Reunification and the Legacy of the Anthem

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So when it is time to digitize your income tax You can bank on Lloyd's. search Lloyd's business accounts to find out more This episode is brought to you by TikTok Believe it or not History isn't just in textbooks, it comes to life every day on TikTok Millions of people are exploring the history of music, fashion, food and art. and discovering new facts about the things they love. One scroll could take you from the roots of jazz to the flavors of ancient kitchens And the next might reveal a quirky fact about how modern traditions came to be Discover the past in new ways on TikTok Curiosity never gets old. This episode is brought to you by MintMobile. It's easy to ditch overpriced wireless with Mint moobile. Sign up online at mintmobile dot com slash history. get three months of premium wireless service. fifteen bucks a month. forty five dollars upfront payment required, equivalent to fifteen dollars per month. New customers on first three month plan only. Speeds slower above forty gigabytes on a limited plan. Additional taxes, fees and restrictions apply. See Mint Mobile for details Tg and that was, of course, the national anthem of Germany. and dominate this time in the World Cup The Germans aren't kind of massive favorites, are they? I mean, when it comes to European teams in the World Cup, the Germans are pretty irresistible. They've won the Wor Cup four times They've been runners up. four times. They have reached the last four thirteen times. which is more even than the Brazilians Yeah. And as co founder of our own beloved production company put it. Football is a simple game. twenty two men chase the ball for ninety minutes and at the end the Germans always win. And the consequence of that is that football fans certainly have got used to hearing the German anthem a great deal. Yeah. That's right But there are of course other reasons why the German anthem is quite familiar and that's not to do with football at all possibly to do with the history of Germany in the twentieth century. You think that as well as being incredibly familiar, it is also actually the most misunderstood because its roots are not kind of militaristic and Its lyrics are not an assertion of German power over the rest of the world, as is often sometimes thought Yeah, I do think that's Tom. I do think it's misunderstood. So I would say that if you were to stop people in the streets in Britain and say to them, what is the German national anthem called? I think there's no doubt that most people would say, o everyone knows what it's called. It' called Deutschland Uber Alice I mean, this is just the general assumption in Britain, I think, because we've been traumatized by so many war films. Yeah. and the Uber Alice means Germany number one Yes, Germany over everybody else. Yeah. actuallyctually It's not called Deutscheland Uberalice. was written in eighteen forty one And the title of the anthem is Daslid de Deutschen, the song of the Germans And today, when you hear that anthem, so when, you know, in the nineteen eighties some un loveovely German West German team was storming to a European or world title with a massive mullet Terrible mullets and moustaches, Rudy Voola or some such clair Um When they were to the horror of people around the world winning tournaments left right and center They never ever sang Deutscheland Uber Allis. It's the kind of thing you would see in a newspaper headlinine Briton in the daily mirror or something But they actually sing Einikit andrech and Fheit, which Tom translates as we both know, as unity and right and freedom. That is not as helpful is it to the headline writers of the Daily Mirror Not at all, not at all. And that's because what Germans sing today is actually the third verse of the hymn, not the first. And this is for historical reasons that we will get into So we will be talking about things like the Weimar Republic, the Third Reich, and so on, East Germany. So there's a lot to unpack in this episode. Yeah. I mean, it is controversial Exactly. So there were a couple of controvversices actually just a few months ago like last autumn So first of all, there was a row when two AFD politicians, or politicians of the far right party, the AFD, they went to New York City and they were filmed singing the first verse Bar with the presresident of the Young Republican Club of New York So they were sing in Deutscheberllis there. And that was a bad look, I think, both for the Germans say I think it was a bad look for the young Republican president as well And at the same time The vice president of D Linkca, the leftft wing partarty in Germany, which is a descendant of the old Communist Party of East Germany This is a guy called Bodo Ramelo who actually used to be the minister president of Tururingia of the state in the east of Germany and was actually from West Germany. Yes So Bodo Ramelo said, I know many East Germans who do not sing the national anthem. And he said we should have a referendum on a new anthem And what I would like is a song written in nineteen fifty by Bertel Brecht And I quote, a pan German anthem that we could all sing together with joy be coming back to this later on. I have a German friend who completely agrees with that Really? yeah, she loves the Birtle Brexel Wellelcll come to the B of Breong. But let's start with what is the anthem right now, The song of the Germans So th' lead their Deutsche And I think it has actually perhaps the most fascinating history of any national anthem, including Tom our own. which is a shocking thing to say I mean, it didn't get there first, did it? I mean, that's the important thing. We got there first preared with their own It is a latecomer So we'll start with the tune The tune was written in seventeen ninety seven by the composer Joseph Haydn Haydn was an Austrian, that is to say, he was a subject of the Habsburg Empire. He's obviously one of the Titans of eighteenth century classical music. So Haydn for people who are not massively into their classical music He's often seen as the person who invented the symphony, the string quartet, the sonata Mozart and Beethoven are standing on Haydn's shoulders. He's a tremendous person to have as the writer of your National anthem. And he's a tremendous person because he's a massive fan of Nelson, isn't he? Oh yes, of course Yeah. I forgotten that. He writes a mass, which comes to be called a Nelson Mass Yeah He hangs out with with Nelson and Emma when they're on their comical procession across across the continent, exactly so So yeah, he's from an older generation. than Mozart say So he spends most of his time basically as a glorified servant He's the music director for the Esta Hazy family in Hungary In seventeen ninety Prince Estter Hazy had died, so Hayydn was free to do what he liked, and he went to London And there he is a massive celebrity. And he hears people, don't forget this is in the context of the French Revolution. And then the Napotonic Wars So hears people singing God save the king course is very current at the time. The first pop song He comes back to Vienna. And he's a great celebrity in Vienna as well and He writes this in seventeen ninety seven and there's a particular reason why he writes it. So seventeen ninety seven is a very anxious moment for the Viennese. They're fighting against revolutionary France, but they've actually lost their territories in what becomes Belgium And they're being absolutely hammered by the revolutionary general Napoleon Bonaparte in Italy and Hydn wants to do his bit to raise national morale And he's just come back from London. There, everyverybody is singing, God save the King, know down down with the French, down with Bononey, all of this And to quote an official Austrian account written later, he envied the British nation for a song through which it could at festive occasions show in full measure its respect and love for its ruler. Hyden wished that Austria too could have a similar national anthem. And what's impressive about that is that we heard in our last episode that lots of countries copy the tune of God saaveve the