It seems appropriate in introducing this book to say something
about its purpose. To begin with, it must be stated that it makes no
claim to be a definitive analysis of the tangled events of the American
occupation of Germany arising out of World War II. There may be
some doubt whether a truly definitive single study of the extremely
complex and widely ramified aspects of the occupation will ever be
forthcoming. In any event, it is likely to require a decade or so before
a serious attempt can be made to produce such a work. Nor does
this book pretend to furnish detailed and technical coverage of the
occupation. Such an undertaking would require for one thing several
times the space available here. Studies of such a character are likely
to be the responsibility of official historical agencies or contracted to
semi-official organizations or private research foundations. The more
modest purpose of this book is to present an overall account of the
American role in the occupation of Germany for the use of general
readers, university students, and others who desire to have a carefully
drafted and authoritative study of what went on in this most impor-
tant undertaking. It is hoped that despite the nontechnical character
of the book certain of its conclusions may be of interest to those with
a more specialized interest.

Although this book does not essay to be definitive, it is based on
a great array of authoritative material. It will be noted even by a
casual reader that it makes generous use of the monographs of the
Historical Division of the Office of the U. S. High Commissioner for
Germany (HICOG). This is no accident. Indeed one of the chief
reasons leading to the preparation of the book was the feeling of the
author who served as the first chief historian of HICOG and partici-
pated as consultant of the State Department in the initial planning of
the project that the significant conclusions of this series of monographs
should be brought together as far as possible within the confines of
a single volume. At one time it was hoped that this could be done
as part of the official project, but for various reasons this did not prove
feasible. And even now the classified status of several of the mono-
graphs precludes a complete summary.

-iii-