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Denazification (German: Entnazifizierung) was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary and politics of any remnants of the Nazi regime. It was carried out specifically by removing those involved from positions of influence and by disbanding or rendering impotent the organizations associated with it. The program of denazification was launched after the end of the Second World War and solidified by the Potsdam Agreement.

Overview

Denazification in Germany was accomplished through a series of directives issued by the Allied Control Council, seated in Berlin, beginning in January 1946. "Denazification directives" identified specific people and groups and outlined judicial procedures and guidelines for handling them.

Though all the occupying forces had agreed on the initiative, the methods used for denazification and the intensity with which they were applied differed between the occupation zones.

Denazification also refers to the removal of the physical symbols of the Nazi regime. For example, in 1957 the German government re-issued World War II Iron Cross medals without the swastika in the center.

Application in the Allied Occupation Zones

American zone

The Joint Chiefs of Staff Directive 1067 directed U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s policy of denazification.

The United States initially pursued denazification in a committed though bureaucratic fashion. For this process five categories for anyone over the age of 18 residing in the US zone of occupation were identified: major offenders, offenders, lesser offenders, followers, and exonerated persons. Ultimately, the intention was the "re-education" of the German people.

In early 1947 90,000 Nazis were being held in concentration camps, another 1,900,000 were forbidden to work as anything but manual labourers.

A report of the Institute on re-education of the Axis Countries in June 1945 recommended: "Only an inflexible longterm occupation authority will be able to lead the Germans to a fundamental revision of their recent political philosophy." On 15 January 1946, however, a report of the Military Government (classified as restricted) stated: "The present procedure fails in practice to reach a substantial number of persons who supported or assisted the Nazis." On 1 April a special law therefore transferred the responsibility for the denazification process to the German administration which established 545 civilian courts (German Spruchkammern) to oversee 900,000 cases.

The denazification was now supervised by special German ministers like the Social Democrat Gottlob Kamm in Baden-Württemberg. By 1948, however, with the Cold War now clearly in progress, American attentions were directed increasingly to the threat of the Eastern Bloc; the remaining cases were tried through summary proceedings that left insufficient time to thoroughly investigate the accused, so that many of the judgments of this period have questionable judicial value. For example, by 1952 members of the SS like Otto Skorzeny could be declared formally "entnazifiziert" (denazified) in absentia by a German government arbitration board and without any proof that this was true.

In December 1945 U.S. President Harry S. Truman justified his refusal to alleviate the induced famine of the German population: “though all Germans might not be guilty for the war, it would be too difficult to try to single out for better treatment those who had nothing to do with the Nazi regime and its crimes.”

The Information Control Division of the U.S. army had by July 1946 taken control of 37 German newspapers, 6 radio stations, 314 theatres, 642 cinemas, 101 magazines, 237 book publishers, 7,384 book dealers and printers. Its main mission was democratisation but part of the agenda was also the prohibition on any criticism of the Allied forces of occupation..

In addition, on May 13, 1946 the Allied Control council issued a directive for the confiscation on all media that could contribute to Nazism or militarism. As a consequence a list was drawn up of over 30,000 book titles, ranging from school textbooks to poetry, which were now banned. All copies of books on the list were confiscated and destroyed; the possession of a book on the list was made a punishable offence. (See also Censorship in the Federal Republic of Germany)

Soviet zone

The abandonment of stringent denazification in the West became a major theme of East German government propaganda, which often claimed that the West German government was nothing but an extension of the old Nazi regime. Such allegations appeared frequently in the official Socialist Unity Party of Germany newspaper, Neues Deutschland. The June 17, 1953 riots in Berlin were officially blamed on Nazi agents provocateurs from West Berlin, whom Neues Deutschland alleged were then working in collaboration with the Western government.

The Berlin Wall was officially called the Antifaschistischer Schutzwall ("Anti-Fascist Security Wall") by the East German government, and was ostensibly built to protect East German society from the activities of Nazis in West Berlin.

