The Potsdam Agreement was the agreement between three of the Allies of World War II: the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union on 1 August 1945. A product of the Potsdam Conference, it concerned the military occupation and reconstruction of Germany, its border, and the entire European Theatre of War territory. It also addressed Germany's demilitarisation, reparations, the prosecution of war criminals and the mass expulsion of ethnic Germans from various parts of Europe. France was not invited in the conference but formally still one of powers occupying Germany.
The history of Germany from 1945–1990 spans the period following World War II, from the Berlin Declaration marking the Allied-occupied period in Germany on 5 June 1945 to German reunification on 3 October 1990.
The final battles of the European Theatre of World War II continued after the definitive overall surrender of Nazi Germany to the Allies, signed by Field marshal Wilhelm Keitel on 8 May 1945 in Karlshorst, Berlin. After German dictator Adolf Hitler's suicide and handing over of power to grand admiral Karl Dönitz in May of 1945, the Soviet troops conquered Berlin and accepted surrender of the Dönitz-led government. The last battles were fought as part of the Eastern Front which ended in the total surrender of all of Nazi Germany’s remaining armed forces such as in the Courland Pocket in western Latvia from Army Group Courland in the Baltics surrendering on 10 May 1945 and in Czechoslovakia during the Prague offensive on 11 May 1945.
Following the termination of hostilities in World War II, the Allies were in control of the defeated Axis countries. Anticipating the defeat of Germany and Japan, they had already set up the European Advisory Commission and a proposed Far Eastern Advisory Commission to make recommendations for the post war period. Accordingly, they managed their control of the defeated countries through Allied Commissions, often referred to as Allied Control Commissions (ACC), consisting of representatives of the major Allies.
The Austrian State Treaty or Austrian Independence Treaty re-established Austria as a sovereign state. It was signed on 15 May 1955 in Vienna, at the Schloss Belvedere among the Allied occupying powers and the Austrian government. The neighbouring Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia acceded to the treaty subsequently. It officially came into force on 27 July 1955.
The Saar Protectorate, officially Saarland, was a French protectorate and a disputed territory separated from Germany. On joining the Federal Republic of Germany in 1957, it became the smallest "federal state", the Saarland, not counting the "city states" of Berlin, Hamburg, and Bremen. It is named after the Saar River.
The entirety of Germany was militarily occupied by the Allies from the Berlin Declaration on 5 June 1945 to the establishment of West Germany on 23 May 1949. After Nazi Germany (1933–1945) of the German Reich (1871–1945) surrendered to the Allies and collapsed on 8 May 1945, the four countries representing the Allies asserted joint authority and sovereignty with the Allied Control Council (ACC) at the 1945 Berlin Declaration. At first, defining Allied-occupied Germany as all territories (1922–1938) of the former German Reich before the Nazi annexing of Austria and later at the 1945 Potsdam Conference of the Allies themselves, the Potsdam Agreement on 1 August decided the new eastern German border by giving Poland and the Soviet Union all regions of Germany east of the Oder–Neisse line and divided the remaining "Germany as a whole" into the four occupation zones for administrative purposes under the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and the Soviet Union. Although the three of Allies agreed about the occupation, division, and border of Germany in the 1943 Tehran Conference in Iran before, the four occupied zones located in Germany were only agreed by the three Allies at the February 1945 Yalta Conference.
The Petersberg Agreement is an international treaty that extended the rights of the government of West Germany vis-a-vis the occupying forces of the United Kingdom, France, and the United States. It is viewed as the first major step of West Germany towards sovereignty. It was signed by West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Allied High Commissioners Brian Hubert Robertson, André François-Poncet (France), and John J. McCloy on 22 November 1949. The Hotel Petersberg, near Bonn, was the seat of the High Commissioners and the place of signature. The agreement was the first modification of the Occupation Statute.
Hotel Petersberg is a hotel and official guest house of the Federal Republic of Germany, termed the "Bundesgästehaus". It is located on the Petersberg, a prominent mountain of the Siebengebirge near Bonn, Germany. With a height of 331 metres (1,086 ft), it overlooks the cities of Königswinter, on the right bank of the Rhine river, and Bonn on the opposite side.
The industrial plans for Germany were designs the Allies considered imposing on Germany in the Aftermath of World War II to reduce and manage Germany's industrial capacity.
The Occupation Statute of Germany of April 10, 1949 specified the roles and responsibilities of the newly created government of the Federal Republic of Germany and the Allied High Commission. It was drawn up by American, British, and French representatives and was in force until the Treaties of Paris (1954) came into force on May 5, 1955.
The Bonn–Paris conventions were signed in May 1952 and came into force after the 1955 ratification. The conventions put an end to the Allied occupation of West Germany.
The legal status of Germany concerns the question of the extinction, or otherwise continuation, of the German nation-state following the rise and downfall of Nazi Germany, and constitutional hiatus of the military occupation of Germany by the four Allied powers from 1945 to 1949. It became current once again when the German Democratic Republic joined the Federal Republic of Germany in 1990.
The Berlin Declaration of 5 June 1945 or the Declaration regarding the defeat of Germany, had the governments of the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and France, acting on behalf of the Allies of World War II, jointly assume de jure "supreme authority" over Germany after its military defeat and asserted the legitimacy of their joint determination of issues regarding its administration and boundaries prior to the forthcoming Potsdam Conference.
The London and Paris Conferences were two related conferences held in London and Paris during September–October 1954 to determine the status of West Germany. The talks concluded with the signing of the Paris Agreements, which granted West Germany some sovereignty, ended the occupation, and allowed its admittance to NATO. Furthermore, both West Germany and Italy joined the Brussels Treaty on 23 October 1954. The Agreements went into force on 5 May 1955. The participating powers included France, the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, West Germany, Italy, Canada, the United States, and remaining NATO members.
The International Authority for the Ruhr (IAR) was an international body established in 1949 by the Western Allies to regulate the coal and steel industries of the Ruhr area in West Germany. Its seat was in Düsseldorf.
The Allied Control Council (ACC) or Allied Control Authority and also referred to as the Four Powers, was the governing body of the Allied occupation zones in entire Germany (1945-1949/1991) and Austria (1945-1955) after the end of World War II in Europe. After the defeat of the Nazis, Germany and Austria were occupied as two different areas, both by the same four Allies. Both were later divided into four zones by the 1 August 1945 Potsdam Agreement. Its members were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, and France. The organisation was based in Schöneberg, Berlin.
The London Six-Power Conference in 1948 was held between the three Western occupation forces in Germany after the World War II and the Benelux countries. The aim of the conference was to pave the way for Germany's participation in the international community through the creation of a democratic and federal government in the area of the U.S., British and French zones of the country. The conference was held in two sessions, the first from 23 February to 6 March, the second from 20 April to 2 June 1948.
This article outlines the history of the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) of the European Union (EU), a part of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP).
