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UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN, LAWRENCE, KANSAS
MAY 8:1946
A Year Later : Denazification of Germany Speeds On
Few Hitlerites Left in Office, U.S. Leaders Say
Berlin. (UP)—At the end of the first year of peace in Europe American Military government officials in Germany claimed a record for denazifying Germans which prompted Lt. Gen. Lucius D. Clay to declare "We are now entering the final phase."
No one could say yet exactly how many Nazis there were to deal with in the American zone but denazification teams looking over the questionnaires of more than 1,250,000 Germans had labeled more than 300,000, or almost 24 per cent, as being Nazis or Nazi sympathizers unfit to hold positions of prominence or responsibility in German economy.
Of that number 85,000 were placed under mandatory arrest to await trial as major offenders. Another 75,000, whose ranks might possibly swell to 100,000 have been sorted out in prisoner-of-war cages to be transferred to civil internment upon their release as p.o.w.'s.
Having accomplished this, Military Government officials believed they had virtually completed their avowed task of "removing Nazis and militarists from public offices and positions of responsibility in important private enterprises . . . to facilitate assumption of power by democratic elements." The Military Government phase of denazification during the first year of peace was a house-cleaning job.
the final or punitive phase of the work has been handed to the Germans, themselves, to accomplish under a watchful Military Government eye.
However the first year of peace has not been too rosy for a known Nazi or Nazi supporter. According to recent military Government
GEN. GEORGE C. MARSHALL
Master strategist, confidant of President Roosevelt, Gen. George C. Marshall was America's army chief of staff during the last war. A brilliant planner, he now has turned to diplomatic peace-making, and today, a year after V-E day, he is back in China, trying to smooth the way toward the end of civil strife there.
Gallup-type poll surveys an average Nazi today has fallen from his Hitler era favored position to a standard of living slightly below the current average for non-Nazis.
These surveys reported that two-thirds of all the German people in the American zone admitted they were making enough money out of current earning to buy at least their daily necessities of life. Of the one-third which claimed they could not balance the budget without dipping into hoarded savings Nazis were predominant.
During this first year American action against Nazis has been mainly negative in nature. A Nazi has suffered more than other Germans as a rule in that he lost his good paying job, his standing in the community, and probably his house and furnishings have been requisitioned. His bank account has been blocked and he has been relegated to work as an "ordinary laborer," a term loosely interpreted to include any kind of work where he is not given authority over others.
Those held in mandatory arrest have at least one advantage over their excluded brethren at large—their necessities of life are provided them. During a recent visit to a civilian internment camp in Berlin, the only complaints to be heard from the men were that they were bored and had too much time on their hands (they are not forced to work).
The women—some of them young and comely—said they were bored, too.
Internee quarters were spotlessly
elean even though quite barren
looking. Everyone was required to
take a hot shower twice weekly.
Their food was served in interneer-operated kitchens and was of slightly higher caloric content than the minimum Berlin ration which, the command explained, was because they had only recently come off of several weeks of starvation ration due to a "miscalculation" in figuring the calory value of the food provided by German Central food rationing board.
Of course, all Nazis have not yet begun to pay the price for their sins. American authorities feel quite certain that unknown thousands—possibly 20,000 or more—have managed to elude custody, or at least screening.
These are believed to have built up hoards of food and negotiable wealth enough to enable them to forego the necessity of obtaining a food ration card at which point investigators usually get their first line on a wanted person.
However, before the second anniversary of the Victory in Europe is celebrated all Nazis should be bearing a fuller burden, both in penalties and responsibility, for paying and working toward Germany's reconstruction.
By that time the war-guilt trials
GEN. DWIGHT EISENHOOWER
Leader on the western front, General Dwight D. "Ike" Eisenhower proved a master at the art of getting skittish Allies to work together. Today, a year after his mission was finished in Europe, he is the army's chief of staff, trying to convince congress that the draft should continue.
at Nuernberg should be completed permitting the dispatch of many lounging interned Nazis.
And by then, the recently adopted German "Law for Liberation From National Socialism and Militarism" should have been in operation long
enough to strip several thousand Nazis of, as a recent Military Governor's report described it, their "ill-accumulated wealth and prepare (them) for eventual rehabilitation."
FOR CLASS OFFICERS
SENIOR CLASS
Ray Evans President
Ken Higdon ... Vice-President
Caroline Morriss --- Secretary-Treasurer
JUNIOR CLASS
Elizabeth Evans President
Joan Woodward ... Secretary-Treasurer
Robert Barnes ___ Vice-President
SOPHOMORE CLASS
Larry Brown President
Robert Rubenthall ___ Vice-President
Marilyn Steinert ... Secretary-Treasurer
VOTEN.O.W.-PACHACAMAC
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