Euro Crisis

Why Germany Won’t Step Up

Germany became public enemy No. 1 this week as pundits fretted about why European leaders can't manage to enact the solutions they all know would work. Germany's insistence that profligate countries not get off scot-free is holding up a deal, and The Washington Post's Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff tries to explain the psychology. "After World War II, West Germany wanted nothing more than to shed its pariah status. Followership, not leadership, earned it the respect it coveted." They haven't forgotten that lesson. "The Germans have discovered a contradiction: Europeans may call for German leadership, but they don’t want to be led by Germany."