Flensburg Government
Although the German military signatories of the May 1945 German Instruments of Surrender had been acting under instructions from Admiral Dönitz, none of the Allied Governments recognised the acting Flensburg Government as validly exercising civil power, and consequently the Allies had insisted that the German signatories should explicitly represent the German High Command alone. On 23 May 1945, the purported German government in Flensburg was abolished, and its members taken into captivity as prisoners of war.