King. Like the assumption is that if you've got to have a national anthem, that's the tune that you have to have. But Haydn as, you know, one of the great musicians, he's not going to be content with just ripping off the twoun the King he's going to write his own. And he deliberately says, he wants to write it to inflame the hearts of the Austrians to new heights of devotion to their princes and their fatherland. So he teams up with a poet called Lorenz Leopold Hushka to write an anthem. and they dedicate it to the emperor Franzis II, Francis II And they first perform it on his birthday twelfth of february seventeen ninety seven. And the first line is a bit of a rip off of God saave the King. It is God saave Franz the Emperor, G E Helter, Franz Deanne Kaiser So he hasn't ripped off the twombe but he's ripped off the words. This guy Lauren's Leopold Hashchgar, I suppose has ripped off the words Anyway As anyone who knows the German anthem Well no The tune is quite slow, quite stately And there's a musicologist who's written about this called Michael Geisler, who is a German scholar working in the United States And he argues that Haydn basically gets this from an Austrian folk song. that's the inspiration for it. It's not a march. it is a sort of slow, stately very hummble, that's kind of music that would appeal to the masses, I suppose. But also that's really interesting because if it's a folk song, this is the ageid of romanticism, the idea that folk songs arise from the had a mass consciousness of the people There is something of the romantic there, but also something of the tradition about the Gods of the King that it has risen from You know, the ancient depths' perfectly calibrated, but for that reason it's a massive hit. Haydn is very proud of it. It is said that during his final illness in eighteen oh nine, he played this was the song that he played again and again on the piano. and his servants actually recorded this is the last thing Haydn ever played before he died So Austrian Anthem very popular, continues for decades, as an account from the eighteen forties. Who does not know the Austrian song God Save the Emperor? Who has not, with heartfelt emotion often joined in singing it? It has penetrated the very blood of Austria's inhabitants All of Germany honors it And even in foreign lands, the lovely melody has found a welcome reception And the welcome reception, people like Beethoven, Rossini, Bruuckner, Tsaikovsky, they all write adaptations of it or variations on it But nobody at this stage doubts that it is Austrian. and not German. It is a haabsburg and some And so now we get to the point where it turns into a German one. And the guy who does this is a poet with the excellent name of August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleaben What is it August Heinrich Hoffman von Falesleben Tom. say that was the first take Listeners, that was Domiic' sixickth t. So He is from Lower Saxony from Brunswick. He's the son of a merchant and he became a professor of literature in Prussia in Breslaav which was then in Prussia, now it's in Poland Now Hoffman We'll just call him Hoffman. He's idealistic, high minded, he's very frustrated with what's happened to German politics after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. So he's a classic German intellectual In the period of the Napoleonic War, he's a total German intellectual wistful yearning for all kinds of things that Germany doesn't have. Exactly. because what's happened is once the French invaded what becomes Germany in the Napononent Wars youve got a sort of dual process. On the one hand, people were inspired by the ideals of the French Revolution But on the other hand, they reacted against French occupation So this is a huge boost to the idea of German nationalism and the idea of uniting all German speakers in a single state and a liberal state, so one that will stand up for freedom of the press and democratic citizenship and all these things. So if you're a poet or a literature professor or in Bloke's case Both You're absolutely, you know, you're imbued with all this kind of thing And you look at what's happened in the eighteen twenties and thirties, so the age of reaction, basically democratic ideals being put back in their box. So Waterloo, Napoleon has been defeated and I suppose the ideals of the French Revolution have been seem to have been crushed. Yes, exactly so. And so this guy Hoffman is sitting there. Now he's already written one himn He's written that unusual thing A song literally celebrating a customs union. It's a hymn celebrating the Zol of the Rhine This German customs unit paves the way for German unity. So he's written this song An eighteen forty one is on holiday on the North Sea island of Heeligoland Heeligo land at this point was owned by Britain It's basically off theor North German coast. Yeah, he's having a British holiday having a British seaside holiday. And he's sitting there and he thinks probably raraining if it's a British seaside holiday, and he thinks to himself, well, I'll write another of these excellent songs And he writes The Song of the Germans Thus lead de Deutsch Now today As we've already discussed, the lyrics are seen as a little bit problematic in some quordters I said that with the seriousness it deserved. So we should say a bit about So what you heard at the beginning of the program is as we've said, the third verse, Einicite and Richt and Freyite. And when you look at the lyrics, they are absolute standard national anthem bingo So unity and right and freedom for the German Fatherland, let us strive for this together brotherly with heart and hand and so on and so forth. It's a kind of word salad, isn't it? It is a word salad. The second verse is so this is the one before the third verse, obviously Mastery of Math kicking in there. Good to see justust explaining So this is this is seen as inappropriate today and because it is sexist So Deutsche Thrauun, Deutsche Troyer Deutsche Wein and Deutsche Sang So this is German women, German loyalty, German wine, German song And these are the things that inspire us to do noble deeds Unfortunately, Tom, you cannot now say German women list because that implies the people who are doing the deeds are men and that women are just like the wine and the song. they're being objectified unfortunately. But maybe you could change it according to the sex or whoever is singing the song. Deutsche mention or something, would it be Wouldn't that work I mean, you should take this up with the with the Germans. Yeah, with the Germans Yeah Send an email to the Germans and suggest your idea and see how you get on them. Yeah. So that's the second verse now Again, my master in maths. before the second verse is the first verse which nobody sings And this actually does start Deutchland, Deutschland, Uber Alice, Uber Alice inwldt And this does not mean Germany over everybody else program for Global conquest is not what it Right. So what does it mean Well, Germany at this point doesn't exist So the Germans couldn't invade and conquer anybody. Kouffman would have been amazed to hear people say this is militaristic and a call for expansionism. What it's actually a call for The song is aimed at the people of the different states of Germany, this patchwork, this quilt this mosaic, very fragmented statelets And he is saying to those people and specifically to their rulers and their governments Put aside your differences, your jealousies. petty regional loyalties and put the ideal of Germany first. So literally it means Germany above everything else Bury these petty grievances and unite around a collective ideal. So it's like the Oat of Joy as the anthem for the European Union It's kind of implicitly saying Let's bury our differences and celebrate a greater whole. Exactly, that's what it is. And at the time, this is not a conservative idea, it's a liberal idea. So the people who are singing this song and the people who love this kind of stuff are students, poets Long haired people of all kinds. They love all this There is one other controversial element in the first verse though, and this is some geographical detail So Von de Mas