The book presents a compelling critique of the political, social, and economic ideologies that have shaped the history of Western Europe and the United States over the past 200 years. The author analyzes in detail how, in the specific historical and geographical circumstances of Germany, these ideologies (statism and nationalism) gave rise to the desire for autarky and the conquest of the “living space” required for this, causing the Second World War, and also how the same ideologies prevented other Western European countries to prevent the impending pan-European catastrophe. Mises was the first to show that Nazism and fascism were totalitarian collectivist systems, having much more in common with communism than with free market capitalism. Moreover, they are a logical consequence of the unbridled statism and militarism of pre-fascist societies. In the Marxist-infused intellectual climate of the 1940s, Mises's connection between fascism and Marxist socialism came as a shock. The final chapter contains a prophetic critique of the idea of world government, including world trade agreements. Of particular relevance for our time is the author's explanation of the nature of modern protectionism as a necessary consequence of state intervention in the economy in general and social legislation in particular.