This category is within the scope of WikiProject Former countries, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of defunct states and territories (and their subdivisions). If you would like to participate, please join the project.Former countriesWikipedia:WikiProject Former countriesTemplate:WikiProject Former countriesformer country articles
This category is within the scope of WikiProject Germany, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Germany on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GermanyWikipedia:WikiProject GermanyTemplate:WikiProject GermanyGermany articles
Although categorized under Category:Former countries in Europe, the article West Germany itself specifies that "West Germany" was not a country, but the common name for the Federal Republic of Germany, which absorbed the former German Democratic Republic and whose constitutional history is thus continuous from 1949 to the present. As such it is just an obsolete shorthand, and not a "former country" any more than it was after the "little reunification" of the Saar. I would also compare this to the American Civil War, fought between the USA ("the Union") and the CSA ("the Confederacy"); the defeat of the Confederacy did not result in a new state, but in the CSA being reabsorbed into the USA. -choster (talk) 23:22, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