been Andy Memel Vone Edge B Andain Belt Now I don't know how your European geography is, Tom. Well, I know where the Mers is. Yes. of the mass because it's coming up here in on our next episode. So there's the Mers runs down through from the Netherlands into France. Then the next one is D Memel. This is the river Niman, we would call this now. So that's kind of Poland, Lithuania kind of area The et is the ADJ That's in Italy And the last one, Andan Belt Bt, the little Bt is a Danish strait off the coast of Jutland Now, you might look at them and say, what's going on here Yeah, Houffman wants to construct this vast empire that includes other people's rivers. What's he thinking actuallyctually What he's thinking is this. there is no German at this point. The map is very fluid He's looking at the map and saying, Well, there's kind of German speakers that way, that way, that way It's just a sort of very vague ideal. of roughly where Germany is. It's absolutely not an irredentist kind of Gabrielle d Nuncio style program It's a bit mening for the Danes I mean, the Danes at this point would console themselves that they actually exist, whereas the Germans don't. Sure, But I mean, itly have poets coming up kind of menacing you with lyrics. I think you are you're only saying that because you're aware of what happen happed subsequently So at the autumn of eighteen forty one, the song is finished and it's first performed on the night of the fifth of October. we know exactly when There's a liberal politician from Varden Carl Vcker and he's visiting Hamburg where Hoffmann and his mates are. Hoffman and his mates who are from a local choir, they go to this Blokes hotel, they sing songs outside by torchlight. Of course they do. Annoying if Carl Becker wants to get some sleep, I suppose. Anyway ne of them is the song The song of the Germans. Is it a massive hit No, it doesn't really catch on. It's actually reprinted in some student songbooks. But unlike say the Star Bangle Banner, which we did last week or God Save the King, which we also did last week, This is not an overnight hit by any means. People aren't you know running around the street singing it or something. The next year Hoffman loses his job as a professor in Breastlau Because the Prussian authorities say this blokes a dangerous subversive with his long hair and his hmms. Get rid. Do you think they've been nobbled by the Danes? Surely Definitely. So he's sent off he goes off into Eceon, Switzerland Six years later Revolution sweeps across Central Europe. We did an episode about this a couple of years ago. This is eighteen forty eight in eighteen forty eight with Professor Sir Christopher Clark For a brief moment, it looks as though all the German states are going to be united in a liberal federal you know, super state with this lovely flag, a trickoler of Red and gold But it doesn't happen The Austrian and Prussian monarchers fight back. They suppress the revolution. Hoffman ends up being pardoned. He never gets to see his name in lights. He becomes very boringly, he becomes the librarian to the Duke of Ratibor. Oh no. No one wants that. And he dies in obscurity in eighteen seventy four Can I just ask one question So this kind of irredentist list that you say isn't irredentist Is Austria part of this? Is he kind of ambitious to see Austria become part of Germany. Well, if you think that the RDJ, which is him Italy, that would imply that Austria would become part of this, yes And I don't forget until the advent of Bismarck, it's not clear that Germany will not include burg, Catholic, Austria There are lots of people goingoing right into the twentieth century We think that Austria should be part of Germany And so if that's the case, is his kind of appropriation of the Austrian anthem a way of say, well, what is good for Austria is good for all Germans. Do you think? Yeah, I think possibly. I think people would recognise it by this point as an Austrian anthem, but don'tget there' already been different we've already said the different composers had written versions of it. So it's sort of gone viral, I suppose, and is being adapted. But yeah, I think people would in Germany, let's say in Hamburg when they're first singing it by Torchlight No one says, hold on, this is an Austrian anthem I think they think it's completely reasonable that Germany would have, you know, that a song about the Germans would have Austrian tune because the Austrians of course are part of the German family. That's what they think. undernderstand Anyway, by the time he dies in eighteen seventy four, Germany has become a reality It is not the liberal Federation that he and his friends envisaged. It's been created by Prussia, and particularly by Prussia's Minister President Otto von Bismarck with his policy of blood and iron So actually what the Prussans have done, they fight three wars in six years against Denmark, the Danes against on Denmark, Austria, and France And what they do is they weld together all the German states except Austria in one empire twenty five different states of this empire And the overall emperor is the king of Prussia Prussia. Does't Prussia have our own beloved national anthem or at least it did for a time. It had God saave the tune of God saave the quQuing as its anthem. Yes, it does. So the Prussians do not adopt the sing of the Germans They see it as a part of the failed long haired liberal experiment of the eighteen forties The Prussians have their own anthem, they don't share with the other parts of the empire It's just the Prusian anthem. A you're absolutely right? The anthem is called Hal D Iseiga Krantz. Hail to thee in the Victor's crown And it is a direct rip off of God's save the King So it goes, Heil deer, Iseiger Krantz, Herschher, Deswarterant, Heil, Kaiser, deer and so on and so forth. They sing it better than I do It is not popular outside Prussia. And the southern kingdoms of Bavaria and Werenberurg, they're part of the empire, but they still have their own kings They want nothing to do with this anthem. They just see it as Prussian rubbish. It's actually the song that is much more popular across the Kaisers Germany. is another song which is called Dact amrine on the rine So this come' a similar vintage. It comes from eighteen forty. But it's not a sort of long haired liberal song at all It's a much more militaristic song. So in eighteen forty there was a brief panic. that the French were going back to their old tricks And then we're going to invade and seize the Rhineland. poet and another poet, thoughre not a sort of not a pacifist poet, a manly poet. A manly poet with the excellent name of Max Schneckenberger wrote a poem And he called on all patriotic Germans to make sure no enemy ever sets his foot on the shore of the Rhine chorus in English Dear Fatherland, put your mind at rest. Firm and true stands the watch, the watch on the Rhine And because it's militaristic and because it is anti French, Soldiers sing it in the Franco Prussian War of eighteen seventy seventy one. It becomes a massive hit in Germany Bismarck loves it and he gives Schneckenberger's widow an annual pension So if Germany has an anthem at this point, it's probably closer to being the watch on the rhind Meanwhile The song of the Germans People have kind of forgotten about it by this point To quote Michael Geiser,'s mldering away in the basement of a Hamburg publishing house It's nothing not a fate that anyone would welcome. But then It's again the British British re enter the story So it's an interaction with the British that revives it In july eighteen ninety, Britain and Germany signed a treaty to swap some territory British get Zanzibar and a bit of Kenya The Germans get another bit of East Africa. And they get Heeligoland. I'm really sad about that. You'd like Heeligand to still be British. I'd have love to have kept it. Yeah What would you do with it Um I would make a massive naval base. Yeah, that would have been fun in the First World War. I'd menace the Baltic and the German coast. You've blockadeed Lubeck or something. See I feel Britain got the wor of that deal You don't write Zanzibar. which is sad I mean it's a bit far away