Figure 1.-- Here we see German children outsude a school somewhere in the Soviet occupation zone in Eastern Germany. The photograph is undated, but it looks like only a few year after the War, perhaps 1946-48. Perhaps our German readers can spot some clues. The photograph underlies a basic difference between the the NAZIs and Soviet Communists. Both Hitler and Stalin crafted police state dictatorships and a cult of personality. Hitkler was, however, much more subtle. You never saw big murals with portraits of Hitler plastered over the front of a German school.
The Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (KPD) had been one of the world's most important Communuist parties. Hitler and the NAZIs largely destroyed the Party. Surprisingly, Stalin's NKVD murdered or sent many syurvivors to the Gulag. As the Red Army first stopped the Whermacht and then drove it back west, Stalin began to prepare for governing Germany after the defeat of the NAZIs. He began to gather together the survivors of his purge of the DKP as well as the children of those purged who had been raised in Soviet orphanasges. They were sent back to Soviet occupied eastern Germany. As in the rest of Eastern Europe, Stalin attempted to hide his political suppression of the occupied countries abd the creation of a Soviet empire. As a kind of fig leaft, the Soviets for consumption in the West made a public shoe of legalizing capitalist and Christian Democratic parties. This was all for show and non-Communist parties had not real opportunity to contest free elections. It did influence people in the West like former vice president Henry Wallace who complained that President Truman's foreign policy was too confrontational toward Stlin abnd the Soviets. There were several all to real developments at the Soviets began to lay the groundwork for a Stalinist state. First, was to force the union of the Communists and Socialistrs into the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party of Germany -- SED) which would eventually become the ruling East German ruling party. Second, Stalin made sure that there would be no proletarian democracy in East Germany to replace NAZI rule. That does not mean that thar there was no democratic facade. Remember that Stalin�s Soviet constitution of 1936-37 was a beautifully crafted democratic document. It provided the facade for Slalinism which apeased the clueless in the West. The NKVD unhindered by the Constitutiion prioceeded to murder of hundreds of thousands of Communist Party members and Red Army officers, sending even more to the Gulag. The same occurred in East Germany. German Communists who went back to East Germany after the War offer graphic testimony as to what happened. [Pollck and Lenohard] And there are also descriptions from the Soviet side. [Kopelev] Stalin ruthlessly crushed working-class opposition to Stalinism. Concentration camps were set up to deal with individuals who were even suspected of opposition. Third, came constant purging, of both East German Communists as well as the Communist movement in West Germany to make sure there was no criticsm of the Soviet Union. This turnedcwhat once had been the hot bead of the Euroopean Communist Party into impotence. Fourth, Stalin was determined to punish the Germans. At Yalta he suggested shooting 50,000 Whermacht officers, a kind of reopeat of Katyn. And in the final days of World War II unleased the Red Army to an orgy of rape on German women. And then Stalin orderd the NKVD to dismantling the industrial plant in the Soviet occupation zone and ship it to the Soviet Union as war reparations and at the same time reduced the potential military capability of Germany. . For Stalin, Germany was the most important part of his new empire. He wanted to make sure thast there would be no duiscebt in East Germany. The Germans had come very close to destroying Soviet Communism and Stalin was determined to make sure that it never occurred again. But in doing so, almost from the point of launching the Cold War, he insured that the Soviet Union would fail. Germany was the ground zero of the Cold War. It wiuld begin and end uin Germany. No country was more important. If Germany went Communist, the Soviets would dminate Europe. If Germany developed into a bulkwark for free enterprise and democracy, backed by Ameruica, the Soviets could not dominate Western Europe. And West Germans not only watched Soviet behavior in East Germany, but experienced the German economic miracle while noeting the abject economic failure of Communist economic plnning theroughout the Soviet Eastern European Empire.
Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (KPD)
Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (German Communist Party-- KPD) was founded in the aftermath of World War I as aplinter group of the larger German Socilist Party. The KPD was initially called the Sparticists abhd attempted to seize ciontrol of Germany by force. Thev KPD had been one of the world's most important Communuist parties. Hitler and the NAZIs largely destroyed the Party. Surprisingly, Stalin's NKVD murdered or sent many survivors to the Gulag. As the Red Army first stopped the Whermacht and then drove it back west, Stalin began to prepare for governing Germany after the defeat of the NAZIs. He began to gather together the survivors of his purge of the DKP as well as the children of those purged who had been raised in Soviet orphanasges. They were sent back to Soviet occupied eastern Germany.
