The American Occupation of West Germany and the Formation of the New German Politic 1945-1953

Beafore, Sydney Anthony

The American Occupation of West Germany and the Formation of the New German Politic 1945-1953

Authors

Beafore, Sydney Anthony

Abstract

With the collapse of the Nazi German state in 1945 the American, Soviet, British and French governments each operated occupation zones with the purpose of demilitarization, deindustrailization, denazification, decartelization and democraticization. In order to enact each of these programs the American Military Government (USMG) first had to establish stability inside American occupied Germany. It was this mission, the establishment of stability, that took precedence over all others. The eventual relaxation of denazification at the end of 1947 and 1948 occurred in efforts to promote economic stability and sustainability. Konrad Adenauer’s and the Christian Democratic Union’s (CDU) rise to political power comes from the centrist policies they adopted in their founding after the war. Adenauer’s ability to place the CDU in association with the West's economic recovery along with the inability of Social Democrats (SPD) to form coalition governments allowed the CDU to rise and maintain their unity of government long into the 1950s.