isn't it I guess so the Eleigalance colder But I can imagine you going there for some sort of seaside break. A bracing wall Bracing walking holiday. Exactly. Anyway, Heligaland has been lost to Britain, which is sad for you. There's an official ceremony to mark its incorporation into the German Empire And the organizers of the ceremony say, well, ideally, Could there be a song written in Helligoland? to celebrate German unity. Menacing the Danes, perhaps And they they scout around in the basement of this Hambo publishing house and guess what? Yeah they blow the dust off it. Unbelievable. such a song exists So this singer at the ceremony. And now it starts to catch on It played in the eighteen nineties and student groups start to sing it and whatnot Not everybody liked it. So Nietzsche I know you're very interested in Nietzsche Nietzsche hated the German anthem Did he kind of want a Wagner opera or something on for seven hours. I think what he didn't like about it, thought it he just thought it was base and Philistine Yeah Well, it is. I mean, that's the point, isn't it Yeah, I suppose. He didn't approve of the nationalism of the late nineteenth century. He kind of gave up his German citizenship. He did. Exactly, exactly So that's the first moment that enshrines it The second moment we've actually already mentioned on the show So Germany entered the First World War on the first of august nineteen fourteen are on the trains The Prussian soldiers when they go to war, they're singing Halel Der Iigerrant Now, unfortunately is the same tune as God's saav the King So it's not appropriate. So it's like the England fans booing Liechtenstein, exactly So the Prussians actually did get a composer called Hugo Kn to write a new tune, but it didn't really catch on Meanwhile There lots of people are singing The watchatch on the Rine So to quote one old soldier's memoir of the First World War He's on his way to the front and he says For the first time I saw the Rhine as we rode westward along its quiet waters to defend this The German stream of stream is from the greed of the old enemy. It means the French The old watch on the Rhine roared out of the endless transport train into the morning sky. I felt as if my heart And Dominant, who is this old German soldier? Are you about to pull a trick you have been known to play before. Yeah, it's a trick that so this is testing listeners, whether they listen to our our original First World War series because this kindly old soldier is actually the worst man in history. It's Adolf Hitler Hitler remembers singing the watchatch on the Rhine on the train And then they get to the front. And there's a scene again that we mentioned in our First World War series Hitler says as he goes into action From the distance the strains of a song reached our ears coming closer and closer, blah blah, blah, the song reached us and we passed it too longong Deutsche, Dutchand Uber Alice, Uber Allis inerldt. What he's doing, as we talked about before, is Hitler is repeating one of the great German legends of the First World War, the story of the Kindermort The idea of this place at Langamark in november nineteen fourteen Student volunteers go into action in heavy fog. they're moan down by the British And they are singing the song of the Germans And this was reprinted in loads of German newspapers at the time. There's probably an element of truth in it because there are accounts by British and French soldiers saying Remember people doing this Of course, we've already said, it's not a militaristic song And I think this is what makes that story so powerful because they're singing an idealistic song about their love of the idea of Germany Germany Above all else. It's students, isn't it as well? So again, a kind of link back to that dreamy exactly. Philosophical age It's a much more powerful story because it's this utopian Yeah, idealistic song. thenen if it had been the Wash on the Rine or you know, a song about the Emperor of Prsia or whatever. Yeah, it's doomed youth. Doomed youth, exactly. Anyway, as everybody knows Germany loses the First World War Chais is overthrown, The empire is abolished You've got the new Weimar Republic takes power. it's Germany is humiliated. It's been, you know, dismembered Everybody iss very embittered. Bed of reparations and all kinds of things. Reparations, the Treaty of Versailles, exactly The new leaders trying to find symbols around which Germany can unite One obvious one is the flag. So there are flag wars, flag controversies all the way through the twenties. People can't agree on what flag to fly If you're on the right, you want the old flag, which is black, white and red If you're on the center on the left you go with the government approved flag Which is the black red gold flag of eighteen forty eight. That's the flag that Germans have today The first president of the Weima Republic who is a social Democrat, is Friedrich Abert says, L, well, we've got to give the consonservatives something. If they're not going to get the flag, we've got to give them something I want to have the arrmy on board. you know, I don't want them against me And so on the third anniversary of the Weimar Constitution in august nineteen twenty two He decided to give them the song played such a key part in that story about the trenches, the Kindermord story, the story about the students being shot So this, of course, is the song of the Germans. And in his speech announcing it actually He doesn't talk about the first verse, Deutschlland Duber Alis. He talks about the third verse, which is the one Germans sing today And he says in his speech, unity and right and freedom In times of internal fragmentation and oppression This triad from the pooet's song voiced the longing of all Germans Let it accompany us now arduous path to a better future So basically, he thinks everyone can unite around this song Yeah there's something here for the liberals. Yeah There's something here for the Cervatives because of its firstirst World War associations and You know, it will smooth the path towards a better Germany And how does that work out? That doesn't work out well So he dies of appendicitis in nineteen twenty five. He succeeded by Ho van Hindenburg Prussian borus He hates the social Democrats. He doesn't really believe in the Weimaar Republic And in january nineteen thirty three, as so many of our listeners will know, Hindenburg appoints us as new Chancellor The man who wrote that memoir about singing Deutscheant Uber Alice and going into battle, and that man is of course the worst man in history. Adolf Hitler So After the break, we will find out what happens to Germany's national anthem under the Nazis and whether the Nazis have any other anthems that they might like to see adopted. We will then investigate the strange story of East Germany's communist anthem and also The anthem we've already mentioned was written by Berhold Brecht, the great German playwright And dominic, we will explore just why German anthem remains controversial to this day. So lot's to look forward to see you soon No This episode is brought to you by The Times and the Sunday Times Tom is another summer of top international football returns It's truly incredible, isn't it? too think about how much the world has changed between the various tournaments. Looking back to when England hosted back in nineteen sixty six, everyone in the crowd supporting England were waving union jacks What fascinating trends does that illustrate? And I suppose The last time the United States hosted the tournament was in nineteen ninety four, and the mood in America in the early nineteen nineties, you know, the Cold War was over. Clinton was in the White House. I was there for that. I was in Boston. Really? I mean, that's an aspect of the story that's very rarely reported on your presence. So you know what this reminds me of Tom? It reminds me that the future is always uncertain. you never know what's coming But the facts need not be uncertain And when the world feels like it's moving too fast, the times and the Sunday times empower you to make smarter, more confident decisions. Click or tap the banner now to learn more or visit thetimes. com Hi, this is Garal Linka from Goldhangers. The restest is foootball. This episode is brought to you by Wise. It's only when you start moving money between currencies that you really think about the exchange rate, the fee and what might be hidden away in the small print Whether you're living abroad, paying someone overseas or just trying to manage your money across borders, you want a fair exchange rate and easy transfer and no surprises along the way. Wise keeps things simple. Wise is a smart way to move the currencies you need around the globe. It works in more than one hundred sixty countries and with over forty currencies. 