Leadership Group
As the Red Army first stopped the Whermacht and then drive it back west, Stalin began to prepare for governing Germany after the defeat of the NAZIs. He began to gather together the survivors of his purge of the DKP as well as the children of those purged who had been raised in Soviet orphanasges. They were sent back to Soviet occupied eastern Germany. Former KPD members also returned to Germany from Western exile after the War.
Stalinist Takeover Tactics
As in the rest of Eastern Europe, Stalin attempted to hide his political suppression of the occupied countries abd the creation of a Soviet empire. As a kind of fig leaf, the Soviets for consumption in the West made a public shoe of legalizing capitalist and Christian Democratic parties. This was all for show and non-Communist parties had not real opportunity to contest free elections. It did influence people in the West like former vice president Henry Wallace who complained that President Truman's foreign policy was too confrontational toward Stlin annd the Soviets.
Major Developments
There were several all to real developments at the Soviets began to lay the groundwork for a Stalinist state.
First, was to force the union of the Communists and Socialistrs into the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party of Germany -- SED) which woiuld eventually become the ruling East German ruling party. The two parties had been rivals in Weimar Germany. And under instructions from Stalin, the KPD was prevented from cooperating with the Siocialists, even after the NAZI rose as a major political party (1929). Uniion wa depicted as a democratic development. In effect what happended was that the Siocislists were disbanded. It was the Communists wjo had total control of the SED.
Second, Stalin made sure that there would be no proletarian democracy in East Germany to replace NAZI rule. That does not mean that thar there was no democratic facade. Remember that Stalin�s Soviet constitution of 1936-37 was a beautifully crafted democratic document. It provided the facade for Slalinism which apeased the clueless in the West. The NKVD unhindered by the Constitution prioceeded to murder of hundreds of thousands of Communist Party members and Red Army officers, sending even more to the Gulag. The same occurred in East Germany. German Communists who went back to East Germany after the War offer graphic testimony as to what happened. [Pollck and Lenohard] And there are also descriptions from the Soviet side. [Kopelev] The NKVD and German auxileries ruthklessly crushed working-class opposition to Stalinism. Concentration camps were set up to deal with individuals who were even suspected of opposition.
Third, came constant purging, of both East German Communists as well as the Communist movement in West Germany to make sure there was no criticsm of the Soviet Union. This turned what once had been the hot bed of the Euroopean Communist Party into impotence.
Fourth, Stalin was determined to punish the Germans. At Yalta he suggested shooting 50,000 Whermacht officers, a kind of repeat of Katyn. And in the final days of World War II unleased the Red Army to an orgy of rape on German women. And then Stalin orderd the NKVD to dismantling the industrial plant in the Soviet occupation zone and ship it to the Soviet Union as war reparations and at the same time reduced the potential military capability of Germany.
Economic Policy
Prisons and Concentration Camps
The NKVD with the defeat and occupation of NAZI Germany established 10 'special camps' subordinate to the Soviet Gulag in the Soviet Occupation Zone. The NKVD used former POW Stalags, prisons, and concentration camps. This included Sachsenhausen (special camp number 7) and Buchenwald (special camp number 2). It is not akltogether clear who the individuals arrested were. Some were NAZIs guilty of war crimes, but not all. The DDR covered up evidence of Soviet actions at these camps. Since the collapse of the DDR, information has emerged of mass killing at these camps. The German government estimated that 65,000 inmates perished in these camps or while being transportation to them." [Germans find ...] There does not seem to have been any trial of the individuals killed. Some of the German researchers contend that, Sachsenhausen, where the remains 12,500 Soviet era victims have been uncovered, should be considered an integral part of the Soviet Gulag system. [Ex-death camp ...] Such ctions were at first conducted by tghe NKVD. As German Communists assumed responsibuility for the DDR, it was German security authorities, such as thec Stasi, which used prison camps to hold political prisoners, opponents of the communist regime or suspected Nazi collaborators. We have not been able to find much information on these camps. We do know that prisoners, including political prisoners were subjected to forced labour. The DDR because of economic failure was chronically short of hard curreny. As a result, prisoners were forced to work for Western companies, the best document incidence was work for the Swedish IKEA furniture company. One source reports, "Alexander Arnold, who was imprisoned in Naumburg in the early 1980s, said prisoners who failed to meet a quota were punished. 'If one delivered less than 80 percent of the expected standard, one was accused of sabotage,' he said.
