain and the World Role, 1900-1970 (1991), pp. 228–232.
- ↑ Avi Shlaim, "Britain, the Berlin blockade and the cold war", International Affairs (1983) 60#1, pp. 1–14.
- ↑ Stefan Berger, and Norman LaPorte, "Ostpolitik before Ostpolitik: The British Labour Party and the German Democratic Republic (GDR), 1955-64," European History Quarterly (2006) 36#3, pp. 396–420.
- ↑ Saki Dockrill, "Retreat from the Continent? Britain's Motives for Troop Reductions in West Germany, 1955-1958," Journal of Strategic Studies (1997) 20#3, pp. 45–70.
- ↑ R. Gerald Hughes, "Unfinished Business from Potsdam: Britain, West Germany, and the Oder-Neisse Line, 1945–1962," International History Review (2005) 27#2, pp. 259–294.
- ↑ Vinen, Richard (2013). Thatcher's Britain: The Politics and Social Upheaval of the Thatcher Era. p. 3.
- ↑ "Embassy History". Internet Archive. Archived from the original on 9 October 2008. Retrieved 19 March 2015.
Further reading
- Adams, R. J. Q. British Politics and Foreign Policy in the Age of Appeasement, 1935–1939 (1993)
- Anderson, Pauline Relyea. The background of anti-English feeling in Germany, 1890-1902 (1939).
- Bartlett, C. J. British Foreign Policy in the Twentieth Century (1989)
- Brandenburg, Erich. From Bismarck To The World War: A History Of German Foreign Policy 1870-1914 (1928) online
- Dugdale, E.T.S. ed German Diplomatic Documents 1871-1914 (4 vol 1928-31), English translation of major German diplomatic documentsvol 1, primary sources, Germany and Britain 1870-1890. vol 2 1890s online
- Dunn, J.S. The Crowe Memorandum: Sir Eyre Crowe and Foreign Office Perceptions of Germany, 1918-1925 (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012). excerpt, on British policy toward Germany
- Faber, David. Munich, 1938: Appeasement and World War II (2009) excerpt and text search
- Frederick, Suzanne Y. "The Anglo-German Rivalry, 1890-1914," pp 306-336 in William R. Thompson, ed. Great power rivalries (1999) online
- Geppert, Dominik, and Robert Gerwarth, eds. Wilhelmine Germany and Edwardian Britain: Essays on Cultural Affinity (2009)
- Görtemaker, Manfred. Britain and Germany in the Twentieth Century (2005)
- Hilderbrand, Klaus. German Foreign Policy from Bismarck to Adenauer (1989; reprint 2013), 272pp
- Hoerber, Thomas. "Prevail or perish: Anglo-German naval competition at the beginning of the twentieth century," European Security (2011) 20#1, pp. 65–79.
- Horn, David Bayne. Great Britain and Europe in the eighteenth century (1967) covers 1603-1702; pp 144-77 for Prussia; pp 178-200 for other Germany; 111-43 for Austria
- Kennedy, Paul M. "Idealists and realists: British views of Germany, 1864–1939," Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 25 (1975) pp: 137-56; compares the views of idealists (pro-German) and realists (anti-German)
- Kennedy, Paul. The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism 1860–1914 (London, 1980) excerpt and text search; influential synthesis
- Lambi, I. The navy and German power politics, 1862-1914 (1984).
- Major, Patrick. "Britain and Germany: A Love-Hate Relationship?" German History, October 2008, Vol. 26 Issue 4, pp. 457–468.
- Massie, Robert K. Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War (1991)
- Milton, Richard. Best of Enemies: Britain and Germany: 100 Years of Truth and Lies (2004), popular history covers 1845–1945 focusing on public opinion and propaganda; 368pp excerpt and text search
- Neville P. Hitler and Appeasement: The British Attempt to Prevent the Second World War (2005).
- Oltermann, Philip. Keeping Up With the Germans: A History of Anglo-German Encounters (2012) excerpt; explores historical encounters between prominent Britons and Germans to show the contrasting approaches to topics from language and politics to sex and sport.
