of speeches and majority decisions but by blood and iron.” A Prussian noble by

birth, Otto von Bismarck used political cunning a brute force to shake 19th

century Europe to its core. Wholly committed to diplomacy at the point of a

gun, Bismarck unified the disjointed states of the former Holy Roman Empire

into a unified state known as the Second Reich. While he remains the picture of

conservatism in the 21st century and a hero of the German people,

questions remain about Bismarck’s motives; his achievements however are without

equal. On this episode we discuss Otto von Bismarck, “The Iron Chancellor."