It has worked particularly well for Germany, which rose from the ashes of 1945 and used to its advantage the geography it once feared. It became Europe’s great manufacturer. Instead of sending armies across the flatlands it sent goods with the prestigious tag ‘Made in Germany’, and these goods flowed down the Rhine and the Elbe, along the autobahns and out into Europe and the world, north, south, west and, increasingly since 1990, east.
