Denazification was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of the Nazi ideology following the Second World War. It was carried out by removing those who had been Nazi Party or SS members from positions of power and influence, by disbanding or rendering impotent the organizations associated with Nazism, and by trying prominent Nazis for war crimes in the Nuremberg trials of 1946. The program of denazification was launched after the end of the war and was solidified by the Potsdam Agreement in August 1945. The term denazification was first coined as a legal term in 1943 by the Pentagon, intended to be applied in a narrow sense with reference to the post-war German legal system. However, it later took on a broader meaning.
Konstantinos G. Karamanlis was a Greek politician who was the four-time Prime Minister of Greece and two-term president of the Third Hellenic Republic. A towering figure of Greek politics, his political career spanned portions of seven decades, covering much of the latter half of the 20th century.
Hans Josef Maria Globke was a German administrative lawyer, who worked in the Prussian and Reich Ministry of the Interior in the Reich, during the Weimar Republic and the time of National Socialism. Later he was the Under-Secretary of State and Chief of Staff of the German Chancellery in West Germany from 28 October 1953 to 15 October 1963 under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer. He is the most prominent example of the continuity of the administrative elites between Nazi Germany and the early West Germany.
Max Theodor Felix von Laue was a German physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1914 for his discovery of the diffraction of X-rays by crystals.
Adolf Friedrich Johann Butenandt was a German biochemist. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1939 for his "work on sex hormones." He initially rejected the award in accordance with government policy, but accepted it in 1949 after World War II. He was President of the Max Planck Society from 1960 to 1972. He was also the first, in 1959, to discover the structure of the sex pheromone of silkworms, which he named bombykol.
The Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science was a German scientific institution established in the German Empire in 1911. Its functions were taken over by the Max Planck Society. The Kaiser Wilhelm Society was an umbrella organisation for many institutes, testing stations, and research units created under its authority.
Wolfgang Walter Arnulf Abendroth was a German socialist, jurist, and political scientist. He was born in Elberfeld, now a part of Wuppertal in North Rhine-Westphalia. Abendroth was a radical social democrat and an important contributor to the constitutional foundation of post-World War II West Germany. In 1943 he was forcibly drafted into one of the 999th Division's "probation units" and while stationed in Greece he deserted to the Greek People's Liberation Army (ELAS).
Karl Jäger was a German mid-ranking official in the SS of Nazi Germany and Einsatzkommando leader who perpetrated acts of genocide during the Holocaust.
Hans-Joachim von Merkatz was a German politician. He was Federal Minister of Justice from 1956 to 1957. He was a member of the Bundestag from 1949 to 1961. He was a member of the German Party before joining the Christian Democrats in 1960.
Ernst Achenbach was a German lawyer, diplomat and politician of the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP), who served as a member of the Bundestag (1957–1976), as a Member of the European Parliament (1964–1977), as Vice Chairman of FDP (1971–1972) and as Vice President of the Liberal group in the European Parliament.
The Association of Persecutees of the Nazi Regime – Federation of Antifascists (VVN-BdA) is a German political confederation founded in 1947 and based in Berlin. The VVN-BdA, formerly the VVN, emerged from victims' associations in Germany founded by political opponents to Nazism after the Second World War and the end of the Nazi rule in Germany.
The Ascq massacre was a massacre of 86 men on 1 April 1944 in Ascq, France, by the Waffen-SS during the Second World War.
Ludwig Hermann Karl Hahn was a German SS-Standartenführer, Nazi official and convicted war criminal. He held numerous positions with the German police and security services over the course of his career with the Schutzstaffel (SS).
The Buchenwald trial or United States of America vs. Josias Prince of Waldeck et al. was a war crime trial conducted by the United States Army as a court-martial in Dachau, then part of the American occupation zone. It took place from April 11 to August 14, 1947 in the internment camp of Dachau, where the former Dachau concentration camp had been located until late April 1945. In this trial, 31 people were indicted for war crimes related to the Buchenwald concentration camp and its satellite camps, all of whom were convicted. The Buchenwald trial was part of the Dachau trials, which were held between 1945 and 1948.
Erich Weise was a German historian and archivist. During World War II, as a member of the Nazi Party, he administered Polish archives captured by Nazi Germany. In this position he purged people he considered "non-Aryans", used Jewish slave labor, and committed the war crime of plundering Polish historical documents.
Margarete "Grete" Fuchs-Keilson was a German politician and official in the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED).
Karl Bittel was a German left-wing historian and journalist.
Walter Bartel was a German communist resistance fighter, historian and university professor.
Günter Stempel was a German politician (LDPD). He was involved in the formation of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), despite which he was a victim of political repression in both the GDR and the USSR.
Carltheo Zeitschel also Carl Theo,, was a German physician, diplomat, Nazi functionary and SS-Sturmbannfuhrer (major).
