TheSoviet occupation zone in Germany (German:Sowjetische Besatzungszone (SBZ) orOstzone,lit. 'East Zone';Russian:Советская оккупационная зона Германии,romanized: Sovetskaya okkupatsionnaya zona Germanii) was an area of Germany that was occupied by theSoviet Union as acommunist area, established as a result of thePotsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945. On 7 October 1949 theGerman Democratic Republic (GDR), commonly referred to in English asEast Germany, was established in the Soviet occupation zone.
| Soviet occupation zone in Germany Sowjetische Besatzungszone Советская оккупационная зона Германии | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Military occupation zone of theSoviet Union | |||||||||
.svg) | |||||||||
 The Soviet occupation zone in red | |||||||||
| Capital | Berlin | ||||||||
| Government | |||||||||
| • Type | Military occupation (member of theEastern Bloc) | ||||||||
| Military governors | |||||||||
• 1945–1946 | Georgy Zhukov | ||||||||
• 1946–1949 | Vasily Sokolovsky | ||||||||
• 1949 | Vasily Chuikov | ||||||||
| Historical era | Post-World War II Cold War | ||||||||
| 8 May 1945 | |||||||||
• German Democratic Republic established | 7 October 1949 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Today part of | Germany | ||||||||
The SBZ was one of the fourAllied occupation zones of Germany created at the end of World War II with the Allied victory. According to thePotsdam Agreement, theSoviet Military Administration in Germany (German initials: SMAD) was assigned responsibility for the middle portion of Germany. Eastern Germany beyond theOder-Neisse line, equal in territory to the SBZ, was to be annexed by Poland and itspopulation expelled, pending a final peace conference with Germany.[1]
By the time armed forces of the United States and United Kingdom began to meet Soviet Union forces, forming theLine of Contact, significant areas of what would become the Soviet zone of Germany were outside Soviet control. After several months of occupation, these gains by the British and Americans were ceded to the Soviets by July 1945, according to the previously agreed occupation zone boundaries.
The SMAD allowed fourpolitical parties to develop, though they were all required to work together under analliance known as the "Democratic Bloc" (later theNational Front). In April 1946, theSocial Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and theCommunist Party of Germany (KPD) wereforcibly merged to form theSocialist Unity Party which later became the governing party of the GDR.
The SMAD set upten "special camps" for the detention ofGermans, making use of some formerNazi concentration camps.
In 1945, the Soviet occupation zone consisted primarily of the central portions ofPrussia. After Prussia was dissolved by the Allied powers in 1947, the area was divided between the German states(Länder) ofBrandenburg,Mecklenburg,Saxony,Saxony-Anhalt andThuringia.[2] On 7 October 1949, the Soviet zone became the German Democratic Republic. In 1952, theLänder were dissolved and realigned into 14 districts(Bezirke), plus the district ofEast Berlin.
In 1952, with theCold War political confrontation well underway,Joseph Stalin sounded out the Western Powers about the prospect of a united Germany which would be non-aligned (the "Stalin Note"). The West's lack of interest in this proposal helped to cement the Soviet Zone's identity as the GDR for the next four decades.
"Soviet zone" and derivatives (or also, "the so-called GDR") remained official and common names for East Germany in West Germany, which refused to acknowledge the existence of a state in East Germany until 1972, when the government ofWilly Brandt extended a qualified recognition under itsOstpolitik initiative.
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See also
editReferences
edit- ^Geoffrey K. Roberts, Patricia Hogwood (2013).The Politics Today Companion to West European Politics. Oxford University Press. p. 50.ISBN 9781847790323.;Piotr Stefan Wandycz (1980).The United States and Poland. Harvard University Press. p. 303.ISBN 9780674926851.;Phillip A. Bühler (1990).The Oder-Neisse Line: a reappraisal under international law. East European Monographs. p. 33.ISBN 9780880331746.
- ^Peterson, Edward N. (1999).Russian commands and German resistance : the Soviet Occupation, 1945–1949. New York: P. Lang. p. 5.ISBN 0-8204-3948-7.OCLC 38207545.
- Brennan, Sean,'Land Reform Propaganda in Soviet Occupied Germany', University of Kent
- Lewkowicz, NicolasThe German Question and the International Order, 1943–48 (Palgrave Macmillan: Basingstoke and New York) (2008)
- Lewkowicz, Nicolas,The German Question and the Origins of the Cold War (IPOC: Milan) (2008)