Germany is on the rise. Berlin’s brawnier foreign policy began with Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, saysupi’s chief European correspondent: “German troops are already present in Afghanistan, the Balkans, Sudan, the Horn of Africa, the southern Caucasus and Palestine—a situation unthinkable a decade ago when the Bundeswher was constitutionally barred from intervening overseas.”

Pave the way Schröder did. But now in steps Angela Merkel, who, with her robust foreign-policy talk and 80 percent approval rating, is presenting a stronger image of Germany than the Western world has seen in decades.

A speech she gave to the Munich Conference on Security Policy last Saturday (February 4) is a case in point. She had strong words for Schröder’s pal, Russia, and how it uses energy supplies as political leverage with former Soviet satellites. She questioned “whether Europe is living up to its human rights rhetoric with China.” She even warned Hamas, the new majority extremist group in the Palestinian parliament, “to renounce violence and recognize Israel or face ostracism ….”

But Merkel, with her “black and white view of politics” saved her “harshest words for the radical Islamist regime in Iran.” upi described her speech in Munich as one that adopted “a muscular tone rarely used by German leaders …” (emphasis ours throughout).

Even before she was “elected” as chancellor last fall, our editor in chief pointed to a Stratfor analysis that likened some of her rhetoric to the “sentiments of a certain earlier German government”—referring to Adolf Hitler.

Ironically, in her criticism against Iran last week, Merkel likened Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s remarks denying the Holocaust and calling for the elimination of Israel to the rise of Adolf Hitler in the 1930s—meaning that Germany’s own history should be “a cautionary tale of what can happen when threats to peace remain unchecked” (New York Times, February 5).

Though largely rhetorical, Merkel’s tone is unusually strong considering that it emanates from a nation that not long ago was careful to couch all its aspirations in the cloak of European unity.

As the New York Times described it, Merkel said “that the world must act now to stop Iran from developing a nuclear bomb ….” The article said she stated this “discarding any diplomatic niceties and raising her voice in a tone of frustration.”

Quoting Merkel directly: “A president that questions Israel’s right to exist, a president that denies the Holocaust, cannot expect to receive any tolerance from Germany”—a statement that was followed by applause. “We have learned our history.”

Indeed, Germany has plenty of history to draw from in how to deal with madmen such as Ahmadinejad.

In a related story, Germany’s former defense minister—a member of the same political party as the chancellor—told a newspaper that Germany needs to considernuclear arms as a deterrent to terrorist-sponsoring nations building nuclear programs.

Though we don’t expect Berlin to be breaking any proliferation treaties just yet, we do see a mindset changing in Germany—fully justifiable, it seems, from the maniacal ravings coming out of Iran.

Watch Germany’s increased boldness in foreign policy. Leadership will come out of Berlin, soon to be more than just in the form of fiery speeches. For more on where this is headed, read our free booklet Germany and the Holy Roman Empire.