The Communist One - East Germany Explained

After Germany's crushing defeat in the Second World War, two new German states rose from the ruins. In this video I discuss the history of East Germany, or the German Democratic Republic. This communist state ruled over the East of modern day Germany for 40 years, before eventually being absorbed into the West. During its existence it was one of the most important nations of the Warsaw Pact, and has a massive impact on Germany to this day.

0:00 Introduction
0:37 Early Soviet Occupation
4:33 Population
5:06 Politics
10:15 Berlin and a Divided Germany
11:54 The East German Police State
15:09 The East German Economy
17:58 Symbols
19:01 East German Culture
22:48 Communism
23:26 "Rehabilitating" Nazis
24:57 Foreign Relations
27:43 The End of East Germany
30:59 Legacy

Sources

Childs D, 1983, “The GDR: Moscow’s German Ally”, Allen and Unwin

“After the GDR”, 2001, Edited by McFalls L & Probst L, Rodopi

https://www.theguardian.com/world/202...

Koehler, J, 1999, “Stasi: The Untold Story of the East German Secret Police”

Jähner H 2019, “Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich 1945-1955”

The Guardian: Eastern Germany: the most godless place on Earth

https://www.eth.mpg.de/3541344/religi...

Remy D, Salheiser A 2010, “Integration or Exclusion: Former National Socialists in the GDR”, Historical Social Research

https://www.businessinsider.com/forme...

https://history.state.gov/countries/g...

1997, “How the Warsaw Pact was dissolved”, Perspectives
Matějka Z

https://www.spiegel.de/politik/wir-br...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe...