Flensburg Government

Schwerin von Krosigk Cabinet
30th Cabinet of Germany
1945
Leading Minister L. Graf Schwerin von Krosigk
Date formed	2 May 1945
Date dissolved	23 May 1945
People and organisations
Head of government	Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk
Head of state	Karl Dönitz
History
Predecessor	Hitler Cabinet
Successor	Allied Control Council (from 5 June 1945)

The Flensburg Government (German: Flensburger Regierung), also known as the Flensburg Cabinet (Flensburger Kabinett), the Dönitz Government (Regierung Dönitz), or the Schwerin von Krosigk Cabinet (Kabinett Schwerin von Krosigk), was the short-lived government of Nazi Germany during a period of several weeks around the end of World War II in Europe. The government was formed following the suicide of Adolf Hitler on 30 April during the Battle of Berlin, and headed by Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz and Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk as the Reichspräsident and Leading Minister (Reich Chancellor) respectively.

The administration was referred to as the "Flensburg Government" because Dönitz's headquarters was located in the city of Flensburg in Northern Germany. Due to the rapid Allied advance, its nominal jurisdiction was limited to a narrow wedge of territory running from the Austrian border through Berlin to the Danish border.

Formation

Situation of World War II in Europe at the time of Hitler’s death. The white areas were controlled by German forces, the pink areas were controlled by the Allies, and the red areas indicate recent Allied advances.

Hitler in his political testament named Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz his successor as Reich President and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, and designated Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels head of government as Reich Chancellor. Goebbels committed suicide in the Berlin Führerbunker on May 1. Dönitz, who was not in Berlin, accepted the office in a broadcast address. The remaining ministers of the Hitler cabinet, who had fled from the Battle of Berlin to Wehrmacht barracks near Plön in Holstein, officially resigned the next day.

Dönitz assigned Finance Minister Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk with the formation of a Reich government. His cabinet first met in Eutin on May 2; immediately afterwards, it had to proceed to the Mürwik naval academy in Flensburg in view of advancing British Second Army forces, capturing the nearby city of Lübeck on the same day.

Dönitz's main task was the initiation of the German Instrument of Surrender, signed by the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) on May 8. Within Allied-occupied Germany, the Schwerin von Krosigk cabinet officially resided at the Mürwik naval base until the arrest of its ministers on May 23. This government was never recognised by the Allied powers or by anyone else. By the Berlin Declaration of June 5, the supreme authority in the German Reich passed to the Allied Control Council.

Cabinet

Retaining some members from the previous Hitler cabinet, Schwerin von Krosigk's government consisted of the following people:

Colonel General Alfred Jodl was Chief of Operations Staff of the Wehrmacht and represented Dönitz in negotiations with the Allies in Rheims, France. Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, was Chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht), to which the Army High Command (Oberkommando des Heeres) had been subject since 28 April 1945, and he represented Dönitz in negotiations with the Red Army in Berlin. Admiral von Friedeburg was appointed to succeed Dönitz as Commander of the Kriegsmarine, and was promoted by Dönitz to the rank of Generaladmiral on 1 May. The Air Force had been destroyed, so no new appointment was made, Field Marshal Robert Ritter von Greim remaining Commander of the Luftwaffe.

Actions

At Dönitz's urging, Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel and General Alfred Jodl attempted to direct what was left of the Wehrmacht towards the armies invading from the west.^[3]

On 4 May Dönitz sent Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg, his successor as naval commander in chief, to the headquarters of British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery at Lüneburg, with orders to negotiate a surrender to the Western Allies. Montgomery informed Admiral von Friedeburg that only unconditional surrender to all the Allies was acceptable, and that this was non-negotiable. Nevertheless, authorized by Dönitz, von Friedeburg signed an instrument of surrender for all German troops in the Netherlands, Denmark and Northwestern Germany, which was accepted by Montgomery on behalf of the Allied Powers. This 4 May surrender, which became effective at 8:00 am on 5 May, included the Flensburg area (being part of Northwestern Germany), and thus meant Dönitz's seat of government could no longer be defended and would soon come under Allied control.

After the partial 4 May surrender, Dönitz instructed von Friedeburg to go to the Supreme Headquarters of the Allied Expeditionary Force to negotiate terms for a general surrender with General Eisenhower. Since von Friedeburg's meeting with Montgomery, the British and American position of not accepting a German surrender to the Western Allies only had been made clear to the Germans; the Western Powers insisted on unconditional surrender, including cessation of hostilities with their Soviet allies.

