 In his view, what was needed was a campaign by the government, the media and historians to create a "positive view" of German history.In Stürmer's opinion, the Third Reich was a major block towards a positive view of the German past, and what was needed was a focus on the broad sweep of German history as opposed to the 12 years of Nazi Germany as a way of creating a national identity that all Germans could take pride in.He wrote that the "loss of orientation" caused by the absence of a German national identity led to a "search for identity".