The German SCP Foundation

The *German SCP Foundation* is an autonomous branch of the SCP Foundation and answerable directly to the O5's. It is led by the Directors Council, a council of Directors of Facilities and Departments, which is presided by the director of Site-DE1. The Council is subordinate to the O5's and answers exclusively to them. As all directors are to have security clearance level 4, the Directors Council is often called the O4, despite not all level-4-personnel being members of the council. Although the designation is factually wrong, it has also been adopted among the directors. Germans, Swiss and Austrians that are part of the O5-Council are not personnel of the *Germanophone SCP Foundation*, but members of the O5 exclusively.

After the Second World War, the SCP-Foundation sent MTF-Units to Germany and Austria to secure, and contain, anomalous artifacts of the SS and other organizations of the Third Reich. German and Austrian researchers and officers who were former members of the SS or Sinneslöschen were - under reserve - accepted into the MTFs. Doubts regarding the German and Austrian personnel's loyalty remained, and promotions to higher clearances and personnel classes were usually denied.

When the Cold War broke out and it became apparent that the mission in Germany and Austria would continue for an undetermined time, it was decided to convert the MTFs into departments, the *Department of the SCP Foundation in Germany* and the *Department of the SCP Foundation in Austria*. These departments remained directly integrated into the SCP Foundation and had no autonomous structure. Their task, besides securing and containing anomalous objects in the respective national territory, was to monitor the states of the Warsaw Pact for anomalous activities and threats. During this time, the Foundation established close ties to the respective government in Germany and Austria, which began to grow weaker since the fall of the Soviet Union. At the same time, the *Department of the SCP Foundation in Switzerland* was established, hoping to get a better position when negotiating with the Swiss government which also demanded neutrality in matters of anomalies. The department in Switzerland was specialized in the containment of politically charged SCPs, and to provide storage and emergency shelter for crucial SCPs and officials of the Foundation.

Only after the *Committee For Accounting Of The NS-Crimes Of Foundation Personnel* was founded in the 1960's, and many important former SS-Officers were reclassified as D-personnel, were reservations against German and Austrian personnel officially abolished, departments restructured and many personnel from other countries relocated closer to their homes, whereupon the departments mostly consisted of German and Austrian personnel. The department in Switzerland consisted mostly of Swiss personnel since its establishment.

In the 1970s, the Departments of the SCP Foundation in Germany and Austria were consolidated in order to ease organization. Attempts to integrate the *Department of the SCP Foundation in Switzerland* failed due to the opposition of the Swiss government. After the German reunification, the German-Austrian department was dismissed into autonomy and the *Germanophone SCP Foundation* became a full branch. Their new task was the classification and containment of the legacies of the Red Army and the anomalous stocks of the GDR-organizations, as well as to establish facilities in the eastern states of Germany and recruitment of suitable personnel. Here, an extensive check for allegiances in the GDR was carried out before the hiring of personnel. Only at the end of the 1990s the Swiss government gave in and approved to the integration of the *Department of the SCP Foundation in Switzerland*. The facilities and personnel of which were transferred to the German, French and Italian branches.

Today, the *German SCP Foundation* has 25 facilities in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, and is in charge of the majority of anomalies appearing in the Germanophone region.