page_title: Denazification
section_title: Responsibility and collective guilt
hierarchical_section_title: Denazification / Responsibility and collective guilt
caption_attribution_description: English: "Diese Schandtaten: Eure Schuld!" (These atrocities: Your fault!") Propaganda poster used in occupied Germany after World War II. This poster and other posters like it were distributed in occupied Germany in the summer of 1945, immediately after World War II. As a publication of the US Government -- OMGUS was under the War Department -- it is public domain by law both under current law and under the law as it stood at the time. There was an Allied directive to Allied press agencies stating that the goal of these demonstrations was to convince the German population of their collective guilt. See Assmann and Frevert, Geschichtsvergessenheit - Geschichtsversessenheit. Text of the poster: These atrocities: your fault! In twelve years the Nazi criminals have tortured and murdered millions of Europeans. Men, women and children were hunted and tortured to death by Hitler's brutish henchmen simply because they were Jews, Czechs, Russians, Poles or French. You quietly watched and tolerated it. Battle-hardened soldiers of the Allies could not hide their disgust and outrage in the face of the gassed, charred and emaciated bodies of the victims in the concentration camps. In Buchenwald camp, according to German camp reports, 50,000 people were burned, shot, hanged. In Dachau, American soldiers found 50 wagons with rotting corpses. Since the beginning of this year, 10,000 people there succumbed to their tortures. In Belsen, British troops found torture chambers, incinerators, gallows and whipping posts. 30,000 people died there. In Gardelegen, Nordhausen, Ohrdruf, Erla, Mauthausen, Vaihingen, countless forcibly displaced persons and political prisoners fell victim to an inferno the likes of which have never been seen in world history! You have watched idly. Why did you not rouse the German conscience with any word of protest, with any cry of outrage? This is your great guilt - you are jointly responsible for these gruesome crimes! Freight cars loaded with dead bodies were discovered by the American troops at Dachau. Layers of corpses stacked like firewood were found by the American troops in Dachau concentration camp. The blood flowed across the floor when the soldiers arrived. This inmate of the Dachau shame-camp was found hollow-eyed and emaciated with hunger by the American soldiers. Some of the 1000 corpses found in a pit, which were found by British and American soldiers during the liberation of a camp. American soldiers inspect an abominable camp where the burned bodies of Nazi victims are piled up. Charred bodies of political prisoners who were hastened to death by SS troops in the Dachau camp. An inmate of the Dachau camp views the bodies of his comrades who became victims of brutish SS troops. The Nazis poured gasoline over the bodies and burned them. Deutsch: "Diese Schandtaten: Eure Schuld!" Propagandaplakat im besetzten Deutschland nach dem zweiten Weltkrieg. Diese und ähnliche Plakate wurden im Sommer 1945, kurz nach Ende des zweiten Weltkriegs, im besetzten Deutschland verbreitet. Als Veröffentlichung des US-Regierungs -- OMGUS wurde dem Kriegsministerium unterordnet -- ist er nach aktuellem als auch zeitgemäßem Urheberrecht gemeinfrei. Laut einer auf alliierte Presseagenturen gerichtete Weisung der Alliierten hatten diese Darstellungen das Ziel, die deutsche Bevölkerung ihres Kollektivschulds zu überzeugen. Siehe Assmann und Frevert, Geschichtsvergessenheit - Geschichtsversessenheit. Text des Plakats: Diese Schandtaten: Eure Schuld! In zwölf Jahren haben die Nazi-Verbrecher Millionen Europäer gefoltert, verschleppt und ermordet. Männer, Frauen und Kinder wurden von Hitlers vertierten Henkersknechten gehetzt und zu Tode gequält, nur weil sie Juden, Tschechen, Russen, Polen oder Franzosen waren. Ihr habt ruhig zugesehen und es stillschweigend geduldet. Im Kampf erhärtete Soldaten der Alliierten haben ihren Ekel und ihre Empörung angesichts der vergasten, verkohlten und ausgemergelten Leichen der Opfer in den K.Z. nicht verbergen können. In Buchenwald wurden nach deutschen Lagerberichten 50&#8239;000 Menschen verbrannt, erschossen, aufgehängt. In Dachau fanden amerikanische Soldaten allein 50 Güterwagen mit verwesenden Leichen. Seit Beginn dieses Jahres erlagen dort 10&#8239;000 Menschen ihren Foltern. In Belsen fanden britische Truppen Folterkammern, Verbrennungsöfen, Galgen und Auspeitschungspfähle. 30&#8239;000 Menschen sind dort umgekommen. In Gardelegen, Nordhausen, Ohrdruf, Erla, Mauthausen, Vaihingen fielen unzählige Zwangsverschleppte und politische Gefangene einem Inferno, wie es die Weltgeschichte noch nie gesehen hat, zum Opfer! Ihr habt untätig zugesehen. Warum habt Ihr mit keinem Wort des Protestes, mit keinem Schrei der Empörung das deutsche Gewissen wachgerüttelt? Das ist Eure große Schuld - Ihr seid mitverantwortlich für diese grausamen Verbrechen! Güterwagen vollgeladen mit Leichen wurden in Dachau von den amerikanischen Truppen entdeckt. - Wie Brennholz aufeinandergeschichtete Leichen wurden im Dachauer Konzentrationslager von den amerikanischen Truppen gefunden. Das Blut floß über den Boden, als die Soldaten ankamen. - Dieser Insasse des Dachauer Schandlagers wurde hohläugig und abgemagert vor Hunger von den amerikanischen Soldaten aufgefunden. - Ein Teil der in einer Grube gefundenen 1000 Leichen, die von britischen und amerikanischen Soldaten bei der Befreiung eines Lagers vorgefunden wurden. - Amerikanische Soldaten besichtigen ein Greuellager, wo die verbrannten Leichen der Nazi-Opfer aufgestapelt liegen. - Verkohlte Leichname der politischen Gefangenen, die von SS-Truppen im Dachauer Lager in den Tod gehetzt wurden. - Ein Insasse des Dachauer Lagers betrachtet die Leichen seiner Kameraden, die Opfer vertierter SS-Truppen wurden. Die Nazis gossen Benzin über die Leichen und verbrannten sie.