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It is january nineteen thirty three and Adolf Hitler has just been appointed the Chancellor Germany and Dominiic, as everyone will know, Hitler despises the Weimar Republic He wants to tear it to pieces But what is he to do about this anthem? The song of the Germans, which was adopted only eleven years earlier and which he had heard being sung by doomed students on the Western front. So on the downside it' Weimer, on the positive side He associates it with German heroism fighting the enemy. Yes, its's meaning is ambiguous, isn't it? And Hitler doesn't scrap it, even though it's associated with the Weimar Republic. Actually you can see why those opening words Deutscheand,eutschand, Uber Allis, Germany abbove everything. Yeah. you can reinterpret it, right? Yeah. evenven though Hoffan meant them differently, if you're a Nazi they fit your creed quite nicely So The Nazists do keep it as a national anthem, but there's a tweak So I mentioned before the break Friedrich Abert, when he adopted the anthem in nineteen twenty two, said, let's sing the third verse, unity and right and freedom The Nazis S forget the third verse. Let's go for the first. Let's sing that firstverse verse Germany above all And of course it's very effective. if you're a German nationalist, if you see, you know The opening of the Berlin Olympics. Hitler comes in to a stadium full of thousands of people singing Deutsche, Deutschland, Uber Alice If you're a nationalist, this is C cllassic, you know, Nazi there. Your heart sings with the sound of it But there is a complication Because this is not the only song that the Nazis want you to sing By this point, by the Berlin Olympics, the song of the Germans is competing with an anthem that is much dearer to The Naz' Hearts and this is a song called The Horst Vessel Leed. which was written in nineteen twenty nine by the paramilitary Stormtrooper. Commander horse vessel. And Tom, you know a lot about this guy, don't you I don't mean that's an indictment of you. I mean that a Yeah, as's a tribute to a scholarship But he features in dominion, I have to say that's why I know about it. Yeah. So we talked about him in the series we did on the Rise of the Nazis. So can't remember what episode it is, but it's there somewhere. Yeah. So just to say it was a Berin law student He was an enthusiastic Nazi, he was a brown shirt, he was an anti communist, who would lead members of his squad through the streets of Berlin, beating up Reds and all of that And he is shot dead by communist paramilitaries in nineteen thirty He's only twenty two There's been a big argument about his girlfriend who is also a prostitute and that's to do with the rent and all kinds of things like that So it's all very squalid and not remotely heroic Gebles isn't going to be worried by something like that. He completely rewrites the story, turns Vessel into this kind of martyr and vehicle for Nazi PR. And then when the Nazis come to power in nineteen thirty three, he turns them into a national figure, the kind of the embodiment of the good Nazi. Yeah, the almost divine figure who other Germans should aspire to. Yes, exactly right. And part of this is the song. Vessel had written songs himself marching songs Yeah, for when they're kind of marching through Berlin. Exactly roughing up the reds. And I actually had one published in a Nazi paper And this is it D Fana Hoch D Ran Feskers Slussen Ah Maret Metruic festom Sit raaise the flag, the ranks tightly closed, the SA marches with calm and steady step We borrowed the tune from a naval song the Kerigberurg lead, which had been popular in the First World War. So it's a classic example. We've had this already multiple times in this national anthem series of people taking a familiar tune because they know that will you know get them a better audience then dancers love this song. They sing it at rallies. they whenever, you know, whenever you go to a beer hall, people are singing it It's their answer to the internationalationalle of the Communists and Hitler made it official In nineteen thirty three, it became was declared as a national symbol. And then in nineteen thirty four, there was a government edict that basically whenever it was played, you had to give the Nazis salute Well you know, it literally becomes an anthphem because the Protestant churches pick it up and they sing it on kind of Reformation Day is now. Yeah, it's kind of sanctified. Yeah, I saw that detail. They sang it in churches and I just thought The Protestant churches, some of them are so close to Nazism aren't they? They're kind of ring wraith churches, yeah. Yeah Anyway, it becomes the musical emblem of the Third Reich. If you were to go on YouTube and watch some random documentary, BBC documentary about the Nazis. Undoubtedly a point where there's playing in the background and there's people marching in torchlight or something Yeah, kind of fair haired members of the Hitler youth beaming. exactly So When Germany loses the war in nineteen forty five, both the tune of the horse Vessel L and the lyrics were banned. And they're banned to the extent that in twenty eleven There was a police investigation into Amazon and Apple and both of them had to take it down from their websites. And there was a court ruling in the German Supreme Court or whatever. two thousand nine ruled that you cannot even put the first words Defana Hoch On a t shirt, you can't wear a t shirt with the first three words of the hororsed vessel lead to seen us so So as a German National Athem, that's a bustard flush. Yes, yees, chances of becoming the post warar anthem are Nil or precisely Nil So yeah,'re in we've got to nineteen forty five, Germany devastated, defeated. This is what the Germans called Stundennull Zero hour. And as lots of listeners will know, Germany was divided into four occupation zones The Soviet zone in nineteen forty nine became East Germany And we'll come to East Germany in a second, but for now, We'll stick with the three Western zones Which in may nineteen forty nine had become the Federal Republic of Germany, West Germany So West Germany, the people who run West Germany have a very deces and conflicted attitude to German history On the one hand, West Germany itlaims a fundamental continuity with earlier German states So the West German leadership say we are tracing our lineage back to the nineteenth century to all those long haired poets to the eighteen forty eight Revolutions barred tradition of German idealism On the other hand West Germany' politicians say, well nineteen forty five is a great break and a chance for a completely new beginning. The Weimaower Republic was a failure. The Third Reich was a criminal aberration. All previous political constitutional arrangements are null and void totally clean slate and we are starting again from scratch And that's not quite how it works because obviously the flag, they dust down the old eighteen forty eight flag And then there's the anthem And right from the start, people on the sort of center right of German politics. so Christian Democrats So likeike Adenaer, th the first Chancellor. Yeah, likeike Conrad Adenauer They say Let's have the song of the Germans. Let's have you know, work for the Weimmer Republic. It was popular in the eighteen forties, pererfect But a lot of people say no, it's too tainted. It was the official anthem during the third write, you can't have it So to start with, they have no anthem at all because they can't agree And when