Our latest “Document of the Week” was chosen by our Senior Curator, Dr. Charlie Hall. It comprises a report written by the Political Division of the British occupation authorities in Germany in 1947. It offers an appraisal of the political views of senior German military figures held in a British prisoner-of-war camp.
After the Second World War, the British and their allies worried a great deal about a possible future German military resurgence, so they monitored the attitudes of German generals very carefully. As this report notes, “the majority of the [German] officers have not changed their attitude to their former enemies in any way”, judging that “this probably makes them the most dangerous threat in the German community to World Peace”.
The report continues by explaining that the German generals “have an unbounding contempt for the British Army as an Army, for the British people and the British way of life”. It surmises that these men “would never feel at home in a democratically run country” and that therefore they might seek to work more closely with the “totalitarian and ‘disciplined’” Russians, despite their ideological differences.
The report concludes by urging the British authorities to dispense with complacency, dispel “the notion that the German Generals and General staff are necessarily ‘on our side’”, and implement more effective re-education initiatives within occupied Germany.
Where to find this document
This item comes from our primary source collection, Building a New Germany: Denazification and Political Re-Education, 1944-1948. Comprising over 3,700 images, drawn from files at The National Archives, this collection provides a detailed account of the denazification and re-education efforts which Britain directed at Germany after the Second World War. The collection offers fascinating insights into British perspectives on Nazi Germany, as well as into concepts of political control and indoctrination, collective psychology, and the shifting ideological landscape of the early Cold War.
Visit the collection page to learn more.
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