Germany's Transformation: Nazi Era to Cold War Division (1939-1989)

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Nazi Germany's Grip on Power and the Path to War

Modern art was branded as degenerate, and all production done by Jews, as well as content related to pacifism, humanism, liberalism, democracy, Marxism, or communism, was banned. A tightly controlled education system and youth activities, especially sports, collaborated with repression to ensure popular obedience. The staging of the power of the people served as a facade as Hitler took charge of the SS and the police inside the party under the leadership of Heinrich Himmler. Deviations were severely punished, especially after 1936 when the state police and the SS came under Himmler's control. All the technical development achieved in Germany was launched against Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and Communists. The more reactionary elements of modernism met its dark designs.

Hitler was responsible for the appointment and dismissal of all charges in the party, each level of government, and the supreme command of the army. In the Reichstag, whose members were appointed by Hitler and voted for by the population from a single list of the NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers Party), the official narrative was the unity of the people and their Führer. Throughout the period, only 7 Acts of Parliament were passed, compared to 987 government decrees. This lack of separation of powers was in line with Nazi law, where equality had no validity. In this system, the right to life belonged to the German people and not individuals.

The policy of Lebensraum (living space) inevitably led to war. The tolerance of democratic countries towards Hitler's Germany could only delay the inevitable. The abandonment of Republican Spain by European democracies further encouraged German expansionism. On September 3, 1939, Britain and France declared war on Germany, resulting in chilling civilian and military casualties. On May 7, 1945, after Hitler's suicide, Germany's unconditional surrender was signed to the Americans, and a day later to the Soviets. The division of the world into blocs, agreed upon at Yalta and Potsdam, was already a fact.

The Division of Germany (1945-1989)

The division of Germany was primarily a product of German responsibility at the start of the war, compounded by the mismatch between the two blocs that were to play the main roles during the Cold War. For the Soviets, Germany, along with other countries in the area, should be part of a cordon sanitaire from north to south. This would ensure that these countries, either under Soviet influence or neutral, would never be used as a base for an attack from Western powers. For Britain and the United States, Germany, as a great power, should join the Western camp. They believed that Germany's inclination toward the Soviet orbit would unbalance the balance of power and put the revolution back on the agenda. Moreover, they also had an interest in delineating the border between the USSR and other countries, trying to ensure that the area was counted as a Western ally.

The Cold War began before the end of the war. Certain behaviors, such as the abandonment of the USSR by the Allies, or the lack of belligerence of democratic countries towards Franco's Spain, gave Stalin reasons for distrust. The Western powers did not frown upon a confrontation between Nazi Germany and Stalin's USSR, as the Soviet dictator had no hesitation in signing a non-aggression pact with Germany in 1939, pending the capitalist powers facing each other without involving the USSR. After the Nazi defeat, the USSR supported a unified Germany, which it hoped to attract, if not into its sphere of influence, then to a neutrality that would distance it from potential danger.

The lack of agreement reached a turning point in 1948 when the Soviets decided to blockade the city of Berlin, closing its roads, ports, and rail access. The German territory had been divided into four parts among the victorious powers, with the US ceding part of its area to France. The symbolic nature of Berlin was evident as the city, despite being in the zone of Soviet occupation, was also divided into four parts. On June 20, 1948, the Western powers implemented a currency reform and took other measures, including the merger of the three areas. Their goal was obvious: the creation of a German government.

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