Mary Fulbrook - A History of Germany 1918 - 2020

FIFTH EDITION

Mary Fulbrook

This edition first published 2021

© 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Edition History

Fontana Ltd. (1e, 1991), Blackwell Publishing Ltd. (2e, 2002), Mary Fulbrook (3e, 2009), John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. (4e, 2015)

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Fulbrook, Mary, 1951- author.

Title: A history of Germany 1918-2018 : the divided nation / Mary Fulbrook.

Description: Fifth edition. | Hoboken : John Wiley & Sons, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Contents: Part I. A divided society: the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich -- Part II. The divided nation: the two Germanies, 1945-1990 -- Part III. The divided century.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020047584 (print) | LCCN 2020047585 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119574170 (paperback) | ISBN 9781119574231 (pdf) | ISBN 9781119574248 (epub) | ISBN 9781119574255 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Germany--Politics and government--20th century. | Germany--Politics and government--21st century.

Classification: LCC DD240 .F85 2021 (print) | LCC DD240 (ebook) | DDC 943.087--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020047584

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020047585

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Cover design by Wiley

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1 Content

2 List of Plates Plates 1 Unemployed dock workers in January 1931 2 Members of the Nazi League of German Girls (BDM) walk proudly down the street of a German town 3 Hitler’s triumphal arrival to popular acclaim in his former home town of Linz during the 1938 Anschluss of Austria (which subsequently represented itself as ‘Hitler’s first victim’) 4 German soldiers execute ‘partisans’, Lithuania, 1944 5 Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto, who, if they survived the misery, hunger and sickness of ghetto life, would ultimately be transported and murdered in an extermination camp 6 The Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, in a landscape of rubble at the end of the Second World War 7 West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer looks uncomfortable on a visit to Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, in August 1961, a week after the Berlin Wall was erected 8 Schoolchildren on their weekly ‘day in industry’ in the ‘people’s own factory’, with which their school is twinned, admire the progress board in the ‘competition for fulfilment of the plan’ 9 Erich Honecker handing over the one millionth new apartment built in the GDR, surrounded by workers in hard hats, and children from a local creche 10 Couple watching television, Er magazine cover, 1952 11 East Berliners hack out mementoes from the now defunct Berlin Wall, in spring 1990 12 Demonstration against rising rents and gentrification, Kreuzberg, Berlin, June 2013 13 ‘Stolpersteine’ – pavement ‘cobblestones to stumble over’, commemorating former Jewish inhabitants who were deported and murdered by the Nazis 14 The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, in the heart of Berlin, spreading over several acres between the Brandenburg Gate and the site of Hitler’s bunker and providing an inescapable and controversial reminder of the Jewish victims of Nazism 15 CDU poster ‘Wir haben mehr zu bieten’ (‘We have more to offer’) showing CDU candidates Vera Lengsfeld (formerly Vera Wollenberger) and Angela Merkel

3 List of Maps Maps 2.1 The Versailles settlement, 1919 3.1 The electoral performance of the NSDAP, 1924–1932 4.1 The Reichstag elections, 5 March 1933 4.2 Territorial annexation, 1935–1939 5.1 The partition of Poland, 1939 5.2 Hitler’s empire by autumn 1942 5.3 Major concentration camps, including extermination centres 5.4 Proportions of Europe’s Jewish population murdered in the Final Solution 6.1 The division of Germany after 1945 13.1 United Germany, 1990

4 Preface to the Fifth Edition Preface to the Fifth Edition I have amended and added to the text for this expanded fifth edition in a number of ways. In particular, the analysis of the Berlin Republic has been extended to the end of August 2020; the section on the Holocaust has been amended in light of an ever-expanding historiography that has significantly enhanced knowledge and understanding; and there have been minor revisions to content and analysis throughout the text, more in some chapters than others. As before, I have resisted the temptation to engage in radical alterations of style and argument that would have turned it into a substantially different book. However, aware that in some areas debates and approaches have moved on considerably, I have updated by light rewriting where relevant. A few additions and alterations have also been made to what remains a highly select bibliography at the end; this is not intended to be comprehensive but merely to provide some starting points and suggestions for readers wishing to explore particular periods and topics in greater depth.

5 Preface to the Fourth Edition

6 Preface to the Third Edition

7 Preface to the Second Edition

8 Acknowledgments

9 Chapter 1: The Course of German History