German reunification: How two countries (sort of) became one | UNPACKED 

i feel you bro

If korea unified. there will be no excuse for american to station troops in japan and south korea

@@taiwancanhelp6582 yes they still can, they hold the Chinese influence

and I envy the one Germany as a Cypriot...

@@andreasantoniou3481 Cyprus is different, Cyprus is more like Israel and Palestine because there its because of ethnic groups and not ideological ones.

Nah we just pursue perfection that is why we always critique something

Nagging is part of german culture. But it must not be taken that serious

Spackfighter when we don’t do it serious we will just become mediocre, so we will rather be nagging Karens than to be just another chapter in history. Only with a pursue can humanity go forward

@Gerd Wiesler perfectionists mind sets are one of the main causes of depression.

@@mrbrainbob5320 that’s why we need the sports

Sadly with Gorbachev it was a different, he was no Stalin and relations with the west was good and he embraced more democratic ideals. Now they have a selfish dictator who detests the west and especially the USA, relations are at an all time low since he has an eye on taking back the former Soviet nations. War now in Ukraine marks the end of peace and renewal of a cold war again.

Germany and it’s people are truly fascinating. From defeating the Roman’s to nearly conquering the world twice despite all odds against them and even after all was lost have managed to resurrect and become a very powerful nation again. Not to mention many of the smartest and most influential people throughout the centuries im just in awe of all of it. Now my hope is that they manage to never have to resurrect again and achieve it’s true potential. The world needs it.

@@davesravens47 Well said. I think not enough credit is given to the amount of geniuses Germany has produced in history. Looking aside from its tainted history, its a truly remarkable nation of some intelligently gifted poeple

Thats dude. Hope the us gets back together too! (Political seen)

Thank you so much❤🇩🇪🇺🇸

why? what changed after that?

@@yasuhohirose6574 everything

@@antonk3533 not everything ; it's useless

@@gutsjoestar7450 yes everything chanced

@@gutsjoestar7450 Yup, everything changed all families were unified Germany became much stronger...

Thanks for sharing Ana, it's interesting what you point out...as someone who lives in the other part of the world, it continue to amaze me the stories within the giant events that occur; just like yours. I'm gonna give myslef the chance (hope you answer) of asking, as an eastern german, what do you think is considered success apart from the western germans?

@@lauragg9121thanks for asking. I'm happy that someone seems so interested in this story since it is part of every Germans life and everyone has his or her own story to tell about this. I also have many more things to tell about what the unification did as a whole but also to my family. But since this would take too much time, I want to focus on your question first. But there is a small problem: sorry to ask but I think I didn't quite get what you want to know since English isn't my first language. Do you want to know what I think are positive aspects of the unification for eastern Germans?

Neoliberal-style reforms were prevalent at that time.Your experience about weddings is sort of a double whammy in terms of values and economic differences. Basically, many countries with non-capitalist economic systems, such as the countries of Eastern Europe and China, were in a similar situation at the beginning of the transition.Although the inflation no as horrible as in Eastern Europe, it was unimaginable to the new generation that the purchase of 500 grams of meat products would cost 5-10% of the average monthly salary in 90s.If it were not being for WTO accession and the development of the private sector economy after 2000, the problems caused by the large unemployed population would have been much more difficult to solve. And if the economic reforms at that time had taken more account of the realities of non-capitalist-style economies, perhaps they would have caused less problems. Now we hope to each other that the government's current policies will alleviate the social conflicts caused by the neo-liberal reforms. P.S At least the east retains some of its DDR-era social welfare, and China sort of smashed it and rebuilt it again. You are relatively more fortunate in the aftermath of reforms, but China is different.The reforms regarding social services and social welfare that have obvious problems are also pains that China is still going through.

@@Anna-he1ox yeiii!!!!! Thank you so much for answering me dear!! How's it goin? Yeah, I mean, in your perspective, what would you (an eastern german) can consider a "succesful" life, and if there's a difference between the conecpt of a western german. Thank you soooo much for answering me! Sending the best!!

Did you like something in the GDR? How authoritarian it was? What about the quality of life?

They are Germans. What you on about?

this is german... DW is a german state-owned broadcaster

@@azamatkhatunar4809 If you saw the video, some people were Americans.

