Stunde Null is the German language equivalent of "zero hour", a military planning term indicating the beginning of some operation or event. Historically, Stunde Null specifically refers to the capitulation of the Nazi government on May 8, 1945, at midnight, marking the end of World War II in Germany. The period immediately following this time is the Nachkriegszeit -- the "time after the war".
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When the Soviets (who were the first occupying power) arrived in Berlin, they saw a city devastated by the air raids and street fighting. It was described as a Geisterstadt — a ghost town.
The job of cleaning up the city fell to the Soviets, as they were first (the Western Allies arrived on July 4, 1945) to enter the city. According to them, the clean-up operation would last 12 years.
On May 29, all women aged between 15 and 65 were conscripted as Trümmerfrauen (rubble women). In all, 60,000 women worked to rebuild Berlin.
The biggest problem that the Berliners had to face was the threat of starvation. German war-time ration cards were no longer valid. Any remaining rations were either used to feed Russian troops or stolen by hungry Germans.
On May 15, the Russians introduced a new five-tier ration-card system: The highest tier was reserved for intellectuals and artists; rubble women and Schwerarbeiter (manual workers) received the second-tier card, which was more valuable to them than the 12 Reichsmark they received for cleaning up a thousand bricks; the lowest card, nicknamed the Friedhofskarte (cemetery ticket) was issued to housewives and the elderly.
During this period, the average Berliner was around 6 to 9 kg underweight.
Due to the meagre rations, the black market came into its own, and 4,000 traded on it daily. Payment was either in cigarettes or by bartering. There were even rumours of cannibalism and the trading of human flesh.
Two new words entered the German vocabulary during 1945:
The winter of 1945-46 was one of the coldest in living memory. Temperatures plummeted to -30°C and there was no protection from the biting cold in the bombed-out houses. About 40,000 people suffered from hypothermia and 1,000 died as a result. The Berlin Magistrat (municipal authority) created official Wärmeräume (warm rooms) for people to warm themselves in.
In 1946, Berlin was a haven of crime. There were an average of 240 robberies and five murders a day, and most criminals were the destitute and homeless. In the areas east of the future Oder-Neisse line already Red Army soldiers and Polish nationalists committed cruelties against the German population. Allied soldiers sometimes harassed German civilians, though the western forces in general were less brutal than their Soviet (eastern) counterparts. Panic and huge uncertainty instantly created much damage in the areas still controlled by the Nazi German Wehrmacht on May 8, 1945 (e.g. western Austria, Bavaria, South Tyrol (Italy), East Frisia and Schleswig-Holstein).
In 1985, Richard von Weizsäcker the President of West Germany at that time, stated "There was no "Stunde Null" but we had the chance for a new beginning" ("Es gab keine Stunde Null, aber wir hatten die Chance zu einem Neubeginn."[2]) a true and total restart never occurred in postwar Germany. The term Stunde null implies that the past is over and nothing from former times continues to exist past the Stunde null. Experts in German culture find that this term is divisive and is a barrier to the collective German psyche and their ability to deal with the recent past. The concept of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (coping with the past) is what experts allude to and Stunde null conflicts directly with this idea, necessitating its judicious use.