Eduard Willy Kurt Herbert von Dirksen is a German junker, diplomat, and statesman. Formerly German ambassador to the Ukrainian State and the Russian Republic (and, due to that, a renowned expert on Eastern European and Asian geopolitics), he has served as Reichskanzler of the German Empire since October 1934.
A well-connected man within the Empire’s political elite, Dirksen has long-standing & close ties to the royal court and even the Kaiser himself, something that is said to have been the main reason for his unexpected appointment in the aftermath of Johann Heinrich von Bernstorff’s resignation following the Lake Lubahn Crisis of autumn 1934; critics claim that the choice only fell on the yes-man Dirksen as Wilhelm tried to reassert his dwindling authority after 14 more or less uncontested years of parliamentary rule, a consequence of the 1920 March Reforms. The relations between chancellor and Reichstag can best be described as tedious, and Dirksen is constantly lacking the needed parliamentary majority for his only vaguely-defined political vision. With the popularity of the so-called “permanent opposition” of SPD and DVLP growing larger and larger, analysts claim that the Reichstag elections of April 1936 could be the nail in the coffin for the struggling Dirksen Cabinet.