Lionel Barber

Is Germany really such a role model?

John Kampfner rightly highlights the country’s post-war achievements, but the Wirecard and Volkswagon scandals reveal a rotten corporate system

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issue 19 September 2020

The British romance with Germany has always been an on-off affair.

At the turn of the century, Kaiser Bill enjoyed brief popularity, based on dynastic ties, until his bombastic militarism set Germany on a path to war. Thirty years on, as Tim Bouverie reminds us in his book Appeasing Hitler, many in the English ruling class favoured Nazi Germany over revanchist France.

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