Has a small, largely elderly, left-behind pocket of Germany struck a fatal blow against its postwar liberal democracy? That is the question many are asking after Sunday’s election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, which saw the Alternative for Germany (AfD) trounce the mainstream parties to stand on the verge of power—the first time a far-right party would do so in Germany since the fall of the Nazi regime.

As has been the case when other tsunamis have struck—Donald Trump’s presidential election victories in the United States, Brexit in the United Kingdom, to name but two of many around the world—the response of those in the political center has ranged from fury to consternation to despair. But most of all, a sense of dumbstruck paralysis. They could see it coming; they took some action, but they were swept away. And now, as they face the consequences, so the recriminations begin.

Has a small, largely elderly, left-behind pocket of Germany struck a fatal blow against its postwar liberal democracy? That is the question many are asking after Sunday’s election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, which saw the Alternative for Germany (AfD) trounce the mainstream parties to stand on the verge of power—the first time a far-right party would do so in Germany since the fall of the Nazi regime.

As has been the case when other tsunamis have struck—Donald Trump’s presidential election victories in the United States, Brexit in the United Kingdom, to name but two of many around the world—the response of those in the political center has ranged from fury to consternation to despair. But most of all, a sense of dumbstruck paralysis. They could see it coming; they took some action, but they were swept away. And now, as they face the consequences, so the recriminations begin.

In Washington, the targets of opprobrium ranged from presidential nominees Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton to Democrats in Congress to the entire party establishment. In the United Kingdom, they were many and varied, from then-Prime Minister David Cameron, who called the 2016 referendum, to then-London mayor Boris Johnson, who changed his mind at the last moment to lead the calls to quit the European Union, to the ever-present right-winger Nigel Farage, to Jeremy Corbyn, the left-wing Labour leader who campaigned half-heartedly to stay while purportedly preferring to leave.

In Germany, it’s simpler. All the guns are trained on Friedrich Merz, the chancellor of the past 16 months with the ignominious distinction of........

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