Destination Germany

Background

As Europe's largest economy and second most populous nation, Germany remains a key member of the continent's economic, political, and defense organizations. European power struggles immersed Germany in two devastating World Wars in the first half of the 20th century and left the country occupied by the victorious Allied powers of the US, UK, France, and the Soviet Union in 1945. With the advent of the Cold War, two German states were formed in 1949: the western Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) and the eastern German Democratic Republic (GDR). The democratic FRG embedded itself in key Western economic and security organizations, the EC, which became the EU, and NATO, while the Communist GDR was on the front line of the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact. The decline of the USSR and the end of the Cold War allowed for German unification in 1990. Since then, Germany has expended considerable funds to bring Eastern productivity and wages up to Western standards. In January 1999, Germany and 10 other EU countries introduced a common European exchange currency, the euro.

Area

• Total: 357,021 sq km
• Land: 349,223 sq km
• Water: 7,798 sq km

Area - comparative

• Slightly smaller than Montana

Coastline

• 2,389 km

Climate

• Temperate and marine; cool, cloudy, wet winters and summers; occasional warm mountain (foehn) wind

Terrain

• Lowlands in north, uplands in center, Bavarian Alps in south

Population

• 82,422,299 (July 2006 est.)

Capital

• Berlin

Nationality

• noun: German(s)
• adjective: German

Languages

• French 100%, rapidly declining regional dialects and languages (Provencal, Breton, Alsatian, Corsican, Catalan, Basque, Flemish)

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