they have public events, they will often play Beethoven's Ode to Joy, which of course has words by the playlwright Siller So there's that A other official events madly They play us a carnival song. It' called The Trizonesia song. And this is written by a jokester from Cologne So Eia, our producer is from Cologne, this guy's from Cologne too. and he was called Carl Berbauer. A German jokester. A German funster. He wrote it for the Cologne Carnival. at the end of nineteen forty eight. And the great joke here is that with Germany having been divided into different parts. West Germany is made up of three of these three zones, and so they all live in this made up tri zone easer Oh yeah, very good. And the chorus, it's the most West German thing imaginable. So when I picture West Germany, I picture people in the beer haall in nineteen seventy two. laughing and slapping their thighs as they, you know, as they turn out Audies and BMWs. In my imagination, they're singing this because this is the song We are the natives of TrizZoneesia Heidi Shimila Shimila Shimila Bum. We have maidens with fiery world natures. Heidi Shimila Shimila Shimila Bum We may not be cannibals, but we kiss all the better for it. We are the natives of Trionesia Tidy simimilar, similar, similar bump Does it have a comedy tune? undoubtedly, Purely an Umpa band That's what it is, I would imagine. Yeah Now, This song starts as a joke and actually people start they think it's serious and they start playing it seriously. I mean, Callum says quite correctly that it would win Eurvision It totally would win Eurovision. It's a very seventies Eururovision though, I think. Yeah Yeah Banger banger boom. Actually, so They hosted a cycle race in Cologne, Cl in nineteen forty nine, and this was played as the German. And a lot of German politicians just said this is such I mean, we've disgraced ourselves recently in multiple ways Yes with the whole fascism thing. With the Narazism business, but this is almost as bad. This is terrible. This is even worse And the Chancellor of West Germany, Conrad Adenhaer, who was a former mayor of Cologne, so he basically had personal for him. He gave a press conference in april nineteen fifty, and he said to the press Several Belgian military personnel were present in uniform and eventually the national anthems were played. The band struck up this lovely carnival song Numerous Belgian soldiers stood up and saluted, believing it to be the national anthem Ada said this isn't shaming for Germany Bring back the song of the Germans. This is nonsense. This is simimila Simila, shimila bump. And actually Polls showed that adenas spate for the majority. So seven out of ten people in the early fifties said come on, we want the old one back The problem though, was that the president of Germany was a guy called Ted or Hoiss and he was a liberal free Democrat And he said, no way's not that's a Nazi song. You can't have that back And he actually commissioned his own rival song called Him T to Germany Protestant hymn writer, which was very dull Land of faith, German land, land of Fathers and heirs, land of faith, German land. It just goes on and on like that And that never caught on Addenaer campaigned and campaigned for the song of the Germans. He used to get people to sing it at rallies, which was very controversial And finally, after a massive standoff, he wrote to this bloke hoist, the presresidident. he said, This has gone a much too long. I'm sick of this now I'm formally officially asking you approve Thus lead the Deutsche as our national anthem And Hooyist, the president cracked and he said, All right, fine As long as we can sing only the third verse, not the first two It's often thought the first two are banned. They're not banned actually. It's a convention that you don't, you know it starts as a convention. that you that you don't sing them So by this point, they're worried about the sexism angle as well as the whole. Yeah, I think so. Kind of conquering people misinterpretation. Yeah, the sort of haa, German wine and women and song. Yeah. I think wine women and song if you're a woman, it's kind of Are you going to sing that with joy? I mean, surely not At the time, when the news got out that they were adopting the old anthem, they lost the foreign press. You can imagine why people made of this in our own day country Displeased. They said, Oh, the Germans, they haven't changed. Back at it again. Yeah. first, you know, one minute they're bringing back the old anthem, and the next they're marching into Poland And the first big flashpoint actually, since this is a serious tie to the World Cup It comes at the World Cup. So some people may remember this from when we did a series about the history of the World Cup tournament back in twenty twenty two The World Cup was held in Switzerland in nineteen fifty four And the big favorites were Hungary who hadn't lost for thirty two games. They played West German in the final This was the first exhibition of the German's irritating habits of making implausible comebacks brink of defeat. The Hungarians went too nill up after eight minutes and the Germans came back to win three two And this was a massive moment in the cultural history of West Germany. The historian Jk infest calls it the true birth of the country, no less. And when the German captain Fritz Walter went up to collect the World Cup trophy A Swiss band starts playing the German national anthem. And the German fans in the crowd who had been drinking, of course, start to sing the first verse Deutsche Uper Alice. Oh Yeah, the menacing one And it is said that Now this is very much a sort of ancient history. It is said that Swiss radio was so shocked they cut I don't know whether that's actually true because that's only the only source for that is, all journalism wrritten in the nineteen nineties or from the Swiss, perhaps pretend that they were braver in standing up for the Germans than they actually were. The Swiss would never do that the Swiss any history of doing that? surely Certainly nots Anyway The fact that they've been singing the wrong words, the old words It's reported in the world's press. and what is then worse The presresident of the German foootball Association Pico Bows, who was a former member of the Nazi Party. gave a celebratory speech in a Munich beer hall. I mean, Jesus f the placeaces ped celebratated his speech and he said Brilliant, we've won the World Cup Our players were inspired by Wotan and Thor and all this And the West German presresident we've already met, Tyodor Hoyiss He was appalled by this. And actually at the official public celebrations at the Olympic Stadium, which were attended by eighty thousand people in Berlin, West Berlin. He publicly reprimanded the head of the German FA. and then he said he read out the third verse of the anthem I any heit inter and fy height And he said, This is our anthem. I want the whole stadium to sing it. And do they sing it Yeah they did 'Cause that's always risky, asking I know, you know low of football fans to sing a particular song. I mean you're kind of asking for trouble. N neverever, ever Anyone who's been to a foot match knows that asking the crowd to do anything never ever works. Now I'll tell you who's watching this with glee That is West Germany's neighbors in East Germany. Of course they would be, wouldn't they? Because the East Germans have always said The Federal Republic, West Germany is basically the Third Reich and a cuddlier guy And they say, well, this is the proof. So one paper in East Berlin said Our neighbors have let the cat out of the bag. They're just the Nazis. When fascists start singing Deutsche and Uber Allice and a horseed vessel song That has nothing to do with sport do with death. They're sing the Horseesestsel song. No I think that's untr. That's mive exageration. It's a massive exaggeration. It's very unfair. They didn't sing the Horse Fessel song at all. I mean unless the head of the German FA was doing it in beer haorn when he wasn't toasting Woton I a skull no doubt That would definitely have been reported if he had. I mean, it would have been so punchy for them to have sung the horse first