We should be wary of politicians who profess to follow history while only noticing those signposts of history that point in the direction which they themselves already favour.

We should be wary of politicians who profess to follow history while only noticing those signposts of history that point in the direction which they themselves already favour.

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.

But Germany will always suffer, I fear, from the intensely dramatic character of the crimes of the Third Reich.

History provides no precise guidelines.

If Margaret Thatcher had been Prime Minister at the time, there would have been no Treaty of Maastricht.