Rebuilding Berlin: A New Police Force to Restore Law and Order
The Allies’ efforts to restore law & order in a devastated, crime ridden, postwar Berlin
After the defeat of the Nazis, the Allies’ initial policies in the newly occupied Germany worsened the life of ordinary Germans and the prospects for a peaceful Europe.
The Soviet generals allowed their soldiers to loot, rape with impunity, and systematically pillage Germany to get reparations. The initial policies of the US occupation force included appropriating the best properties and displacing Germans.
Further, US soldiers were trained, at first, to be skeptical of Germans. The situation in Berlin got increasingly worse and the occupying forces decided to establish a police force in a bid to restore law and order. The increasing crime rates and youth crime were of great concern to the occupying powers.
Establishing a New Police Force
Upon defeating the Nazis, the Allied leaders sought to make their victory total and sought to remove all people with Nazi affiliations from positions of power (Council Directive 38).
This was an effort to remove former Nazis and their collaborators from “public life” (McCloy: Godecke). Importantly, Americans pushed for amnesty for people born after January 1, 1939, thus from the beginning the USA held that the young should be treated differently (McCloy).
Pragmatic concerns and the need to establish order surpassed the desire to deNazify Germany. The Soviet zones quickly repudiated Nazi laws, but authorities soon thereafter had no choice but to use some of those policies to start restoring order (Evans, 306).
Swiftly they entered into an agreement with the German Democratic Republic (East German Communist State) to release German prisoners of war unless they had committed major crimes (SU and GDR). They were keen to let former Nazis keep their jobs if they pledged to work for communism (McCloy).
Despite their promise to remove Nazis from public life, they appointed Markgraf, a former Wehrmacht Captain to the police force (Fenemore, 40). Practical needs like forming a new police force were more important than denazification. As tensions grew between the US and the Soviets, each side’s prime goal became establishing a well-functioning occupation sector.
The challenges of forming a new police force made it harder to establish the rule of law. One of the obstacles was that police records were destroyed and thus it was difficult to determine whether applicants had been former criminals (Fenemore, 40).
Another problem was that many of those qualified to serve had had close connections to the Nazi regime. Within two months, the new police recruited sixteen thousand members (Fenemore, 42). It is now known that some former Nazis claimed to be victims and joined the police force (Fenemore, 44).
The problems Berlin faced made the police force ineffective. Many Germans were drawn to the force despite the poor pay because policemen got good rations (Fenemore, 46). In a city where many had to commit crimes to avoid starving, good rations were a powerful motivator.
Thus, those who were recruited may not have been the most suited for the job at hand. Police groups lacked vehicles, structures, and training; therefore, they could not do their jobs properly (Fenemore, 45).
There was also mass migration and by 1949 half a million young people had fled from East to West Germany (Evans, 309). Between the personnel issues, the lack of equipment and training, and other programs, there was little the police force could do. Their ability to succeed was hampered by political decisions too.
In Berlin, police troops were restricted to their respective occupation zones and could not apprehend Allied soldiers or police in other zones (Fenemore, 42, 45). There are reports of Allied forces playing with the helmets of the officers of the newly formed police force (Fenemore, 61–62). Many women also responded to the call for police recruits, and in Soviet zones they were assigned to be detectives (Fenemore, 47–51).
Policewomen faced sexism and were mostly assigned to deal with truant students (Fenemore, 51). They worked on special police groups that oversaw sex crimes and crimes involving children. The creation of special task forces to deal with the problem of truancy and youth crime demonstrates that the levels of such crime were sufficiently high to warrant such measures. Given this increase, police women’s role would be important in establishing some sense of law and order.
Conclusions
In short the aftermath of the war brought ever more misery and trouble to Berlin. These problems were coupled with growing tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union.
- The chaos and lawlessness meant that many Germans needed to resort to criminal activity for survival. The Allies initial policies pushed Germans to operate a black market and see some crimes as tolerable.
- Growing tensions between Americans and Soviets increased the significance of their ability to establish a well functioning society.
- The establishment of a Police force faced many challenges which increased the negative impacts of crime.
This post heavily draws from an essay Christian wrote for a class on the history of everyday life in Cold War Berlin. Christian would like to express his gratitude to Briana and Caroline for an exciting course, their help and support. Lucas and Christian have worked on a substantial revision of Christian’s original work.
Authors: Christian Orlic and Lucas Heili
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