German-speaking Europe in the context of "Pan-Germanism"

Pan-Germanism (German: Pangermanismus or Alldeutsche Bewegung), also occasionally known as Pan-Germanicism, is a pan-nationalist political idea. Pan-Germanism seeks to unify all ethnic Germans, German-speaking people, and possibly also non-German Germanic peoples – into a single nation-state known as Greater Germany.

Pan-Germanism was highly influential in German politics in the 19th century during the unification of Germany when the German Empire was proclaimed as a nation-state in 1871 but without Germanophone Switzerland, Austria-Hungary, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein (Kleindeutsche Lösung/Lesser Germany) and the first half of the 20th century in Austria-Hungary and the German Empire. From the late 19th century, many Pan-Germanist thinkers, since 1891 organized in the Pan-German League, had adopted openly ethnocentric and racist ideologies, and ultimately gave rise to the foreign policy Heim ins Reich pursued by Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler from 1938, one of the primary factors leading to the outbreak of World War II. The concept of a Greater Germany was attempted to be put into practice as the Greater Germanic Reich (German: Großgermanisches Reich), fully styled the Greater Germanic Reich of the German Nation (German: Großgermanisches Reich der Deutschen Nation). As a result of the Second World War, there was a clear backlash against Pan-Germanism and other related ideologies. Today, pan-Germanism is mainly limited to a few nationalist groups, mainly on the political right in Germany and Austria.

Wends is a historical name for Slavs who inhabited present-day northeast Germany. It refers not to a homogeneous people, but to various people, tribes, or groups depending on where and when it was used. In the modern day, communities identifying as Wendish exist in Slovenia, Austria, Lusatia, the United States (such as the Texas Wends), and in Australia. One present-day group, the Lusatian Sorbs of Eastern Germany, remain in the Wendish homeland.

In German-speaking Europe during the Middle Ages, the term "Wends" was interpreted as synonymous with "Slavs" and sporadically used in literature to refer to West Slavs and South Slavs living within the Holy Roman Empire. The name has possibly survived in Finnic languages (Finnish: Venäjä [ˈʋenæjæ]; Estonian: Vene [ˈvene]; Karelian: Veneä), denoting modern Russia.

Jäger (German: [ˈjɛːɡɐ] ; German for 'hunter'; sg. [der] Jäger, pl. [die] Jäger) is a German military term referring to specific light infantry units.

In German-speaking states during the early modern era, the term jäger came to denote light infantrymen whose civilian occupations (mostly hunters and foresters) made them well-suited to patrolling and skirmishing independently, rather than as part of a large military unit or traditional line infantry. Jäger was used to describe skirmishers, scouts, sharpshooters and runners.