150th anniversary of death of Carl von Clausewitz - Germany / Federal Republic of Germany 1981 - 60 Pfennig

Of the military personalities of recent history, no one has been able to attract worldwide attention to such an extent as the Prussian Major General Carl von Clausewitz (1780-1831). The return of his 150th anniversary on November 16, 1981 is accompanied by a Clausewitz renaissance far beyond the borders of Germany. This is no coincidence; for Clausewitz's left-over, incomplete work "On War" occupies a unique place among the military writings with more than a thousand pages. It belongs to the standard works of world literature. Whenever the relationship between politics and warfare is mentioned, his name is mentioned; whether to appeal to him or to try to refute him. The western-democratic and communist states are equally interested in him. Even under the conditions of nuclear strategy, the highly differentiated mass society and totally changed political structures, Clausewitz is still considered undisputed today as the classic of the theory and philosophy of war. Clausewitz's merit remains that he was the first to bring the war to the fore and recognize it as "an instrument of politics." With his - often misquoted - definition: "The war is nothing more than a continuation of political traffic with the intervention of other means," he clarifies the political nature of the war. At the same time he establishes the primacy of the political over the military. According to Clausewitz, the war does have its own "grammar" but no "own logic". If war is merely the "instrument," politics is "intelligence." In the sense of Clausewitz, the war can only be considered as a form of political conflict between the states if the purpose, the goal, the means and the sacrifice are proportionate to one another. Over the years, Clausewitz's theories have experienced varying and changing interpretations among politicians and military officials at home and abroad, among scientists, and recently among peace researchers. Following on from Engels and Lenin, both of whom had studied Clausewitz thoroughly, Mao, Ho Chi Minh and Che Guevara - especially with regard to the petty war - drew on the ideas of Clausewitz. The picture of Carl von Clausewitz would be incomplete, one would not mention his merits in the reform of the Prussian army after 1806. He represented - like Scharnhorst and Gneisenau - humanistic educational goals and demanded for the officers a broad and balanced, oriented to humanities and natural sciences education in order to prepare them well for their future tasks in the military leadership. The question of the validity of Clausewitz's teachings in the atomic age is asked again and again; At the same time one must take the trouble to peel off the timeless elements of war from the time-bound accessory of the book "From War." (Text: Federal Ministry of Defense, Bonn)