William Mulligan (1) (1975–)

The subtitle says it all here, as the author examines how Gen. Walther Reinhardt cooperated with the leadership of the Wiemar Republic, not so much out of a sense of commitment to republican values, but out of a pragmatic belief that constitutional government was the best available option to reconstitute a German state capable of playing the role of a great power. While this realistic mentality earned Reinhardt the distrust of the wider German military class, the irony is that the general himself had a wide-reaching vision of how Germany had to become a nation-in-arms, and ultimately became disappointed in the state whose future he helped to secure, and its failure to make military virtues the cornerstone of German society.… (mehr)