The German Question, the question of German unity, was the most important and intractable problem to remain unsettled after World War II. It was also one of the least understood. W.R. Smyser explores the German Question and uses it to illustrate the difficulties and opportunities of diplomacy in our age. He tells the story of how Germany was divided and then united, against a background of global events and a continuing search for stable peace in an area that has not known it since the age of Charlemagne. Smyser analyzes how and why the victors, after collaborating during World War II, failed to agree on the future of Germany, and how the two Berlin crises led to the complete partition of Germany. Spanning over forty years, Smyser shows how the German Question posed immensely difficult problems for Germans, Europeans, Russians, and Americans, and how it carried heavy, even gruesome, historical burdens, arousing emotions so powerful they transcended reason. In examining the German Question, this book asks crucial questions about the achievements and limits of diplomacy, what it means in a contemporary context, and how the new Germany compares with the old.