Denazification

Denazification (German: Entnazifizierung) was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary and politics of any remnants of the Nazi regime. It was carried out specifically by removing those involved from positions of influence and by disbanding or rendering impotent the organizations associated with it. In practice, denazification was not limited to Germany and Austria — in every European country with a vigorous Nazi or Fascist party, such as the ones in France, the Netherlands or Norway, effective measures of denazification were carried out. The program of denazification was launched after the end of the Second World War and solidified by the Potsdam Agreement.

The radical left in Germany during the 1960–70s and Nazi allegations

Because the Cold War had curtailed the process of denazification in the West, in the late 1960s and 1970s the radical left who chose to use violence, e.g. Red Army Faction (RAF), against the West German government and society, used the argument that the West German establishment had benefited from the Nazi period and that it was still largely Nazi in outlook. They argued that "What did you do in the war, daddy?" was not a question that many of the leaders of the generation who fought World War II and prospered in the postwar "Wirtschaftswunder" (German Economic Miracle) encouraged their children to ask. For example, one of the major justifications that the RAF gave in 1977 for murdering Hanns-Martin Schleyer, who was the President of the German Employers' Association (and thus perceived as one of the most powerful industrialists in West Germany), was that as a former member of the SS, he was part of an informal network of ex-Nazis who still had great economic power and political influence in Germany.

Related Topics:
1960s - 1970s - Red Army Faction - Wirtschaftswunder - 1977 - Hanns-Martin Schleyer - SS

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