Anita Gossler, a campaigner and former prisoner, said inmates of East Germany�s notorious Hoheneck prison for women were forced to sew bedclothes destined for foreign companies. 'There were three shifts each day,' she said. 'You couldn�t refuse. If you did you were locked in a dark cell with bread and soup for at least three days.' Until 1980 prisoners also risked being sent to the �water room,� where they had to stand knee-deep in cold water for hours.
Gossler said one inmate once managed to hide a note in a bed cover that was later discovered by an IKEA customer in the west � a rare piece of evidence of forced labor at the time." [Adams] At the heart of the DDR prison and concentration camp system was the Stasi State Prison Berlin-Hohensch�nhausen. To facilitate its state security mission, the Stasi operated its own separate penal system, separate from that of the Ministry of the Interior. The Stasi system handeled concentration camps for political, as opposed to criminal, offenders. The Stasi used both physical and psychological torture in its camps. The Stasi through the Hohensch�nhausen coordinated the detention and interrogation of the political prisoners (1951-89). Hohensch�nhausen Prison is located in Lichtenberg, in the far east of Berlin. It is set in the middle of a non-descript residential neighborhood. The streets were blocked off to create a restricted area. It is unclear to what residents knew what was going on behind the bleak grey walls. The prisoners incarcerated there had no idea where they were. After arrest, prisoners were driven around in a windowless truck, disguised as an ordinary delivery truck. This went on for hours to distorient them. Only after release did they realise d they realise they were still in East Berlin. Prisoners entering Hohensch�nhausen were kept in complete isolation with absolutely no personal belongings. They had no contact with anyone other than the guards. No visitors were allowed and the familywas not infiormed where thiose arrested were being held.
Stasi
The Ministry of State Security (Stasi) included the Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment. This was used for facilities security and plain clothes events security. This was the sole part of the Stasi that was visible to the public and thus were very unpopular. The Stasi was a force of about 90,000 full time employees supported by 189,000 unofficial collaborators. After the fall of tthe DDR, East Germans learned that the Stasi commonlyvrecruited family members to spy on suspects. The Stasi maintaining close, repressive surveillance over the East German people. The Stasi played an almost unbelievanle role in the lives of East German citizens. [Funder] The story of the Stasi is George Orwell's 1984 brought to life. The Stasi were both pervasive and ruthless in their supression of a relatively small population. The Stasi facilitated state control of just about all aspects of DDR life, including the media, to schooling and even, to some extent, people's private lives.
Foundation of the DDR (1949)
Thec Western Allies unified their occuption zones and carried out a series iof reforms that would lead to the German Economic Miracle. Stalin after failing to force the Allies out of Berlin, decided to form the German Democratic Republic (1949). This left two German states, formalizing political division. The Soviets turned control of East Germany obstendibly over to the Socialist Unity Party headed by Wilhelm Pieck (1876�1960). He became president of the DDR and officially the most important figure in the DDR until his death. The primary executive
function was assumed by the SED General Secretary Walter Ulbricht. Firnmer Socialist leader Otto Grotewohl (1894�1964) became prime minister, but had much less influence than Ulbricht. Grotewohl after Stalin's death in an important speech to an SED party conference criticized abuses by SED functuiinsries (March 28, 1956). This was niot a soeech hec woukd have given if Stalin had still been alive. This was a time of liberalization in the Communist world. Khruchev cruicized Stalin at the 20th Party Congress. The Poles were pressing for liberalization. Grotewohl in particular condemned abuses in the legal system. He denounced illegal arrests and called for more respect for civil rights. He suggested that issues be debated in parliament and notv decioded by thec SED leadership. [Hoffman] The Hungarian Revolution briought the oricess of liberalization to a halt (October1960). This strengthened the hand of hardliners like Ulbricht.
