r/AskEurope • u/Volume2KVorochilov • Feb 27 '25

History What's the most taboo historical debate in your country ?

As a frenchman, I would argue ours is to this day the Algerian war of independence.

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u/smors Denmark Feb 27 '25

The second Schleswig War, aka, the war in 1864.

In the usual danish storytelling, that was the heroic danes defending the country against the nasty prussians (and other sorts of germans). While happily ignoring that especially Holstein has never been danish in the sense the word is used now.

Holstein is and was german, for many years with the danish king as the ruler. But having the king of Denmark also ruling Holstein does not make the area danish.

The first Schleswig war was not won on the battlefield. It was won when Russia and England told the prussians to piss of, because it suited the grat powers just fine to have a small weak state in control of the entrance to the baltic.

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u/Special_Entry_5782 Denmark Feb 27 '25

This is just plain not true though. The millisecond this controversy started brewing, and a Danish and German nation state started forming, the Danes said, okay, sure, we'll split it, Holstein goes to you, we keep Slesvig. But the Germans played for higher stakes, because they knew could likely get more than Holstein, and they referred to some Treaty from the 1400s which said that Holstein and Slesvig can never be divided. And so, with Prussian militarism they conquered territories which had been as ethnically Danish as it gets for 1000 years. It is objectively military conquest and imperialism, I don't know what you get out of both sides-ing this.