| American occupation zone in Germany Amerikanische Besatzungszone Deutschlands | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Military occupation zone of theAmerican part ofAllied-occupied Germany | |||||||||
| 1945–1949 | |||||||||
.svg) | |||||||||
 American occupation zone (orange) | |||||||||
| Capital | Frankfurt | ||||||||
| Government | |||||||||
| • Type | Military Occupation | ||||||||
| Military governors | |||||||||
• 1945 (first) | Dwight D. Eisenhower | ||||||||
• 1949 (last) | Clarence R. Huebner | ||||||||
| Historical era | Post-World War II Cold War | ||||||||
| 8 May 1945 | |||||||||
• Federal Republic of Germany established | 23 May 1949 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Today part of | Germany | ||||||||
TheAmerican occupation zone in Germany (German:Amerikanische Besatzungszone), also known as theUS-Zone, and theSouthwest zone,[1] was one of the fouroccupation zones established by theAllies of World War II in Germany west of theOder–Neisse line in July 1945, around two months after theGerman surrender and the end ofWorld War II in Europe. It was controlled by theOffice of Military Government, United States (OMGUS) and ceased to exist after the establishment of theFederal Republic of Germany on 21 September 1949 (FRG established 23 May 1949), but the United States maintains military presence across Germany.
The American zone of occupation was more than 40,000 square miles (100,000 km2) or about the size ofPennsylvania, with almost 1,400 miles (2,300 km) of internal and international boundaries. The largest cities wereFrankfurt andMunich.[2]: 6 The zone encompassed a large section of south-eastern and central Germany:
In addition,Bremen andBremerhaven (including the districts ofWesermünde,Osterholz undWesermarsch until December 1945) were part of the zone and played a central role as the port through which the occupation zone was supplied.
More than 16 million Germans and more than one half milliondisplaced persons lived in the zone.[2]: 6 At the end of October 1946, the American Zone had a population of:
Berlin was divided in four between the four occupying powers. The southwestern portion (Zehlendorf, Steglitz, Schöneberg, Kreuzberg, Tempelhof, Neukölln) was the American sector and came under US military administration, but was formally separate from the American occupation zone.
Under theWanfried agreement on 17 September 1945, some villages on theWerra river were exchanged for some villages in theSoviet Occupation Zone, in order to place the whole of theFrankfurt–Göttingen railway under American control. This also brought part ofEichsfeld into the zone.
The headquarters of the OMGUS was the formerIG Farben Building in Frankfurt. Command of the OMGUS was initially invested in the later PresidentDwight Eisenhower, who wascommander-in-chief of the American forces in Europe at the end of World War II.
Eisenhower's successors were:
The four Allied powers coordinated the occupation of Germany through theAllied Control Council, which ceased to operate after the Soviets withdrew from it on 20 March 1948. In 1949, the military administration of the American, British, and French zones was succeeded by theAllied High Commission, which remained in operation until 1955.
TheUnited States Constabulary provided security, with soldiers in other fields retraining as military police.[2]: v The military occupation of the American sector ofWest Berlin continued until 2 October 1990.
Under "Proclamation no. 2" of 19 September 1945, they announced the intention to organise the territory on afederal model. Between 1945 and 1946, the Americans established fourstates in their zone:Bavaria,Bremen,Greater Hesse, andWürttemberg-Baden, which worked together in theState Council of the American occupation zone [de] (Länderrat). Württemberg-Baden subsequently merged with the states ofBaden andWürttemberg-Hohenzollern in theFrench occupation zone to formBaden-Württemberg in 1952.
On 5 March 1946, the Law for Liberation from National Socialism and Militarism (German:Befreiungsgesetz) came into force in the American zone, providing the model forDenazification throughout the western zones: all Germans over 18 years of age must complete a questionnaire giving an account of their role inNazi Germany.[4]
In January 1946 elections were held for local councils in 10,429 towns smaller than 20,000 people. Nazis were disqualified from voting or running for office. An unexpectedly high 86% of eligible voters participated. CSU received the most votes in Bavaria, CDU in Württemberg-Baden, and SPD in Greater Hesse. While OMGUS observers were dubious of the German people having suddenly wholeheartedly embraced democracy, they were pleased that the elections gave some legitimacy to local governments that until then the American occupation had appointed.Landkreis andStadtkreis elections were held on 28 April and 26 May 1946; while OMGUS remained skeptical of genuine democratic inclination, American Landkreis and Stadtkreis detachments became liaison and security forces.[5]
On 30 June 1946, the first state Constituent Assembly elections were held (except in Bremen). In Bavaria, CSUwon a majority; in Württemberg-Baden, CDU won a plurality, whilst in Greater Hesse, SPD won a plurality. In Bremen, the first elections were held on 13 October 1946, resulting in a SPD majority, butWilhelm Kaisen still chose to form a coalition with KPD and Bremen's Democratic People's Party (Bremer Demokratische Volkspartei, BDV), a precursor of FDP. Following the passage of state constitutions, new elections were held in Württemberg-Baden on 24 November, resulting inReinhold Maier (DVP) continuing the all-party (CDU, SPD, DVP, KPD) government, and on 1 December in Bavaria, where CSU won a majority, butHans Ehard still formed a grand coalition with SPD andWAV, before leading a one-party government from 20 September 1947; and in Hesse, where SPD won a plurality andChristian Stock (SPD) formed a grand coalition with CDU. On 12 October 1947, Bremen held another election, where SPD came four seats short of a majority and thus formed a coalition with BDV, with Kaisen continuing in office.
On 1 January 1947, the American andBritish occupation zones were combined to form theBizone. This became the Trizone after the French occupation zone joined on 1 August 1948 and became the Federal Republic of Germany ("West Germany") on 23 May 1949 with the passage of theBasic Law.
Following the complete closure of all Nazi German media, the launch and operation of completely new newspaper titles began by licensing carefully selected Germans as publishers. Licenses were granted to Germans not involved in Nazi propaganda to establish those newspapers, includingFrankfurter Rundschau (August 1945),Der Tagesspiegel (Berlin; September 1945), andSüddeutsche Zeitung (Munich; October 1945).
Radio stations were run by the military government. Unlike the French and British zones, which each established a single channel (SWF [de] andNWDR respectively), the Americans established several broadcasters, in line with the system of local radio broadcasters in the United States:Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR, initiallyRadio München),Radio Bremen,Hessischer Rundfunk (HR, initiallyRadio Frankfurt), andSüddeutscher Rundfunk (SDR, initiallyRadio Stuttgart). TheRIAS in West-Berlin remained a radio station under U.S. control.
From 22 September 1945, there were three long-distance train services operating in the American occupation zone, for the first time since the end of the war. All three routes travelled from Frankfurt am Main and werethird class only:[6]
The original documents of the OMGUS are kept in theWashington National Records Center (held by theUniversity of Maryland). The documents from Hesse were recorded on microfiche in the late 1970s/early 1980s, which are now accessible in all three Hessian State Archives (Hessian Central State Archives inWiesbaden,Hessian State Archives in Marburg undHessian State Archives in Darmstadt [de]).[8] The Hessian State Archives in Darmstadt have made the details of all these microfiches available online.[9]
Allied-occupied Germany (1945–1949/1956/1990) | ||
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American Zone |  | |
British Zone | ||
French Zone | ||
Soviet Zone | ||
| Berlin (1949–1990) |
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| International | |
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| National | |
