Occupied Germany and occupied Iraq

I was surprised when I came across the following reference to postwar German resistance to the occupation authorities.  It comes in a review by history professor Hal Elliott Wert in the May-June 2005 issue of the Army's Military Review, (Review p. 110; p. 19 of the *.pdf document in my viewer)

He is reviewing the book Endkampf: Soldiers, Civilians,and the Death of the Third Reich by Stephen Fritz (2004).

He writes:

In April 1945, the war in Europe was near its end. Allied commanders, however, feared German SS and other hardcore elements in the Nazi regime would not surrender but, instead, continue to tenaciously resist while retreating to the mountains of Bavaria and Austria - an alpine festung [fortress].  How long these “werewolves” might hold out was anyone’s guess.

Stephen G. Fritz’s Endkampf convincingly challenges the accepted view that after the Allies crossed the Rhine in March 1945 the German army rapidly disintegrated and the war quickly wound down.To the contrary, he argues, the resistance in Bavaria was intense, and American units suffered more casualties in April 1945 than they had previously. Large numbers of civilians and combatants needlessly lost their lives in this hopeless Nazi last-ditch effort.

So far, that hardly seems controversial, although I doubt anyone on the Anglo-American side thought that the Germans would just throw down their arms as soon as the Rhine was breached.  That had fought ferociously for occupied territory.  Why would anyone expect they would fight less tenaciously, much less just surrender, when they were fighting on their home territory?

But then he continues.  And here it's not clear whether he's referring to material in the book or introducing this himself:

In 1947, American soldiers were attacked, sometimes killed, and Army facilities sabotaged or attacked. Part of the resistance was caused by diehard elements who stuck it out in frustration over the deteriorating economy and the large number of German women who were involved with American GIs.

And he draws a very strained analogy to the postwar occupation of Germany and today's occupation/counterinsurgency in Iraq.  "Very strained" is putting it mildly, although I know that has been a favorite  superficial comparison among the Bush true believers.

Reminiscent of the current situation in Iraq, occupation authorities, journalists, and visiting politicians often despaired of success in Germany, calling for more troops and more trained civil affairs personnel.  The Army and President Harry S. Truman’s administration (repeatedly accused of poor planning) faced charges similar to those being hurled today at those responsible for the war in Iraq. Skepticism toward eventual success and predictions of disaster were brandished by the press and public alike. Germany’s past, the devastation wrought by war, and the perception of a botched occupation led many to conclude that restoration of a democratic society was beyond reach.

What caught my attention was his reference to what he seems to think was an organized, violent resistance movement as late as 1947.  Because the accounts I've seen of that period were more in agreement with, for instance, this RAND study, America’s Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq by James Dobbins, et al (2003) Chapter 2: Germany (*.pdf file; p. 21 of report; p. 19 the *.pdf document on my viewer.)

U.S. officials anticipated and planned to deal with significant residual German resistance following the surrender of its armed forces. Yet no resistance of consequence emerged then or at any time thereafter, much as in Haiti during Operation Uphold Democracy .... The large number of U.S. and allied military forces in West Germany and the establishment of a strong constabulary force preempted most resistance. Indeed, the constabulary force was specifically created to respond to incidents of civil unrest, conduct mounted and dismounted police patrols, interdict smuggling operations, and aid in intelligence gathering. This contrasts starkly with nation-building efforts in such countries as Bosnia, which were marred by organized crime and civil unrest.

I have to wonder if his reference to what he gives us tobelieve were politically-motivated killings in 1947 were not more likely to have been murder for more-or-less personal reasons, as his mention of GI's dating German women seems to suggest.  I know there was some nationalistic resentment in Germany and Austria about local women dating Americans.  (It's a subject of some interest to me since my wife is Austrian.) And even on that subject - and I don't mean to be grim in saying this -  it's not as though any able-bodied German man would have experienced a shortage of eligible women at that time, even in very difficult economic circumstances.  Because such a large number of German men, especially but by no means exclusively younger men, had been killed in the war.

It seems to me that Wert is trying too hard in this review to create an easy comparison to today's situation in Iraq.  I haven't tried to analyze the RAND document in detail.  But my impression is that it gives a fairly realistic picture of the situation in the space available.  But it also seems to be reaching pretty hard for Iraq analogies.  For example, it argues:

The most important lesson from the U.S. occupation of Germany is that military force and political capital can, at least in some circumstances, be successfully employed to underpin democratic and societal transformation. Furthermore, such a transformation can be enduring. U.S., French, and British efforts to help build democratic institutions in Germany and to encourage the establishment of political parties were incremental and began in 1945. Over the next several years, these powers oversaw local and national elections; the establishment of a constitution and a bicameral parliament; and, in September 1949, the election of Konrad Adenauer as the first postwar chancellor of the newly formed West German state.

But it's not as though the Allied armies just rounded up people in the town square and said, "Okay, we're going to be using a strange new system called 'democracy' around here now, and here's how it works."

Germany had a democratic tradition going back to the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon (as they are called in German history), although it wasn't until the 1918 democratic revolution after the First World War that a fully democratic system was established there.  The weaknesses of the Weimar democracy have been widelydiscussed.  But in the 1920s, Germany was considered a model democracy by aspiringdemocrats in middle and eastern Europe.

That meant that Germany *had* leaders like Konrad Adenauer, Ernst Reuter, Kurt Schumacher, Herbert Wehner and Theodor Heuss who had actual experience in democratic politics.

The RAND study also seems to make a lot of the "denazification" program.  Although the Allies did intervene to prevent neo-Nazi type political groups from developing, the "denazification" program as such seems to be generally regarded by German historians as little more than an ineffective joke.

This is not to minimize the American, British and French contributions to building the postwar Federal Republic (of West Germany).  It's to recognize that it took place in a particular context.