“As the 1990s dawned, German-led European capitalism burst into the arena, not only making the competition [between the U.S. and Russia] three-sided, but fundamentally altering its rules, its nature, and perhaps its outcome” (emphasis mine throughout). So wrote Daniel Burstein in the introduction to his 1991 bestseller, Euroquake!

Back then, Burstein declared, “[T]he new German superpower is being born …. Germany now has the wide expanse of all Europe as a home market …. Its leaders have been encouraged, even compelled, by history to begin to assert the nation’s true power. Neither global politics nor the corporate competition will ever be the same.”

In November, Germany celebrates the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Reflecting on how Germany has, in just two decades, evolved from a divided nation into a true economic superpower, with global political clout, second only to the United States in the production of armaments, its military forces spreading increasingly from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf, from the Balkans to Afghanistan, it’s easy to see just how prescient Burstein’s prediction was.

Yet, how much more vision and foresight compelled Herbert Armstrong to prophesy of the Germany of today clear back at the time of its defeat by the Allies 65 years ago?

In 1947, Herbert Armstrong toured Western Europe witnessing the devastation of war before general reconstruction under the Marshall Plan had taken effect. Of his impressions at the time, he wrote: “Europe was laid waste, many of its cities in ruins. Almost no one believed, then, that Europe could ever rise again. Yet I had been persistently proclaiming for two years, over the air and in the Plain Truth, that Germany would once again come to economic and military power, heading a 10-nation resurrection of the Roman Empire” (Autobiography of Herbert W. Armstrong,Volume 2, Chapter 54).

Just seven years later, during another visit to Germany, Herbert Armstrong wrote (co-worker letter, Sept. 18, 1954):

In Germany our eyes were opened! I’ve told you the Germans are coming back far faster than after World War i. But now I’ve seen it! The Germans are a vigorous, hard-working people, with just one common goal—to restore Germany to world power—to put Germany back where once again she can set out to conquer the world! …Today the Germans are out to capture the world markets …. Nothing can prevent Germany from completely dominating Europe. Soon there will be the prophesied united Europe—the resurrected Roman Empire—with Germans in complete domination. It’s prophesied!

With that prophecy now largely fulfilled, we are already amid the very global crisis that Herbert Armstrong declared would propel this powerful united Europe, under German domination, into action, politically and militarily, to global dominance!

Our editor in chief reprised that prophecy in his personal in our May/June edition. In July 1984, Mr. Armstrong said:

I can see now the event that is going to trigger the formation of the reunification in Europe, the resurrection of the medieval Holy Roman Empire that we’ve been looking forward to that is prophesied to come. …I believe that some event is going to happen suddenly, just like out of a blue sky, that is going to shock the whole world, and is going to cause the nations in Europe to realize they must unite! …I think I can see what may be the very event that is going to trigger it, and that is the economic situation in the world.

In August 2007, the subprime mortgage balloon was pricked. A year later, the full scale of the global financial and economic crisis began to hit with progressive bank failures creating a domino effect in the markets. The stock market crashed to half of its pre-crisis level. Oil prices tumbled. The full impact of the economic devastation is even yet to be realized.

As our editor in chief declared, “Mr. Armstrong saw the banking crisis coming 25 years ago. And how did he know that the financial crisis would probably trigger 10 European kings to profoundly unite into a world superpower? That is truly astounding!”

Astounding indeed!

Still some will ask, “Where are the 10 European kings that are to profoundly unite into a world superpower? Isn’t the EU anything but united right now?”

Precisely! Hence the gathering of many high-profile German and EU politicians in Berlin on Friday to address the topic “Europe in Crisis”!

What was the mood among these movers and shakers of the Germanic European Union?

Perhaps the speech that demonstrated most the vast gulf that exists between the naive approach to foreign policy of the current American administration and the cold hard reality of elitist, Germanic EU politics was that delivered by former Bavarian Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber.

In an election year for both the European Union and Germany, Stoiber is able to essentially stand aloof from direct involvement in campaigning in both and speak his mind. And he certainly did!

In a press release on Stoiber’s address to the Europaforum, the convener, wdr (West German Broadcasting), stated (our translation):

Ex-Prime Minister of Bavaria Stoiber sees the Anglo-American approach to growth completely discredited by the economic crisis. The former Bavarian minister president and today’s director of the European Union’s anti-bureaucracy group, Edmund Stoiber, is convinced that the economic world will be drastically changed after the present crisis.He was convinced that the Anglo-American profit motive combined with high-risk business practices is completely discredited. …The United States now must pay the bill for economic and environmental mistakes of the past. “The Bush government operated an anti-ecological policy and the Americans must now pay the bill for it. One can read the results from the condition of its automobile industry,” stated the csu [Christian Social Union] politician.

Edmund Stoiber ran the most economically successful state in Germany during his long term as prime minister of Bavaria and leader of the Christian Social Union political party. Trained by his mentor, Franz Josef Strauss, to work for fulfillment of the Germanic dream of a united Europe under German domination, Stoiber, of all leaders in Germany, has the demonstrated capacity to lift Germany and Europe out of the coming chaos that any future disruption to the EU economy will bring.

