Margaret Thatcher was fearful of German unification because she believed that this would bring an immediate and formidable increase of economic strength to a Germany which was already the strongest economic partner in Europe.

There is no consensus even today on the merits of Napoleon - and certainly no agreement on the rights and wrongs of the origins of the First World War.

Margaret Thatcher, growing up in a bombed and battered Britain, derived a distrust which has grown with the years not just of Germany but of all continental Europe.

War on Iraq runs the risk of turning the Middle East into an inexhaustible recruiting ground for anti- western terrorism.

There are thus great swathes of the past where understanding is more important and reputable than judgement, because the principal actors performed in line with the ideas and values of that time, not of ours.

We must admit that history is enjoyable to a large extent because it enables us to pass judgment on the past.

A genuinely democratic Iraq might well act as a fresh spur.