HI136 The History of Germany Lecture 13
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Transcript of HI136 The History of Germany Lecture 13
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HI136 The History of Germany
Lecture 13
Defeat, Occupation and Division
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The Morgenthau Plan • Drawn up by the US
Secretary of State, Henry Morgenthau.
• Designed to ensure that Germany could never again be a threat to her neighbours.
• Germany to be divided into independent states, higher education prohibited and heavy industry destroyed.
• Pressure from the public to punish Germany led to this being adopted as official US and UK policy until the spring of 1945.US Secretary of State, Henry Morenthau Jr.
(1891-1967)
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The Yalta Conference• An Allied Control
Commission to be established to govern a defeated Germany.
• Germany to be occupied by the 3 wartime allies and France. Each power was to occupy and administer a zone of its own.
• The USSR was to retain the territory seized under the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939 & the borders of Poland were to be shifted westwards.
• Reparations to be extracted from Germany.
Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin at the Crimean resort of Yalta, February 1945
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Divisions within the Allies• The Americans wanted a decentralized, federal
democratic system in Germany (modelled on the US constitution).
• Great Britain wanted Germany denazified and demilitarized, but then a revival of the economy – “security from attack, then business as usual” (Kramer).
• Russia envisioned a united and neutral Germany. Her priorities were to consolidate gains in Eastern Europe & extract reparations from Germany.
• French aims were similar to those after WW1 – They wanted Germany broken up into weak states that would be no threat to French security and the creation of buffer zones in the Rhineland and the Saar.
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Aerial view of Dresden after allied bombing Allied troops enter Berlin, 1945
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Source: R. Overy, The Penguin Historical Atlas of the Third Reich
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Problems facing the Allies• Germany is social, political and economic chaos.• German cities had been destroyed by Allied bombing: 75%
of buildings in Berlin had been demolished, only 1% of buildings in Hanover were undamaged.
• Communications & infrastructure had been similarly disrupted: roads, rail networks, bridges etc.
• Social chaos: old social structures disrupted, German men killed or imprisoned during the war, women had to fend for themselves.
• Refugee crisis: up to 12 million Germans migrated from the east, plus thousands displaced within Germany, POWs and concentration camp inmates.
• Political chaos: no authority or administration, need for restoration of law & order.
• Basic necessities of life had to be restored: gas, electricity, water, food supplies, housing etc.
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Source: R. Overy, The Penguin Historical Atlas of the Third Reich (1996)
Occupied Berlin
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The Potsdam Conference• The Allies agreed on the broad
principles for the treatment of Germany:• Demilitarization & disarmament.• Denazification & democratization.• Industry to be decentralizaed &
reconstruction focus on ‘peaceful domestic industries’.
• No central government for the time being.
• Reparations in kind rather than cash – each power authorized to seize goods from their own zone. The USSR to get 50% of the total amount.
• All decisions to be taken collegially within the Allied Control Council.
• These temporary measures, pending a formal peace conference.
Attlee, Truman and Stalin at Potsdam. Standingbehind them are their respective foreign ministers:
Ernest Bevin, James Byrnes & Vyacheslav Molotov.
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Denazification• Nuremberg Trials: 22 Nazi leaders
put on trial, 12 condemned to death.
• Four-power agreement on the need to remove Nazis from the civil service, judiciary, education etc.
• Differences in approach:• Russians saw Nazism as an
outgrowth of German capitalism – radical structural reforms.
• Americans wanted to remove Nazism but maintain the existing social & economic structure – a more bureaucratic approach.
• British & French saw Nazism as inherent in the German national character – an emphasis on re-education.
• Denazification ultimately devolved to German tribunals.
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Democratization• 1947: Break up of the old state of Prussia.• Creation of new administrative areas (Länder)
within the zones of occupation.• Differences in approach:
• A more centralized approach in the British zone – unelected German officials made up Central Economic Office & Zonal Advisory Council. Municipal elections in autumn 1946, elections to state assemblies in May 1947.
• The Americans keen to introduce democracy as soon as possible: elections held in Jan. 1946. By the beginning of 1947 power had been devolved to the Länder in the US zone.
• The Russians established a central authority, the Soviet Military Administration of Germany (SMAD), in July 1945 at the same time as governments in the Länder in their zone.
