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Using a case study of the Protestant churches in the British zone in occupied Germany after the Second World War, the article explores church responses to an often-neglected aspect of the Allies' purge of post-Nazi Germany: their mass internment of German civilians. Whereas the literature is critical of church support for former Nazis and opposition to Allied measures, the article argues for differentiation. Church assistance for internees was even more extensive than previously recognized and erred on the side of assisting undeserving former Nazis, while also being somewhat selective and discerning. Much church activity was in opposition to the British, yet there was also a degree of cooperation and negotiation. The article argues that ecclesiastical criticism of civilian internment was not merely a symptom of a refusal to confront the past or an expression of nationalist ideology. Internment was a genuine object of criticism in its own right and a source of wider church objections to denazification. Ultimately, Allied internment policy, pressure from below, interconfessional rivalry, national solidarity and the lack of a German government all contributed to the Protestant churches becoming outspoken critics of the Allies and advocates for those members of the German people who found themselves in civilian internment camps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using recent scholarship on memory and German identity formation as a springboard, this article examines the illicit trade that flourished in the immediate postwar period to probe the creation of a community of fate, one that emphasized its victimhood. It explores both contemporary perceptions and the memory of the black market from multiple viewpoints, the occupiers, the Germans and the Displaced Persons (DPs). Rather than treating the illicit trade as solely one activity, it explains its gradations, in terms of what was exchanged, by whom, and the perceived morality of the exchange. This approach highlights the disconnection between ubiquitous participation by Germans in illicit trade and their memories of it as primarily a foreign phenomenon. In other words, Germans saw their trading outside of official channels as necessary and moral, whereas the trade by foreigners, either DPs or occupation troops, was seen as both exploitative and immoral. Given the high visibility of Jews among the DPs, it also provides a window into the continuation of antisemitism in the immediate postwar period. It argues that the conjunction in 1948 of the currency reform, the noticeable drop in black market activity, and the emigration of Jewish DPs have cemented two of the prevailing myths of the postwar period: the economic miracle and Jews as black marketers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Recent military interventions by the West highlight persistent and unresolved problems regarding future foreign policy. Reconsidering the wider legacy and precedent of the British occupation of Germany from 1945 is critical in understanding these debates. Addressing a neglected topic, this article examines whether Britain reconciled its liberal democratic values as an occupying power, and in particular how its government tried to invoke the Christian ‘moral mandate’ of the British churches and voluntary organizations as an instrumental feature of policy, part of its civilizing mission in Germany. Central to this, however, were manifest contradictions between the churches’ rhetorical efforts to help the presentation of the moral case for military rule, and a policy vacuum that offered few practical measures to help German civilians, and especially expellees and refugees. Moreover, Britain's claims of moral leadership were at odds with its decision to delegate refugee matters to the German authorities. There were major differences in approach by church leaders, Whitehall ministers and civilian administrators in Germany in assessing how magnanimous to be in their treatment of Germany. With greater unanimity of purpose, humanitarian initiatives might have had greater success and become a more uniting symbol for reconciliation. The main failing was in the churches’ inability to modify government policy. Compassionate rhetoric and humanitarian relief efforts could not repair the damage caused by earlier political decisions to marginalize forced migrants that effectively punished them as Germans, a legacy of the occupation often sidestepped in order to focus on greater British achievements. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]