West Germany
Encyclopedia : W : WE : WES : West Germany
West Germany was the informal English nameIn German, Westdeutschland was more often and is still used to distinguish the contiguous western states from West Berlin, which was in the middle of East Germany. In German, the western German state was, like its eastern counterpart (DDR), usually known by its initials: BRD (from Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Federal Republic of Germany)[[Citing sources citation needed]]. for the Federal Republic of Germany from 1949 to 1990, during which time the Federal Republic did not include the German Democratic Republic (GDR) (informally known in English as East Germany). From 3 October 1990, when the GDR's constituent Länder acceded to the Federal Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany (still the country's legal name) has been commonly known simply as Germany.
West Germany was declared "fully sovereign" on 5 May 1955, although the British, French and US militaries remained in the country, just as the Soviet Army remained in East Germany. However, the Four Powers did not surrender total sovereignty to the Federal Republic until just before the reunification. West Germany's capital was Bonn.
Germans sometimes now refer to the old West Germany as die Bonner Republik – the Bonn Republic.
History
After World War II, leaders from the United States, Britain, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) met at the Potsdam Conference. They decided to temporarily divide Germany into four occupation zones – French in the southwest, British in the northwest, American in the south, and Soviet in the east. In 1949, the two German republics came into existence.Before the 1970s, the official position of West Germany concerning East Germany was that, according to the Hallstein Doctrine, the West German government was the only democratically elected and therefore legitimate representative of the German people, and any country (with the exception of the USSR) that recognized the existence of East Germany would not have diplomatic relations with West Germany. In the early 1970s, Willy Brandt's policy of Ostpolitik led to a form of mutual recognition between East and West Germany. The Treaty of Moscow (August 1970), the Treaty of Warsaw (December 1970), the Four Power Agreement on Berlin (September 1971), the Transit Agreement (May 1972), and the Basic Treaty (December 1972) helped to normalise relations between East and West Germany and led to both German states joining the United Nations. The two German states entered into a currency and customs union in July 1990, and on 3 October 1990, the East German state dissolved and became part of the Federal Republic bringing an end to the East-West-divide.
Geographical usage
Geographicaly Rhineland and Westphalia are usually considered to be Western Germany.See also
Notes
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.