Konrad Adenauer

Chancellor Adenauer walks through a garden at a villa on Lake Como.

Konrad Adenauer was a German statesman, the mayor of Cologne before and after the war, and the first chancellor of West Germany (1949-1963). Adenauer presided over the country from its most vulnerable to its economic success and social, cultural, and political reintegration into Europe. His policies and beliefs reflected a desire to repress the country’s Nazi past and move forward, and this address to the Bundestag illustrates his desire to move on from the initial period of denazification and to create rapprochement with the West at the expense of minimizing the past. He is highly respected, even today, having earned the title “der Alte,” or “the old Man,” due to his advanced age. He was a foundational member of the Christian Democratic Union.