prussian phenomenon and its historical distortion

The article deals with the phenomenon of Prussia. Once, Prussia had been the largest continental Protestant state in Europe. The main issue of this phenomenon is that upon the tragic events of the World War II Prussian history and heritage had been considerably distorted, in order to compensate somehow for the dreadful casualties suffered by the victorious powers. The common European misconception implied that Prussia had been the bulwark of militarism, and therefore had to bear all the responsibility for the atrocities of war. Unfortunately, the majority of modern German historians share such misinterpretation of Prussian heritage in order to please false political correctness, perhaps, as an act of contrition for National Socialism and its crimes. However, the Prussian tradition and history go far beyond this militarism, and this article explains what ways. The authors believe that there should not be any prejudices and biases, that any subject should be examined sine ira et studio. Moreover, given that it is possible to characterize the Great French Revolution as a juristic one, and the Great October revolution – as a social one, the Prussian revolution “from above”, led by the first representatives of the Hohenzollern family, may be well considered as a pedagogical revolution. This revolution did bring definitely positive changes; they are surveyed in the article. The French Revolution has not eliminated the covetousness of the bourgeoisie after 1789; despotism of the authorities and people’s passiveness similarly have remained unaltered in Russia after 1917. On the contrary, Federal Republic of Germany of nowadays, distinctive for its law, order and effective responsible government is unthinkable without Prussian heritage.