s after winning the World Cup in the fififties and they didn't do it. I mean I want stressed they didn't do it Now of course, the East Germans have a different song at this point They have adopted a new anthem with none of the shilly shallying in democratic in weak democratic West Germany, this is the great positive Toma living in in a totalitarian dictatorship You can decide instantly So within three days of the foundation of East Germany in october nineteen forty nine S Pident, who was a stalinist called Wilhem Pek He set the ball rolling. He commissioned a text from somebody he'd known in exile in Moscow who is an avant Gard poet, There's a lot of poets in this Johannes Becker No relation to Boris. No relation to Boris And the title of the new anthem was Alff Standen Aus Rinen and the opening lines in English From the ruins newly risen to the future turned we stand Let us serve your welfare truly, Germany, our fatherland I mean, that's not kind of overtly communist, is it? No, well it comes to this. The lyrics are not overtly communist And actually what's really interesting just before we get to the lyrics. The tune is compatible with Haydn's tune. You could sing it to the old tune They don't they They don't They commissioned competing tunes by two guys Wh sang them, they put on performances at the Cultural Workers Club in East Berlin, and the Polit Bureau voted kind of Communist Eurovision. Communist Eurovision And they voted for a tune by a guy called Hans Eisler Eisla was a communist of very long standing. He'd been a member since he was fourteen. He'd been exiled. This is a great great story head. the guy who wrote the East German anthem have been exiled to the United States during the third race. He was accused when he was in America of being a Soviet agent. wasas he? In sort of McCarthyism. I think he probably a bit was because he was a communist. S he was a bit. Yeah. he was a Stalinist They called him the American press courordem The Karl Marks of Music L that S, that'sillyra, isn't? put on a Hollywood blacklist And he was deported. Well, he's a communist. Of course, he was put on a Hollywood blacklist. Yeah, but deported his house. I he literally was a communist. He literally was a communist right? He was deported in nineteen forty eight. Right That's the that's the debit side. On the credit side, I'm just going absolutely pin my colors to the mas my East German colors I think his anthem, the East German anthem, is an absolute all time banger. And for me And I know you'll say I hate Britain But I'm just going to I think there's only one better anthem and that's the anthem of the Soviet Union I think they are brilliant anthems. Madness. You do hate Britain So a couple of interesting things about the anthon. firstirst of all Eisla said I've written as a humanistic anthem, Nothing jazzy, nothing military. And nothing about mountains the lakes or anything like that. Not really, no There were allegations that he'd ripped it off from an Austrian pop song from the nineteen thirties. And actually the Austrian bloke took the case to the United Nations Copyright Commission But he didn't win And could of just ask, what is the Austrian Anthem by this point, is it still the Haydn one if they moved on from that? No So they had the hydnen tune right up to the Angelus, but then they dropped it when Austria was reborn in the nineteen forties and they adopted a very boring anthem called Land Dberg, land Amstrona Land of the peaks, land by the stream. So one of the generic geographical anthems. what a falling off was there. Yeah, exactly, disappointing for the Austrians. But the other interesting thing about the East German anthem is it was designed not as the anthem of East Germany, but as the anthem of all Germany.ight. becausecause at this point Theast Germans claim All Germany. And so The first verse explicitly mentions Deutsch, Einich Wterland. You know, I would love to hear this at the end of the episode. We will play it at the end of the episode because it is such a banger. land a united fatherland. This is for Dominic E Senbrook. H favorite song my desert are in disc selection. Which one's it to be? alwaysways the show out There's nothing communist about the lyrics, y, you were right about that. So there's nothing about workers, there's nothing about peasants The word socialism never appears. There's nothing about class struggle. It's all kind of the shining sun, youth, peace, things that I stand for Tom. Yeah. No wonder you love it. Yeah, German youngsters laughing in the sunshine. That's what I'm all about And actually It was not controversial at the time. So this is a very unusual example of a national anthem that didn't provoke any controversy The DDR, the East German authorities made a great effort to push it. They played it in public, they put up banners with the lyrics They made children sing it in school But there's a historian, a German historian called Heiker Amos And she's looked into this and she says all the evidence and party reports and stuff. is that you know, when people reported about, they said people actually love this anthem. they can't get enough of it It becomes a part of an integral part of life in East Germany. and a much loved part of it Like a travant likeike a state sponsored week's holiday in some sand dunes of the Baltic Well the stars who watch you from behind a load of reeds. That's less loved, isn't it? But Yeahah. In East Germany, you would do a ceremony when you were fourteen this is when you became an adult and got your identity papers pledged yourself towards the defense of socialism It was called the Junggeundwyer Youth consecration ceremony And you would have to sing all three verses of the East German anthem So I would have enjoyed that I would have very much enjoyed it. Anway. There is a twist in the late sixties after the building the Berlin wall It is obvious that East Germany's ambitions to become all Germany are going to be frustrated basasically because his' German is terrible and everyfore's trying to escape And then in the early seventies Both Germanies are admitted to the United Nations. has states And so about this point, The East Germans start to discourage people from singing this great anthem. Be they don't want people to think about Deutscheland, Einich Fatherland a united Fatherland. Actually, what they're trying to do now in the seventies tellell people You know, the idea of a united Germany was always mad. East Germany has always been different West German is full of Catholics We've always been Protestant and Lutheran We have our own separate traditions, we have our own cultural identity Let's stop singing this song about a United Fatherland So madly, they now have a situation where you do the Anthem at school You stand for it, It plays, but you are discouraged from singing. Oh, so they don't just replace it. come up with new lyrics or something? No, which they should have done. I mean, why don't just change the words I suppose because changing the words would mean S some sort of admission that they'd been wronged which they don't want to do So anyway, this is the position all the way through to the fall of the Berlin wall. There are two anthems There is the song of the Germans in the West. There's Alfa Stand anned Ruin in the east, then the Berlin Wall falls, the two Germanans are going to be reunited and the question is Which anthem are they gonna to pick? Well, it's obious, isn't it? I mean,' go with the West German one because West German one's basically swallowing it. No It's not obvious So First of all The song of the Germans has been massively controversial all the way through in West Germany Polls in the seventies and the eighties found that So the lefty West Germans. didn't like it. They said it's reactionary. It's a relic of Nazism. You know if you're sort of Barda Meinhoff adjacent, Yeah. you're not a fan of this anthem. You have those kind of stickers with the smiley sun that's against nuclear power. Tpletely. You're going on Demonstrations against Pershing missiles. and you hate Ronald Reagan. ninety nine red balloons. Precisely Meanwhile, on the right of West German politics Christian