Socialist Unity Party of Germany

The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (German: Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, or SED) was the governing party of East Germany from its formation in 1949 until the elections of 1990. The SED was created in 1946 from a Soviet-influenced merger between the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) members and the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) members who lived in the Soviet-occupied zone of Germany and the Soviet-occupied sector of Berlin. After 1990, the party reformed itself as the Party of Democratic Socialism, and continues to be a notable force in German government on the state and local levels in former East German territory.

External links

• Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands from chronik der wende
• 1946 Soviet intelligence document from Lieutenant Coloniel S. I. Tiulpanov, director of the Propaganda Administration of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany, detailing problems arising with the formation of the SED.
• The East German NVA (Nationalen Volksarmee) comprised one of the Warsaw Pact's most potent and professional armies. Generally regarded as "Second in the Warsaw Pact" the armed forces of the DDR were the most closely bound of the Warsaw Pact armies to the Soviet offensive/defensive strategy for Eastern Europe.