In the recent German state elections, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party received the largest share of the vote in Thuringia and ran a close second in Saxony. The newly formed Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance finished third in both states and is poised to play a central role in the resulting governments. There are many lessons one could draw from these results, but here’s one: Be careful what you wish for. The far right’s popularity is a vivid reminder that what seems like a stunning triumph at one point in time can sow the seeds of big trouble down the road.
In the recent German state elections, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party received the largest share of the vote in Thuringia and ran a close second in Saxony. The newly formed Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance finished third in both states and is poised to play a central role in the resulting governments. There are many lessons one could draw from these results, but here’s one: Be careful what you wish for. The far right’s popularity is a vivid reminder that what seems like a stunning triumph at one point in time can sow the seeds of big trouble down the road.
In the case of Germany, for example, the peaceful reunification that took place after the Cold War was a vindication of the West German social democratic model and a noteworthy achievement of Bonn’s diplomacy. It was also a powerful victory for German nationalism—symbolized in the return of the federal government to the traditional capital of Berlin—and a sign of its successful recovery from the Nazi past.
With hindsight, however, reunification has proved to be even more difficult than Germans might have expected when it occurred. More than three decades have passed, and the political differences between the country’s eastern and western halves remain considerable. This is hardly surprising, insofar as Germany’s two halves were governed by wholly different political institutions for more than 40 years. Economic conditions in the east continue to lag behind the west, and citizens there exhibit far more autocratic impulses than the rest of the country. It is no accident that neo-Nazi movements have found more fertile soil in the east, but the rise of these parties is now affecting the politics of the entire country in ways that few observers would have imagined during the heady months after reunification.
(Side note: If you think unifying Germany has proved tougher than expected, imagine what might happen if the two Koreas tried to recombine.)
Now consider Hungary’s political trajectory. Back in the 1990s, bringing the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland into NATO, and eventually the European Union, was seen as a victory for liberal ideals and as a way to ensure these fledgling democracies didn’t backslide. Russia wasn’t happy about it, but even enlargement skeptics like me believe Moscow would have accepted the first wave of enlargement had the process ended there. Instead of being a permanent liberal triumph, however, Hungary (and to a lesser extent, Poland) became a poster child for so-called illiberal democracy: a governing model that preserves the forms of democracy (e.g., elections) but not the substance (e.g., rule of law, tolerance, free and fair political competition). Instead of making NATO and the EU stronger, Hungary has been a persistent thorn in the side of both institutions and an inspiration for would-be autocrats such as Donald Trump. How many U.S. senators expected this outcome when they voted to expand NATO back in 1998?
Or take Israel. As I argued a few weeks ago, Israel’s stunning victory in the 1967 Six-Day War was an undeniable military triumph that seemed miraculous to many Israelis. But that victory also sowed the seeds of a danger that now threatens the country’s long-term future. Once Israel’s leaders decided to occupy and colonize the lands conquered during that war, it could no longer be both a Jewish state and a genuine democracy. Either it had to create an apartheid system over the millions of Palestinians it now controlled—with all the brutality that such systems require—or it had to allow them political rights, which would have meant abandoning the Zionist vision of a Jewish state. As the past year has shown, this dilemma has only gotten worse with time, another telling example of how success now can lead to failure later.
This phenomenon is a recurring theme after great wars, of course. Germany’s defeat in World War I was a wonderful moment for the victorious Allies, but the peace settlement fashioned at Versailles made a return match very likely if not inevitable. Stopping the Axis and overthrowing German and Italian fascism and Japanese militarism were undeniable achievements in World War II, but these victories also allowed the Soviet Union to impose communism over Eastern Europe and helped Mao Zedong gain power in China—events that contributed to 40 years of cold war.
When the Cold War ended, Westerners and especially Americans greeted the collapse of communism with undisguised elation, assumed that victory demonstrated the universal appeal of the West’s core values, and quickly succumbed to the hubristic belief that Washington possessed the magic formula for success in the modern world. The result was a misguided effort to remake the world in America’s image, one that persisted long after its shortcomings were apparent. And some earlier successes came back to bite: How many Americans foresaw that helping the Afghan mujahideen bleed the Soviets white in Afghanistan would also nurture the emergence of al Qaeda or that the subsequent 9/11 attacks would eventually ensnare the United States in the same quagmire that had helped bring down the Soviet Union? One might say the same thing for that “Mission Accomplished” moment in Iraq or the ouster of Muammar al-Qaddafi in Libya, in each case a short-term success that deteriorated almost immediately.
If victory is sometimes the prelude to disappointment, defeats or setbacks can herald a brighter future if future leaders learn the right lessons from them. German and Japanese elites learned many of the right lessons from the disasters of World War II and benefited greatly from a wholly different approach to politics and foreign policy over the next 50 years. Defeat in Vietnam taught a generation of U.S. leaders to avoid the siren song of “nation-building”; sadly, that lesson was forgotten by the time George W. Bush and his neoconservative advisors gained power. These and other cases remind us that states (and people) sometimes learn more useful lessons from failure than they do from success. But not always.
Why do great victories turn to ashes? The ancient Greeks warned of hubris: the fatal flaw of excessive pride that offended the gods and lured heroes to a tragic end. That is surely part of the problem: Those who preside over a great victory are prone to give themselves too much credit and ignore the role that good fortune (or an opponent’s errors) played in their success. Great victories are also highly disruptive: They set many different social forces in motion, and unintended consequences will be rife, confounding the victor’s ability to predict how the future will unfold or to manipulate it to their advantage.
The lesson is not that states should abandon ambitious foreign-policy objectives, dream no large dreams, or refrain from celebrating those rare and wonderful moments where events take a favorable turn. To expect the latter is to deny much of what we know about human nature. Nor am I suggesting that failure is preferable to success because one sometimes learns more from setbacks. The real lesson is not to interpret even singular achievements and strokes of good fortune as proof that history is on our side and that a happy future is assured.
As any good investment firm will tell you, performance is no guarantee of future returns. In international affairs, success is often the harbinger of future troubles. Victories should be savored briefly, therefore, and then attention must turn to dealing with the inevitably messy consequences.
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