Democrat politicians keep trying to sneak the old words back in, which don' do for ass They keep trying to get that first verse in. They love that first verse. L helelmet Cole trying to slip down another pig's knuckles Exactly. So every now and again and it's always but this always happens in Barden Werenberg Every now and again in Barden Verenberg, there'll be a controversy because it'll turn out that some local politician has been trying to get schools to sing the first first of anem. And meanwhile, you know anti nuclear green campaigners say he should be tred and feathered in you know as punishment So there's that. Meanwhile, there's the issue that seventeen million East Germans have been brought up to believe The song of the Germans is an evil capitalist relic of, you know Nazism and militarism and stuff. So The last prrime Minister of East Germany, who was a guy called Loter de Mesier, suggested a compromise He said Well you know what? We can use our lyrics with your tune Why don't we have Haydn's tune and the East German lyrics Yeah. I mean, that's quite a neat idea. It is a neat idea and it's a kind of pre figuring of what we're going to be talking about in our last episode about South Africa. Yeah where they're similar agonized debates and actually a very effective compromise is arrived at. Very good compromise, exactly. And the West Germ' helmut coal Raouse, you know, lifts himself from from the gravy. to say No way. He says no way These are the lyrics of a you know, a cruel dictatorship We're never going to have the lyrics that were sung by the Stari and the people who built the Berlin wall. You can forget your lyrics So at this point, Germanist intellectuals say, well, there is another song. and this is the song that we alluded to right at the beginning, You said your friend likes, but we haven't mentioned And this is a song written by Bertold Brecht by one of Germany's best known playwrights, one of Germany's best known twentieth century intellectuals Brecht in the nineteen fifties wrote this And it's called The Kinderymnna, the Children's Anthem and Again, it's a sort of compromise because he wrote it in response to Addenauer's decision to bring back. The old Hm in West Germany And he had it set to music by the bloke who wrote the music Eisler, the Karl Marx of music for East Germany If you look it up online Chren's anthem. You can see AY people on the left love it. and why everybody else thinks it's mad. Because basically It's massively self flagellating. So the second verse explicitly says O great hope is that other countries will no longer recoil from us in horror at our crimes I mean, we could have that A lot of countries could have that. Well, I think no country. it's very unusual to have a national anthem in which you flagellate yourselves And the third verse says explicitly Nicht Uber, Nich Uter and then Vilken V Ver in And not over and not under other nations will we be. But you know my favorite lines from it J home. It may seem dearest to us just as other people's countries seem dearest to them I mean that Banging lyrics. I mean, imagine thats at the Wld Cup Someone has a massive massively bombastic Anthem And then the Germans smugly sing well, you know in better than anybody else. Yeah, it may seem dearest to us, but Doesn everyone think that? They're playing Paraguay or somebody have an incredibly stratting anthem about glories of Vswunen. And then the Germans sing, you know, we're very sorry we're behave poaorly. Please don't record from us in horror anymore And then a result of all this is they end up sticking with the The Vimar anthem That's the song with the Germans. Third verse tiny kite and reft and fry height unity and right freedom And this becomes basically the motto of the reunited Germany. those words Einichheid and Rerecht and Freid They are printed on the belt buckles today of German soldiers printed, they are engraved on the edge of every two euro coin that is minted in Germany. As you know, as with the first two anthems that we talked about The arguments just do not go away in the late nineteen nineties, the Green Party in Germany said we've made a massive mistake We should have Brechanthem after all. we should have the flagellating. handsome We cannot go on having a national anthem whose first verse is sung by the radical right and whose third verse is sung by conservatives Conservatives, the horror People still make this case today But since were this is a world Cup associated podcast. We'll just end with the two thousand six World Cup because that I think is the key moment for Germany and its embrace of its anthem. This was the first time that a united Germany had hosted the World Cup. And there was a big debate before the tournament about the anthem And lots of commentators said, the problem we have is that The eyes of the world will be honest and lots of people will not be singing the anthem That's Spgel. prestigious German paper said A historic opportunity was missed back in the fifties because these verses no longer work today Anyone who sings unity and justice and freedom knows that there are also two other undesirable verses. and in today's Germany they sound about as modern as a teacher with a cane in a high school Anyway, the Siegel was wrong becausecause actually lots of Germans did sing the anthem and nobody complained at all. and the German broadcaster, Deutchvella set after the tournament The sight of the German team, their arms around one another as Dash Deutschland lead another way of putting the song in the Germans is the Germany song played was an emotional moment for many of us. It seems that football has done what politics could never do give a voice to a generation to whom patriotism is not a dirty word And maybe it's okay to be a German and proud of it after all. Yeah. I mean, the biggest controversy of that World Cup was all the wags going shopping Barden Bart and distracting our brave boys from more important things like scoring penalties. More bad behavior in. Bardam Wetenberg. Everything that's terrible happens there. Exactly. it all goes back to that, doesn't it? Yeah, agreed, the wags let themselves down in that World Cup. I don't think they did. I mean, I enjoyed it Tough spice, P England should have won that world Cup toom We had a good team. we had a really good team and we just played abysmally. golden generation But as for the anthems, my personal view is, I think it's a good anthem, the German anthem. Yeah, I like it. I think if I was German, I would sing it with great enthusiasm. I mean, let's bear in mind ye, it's written by a guy who loved Nelson What's not to like Let's see the problem. Well justust to remind people next time the Netherlands. And then next week, Brazil in South Africa But Tom, it would be remiss of us not to say at the very end. although the German anthem is good. It's not as good as East German, okay? It's not as good as what they could have had. So ladies and gentlemen, here it is Dominic Sam Brooks Desert Island disisc Take it away, Callan Hello everybody now As those of you who are good children will know here in Britain. onn the twenty first of June It's Father's Day, but not just here in Britain It's also Father's Day on the twenty first of june in the United States In Canada and in the Republic of Ireland So those are four countries that are united Dads who love to listen to the rest is history. And that is why we are offering an amazing twentyenty five percent. Father's D discount on the subscription price to the Rest is History Club because we are all heart. So treat the Peter the Great in your own life this Father's Day to early access to full series. You get say early access to that, you get that with a membership, you get bonus episodes, you get ad free listening You get access to tickets for live shows. Basically you get an entire host of supplementary benefits. And that I think is what a lot of patriarchs want, isn't it? It absolutely is because I think nothing says happappy Father's Day quite like the chance to listen to six solid hours Ad free the First World War. Yeah, That's what most fathers want. So two, the rest is history. com click on the word gifts