A. LUKOYANOV Candidate of Historical Sciences Western mass media like to publish pictures of German army soldiers on their pages - brave soldiers and officers with impeccable German bearing. But if you look closely, German soldiers are photographed more and more often against the background of non-Gothic cathedrals or clean, neat streets of German cities - behind them you can clearly distinguish the Afghan mountains, the dusty roads of Iraq, the ancient mosques of Bukhara and Samarkand. The Bundeswehr's activity outside of its own country, if we recall the events of 60 - 70 years ago, cannot but raise at least a number of questions among the world community. As you know, after the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945, German society, both in its western and even more so in its eastern part, accepted as the fundamental moral basis of public consciousness the rejection of any militarization of the country. In the German Democratic Republic (GDR), all militaristic, and especially nationalist, ideas and even thoughts were severely censored, which made it possible to educate the younger generation in the spirit of respect for our country, whose soldier was a true liberator of both Europe and the whole world from the "brown plague". However, it should be noted that in the west of the country, the attitude to the militaristic past was still somewhat different, although this was not officially advertised. What is worth, for example, the fact that the national anthem, which was before Hitler and under Hitler - "Deutschland ueber alles" - "Germany above all" - was banned in the GDR, while in Germany it was played at all official events. It came to incidents. When an official from the Federal Republic of Germany came to Israel, the orchestra at the Tel Aviv airfield refused to play the anthem. Certain problems also occurred during meetings with representatives The article was prepared with the participation of A. Tronov (IB RAS). page 36 Germany and the GDR. And when the two parts ... Читать далее