Peter Wiley wrote:
My knowledge of Euro history is pretty ordinary, but didn't Germany
take most of the land it lost at the end of WW1 from France in the war
of 1870?

Sure, and much of that was land that France managed to grab during
Napoleon's time, etc etc. Borders are changeable. It's one of the
ongoing problems between nations... for that matter, between states
within nations. For example there are several states borders here in the
US that are defined by rivers, which are constantly removing land from
one side & depositing it on the other, and vice versa. The big question
is, shall we kill people over it?



Seems to me it was the reparations that led to massive inflation and
economic chaos that led to the rise of Hitler more than the loss of
territory. Even the reparations were just playing by the same rules
Germany had used itself, previously.

Yep, that sound pretty close to right to me. Although the stolen land
was part of the Nazi's political sloganeering, as was the "stab in the
back" (their popular theory that Germany didn't really lose WW1).

Shows you what happens when countries try and formulate national policy
of wishful thinking and slogans basd on fantasy.



As for wars, dunno. Basically the Western powers can economically ruin
a country without taking military action. Is this preferable?

Yes. An economy in ruins is better, by definition, than an economy in
ruins with 100,000+ dead and all infrastructure destroyed.

DSK