Stoiber refused the post of minister for the economy in Angela Merkel’s government, probably realizing just what a poisoned chalice it would have been given the systemic problems underpinning Germany’s export-based economy, with its entrenched labor and social security issues.

Though it is true that, as Stratfor has highlighted, Germany of all nations stands to benefit from the present global financial and economic crisis in the longer term, the nation does face a degree of disruption as these systemic problems rise to the surface because of failing financial institutions, rising unemployment and increasing pressures for government bailouts of major business and banking concerns.

Perceiving this situation, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, whose Social Democratic Party has strong support from the labor unions, has launched his political campaign for the chancellorship on the theme of Germany in crisis. The publicity given to such a campaign theme will only serve to heighten the feeling of crisis and impending chaos in the minds of the German populace.

We remind our readers that Herbert Armstrong declared fully 27 years ago that the failure of any major bank in the U.S. “will affect the banks in Britain, in Paris, in Tokyo, and in the capitals of the world. And the heads of the governments in those countries know it. The banking system is so interlocked between nations, that if one goes under they will all go under, and that’s going to mean chaos, economic chaos all over the world for many nations and millions and billions of people” (sermon, June 1982).

It was German philosopher Freidrich Nietzsche who declared, “The German soul has its passageways and inter-passageways; there are caves, hideouts and dungeons in it; its disorder has a good deal of the attraction of the mysterious; the German is expert on secret paths to chaos.”

In her book Germany Will Try It Again, Sigrid Schultz, who reported for the Chicago Tribune from within Germany after World War i on through the early years of World War ii, predicted, “[T]he Germans have brought chaos and agony to every country within their long reach. They will cry chaos again, and still again … at the first sign of weakness on our part, they’ll try it again.”

Commenting on the Nazi organization that was set up as far back as 1940 to continue to pursue the Nazi dream of world conquest underground in the event of German defeat in World War ii, Schultz wrote, “The broad outline of the campaign aims at a ‘scientifically provoked and directed chaos,’ with which they feel certain to win ultimate victory.”

This all sounds a lot like the deliberately timed theme of Steinmeier’s political campaign.

Germany may well be weathering the deepening global recession better thus far than most other nations in the world. Yet there’s no doubt that by dint of Europe’s deepening recession and the conditioning of the minds of the masses to anticipate chaos amid impending crisis, that the cry for a leader in whom the people can have confidence to deliver them from any perceived chaos will increase.

Among all of Germany’s political elite, is there a politician possessing the credibility to be trusted to deliver the nation from the coming economic crunch?

There is such a one, biding his time, waiting in the wings for his moment. Edmund Stoiber, former premier of Bavaria, who ran the most successful state economy in Germany for many years, certainly made his presence felt at the recent “Europe in Crisis” forum.

Stoiber declared outright that he sees the Anglo-American approach to growth completely discredited by the economic crisis and is convinced that the economic world will be drastically changed after the present crisis. Stoiber clearly pinned the source of the world’s financial and economic woes on Anglo-Americans. He declared that our way of doing business is outmoded. No doubt he has a suitable Teutonic model in mind to replace it!

As Herbert Armstrong declared, “I believe that some event is going to happen suddenly, just like out of a blue sky, that is going to shock the whole world, and is going to cause the nations in Europe to realize they must unite! … I think I can see what may be the very event that is going to trigger it, and that is the economic situation in the world.”

Mr. Armstrong pointed to massive bank failures as causing “chaos, economic chaos all over the world for many nations and millions and billions of people.”

The world has experienced the sudden shock of massive financial failures. It is increasingly experiencing the chaos that such a crisis engenders.

Mr. Armstrong declared that such a situation would trigger the rise to global dominance of the prophesied beast power of Revelation 13 and 17. Now, coincident with these phenomena, we have an influential German political leader declaring that the Anglo-Saxon model of business, finance and economy has failed and inferring that it will be replaced by a different model.

Stoiber is right! And that model, as we have consistently declared, will be “Holy” Roman at its spiritual roots, and very Germanic in its systems of economy, politics and military power.

Yet first will come the chaos that will emanate from the continuing, deepening recession in Europe. Then out of that chaos arises the leader who will promise to lead Europe out of crisis by imposing a very different system of economy than the Anglo-American one that has dominated global business for the past two centuries.

That system will be endorsed by a leaner and meaner European Union comprising the 10 prophesied leaders all giving their allegiance to a dominant religious power and a dominant politico-military power (Revelation 13 and 17).

Herbert Armstrong consistently claimed that our enemies would cast the blame for the world’s economic troubles on the Anglo-Americans. Last Friday, Edmund Stoiber did just that. He may well be a man to watch in the event of political chaos emerging in the wake of the upcoming German elections this September!

For more information on this subject, read our booklet Nahum—An End-Time Prophecy for Germany.