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OUTPOST OF FREEDOM: A GERMAN-AMERICAN NETWORK’S CAMPAIGN TO BRING COLD WAR DEMOCRACY TO WEST BERLIN, 1933-72 Scott H. Krause A dissertation submitted to the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History. Chapel Hill 2015 Approved by: Konrad H. Jarausch Christopher R. Browning Klaus W. Larres Susan Dabney Pennybacker Donald M. Reid Benjamin Waterhouse © 2015 Scott H. Krause ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Scott H. Krause: Outpost of Freedom: A German-American Network’s Campaign to bring Cold War Democracy to West Berlin, 1933-66 (under the direction of Konrad H. Jarausch) This study explores Berlin’s sudden transformation from the capital of Nazi Germany to bastion of democracy in the Cold War. This project has unearthed how this remarkable development resulted from a transatlantic campaign by liberal American occupation officials, and returned émigrés, or remigrés, of the Marxist Social Democratic Party (SPD). This informal network derived from members of “Neu Beginnen” in American exile. Concentrated in wartime Manhattan, their identity as German socialists remained remarkably durable despite the Nazi persecution they faced and their often-Jewish background. Through their experiences in New Deal America, these self-professed “revolutionary socialists” came to emphasize “anti- totalitarianism,” making them suspicious of Stalinism. Serving in the OSS, leftists such as Hans Hirschfeld forged friendships with American left-wing liberals. These experiences connected a wider network of remigrés and occupiers by forming an epistemic community in postwar Berlin. They recast Berlin’s ruins as “Outpost of Freedom” in the Cold War. Popularizing this narrative through access to the vast resources of American foreign policy and control of the city’s dominant party and radio RIAS made Ernst Reuter and Willy Brandt especially effective Mayors. Archival research uncovered how personal experiences in exile prefigured this surprising alliance between reformers of the SPD and US occupation officials within OMGUS and HICOG. By connecting the network that redefined West Berlin with its roots in wartime Manhattan, this study provides a new, transnational explanation for the alignment of Germany’s principal left- iii wing party with the Western camp in the Cold War. By unearthing substantial, yet covert American contributions, my research outlines how this network shaped an anti-Communist political left in postwar Germany. While standard accounts portray Berlin as a stage of Cold War dramatics, my research highlights how the city’s urban politics pioneered seminal developments in the Federal Republic of Germany, rendering it an alternative to the West German brand of democratization. For instance, the remigrés anticipated the national SPD’s 1959 turn that scrapped Marxist theory and endorsed NATO membership. Moreover, this network groomed Brandt for the Chancellorship, illustrating a route between the margins of exile and West Germany’s most prominent posts. iv To my family. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Much like the subject of this study, this dissertation has been a transatlantic enterprise. Thus I am grateful for the support I have received from individuals and institutions on both sides of the Atlantic. I am grateful for their support that has shaped this project in numerous ways, which I can only acknowledge here. Transnational research requires cost-intensive international research. I have had the good fortune of receiving generous support from a host of institutions to make archival research across two continents possible. The History Department of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has enabled me to teach and conduct research simultaneously. Led by Mischa Honeck, the Bosch Foundation Archival Seminar served as an invaluable introduction to archival research in 2012. A DAAD Graduate Research Grant enabled yearlong immersion in German archives. A Doctoral Fellowship by the German Historical Institute, Washington, DC, (GHI) gave me the chance to consult American repositories for a semester. A Visiting Fellowship by the Bielefeld Graduate School in History and Sociology (BGHS) offered an engaging cross-disciplinary environment to jumpstart the writing process over the summer 2014. A Doris G. Quinn Foundation Fellowship allowed me to sustain this pace in Chapel Hill. Grants from Central European History Society (CEHS) and the Carolina Center for Jewish Studies (CCJS) made crucial follow-up research across Europe possible. The UNC Graduate School funded a Dissertation Completion Fellowship that allowed me to concentrate on completing the dissertation in its final phase. vi Dedicated staff in the archives consulted greatly enhanced the