On the next day, 5 May, von Friedeburg arrived at General Dwight D. Eisenhower's headquarters at Rheims, France, to negotiate a total surrender. Jodl arrived a day later. Dönitz had instructed them to draw out the negotiations for as long as possible so that German troops and refugees could move west to surrender to the Western Powers. Eisenhower made it clear that the Allies demanded unconditional surrender. When it was obvious that the Germans were stalling, Eisenhower threatened to close the front unless it stopped. Had this happened, German soldiers attempting to cross the line to surrender would be fired on and all subsequent surrenders would have to be to the Soviets. When Dönitz learned this, he radioed Jodl full powers to sign the unconditional German Instrument of Surrender at 1.30 am on the morning of 7 May. Just over an hour later, Jodl signed the documents. The surrender documents included the phrase, "All forces under German control to cease active operations at 23.01 hours Central European Time on 8 May 1945." U.S. Army General Walter Bedell Smith (Eisenhower's chief of staff at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) signed on behalf of the Western Allies (the Western Allies had a unified command structure, and formed a single expeditionary force, the "Allied Expeditionary Force"; thus one representative signed for all the Western Allies), and General Ivan Susloparov (the Soviet liaison officer at SHAEF) signed on behalf of the Soviets. French Major General François Sevez signed as the official witness.^[3]

As soon as the Soviets learned that the Act of Military Surrender had been signed at General Eisenhower's headquarters in Rheims, they demanded that the act of surrender be repeated in Berlin, at Marshal Georgiy Zhukov’s headquarters. General Susloparov did not have the necessary powers to accept the surrender on behalf of the Soviet High Command, and as soon as he tried to radio Soviet Headquarters in Berlin to inform them that the instrument of surrender had been signed, he saw orders not to sign the documents. Given this situation, Susloparov and the representatives of the Western Allies present at Rheims extracted from Jodl a written undertaking that the Germans would execute a "formal ratification" of the Act of Military Surrender that had just been signed.^[3]

A second instrument of surrender was accordingly signed at Soviet Headquarters in Berlin on 8 May shortly before midnight. Marshal Zhukov signed for the Soviet High Command, and the British Marshal of the Royal Air Force A.W. Tedder signed on behalf of the Western Allies (Tedder acted as Eisenhower's representative at the Berlin ceremony, and signed "on behalf of the Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force", in his capacity as Deputy Supreme Commander). French General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny and U.S. Army Air Forces General Carl Spaatz signed as the official witnesses.^[3] The Allies had demanded that representatives of the German Army, Navy and Air Force, as well as the High Command of the Armed Forces, should sign the ratification of unconditional surrender.^[3] Complying with that demand, Dönitz's message appointing the German representatives and granting the necessary powers authorised Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel to sign as representative of the High Command of the Armed Forces and also as representative of the Army, named Admiral von Friedeburg to sign as the representative of the Kriegsmarine (navy), and appointed General Hans-Jürgen Stumpff to sign for the Luftwaffe (air force). Thus empowered by Dönitz, Keitel, von Friedeburg and Stumpff signed the second instrument of surrender in Berlin as the representatives of Germany.^[3] At the time specified, World War II in Europe ended. On 9 May, Dönitz issued orders to the German Armed Forces regarding the surrender.

Dissolution

During 1944 and 1945 formerly neutral countries, and former German allies, had been joining the Allied Powers and declaring war on Germany. The German embassies to these countries had been closed down, with their property and archives held in trust by a nominated Protecting power (usually Switzerland or Sweden) under the terms of the Geneva Conventions; with counterpart arrangements for the former embassies of Allied countries in Berlin. The United States State Department had prepared for the diplomatic consequences of War's ending on the assumption that there would have been an explicit statement of unconditional surrender of the German state in accordance with the terms of the original jointly agreed surrender text. On 31 April 1945, the State Department notified the Protecting powers, and all other remaining neutral governments (such as Ireland), that following the forthcoming German surrender, the continued identity of the German state would rest solely in the four Allied Powers, who would immediately recall all German diplomatic staff, take ownership of all German state property, extinguish all Protecting power functions, and require the transfer of all achives and records to one or another of the embassies of the western Allies..^[4] On 8 May 1945, these arrangements were put into effect in full, notwithstanding that the only German parties to the signed surrender document had been the German High Command; the western Allies maintaining that a functioning German state had already ceased to exist, and that consequently the surrender of the German military had effected the complete termination of Nazi Germany. As the Protecting powers complied fully with the Allied demands, the German state ceased as a diplomatic entity on 8 May 1945; (Imperial Japan, the only remaining Axis belligerant, having already denounced the German surrender and Flensburg government, seizing the German embassy in Tokyo and seven U-boats). Consequently. although the Flensburg government had a nominated Minister for Foreign Affairs, it had no access to the diplomatic assets of the former German state and was not accorded diplomatic recognition by any of the former Protecting powers or other remaining neutral countries.

Former armaments minister Albert Speer suggested that after the surrender the Flensburg government should dissolve itself. Instead Dönitz and his ministers chose to continue in hope of presiding over post-War Germany as a provisional government.