Denazification in pre-war Polish territory and in the part of Germany annexed by Poland

At the end of the war the victorious Allies de-facto annexed a quarter of Germany. Part of East Prussia was handed over to the Soviet Union and the remainder of the territory east of the Oder-Neisse line was handed over for Polish occupation, which became permanent (Germany accepted the new border in the peace treaty signed in 1990). The parts of the population that had fled before the Red Army were refused the right to return to their homes, while the remaining millions over a period of years were forcibly expelled with much loss of life (see Expulsion of Germans after World War II). The area, formerly populated by 11,4 million ethnic Germans was resettled mainly by Poles from central Poland and to some extent by Poles from the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union (formerly populated by 5,3 million ethnic Poles)

For the area annexed from Germany Polish communist authorities introduced the term Recovered Territories, with the 'recovered' being a reference to the territories which temporarily were under the control of the Piast dynasty during the middle ages. (see History of Poland (966–1385)) The creation of a picture of the new territories as integral part of historical Poland in post-war Communist propaganda had the aim of forging Polish settlers and repatriates arriving there into a coherent community loyal to the new regime.

Some ethnic Germans were expelled because of their Nazi activities during the war, yet the single most common reason for their expulsion was their German ethnicity. They were sent to makeshift camps or cities in eastern and western Germany, and Austria, generally according to their Landsmannschaft.

Many of the ethnic Germans living within the Polish pre-war borders were prior to their expulsion for years used as forced labor in camps such as the camp run by Salomon Morel. For example Central Labour Camp Jaworzno, Central Labour Camp Potulice, Łambinowice, Zgoda labour camp and others. (see also this HNET review)

French and British zones

The French and British took a more measured approach and focused primarily on a removal of the elite, rather than pursuit of all those who collaborated with the regime.

Implications for the future German states

The culture of denazification strongly influenced the Parliamentary Council charged with the responsibility of drawing up a constitution for the occupation zones. This constitution, called the Grundgesetz ("Basic Law"), was finalized on May 8, 1949, ratified on May 23, and came into effect the next day. This date effectively marks the foundation of the Federal Republic of Germany.

Efforts to instill a sense of "collective guilt"

"In 1945 there was an Allied consensus—which no longer exists—on the doctrine of collective guilt, that all Germans shared the blame not only for the war but for Nazi atrocities as well."

The British and The Americans considered the Germans to be guilty, using the terms "collective guilt", and "collective responsibility"

The British instructed their officers in control of German media to instill a sense of collective guilt in the population

In the early months of the occupation the Psychological Warfare Division of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) undertook a psychological propaganda campaign for the purpose of developing a German sense of collective responsibility. Using the German press (which were all under Allied control) and posters and pamphlets a program acquainting ordinary Germans with what had take place in the concentration camps was conducted.

"During the summer of 1945 pictures of Bergen-Belsen were hung as posters all over Germany with 'You Are Guilty' on them."

Later the U.S. army came to draw a distinction between those legally guilty and the rest of the population which was then merely considered morally guilty.

A number of films showing the concentration camps were made and screened to the German public. For example "Die Todesmuhlen", released in the U.S. zone in January 1946, "Welt im Film" No. 5 (June, 1945). A film that was never finished due partly to delays and the existence of the other films was "Memory of the Camps". "...the object was to shake and humiliate the Germans and prove to them beyond any possible challenge that these German crimes against humanity were committed and that the German people -- and not just the Nazis and SS -- bore responsibility."

Immediately upon the liberation of the concentration-camps many German civilians were forced to see the conditions in the camps, bury rotting corpses and exhume mass-graves. On threat of death or withdrawal of food civilians were forced to provide their belongings to former concentration camp inmates

Polls

The original Information comes from Tony Judt "Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945"

• A majority in the years 1945-49 believed National Socialism to have been a good idea, badly applied.
• In 1946 6% of Germans said the Nuremberg trials had been unfair.
• In 1946 37% in the U.S. occupation zone said about the holocaust that "the extermination of the Jews and Poles and other non-Aryans was necessary for the security of Germans".
• In 1946 1 in 3 in the U.S. occupation zone said that Jews should not have the same rights as those belonging to the Aryan race
• In 1950 1 in 3 said the Nuremberg trials had been unfair.
• In 1952 37% said Germany was better off without the Jews.
• In 1952 25% had a good opinion of Hitler.

