There was no forum for a critical appraisal of Germany's responsibility for the horrors committed during the Nazi era. The country's enemies were to be found west of the Elbe River and west of the Atlantic: in West Germany and the USA. Walter Ulbricht attacks West Germany's accession to NATOĮast Germany styled itself as a bulwark against fascism and imperialism. Image: picture-alliance/Bildagentur-online/Schoening The Soviet War Memorial in Berlin was built to commemorate the 8 million Soviet soldiers who died in WWII. Its political system, based on violence and oppression, would be imposed on the whole of the Eastern Bloc by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. "The Liberator," as the gigantic figure was called, embodied the Soviet Union's triumph over Nazi Germany. With this monument, towering 30 meters into the sky above, East Germany's leaders took a firm grip on the imagery that would be employed to commemorate the end of the war. The most visible manifestation of this development was the gigantic War Memorial and Military Cemetery at Treptower Park for more than 5,000 war dead, inaugurated on the fourth anniversary of the end of the conflict.Īt the heart of the complex is a soldier cradling a small child in his arm while at the same time crushing a Nazi swastika under the heel of his boot. While senior West German politicians struggled to come up with the right gestures, and the right words, to describe the crimes committed in Germany's name, the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany) - founded on Octohad adopted the occupying Soviet Union's state cult of anti-fascism. And, Heuss added, "We knew of these things."Ī monument to the Red Army: "The Liberator" "The Germans must never forget what was done by people of their nation during these shameful years," said West Germany's head of state as he contemplated Germany's biggest crime - the Holocaust. Three years later, his visit to the former Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp was seen as a watershed moment. In September 1949, Heuss was elected as Germany's first federal president. Why? Because we were, at one and the same time, redeemed and annihilated." The Free Democrat Theodor Heuss (FDP) was in a reflective mood as he looked back on the end of the war: "The fundamental fact is that for each of us remains the most tragic and questionable paradox of history. On May 8, 1949, exactly four years after the end of World War II, representatives of the country's political parties gathered in the city of Bonn to enact a new constitution (Basic Law) for the emerging Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, West Germany). An ideological war between the communist Soviet Union and an alliance of democracies in the West began to take hold, signaling the division of Germany and the division of Europe. ![]() ![]() Now the tables had been turned: Germany defeated and occupied. In the post-war years, any sense of outrage over these crimes was still not enough for most Germans to consider May 8 as a day of liberation - in contrast to the European countries that German forces had occupied during the six years of war. Unprecedented crimes against humanity followed, above all the systematic extermination of six million Jews. The Third Reich had set the terrible conflict in motion with its invasion of Poland. It triggered emotions of guilt and shame. Defeat had been complete and overwhelming. Their country had been destroyed and then divided into four zones of occupation by the victorious powers. The unconditional surrender of Germany's armed forces, the Wehrmacht, brought to an end the suffering of millions - initially, however, only in Europe because Nazi Germany's ally, Japan, continued fighting and would only concede defeat in August when the Americans had dropped atomic bombs on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.įor the international anti-Hitler coalition - led by the Soviet Union, the United States, Great Britain and France - May 8 was, despite all the suffering that had gone before, a day to celebrate. ![]() World War II, started by Adolf Hitler's Nazi Third Reich in 1939, was over.
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