@@azamatkhatunar4809 as a german i have to say that you did not watch the video. Because if you had you would the that the op has a point that most of those people were not german. I have no problem with that but the op has with his opinion a point

Bro Germany is weak Very Weak A once strong country is a shadow of its former self NATO is there to keep the Russians out and the Germans in Too much German war guilt

No

@@imperator791 keep watching Fox news

@Soviet Union all the stuff you mentioned is just cooperation between the west it's called having friends but being a Soviet you don't have any ?

So if we're a slave to the US, why do we build a pipeline to russia? Why didn't we join the US into the third Irak war? Why didn't we budge to the US demands to open our markets for US products? Maybe we're just a state who knows that they need some strong allies until we could help to shape the EU to a superpower like China and the US? We're still not there but with an even stronger China it could happen that the EU will creater stronger bonds internaly to be more secure from outside influence.

And the people, responsible for building the wall, knew that beforehand! Think about that. Another attemt to divide a united germany, like many other attempts before. Some of them led to world wars.

What holds Modern Germany together? Before, it was the Prussian Nobility. Now it’s erasing of the idea of being German. It should be divided yet again.

@@N9mber nation states are dead. The future is the neoliberal order

@@dayviduh nation-states are far from dead. The amount of independence movements around the world proves more states will be formed not less (through globalization.)

Well I would prefer if we in the south (BW & BY) leave the federation

Ummm . No.

Its not. Greeting from germany

@@godwrote01 why do u say that?

@Fabian Kirchgessner sagt der Wessi

@@Fernando_Sanchez because i live in germany and the people are about to get on each others throat since 5 years

Ever heard of something called a kik?

@TheSatanicTicTac Biggest failure

You've never been to Germany have you...

@TheSatanicTicTac Berlin Airport has nothing to do with productivity though.

renegadeMoscow if Russians have allowed Democracy and not DICTATORSHIP, then it was possible!!!

...Porsche and Mercedes are Germany companies. It would be sad if no German could afford them. Granted, Porsche is a luxury brand, but Mercedes has models for every day use.

Yet germany still has a rather thriving defence sector, just to name a few examples: KMW, Rheinmetall, Heckler&Koch, MAN, MTU, Diehl, Airbus,... feel free to extend the list!

If the Russia was ran by Germans they probably woulda had a similar success

u must be happy that u live in russia . im live in turkey, im 23 years old and ı havent seen mediterrenean sea yet. %35 turkish people works with minimum wage (300dollar) un employement rate is %25 . chepest new brand car is clio 1.0 engine , and its cost 15.000 dollar. if you teacher here u have to work 2 mouths for ı phone x 124 gb. russia has better sitiation. we even cant go to beach in turkey, because hotels takes money from us even its forbbidden, because half of that money goes to state,uber is forbbidden here, because corrupt leaders hve taxi companies, etc...

GDR is what East Germany is known as in English-speaking countries. I have never heard Germans use VSA on the other hand...

@@marcellkiss-redey8451 yeah because DDR is german "Deutsche Demokratische Republik"

DDR4

@@marcellkiss-redey8451 that is his point. English speaking countries referr in their language to another country while other countries have to use the english variant of english countries instead of their own description of that country. Otherwise nobody woud understand what we're talking about. Kind of like how france calls germany allemagne and english speakers say germany while it is called Deutschland.

@@marcellkiss-redey8451 VS (Vereinigte Staaten) is used in German

Yeah they fixed the bug

You mean you’re on stolen land, Cyprus belongs to the Turkish Republic of Cyprus

dont do it

@@jonixd4919 Why be so offensive?

@@jonixd4919 As I told you again, The so called "Turkish Republic of Cyprus" calls itself the "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus". And dont you tell me that I am living on stolen lands, when my ancestors have been living here for 3000-4000 years. I am a Cypriot and I live in the Republic of Cyprus. That's what my recognised indentity says, that's what my recognised passport says and that's where I pay my taxes. The only ones in Cyprus that are living in stolen lands are the 40 000 people who came from Turkey after 1974.

@@andreasantoniou3481 👏👏

Do you really think Germany is the only country that’s honest about issues in their country?

It is about honesty, integrity and trying not to be bias towards ones own country. As DW is a government supported news agency i was surprised to see those qualities. Another good episode they made was about free trade.

Sharp eyes!

You can still move between borders

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Why would the soviets get to decide that over a sovereign nstion 1000km away from them

​@@euphoriaggaminghd ironic USA still do it until this day and they are far away from Europe

Germany is a desaster

@@godwrote01 your English skills make you a disaster

@War Against Tyranny Just like you enjoy supporting an unhinged lunatic who engages in means of Genocide. But keep pointing at others. That's all your degenerated country is good for these days...