- Padfield, Peter The Great Naval Race: Anglo-German Naval Rivalry 1900-1914 (2005)
- Palmer, Alan. Crowned Cousins: The Anglo-German Royal Connection (London, 1985).
- Ramsden, John. Don’t Mention the War: The British and the Germans since 1890 (London, 2006).
- Reynolds, David. Britannia Overruled: British Policy and World Power in the Twentieth Century (2nd ed. 2000) excerpt and text search, major survey of British foreign policy
- Rüger, Jan. The Great Naval Game: Britain and Germany in the Age of Empire (Cambridge, 2007).
- Rüger, Jan. "Revisiting the Anglo-German Antagonism," Journal of Modern History (2011) 83#3, pp. 579–617 in JSTOR
- Schmitt, Bernadotte E. England and Germany, 1740-1914 (1918) online.
- Scully, Richard. British Images of Germany: Admiration, Antagonism, and Ambivalence, 1860–1914 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) 375pp
- Sontag, Raymond James. Germany and England: background of conflict, 1848-1898 (1938)
- Taylor, A. J. P. Struggle for Mastery of Europe: 1848–1918 (1954), comprehensive survey of diplomacy
- Urbach, Karina. Bismarck's Favourite Englishman: Lord Odo Russell's Mission to Berlin (1999) excerpt and text search
- Weinberg, Gerhard L. The Foreign Policy of Hitler's Germany (2 vols. (1980)
Post 1941
- Bark, Dennis L., and David R. Gress. A History of West Germany. Vol. 1: From Shadow to Substance, 1945–1963. Vol. 2: Democracy and Its Discontents, 1963–1991 (1993), the standard scholarly history
- Berger, Stefan, and Norman LaPorte, eds. The Other Germany: Perceptions and Influences in British-East German Relations, 1945–1990 (Augsburg, 2005).
- Berger, Stefan, and Norman LaPorte, eds. Friendly Enemies: Britain and the GDR, 1949–1990 (2010) online review
- Deighton, Anne. The Impossible Peace: Britain, the Division of Germany and the Origins of the Cold War (Oxford, 1993)
- Dockrill, Saki. Britain's Policy for West German Rearmament, 1950-1955 (1991) 209pp
- Glees, Anthony. The Stasi files: East Germany's secret operations against Britain (2004)
- Hanrieder, Wolfram F. Germany, America, Europe: Forty Years of German Foreign Policy (1991)
- Heuser, Beatrice. NATO, Britain, France & the FRG: Nuclear Strategies & Forces for Europe, 1949-2000 (1997) 256pp
- Noakes, Jeremy et al. Britain and Germany in Europe, 1949–1990 * Macintyre, Terry. Anglo-German Relations during the Labour Governments, 1964-70: NATO Strategy, Détente and European Integration (2008)
- Mawby, Spencer. Containing Germany: Britain & the Arming of the Federal Republic (1999), p. 1. 244p.
- Smith, Gordon et al. Developments in German Politics (1992), pp. 137–86, on foreign policy
- Turner, Ian D., ed. Reconstruction in Postwar Germany: British Occupation Policy and the Western Zones, 1945–1955 (Oxford, 1992), 421pp.
- Zimmermann, Hubert. Money and Security: Troops, Monetary Policy & West Germany's Relations with the United States and Britain, 1950-1971 (2002) 275pp
External links
- Anglo-German Relations: Paul Joyce, University of Portsmouth
- Anglo-German Club in Hamburg
- Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft in Berlin
- Anglo-German Foundation
- Anglo-German Trade
- British-German Association
- German-British Chamber of Industry & Commerce in London
- German Industry in the UK
- UK-German Connection
- British Embassy in Berlin
- German Embassy in London
- Centre for Anglo-German Cultural Relations
- News BBC - 'Thatcher's fight against German unity'
- German Association for the Study of British History and Politics