Don’t Let’s Be Beastly to the Germans: The British Occupation of Germany, 1945-49
Not so long ago, Britain ruled a slice of the European continent, half the size of the UK and with about half the population: the British Zone of Germany. The British civil administration lasted from 1945 until 1949, although British troops remained until 2020.
Cowling’s book examines the Occupation almost entirely from a British viewpoint, largely based on British sources and, as the title suggests, very much concerned with British attitudes to the German people. It is an unflattering portrayal, describing rampant black marketeering, ruthless interrogation methods and widespread corruption. He does admit, however, that Britain was the first of the four occupying powers to shift away from the ‘four Ds’ of Potsdam (demilitarisation, denazification, deindustrialisation and democratisation) to develop a sustainable German economy, no longer needing outside subsidy, which Britain could ill afford.
Although the book gives much more space to the downside than to the good work done by the Control Commission in re-establishing a functioning state out of the post-war devastation, one cannot escape the conclusion that this was a far more successful Occupation than most.