@@Exodon2020 We're not all like this.....

@@Exodon2020 Germany started the worlds most destructive war in human history how did trump do the same?

Please call it DDR.

Of course. Its an money-pool only for the east. It would be illegal to take money from it to fund other stuff. Or have you any proof of your point.

...and foreigners also pay the solidarity tax...

@@nevergonnagiveyouup.9162 , you are totally wrong (similar to the video) : >Solidarity tax< is an income tax everybody has to pay in Germany. It goes directly into the federal budget with no intended purpose use given. When tax was introduce it was justified with additional cost of the unification expected. But actually this money went amoung others for the military expenses Germany had to pay in connections with wars at the Gulf or on the Balkans. Then there a federal program call >Solidarity pact< which gives subsidies to the East German States including Berlin to rebuild infrastructure or cope with depts. Just because the word >Solidarity< shows up in these two different things, people (like you) get confused and mix it up.

Well we have an orange off brand mustache man with a bad hair cut so yea no I don't it working.

perhaps some country need to learn to not kill some group of people just because they are exist

Learn what exactly?

Dont

Learn what?

The economic and ideological gap is much more greater than in Germany, it will be so expensive and traumatic to the country and its people

Can't even imagine what a Korean unification would look like after 70+ years of separation.

Really unlikely they will go broke. Be in debt it will destroy south koreas economy

Read that South Koreans are not willing to pay the reunification price/cost.

@@mickkrever4084 I'm assuming your talking about Taiwan. The thing is that the Taiwanese don't want to be under Communist rule. They would go war before getting invaded.

You want that headache? Because, as far as economies and quality of life go GDR was a million times better than modern day north Korea. Not to mention what are they gonna do with all the random nukes and weapons caches across the country? Some of it might spill out of the continent.

... German version of "... since ancient times", at least Chinese Version is actually "ancient times" - it was unified 2000 years ago, in Germany's case 300 years.

@@amm287 *... however China seems has less common sense - Sigh*

Long gone, consequence of the lost war. We want to live in peace with our neighbors

No issue at all. The only problem is that russia now has a closer access into europe.

Lost Austria too.

Because that's what the Allies agreed to when they occupied Germany. If there weren't tensions setting in literally the moment the German signed the declaration of unconditional surrender West Berlin would have been handed over to the Soviets pretty quickly as cost for maintaining such an outpost were pretty staggering. But with the 1948 Blockade and the development leading towards the formation of two different states on German soil this agreement became the Status Quo. Berlin was the World's Capital of Espionage during that time.

I'm not sure if you can still call the country you have in mind "democratic"

*We don't

@@itsme-sn5gi we don't are you sure about that

@Scott Martin Germany paid the reparations for WWI, the last bill was paid in 2010. Also, Germany paid some reparations for WWII, but because of the cold war, a strong Germany was preferred, so they (West-Bloc countries) allowed to stop the payment until reunification. But when the reunification started, the international laws changed during the cold war, and Germany saw the opportunity to get rid of these last payments with the 2 + 4 treaty. I only know 3 countries, who want reparations. Greece (who always mentioned it to Germany), Poland (who waived the depts during the cold war because of the USSR), and Namibia (genocide against Herero and Tutsi). And Germany won't like to pay for it (WWII), because when one country gets now reparation, other countries will follow with their demands to Germany. I think the only country that might get the right to reparations from Germany is Greece when they complain at the international court.

@@cccccc9929 east germany paid its reperations to russia. 80billion mark both in cash and corporate assets.

@@uteriel282 West-Germany paid the USSR too. Russia won't claim reparations from Germany.

Says Napoleon, one of these guys wich tried hard to avoid a unified germany 😂

@@Maxtherealone He wanted a unified Germany, but small, weak and under his thumb. That's also why both Prussia and Austria were excluded from it.

And by dat u mean ?

Cheers

Then he was simply a shelterd Eastern German.

Haha. You couldn’t be more wrong.

So your idea of a better world is based on centre values? Gee... I hate to spoil it for you but a stance towards neutrality might just as well be no stance at all, moderation is the reason why our world is in such a mess, had policymakers cared more about making big systemic changes rather than appeasing their voter base than the world would have been a much different place, if you try to appease everyone than you truly appease no one hence the reason nations the world over are seeing increasing polarisation.