effectiveness of these research trips. In particular, I would want to thank Sven Haarmann and Meik Woyke at the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Bonn, the wonderful staff at Dartmouth’s Rauner Special Collections Library, Jörg-Uwe Fischer and Ingrid Wichtrup at the Deutsches Rundfunkarchiv Potsdam- Babelsberg, Martin Baumgärtel at the Deutschlandradio Berlin for the RIAS audio files, Lydia Kiesling at the Landesarchiv Berlin, Ronald Coleman at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum for bringing the AFSC files to my attention, and Susanne Belovari at Tufts Special Collections. Maren Roth at the LMU Munich not only gave me access to Melvin Lasky’s papers, but also freely shared insights from her own research. The Aspen Institute Berlin with Lena Kiesewetter and Executive Director Rüdiger Lentz gave me unrestricted access to the Institute’s internal archive, setting an example to follow. Margaret Stone MacDonald took a leap of faith and opened her father’s private papers for me. I am privileged that two subjects of the study, Egon Bahr (†) and Harold Hurwitz (†), generously took their time to explain a doctoral student the intricacies of West Berlin’s inner workings. They drew connections and pointed out contemporary challenges that would otherwise have gone unnoticed. The UNC History Department brings together a unique array dedicated scholars, creative researchers, and patient educators that has shaped this dissertation. Konrad Jarausch’s interpretation of the advisor role serves as a model to be emulated. Discussions with him were crucial for conceiving the project and shaped it as it developed. With marvelous aplomb, he prodded me to question common wisdom at times, while encouraging me to move on in other instances. Through the entire process, he always took his time – often on short notice – to offer his perspicacious advice, while deliberately leaving all creative decisions to me. The committee members wrote countless letters of recommendation on my behalf, but also took a keen interest vii in this project far beyond any call of duty. Christopher Browning gently insisted on the centrality of the democratization concept for my interests before I could confirm it through archival research. Klaus Larres helped me immensely taking the shifting Cold War context into account. Susan Pennybacker has helped tremendously in navigating the politics of the international left. The depth of her expertise on leftist émigrés at mid-century still astounds me, even if I have benefitted from it so often. Although her specialization nominally is Modern Britain, she guided me to unduly overlooked German exile sources in France. Don Reid played a crucial role in turning the concept into a workable organization for a text. All the while, he skillfully drew connections between Berlin’s local developments with broader European processes. Ben Waterhouse bridged the gap between the European and American histories with ease and great effect. His expertise has been instrumental in linking developments in occupied West Berlin with currents of American domestic politics. The opportunity to interact with numerous practitioners of the profession on both sides of the Atlantic greatly improved this study in multiple ways. I remain indebted to my Freiburg MA advisor Willi Oberkrome for his perspicacious advice and continuing interest in my work. Daniel Stinsky at Maastricht has helped me tremendously in discussions and leading me to important Swedish files and Ford Foundation records. I thank Mathieu Gilabert (Fribourg), Michael Hochgeschwender (LMU Munich), Peter Hoeres (then Mainz, now Würzburg), Vincent Lagendijk (Maastricht), Paul Nolte (Free University Berlin), and Christiane Kuller (Erfurt), Jens Späth, (Saarbrücken), and Britta Waldschmidt-Nelson and Mischa Hohneck (GHI Washington) for the opportunity to present my work in their research colloquia and panels. I have benefitted from an ongoing discussion with David Barclay (Kalamazoo) on West Berlin who has graciously shared his own research and experiences. Jeffrey Herf (University of Maryland) and Siegfried viii Weichlein (Fribourg) read earlier drafts of my work and made important suggestions regarding the postwar transformation of the SPD. The Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam (ZZF) boasts an enviable brain pool for research on German postwar history. I have profited tremendously from Martin Sabrow’s advice on the GDR and the autobiographical genre. Jan- Holger Kirsch continues to provide exemplary editorial support for publications, blending intellectual curiosity with meticulous professionalism. Hanno Hochmuth’s passion for urban history led to the creation of an international working group that has organized two conferences on Berlin’s history from an integrated