From Wagner to Tolkien

German militarism may not be very smart, but its style is evolving

A dark clearing in a forest at dusk, flaming torches, a blazing brazier with an almost runic-looking sword shape cut into its cast-iron shell, a machine gun pointing into a foreboding sky in a steep Leni Riefenstahl angle, the oddly grating voice of the leader holding forth about “Kameraden,” “kriegstüchtig,” and “siegen” in German, and a lot of men in uniform enthusiastically hollering in response.

All set against a score that seems to have been composed by Richard Wagner on acid to accompany a horde of burned-out German tanks riding off into Valhalla, circa 1943.