@@anuradhahazarika5090 no, centrism Is pragmatism, freedom, compromise and most of all MULTILATERALISM, something that now the US hates. Being a centrist doesn't mean being spineless

Antonino Napoli@ Being a centrist means not taking a stand on the things that truly matter, it truly is a passive approach to life, centrists have never been the authors of change and never will since they don't have any strong values to stand for. You don't have to be centrist to be pragmatic or even strategic in your approach it is just that after the advent of the internet people have become polarised in their opinions hence unable look eye to eye on any issue, it is a problem of media (echo chambers). As far as Multilateralism goes it is a failed system which is a hindrance to change since every political party is looking after their interests, look at China how do you think they manage to progress year after year without any problems? 'Duh' cause they have a one-party system which is much more efficient than having multiple parties vying for their gain (which is illogical if you're concerned of the interest of people).

@@anuradhahazarika5090 ok think like that, liberal democracy has been literally created by centrists, being moderate doesn't mean you don't have values, but you clearly don't want to understand that

@@antoninonapoli5085 "liberal democracy has been created by centrists" would you care to explain why you think that is? Plus you're taking it personally, I've simply stated what holds to be true based on my understanding of politics, centrism is an ideology for those living in bad faith, sooner or later everyone is going to be forced to take a side whether they like it or not, the increasing polarization of our world is a testament of things to come.

West Germany sold chemicals, not all in one as a package but some here and some there ....but yes if you put these chemicals together you get an chemical weapon lol

Yeah. It’s kind of funny how they just take the words that were used by a dictatorship and regurgitate them. 2050 after Korean reunification do you think they’ll start describing North Korea as democratic because they had it in the name and described themselves as such? Lol.

That would be nice but without Russian and American support it will never happen. There is a treaty stoping the reunification

@@alexiel4406 first of all russia is way weaker than germany as of rn and is in debt to germany and alr said they would support germany in getting their eastern terriotires back and the usa u could say that for that germany will pay more into nato and also will give the usa military bases in austria so the usa would benefit and for russia just lower some debt

@@SchwarzeSonne130 you literally just explained that with their support they will get the territories back. Someone just has to make the deal

@Only a German Guy yes however the austrians always wanted to join germany even before ww1 they called themselves german etc. however they couldnt decide which house would be the ruling monarchs and also bismarck didtn want it otherwise austria,bohemia and slowenia would joined the german empire the hungarian part would become independent

@@alexiel4406 yep bc putin knows that whe ngermany and russia cooperate its time for peace they were allies once but other powers made them fight eachother but putin well knows a german - russian friendship would benefit both very good

@Troy Bailey You mean socialism, we never had communism in the world.

@@cccccc9929 cuban ussrn china , east germany , poland , romania, hungary, yougoslavia, bulgaria, Czechoslovakia , afganistan , north korea, vietnam, etc were communist i mean , how dumb of a perosn can you be to say there was never communism communiqm not only suck but it was used ussr and russia was the biggest comunist state and first in the world and socialismasocialisme nd communism is the same

@@gutsjoestar7450 It's not! Look for the definition. Communism is the idea, that the people live in a classless society and don't need a form of government. Socialism was the idea to get into communism, it's an intermediate form. It failed! Because this form wasn't democratic and free. But many people, especially in the USA, have problems to understand it. We never had communism, only socialism.

@@cccccc9929 Communist ideology is the bring a socialist society you don't need to create your own theroy about comunnism because it's not communist are just people tired of riches taking advantage of workers so they create a whoe thing about workers i

@@cccccc9929 the main communist idea is too unite a whole nation under one communist state the state is everything in communism a stateless country is just a stateless country no need to name it communism stalin was communist ussr mean union of soivet socialists republic there's socilaist into it socialism is a economic system comunism is an idelogy they're both related to ; as communism seek to establish a socilaist regime

oh pls not

F

Wish Somalia could go similar thing soon (stop being anarchy state) u guys have a huge potential a a functioning country .Anyway best wishes from Poland.

They have the most people

@@UsernamerAlreadyTakn and still the GDP per person is higher.

@@nevergonnagiveyouup.9162 Well at least of the >10 or 20 million countries. However some of the smaller countries like Swiss and Liechtenstein have higher GDP per person.

Its all ready stuffed the dumbedt thing you can do is have states governors. You need one coubtry one law.

in East Germany would vote Trump and West Germany Biden. Thats the truth today