Stalin Note (March 1952)
Stalin came to see that his policy of not cooperating with the Western Allies in occupied Germany and suppressing all non-Communist expression abnd political rights had been a terrible mistake. The Western Allies had no agreed policy about post-War Germany. There were many in the West preoared to both punish and demilitarize the Germans. The Morgenthasub Plan was one exoression of this line iof thought. Stalin by taking over all of Eastern Europe made it cklear what huis objective was in Western Europe. The Western reaction was to instead of punishing the Germns, to instead let the Germns recover and eventualkly once democracy was estabklished, to allow them to remilitarize and becone a buklwark against Communism in Central Europe. This was just what Stalin did niot want, a remilitarized Germny. Stalin thus issued a policy proposal to reunify Germany, by creating a neutral, demilitarized state (1952). He offered no demands on economic policies and with guarantees for "the rights of man and basic freedoms, including freedom of speech, press, religious persuasion, political conviction, and assembly" and free activity of democratic parties and organizations. [Steininger] This all sounded very good. The problem which West Germans understoiod immedistely was that with no military of its own backed by the Americans, there woukld be no guarantee that the Red Army woukd not at some future date invade. Thus West German leaders did not tajke the proposal seriously, knowing what happened to non-Communists politicans in Sioviet-controlled states. ThecWestern Allies, concerned about Siviet intentions also did not respond, understanding thst estern Eurioe was indfebnsable with out a German mikitry commitment. Wes German was already being seen as a future member of NATO.
Importance of Germany
For Stalin, Germany was the most important part of his new empire. He wanted to make sure thast there would be no discent in East Germany. The Germans had come very close to destroying Soviet Communism and Stalin was determined to make sure that it never occurred again.
Cold War Implications
But in doing so, almost from the point of launching the Cold War, he insured that the Soviet Union would fail. Germany was the ground zero of the Cold War. It wiuld begin and end uin Germany. No country was more important. If Germany went Communist, the Soviets would dminate Europe. If Germany developed into a bulkwark for free enterprise and democracy, backed by Ameruica, the Soviets could not dominate Western Europe. And West Germans not only watched Soviet behavior in East Germany, but experienced the German economic miracle while noeting the abject economic failure of Communist economic plnning theroughout the Soviet Eastern European Empire.
Innovation and Creativity
One question not often asked is the impact of Stalinism on innovation and creativity. Germany before the NAZI take over and World War II was a hotbed of scientific discovery and technical inovation. No country approached Germany in Nobel Prize laurates and lesser scientific achievements. And this continued even after the disater of World War I. The NAZIs and Workd War II finally changed this. But even so scientufic achievements ciontinued in the German Federal Republic (West Germany). But what is notabke after the War is that the DDR virtually fell off the map in terms of scientific and technical innovation. The paucity iof Nobel laurates is in stark contrast to the achievements of West German scientists. One has to ask, what notable scientific achievement, pharmaecutical discovery, medical innivation, industrial innovation came out of East Germany. And this was a country with an extremekly well educated population including many scientists and engineers. One has only to compare the East German Trebant with West German Volkswagens and BMWs. One has to ask why this was. Here it is difficuklt to isolate Stalinist oppression from the economic impacts of socialism and state planning.
Sources
Adams, Becket. "Ikea apologizes for using forced prison labor in Communist0occupied East Germany," The Blaze (November 16, 2012).
Funder, Anna. Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall
Kopelev, Lev. No Jail for Thought. Kopelev was a Red Army officer who was senternced to 10 years in the Gulag for being soft on German civilians.
Leonhard, Wolfgang. Child of the Revolution.
Pollck, Stephen. Strange Land Behind Me.
Hoffmann, Dierk. Otto Grotewohl (1894-1964): Eine politische Biographie.
Steininger, Rolf. The German Question: The Stalin Note of 1952 and the Problem of Reunification (New York: Columbia University, 1990).
"Ex-death camp tells story Of Nazi and Soviet horrors, New York Times (December 17, 2001).
"Germans find mass graves at an ex-Soviet camp," New York Times (September 24, 1992).
