1947
When Germany unconditionally surrendered in 1945 the
Government of the German Realm was taken over by an Allied Control Council. The
German Realm as such did not cease to exist, but its government was taken over
by the allied powers. Germany was defined as the territory under German
sovereignty in 1937. As such it was now under allied rule and responsibility.
The Saarland was put directly under French protection however, and the areas
east of the Oder and Neisse rivers were "temporarily" placed under Polish and
Soviet Administration. In practice this meant that these territories were
annexed by Poland and the Soviet Union and that its German population was
removed and replaced by Poles and Russians. Poland had lost vast territories in
the East. The parts of Poland that the Soviets annexed in 1939 were not returned
to Poland, so Poles from these areas repopulated the former Prussian provinces
now under Polish administration. The 1937 border is depicted as a grey line on
this map. Later there would be much ado about the question whether these
territories were in theory still a part of allied controlled Germany or not, but
in practice they were lost to Germany forever. The rest of Germany was divided
into four zones of occupation that is each given its own colour on the map. The
Russians, French, British (red) and Americans (light-yellow) each had their own
zone of occupation. Berlin was also divided between the four powers. Austria
regained its independence and an Austrian government was set up, but that
country and its capital were also divided into zones of occupation. Maintaining
a joint administration of Germany was soon made very difficult by the onset of
the Cold War. In Germany and Berlin two separate administrations were formed,
one in the three western zones, that formed an economic union, and one in the
Soviet zone. By 1946 the old German constituent states had been replaced by new
ones. Prussia was dissolved in 1946 and its constituent provinces became Lands
of Germany. Later more reshuffling was done to make the administrative
subdivisions of Germany more balanced.