The speech by Winston Churchill announcing victory to the British people is evidence of de facto recognition of the Flensburg Government's authority, at least up to the moment of the unconditional surrender, since Churchill specified that the surrender had been authorised by "Grand Admiral Dönitz, the designated Head of the German State".^[5] After the unconditional surrender, the Flensburg government was not recognised by the Allies.

On 20 May, the Soviet government made it clear what it thought about the Flensburg government. It attacked the Dönitz Administration, calling it the "Dönitz Gang" and harshly criticised any idea of allowing it to retain any power. Pravda said:

Discussions of the status of the Fascist gang around Dönitz continue. Several prominent Allied circles will deem it necessary to make use of the "services" of Dönitz and his collaborators. In the British Parliament, this gang has been described as the 'Dönitz Administration'... A reporter of the reactionary Hearst press has called the enlistment of Dönitz "an act of political sagacity." Thus a Fascist scribbler has seen fit to make common cause with Hitler's marauding disciple. At the same time, the Fascist press on both sides of the Atlantic has put it abroad that conditions in Germany in 1918, when German Rightists produced similar fairy-tales of impending chaos. Then, the intact German Army units were used for new adventures in the East, immediately after capitulation. The present campaign has similar objectives. Many reactionary circles around the Allies are opposed to the creation of a new Europe on the basis of the Crimea Conference. These circles consider the preservation of Fascist states and breeding grounds as a means of thwarting the democratic aspirations of all freedom-loving nations...^[6]

Three members of the Flensburg Government, General Alfred Jodl, Dr Albert Speer, and Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz, after their arrest by the Allies.

On 12 May, American Major General Lowell W. Rooks and his British deputy, Brigadier E. J. Foord arrived in Flensburg and established their quarters in the passenger ship Patria, docked in Flensburg harbour. Their mission was to liaise with the Dönitz "acting government" and to impose the will of the victorious Allied Powers on the German High Command. After several contacts between the Allied liaison officers and the Dönitz acting government, on 21 May the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF), in agreement with the Soviet High Command, decided to dissolve the Flensburg government and arrest its members as POWs. The dissolution was carried out on 23 May. On that day, a British officer went to Dönitz's headquarters and asked to speak to the members of the government. Dönitz, Von Friedeburg and Jodl were then taken aboard the Patria, where Maj. Gen. Rooks informed them of the dissolution of the Government and placed them under arrest.^[7][8]

The communication regarding the dissolution of the acting Government and the arrest of its members was made in a formal manner, around a table on Patria's deck: Dönitz, Jodl and Von Friedeburg sat on one side, with Major General Rooks, British Navy Captain Mund and Soviet General Trusov on the other. Brigadier Foord remained standing, next to Maj. Gen. Rooks, and an official interpreter was also present at the proceedings.^[8] By the time Dönitz emerged from the ship, the town's main street was filled with British tanks and troops rounding up the Germans. Von Friedeburg committed suicide, while Dönitz, Speer, Jodl and other members of the dissolved Flensburg Government were taken prisoner.^[7]

With the arrest of the Flensburg Government on 23 May 1945, the German High Command also ceased to exist, and no central authority was kept in place to govern Germany, or even to assume responsibility for complying with the demands and instructions of the victorious nations. The power vacuum that ensued following the arrest of the Flensburg Government continued for almost two weeks until 5 June 1945, when the representatives of the Allies signed the Declaration Regarding the Defeat of Germany and the Assumption of Supreme Authority by Allied Powers.^[9] By means of that declaration the Four Powers assumed direct control of the administration of Germany, with absolute powers.

The Sportschool in Mürwik, on the edge of the Naval Academy Mürwik, where the seat of the Flensburg Government was found

The declaration, issued in Berlin at 18:00 hours on 5 June 1945, and signed by General Eisenhower on behalf of the United States, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery on behalf of the United Kingdom, Marshal Georgiy Zhukov on behalf of the Soviet Union, and by General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny on behalf of the French Provisional Government, contained the following statement:

The Governments of the United States of America, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the United Kingdom, and the Provisional Government of the French Republic, hereby assume supreme authority with respect to Germany, including all the powers possessed by the German Government, the High Command and any state, municipal, or local government or authority. The assumption, for the purposes stated above, of the said authority and powers does not effect the annexation of Germany.

Therefore, from 5 June 1945, Germany did not possess a native government. Whether the German Reich continued to exist as a state is a matter of perspective and debate, since full authority was assumed by the Allied Military Occupation Government. In any event, Germany continued to exist as a nation.

During the initial stage of the occupation of Germany, supreme authority was discharged by the Four Powers jointly for all occupation zones via the Allied Control Council, so that this Council was the immediate successor of the Dönitz Administration in the Government of Germany.

See also

• End of World War II in Europe
• German Instrument of Surrender
• Victory Day (9 May)
• Victory in Europe Day

References