context_page_description: Denazification was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of the National Socialist ideology. It was carried out by removing those who had been Nazi Party or SS members from positions of power and influence and by disbanding or rendering impotent the organisations associated with Nazism. The programme of denazification was launched after the end of the Second World War and was solidified by the Potsdam Agreement in August 1945.
  The term denazification was first coined as a technical term in 1943 in the Pentagon, intended to be applied in a narrow sense with reference to the post-war German legal system. Soon afterwards, it took on a general meaning. From 1945 to 1950, the Allied powers detained over 400,000 Germans in internment camps in extrajudicial fashion in the name of denazification.
  In late 1945 and early 1946, the emergence of the Cold War, the economic importance of Germany and a lack of Allied manpower to run the denazification effort caused the western powers and the United States in particular to lose interest in the programme.
context_section_description: The ideas of collective guilt and collective punishment originated not with the US and British people, but on higher policy levels. Not until late in the war did the U.S. public assign collective responsibility to the German people. The most notable policy document containing elements of collective guilt and collective punishment is JCS 1067 from early 1945. Eventually horrific footage from the concentration camps would serve to harden public opinion and bring it more in line with that of policymakers.
  Already in 1944, prominent U.S. opinion makers had initiated a domestic propaganda campaign (which was to continue until 1948) arguing for a harsh peace for Germany, with a particular aim to end the apparent habit in the U.S. of viewing the Nazis and the German people as separate entities.
  Statements made by the British and U.S. governments, both before and immediately after Germany's surrender, indicate that the German nation as a whole was to be held responsible for the actions of the Nazi regime, often using the terms "collective guilt" and "collective responsibility".
  To that end, as the Allies began their post-war denazification efforts, the Psychological Warfare Division (PWD) of Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force undertook a psychological propaganda campaign for the purpose of developing a German sense of collective responsibility.
  The Public Relations and Information Services Control Group of the British Element (CCG/BE) of the Allied Control Commission for Germany began in 1945 to issue directives to officers in charge of producing newspapers and radio broadcasts for the German population to emphasise "the moral responsibility of all Germans for Nazi crimes". Similarly, among U.S. authorities, such a sense of collective guilt was "considered a prerequisite to any long-term education of the German people".
  Using the German press, which was under Allied control, as well as posters and pamphlets, a program was conducted to acquaint ordinary Germans with what had taken place in the concentration camps. For example, using posters with images of concentration camp victims coupled to text such as "YOU ARE GUILTY OF THIS!" or "These atrocities: your fault!"
  The introduction text of one pamphlet published in 1945 by the American War Information Unit (Amerikanischen Kriegsinformationsamt) entitled Bildbericht aus fünf Konzentrationslagern (Photo Report from Five Concentration Camps) contained this explanation of the pamphlet's purpose:
  Thousands of Germans who live near these places were led through the camps to see with their own eyes which crimes were committed in their name.  But it is not possible for most Germans to view a KZ. This pictorial report is intended for them.
  A number of films showing the concentration camps were made and screened to the German public, such as Die Todesmühlen, released in the U.S. zone in January 1946, and Welt im Film No. 5 in June 1945. A film that was never finished due partly to delays and the existence of the other films was Memory of the Camps. According to Sidney Bernstein, chief of PWD, the object of the film was:
  To shake and humiliate the Germans and prove to them beyond any possible challenge that these German crimes against humanity were committed and that the German people – and not just the Nazis and SS – bore responsibility.
  Delays led to the decision that the approach to the film was not as good as other extant films, and the footage and unread script were shelved.
  Part of the reason the film was scrapped was that the harsh attitudes toward Germans had changed. Initially denazification had a more harsh goal. English writer James Stern recounted an example in a German town soon after the German surrender.
  [a] crowd is gathered around a series of photographs which though initially seeming to depict garbage instead reveal dead human bodies. Each photograph has a heading "WHO IS GUILTY?". The spectators are silent, appearing hypnotised and eventually retreat one by one. The placards are later replaced with clearer photographs and placards proclaiming "THIS TOWN IS GU
caption: Diese Schandtaten: Eure Schuld! ("These atrocities: your fault!") One of the posters distributed by U.S. occupation authorities in the summer of 1945.[70]
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