The radical left in Germany during the 1960s–70s and Nazi allegations

Because the Cold War had curtailed the process of denazification in the West, certain radical leftist groups such as the Red Army Faction justified their use of violence against the West German government and society based on the argument that the West German establishment had benefited from the Nazi period, and that it was still largely Nazi in outlook. They pointed out that many former Nazis held government posts, while the German Communist Party was illegal. They argued that "What did you do in the war, daddy?" was not a question that many of the leaders of the generation who fought World War II and prospered in the postwar "Wirtschaftswunder" (German Economic Miracle) encouraged their children to ask.

For example, one of the major justifications that the Red Army Faction gave in 1977 for killing Hanns-Martin Schleyer, President of the German Employers' Association and perceived as one of the most powerful industrialists in West Germany, was that as a former member of the SS, he was part of an informal network of ex-Nazis who still had great economic power and political influence in Germany.

Today

The late confession of famous German writer Günter Grass, perceived by many as a protagonist of 'the nation's moral conscience', that he was a member of the Waffen SS reminded the German public that, even more than sixty years after the Third Reich had been destroyed, membership in Nazi organisations is still a taboo issue in public discourse. Statistically it is very highly likely that there are many more Germans of Grass' generation (also called the "Flakhelfer-Generation") with biographies not unlike his, who have never come clean about their involvement at the time.

Denazification in other countries

In practice, denazification was not limited to Germany and Austria; in every European country with a vigorous Nazi or Fascist party, such as the ones in France, effective measures of denazification were carried out.

Denazification was also practised in most countries which fell to German occupation, because in these countries Nazi-held puppet regimes were established with the support of local collaborationists. This is the case of countries such as Belgium, Norway, Greece or Yugoslavia. In Greece, for instance, Special Courts of Collaborators were created after 1945 to try former collaborationist individuals. The three Greek quisling prime ministers, for example, were convicted and sentenced to death or life imprisonment. Other collaborationists after German withdrawal underwent repression and public humiliation, besides being tried (mostly on treason charges). Some left Greece, while others disappeared from public life only to re-emerge in post-war politics. The term 'quisling' is in itself a good embodiment of the Norwegian denazification efforts; demonizing the most prominent of the individuals that did partake in partisan Nazi activities before or during the war. Vidkun Quisling was himself shot after being sentenced to death for high treason.

Notes

1. Herbert Hoover's press release of The President's Economic Mission to Germany and Austria, Report No. 1: German Agriculture and Food Requirements, February 28, 1947. pg. 2
2. Steven Bela Vardy and T. Hunt Tooley, eds. Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe ISBN 0-88033-995-0. subsection by Richard Dominic Wiggers, “The United States and the Refusal to Feed German Civilians after World War II” pg. 281
3. The Expulsion of Germans from Poland, Revisited, H-Net Review
4. Concise statistical year-book of Poland , Polish Ministry of Information. London June 1941 P.9 & 10
5. Martin Åberg, Mikael Sandberg, "Social Capital and Democratisation: Roots of Trust in Post-Communist Poland" pg. 79
6. Karen Margolis: Who wasn't a Nazi?

See also

• Ex-Nazis
• Collaboration during World War II
• Pursuit of Nazi collaborators
• Operation paperclip
• Secondary antisemitism

Further reading

• Germany 1947-1949: The Story In Documents The Department of State Publication 3556. 1950, U.S. Government Printing Office

• Hentschel, Klaus with Ann M. Hentschel as translator The Mental Aftermath: The Mentality of German Physicists 1945 – 1949 (Oxford, 2007) ISBN 978-0-19-920566-0

External links

• THE U.S. MILITARY GOVERNMENT AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF DEMOCRATIC REFORM,

FEDERALISM, AND CONSTITUTIONALISM DURING THE OCCUPATION OF BAVARIA, 1945-47

• The Denazification of Austria by France

• Aftermath of World War II
• History of Austria
• History of Germany
• Nazi Germany
• Political and cultural purges
• Political terms