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The Economy• Major dislocation in the economy after 1945 – food
shortages, valueless currency etc. led to a thriving black market.
• Ongoing disagreements over reparations: the Americans saw the revival of the German economy as a priority whereas the Russians wanted reparations as soon as possible.
• July 1946: the USA suspends reparations deliveries to the Russian zone and offers an economic merger of the zones. Only the British agree, leading to the creation of the Bizone on 1 Jan. 1947.
• The French and Soviets continued to extract reparations in kind from their zones – by 1949 the Russians had secured over $10 billion worth of resources and equipment.
• In the Soviet zone a radical programme of nationalization and land reform.
• In the western zones an insistence from the Americans that reconstruction and reform be achieved within the framework of the free market.
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Steps Towards Division• 21 April 1946: Merger of the SPD and KPD in the Soviet Zone to
form the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party, SED)
• Establishment of the Bizone – interpreted by the Russians as an attempt to create a separate state hostile to the USSR• July 1947: Centralization of Bizonia with new political & economic
institutions set up.• In response the Russians establish the German Economic Commission
(DWK) in their zone.• Nov-Dec. 1947: Failure of the London Foreign Ministers Conference
– Convinces the Western Allies that the Russians are trying to establish a Communist puppet state. They determine to devolve more power to West Germany & integrate it into Western Europe to provide a buffer against the spread of Communism.
• Feb-March 1948: London Conference: Western Allies meet to decide the fate of Germany.
• April 1948: The Bizone included in the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC) & accepts Marshal aid.
• June 1948: The Western powers announce their intention to convene a constituent assembly to draw up a constitution for a separate West German state.
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The Berlin Blockade• 20 June 1948: A new currency,
the Deutschmark, introduced in Bizonia, the French Zone and West Berlin.
• The Russians fear that this will destabilize the economy in their zone & move to cut off road & rail access to West Berlin in the hope of pressuring the west to abandon their plans for a separate state.
• June 1948-May 1949: The allies airlift fuel & food into West Berlin.
• A symbolic struggle that back-fired on the Russians & only accelerated the integration of West Germany into the Western European system.
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The Formation of the FRG• July 1948: 65 member
Parliamentary Council established to draw up a constitution for the Western zones.
• 10 Feb. 1949: The proposed constitution presented to the Military Governors for their approval.
• 8 May 1949: The Parliamentary Council adopts the ‘Basic Law’ by a vote of 53 to 12.
• Elections in August return a majority for a centre-right coalition of the Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Free Democrats (FDP).
• Konrad Adenauer elected first Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany on 15 September 1949.
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The Formation of the GDR• Despite the long build up, the
establishment of the FRG took both the Russians and the East Germans by surprise.
• Stalin still hoped that a single neutral German state could be formed and was reluctant to agree to proposals from the SED leadership for a separate state in the East.
• But establishment of the Federal Republic ended such hopes and on 7 October 1949 the establishment of the German Democratic Republic was announced.
• A draft constitution had already been drawn up in the spring – on paper this was very similar to that of FRG. In practice the GDR was a single-party state dominated by the SED backed up with Russian tanks.
• 12 October: A new government led by Otto Grotewohl formed.
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The Berlin Wall• Berlin remained under four-
power control after 1949 & Berliners could move relatively freely between the Eastern & Western Zones.
• This led to many East Germans fleeing to the West via Berlin.
• The East German leadership wanted to plug this gap & proposed doing so by force.
• 1958-61: Berlin Crisis – a stand-off between the USSR & USA over the position of Berlin.
• The East Germans use this as an occasion to close the border crossings & erect a wall 140 km (87 miles) long across Berlin.
• Formalized the division of Germany and became the symbol of the Cold War division of Europe.
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Conclusion• Germany’s total defeat in WW2 placed her in the hands
of the Allies.• Most Germans were more interested in the day-to-day
struggle to survive than politics.• The division of Germany therefore has to be seen in the
context of emerging Cold War tensions between the Superpowers.
• Historiography:• Orthodox school = the Soviet Union primarily to blame for
the Cold War & division of Germany.• Revisionist school = the Western powers (and the USA in
particular) primarily to blame for the Cold War & division of Germany.
• Post-revisionist school = both sides share equal blame – the division of Germany a consequence of mutual suspicion and irreconcilable ideological differences.