Drawn largely from his recent work, The Russian in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949 (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1995), Naimark's article provides an interesting selection of the results of his research. Naimark opens his article with arguably the most pressing question surrounding the release of eastern European archives -- in particular, the Soviet archives -- for scholarly research: namely, will studies based upon these new resources change our understanding of the history of eastern Europe.
Focusing on Soviet-East German developments from 1945 to 1949, Naimark argues two basic points: first, these new archival resources allow researchers to more effectively analyze the functioning of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany (SMAD), its relationship with Soviet authorities in Moscow, and its influence over the emerging East German political system. Second, Naimark holds to the belief that the value of these resources has been over-emphasized. These resources, Naimark argues, basically confirm the analyses made on the basis on Western archival holdings and second-hand information. Naimark selects four examples to make his case: the rape of German civilians by Soviet soldiers, the NKVD's special interment camps, uranium mining, and Sergei Tyulpanov's influence over SMAD policy in Germany.
Often rejected as the consequences of German propaganda during the last few years of the Second World War and later as Western Cold War propaganda, the reports of rape now find extensive additional substantiation in SMAD documents (although not in the files of the Central Committee or the Foreign Ministry). Only in 1947 did Soviet authorities finally enforce strong non-fraternization measures limiting contact between Soviet soldiers and officers and the German populace. These same documents also reveal an apparent unwillingness on the part of newly established East German authorities, namely, the Deutsche Verwaltung des Innern (German Administration of the Interior) to intervene on behalf of German civilians (Naimark does not mention in his article the extensive reports gathered by German authorities in the Zentrale Erfassungsstelle Salzgitter).
Naimark's research adds additional depth to the issue. According to Naimark, SMAD documents provided numerous internal reports of violence initiated by drunk Soviet soldiers and officers refusing to bring the situation under control. Politically, these problems led German women to increasingly reject the Soviet system of government imposed on eastern Germany. Soviet authorities then moved to separate German civilians and the Soviet military. Not everyone was pleased; a number of high-ranking generals protested the decision in 1947 on the grounds that it was unreasonable to punish officers who had personal relationships with German women. Consequently, Naimark sees this problem and its resolution confirming Western sources which conclude that rape constituted a significant problem undermining Soviet political objectives in postwar eastern Germany.
Naimark's second example focuses on the activities of the NKVD/MVD (the predecessors of the Soviet KGB) and their special internment camps. Of the eleven camps, four were established on the sites of former Nazi concentration camps. Shortly after the war, camp inmates were primarily members of the Nazi Party, the SS, and their supporters. But less than twelve months later, camp inmates counted among their ranks former Social Democrats, Communists (not referred to by Naimark in the article), critics of the Socialist Unity Party (SED), and occasionally the immediate relatives of SED members. Naimark has no difficulty labeling these camps as death camps, but he reports that Western sources estimated the number of inmates to be considerably higher than proved to be the case. NKVD/MVD sources put the total at 120,000, of which 42,907 died in the camps for the period running from 1945-1949. Naimark, apparently suspicious of his new found sources, appeals to Western estimates in asserting that at least 120,000 and possibly 140,000 individuals died in these camps. (Somewhat surprisingly, Naimark does not refer in this article to evidence discovered over the last five years around the camps which indicates that Naimark's own figures are quite plausible.)
While revelations about camp life in eastern Germany after 1945 are important additions to our knowledge of the postwar era, Naimark uses Soviet concerns over the long-term implications of NKVD policies on internment to illustrate the innere Dynamik der sowjetischen Besatzungsherrschaft (the internal dynamic of Soviet occupation authorities). For example, two SMAD generals, namely, I.S. Kolesnicenko in Thuringia and Vassilii Makarov, took their concerns to then Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov. They characterized NKVD policies as the greatest threat to German cooperation with Soviet authorities, since they undermined attempts to restructure the German political system.
Naimark's third area of concern, uranium mining, provides a similar example of the increased depth offered through new documentation. Consistent with Soviet plundering of the economic resources of their occupation zone, uranium mining specifically served the Soviet nuclear weapons program. A project directed under the watchful eye of the Lavrentii Beria, Stalin's chief of the secret police, Soviet authorities employed the forced labor of German scientists and workers. Intended as a highly secret project, the SED, the FDGB (Free German Workers Union), and numerous physicians attempted to influence Soviet mine managers to improve working conditions, but to no avail.
Naimark's fourth and final example centers on SMAD's propaganda chief, Sergei Tyulpanov. Communication between the Central Committee in Moscow and SMAD headquarters in Karlshorst, on the one hand, and between Molotov's Foreign Ministry and Semonov (Soviet Military Governor), on the other, offer unique insights into Soviet policy in eastern Germany. These communiques indicate that Soviet policy, directed largely through the Central Committee, shifted in response to election results, SED initiatives, and various problems arising in eastern Germany. When several Soviet agencies undertook contradictory objectives, however, Tyulpanov could pursue his own agenda, namely, the elimination of middle class influence, German socialist tradition, and the creation of a new socio-political system patterned after Soviet-style Communism. Tyulpanov's role in Germany's division, consequently, is considerably greater than previously assumed. On the other hand, Naimark analysis rests upon the one central assumption that Soviet authorities made policy while Germans carried out SMAD's directives. Consequently, Naimark's observations need additional reinforcement from East German archives.
Naimark also reveals clear limitations on the materials currently available for scholarly research. Many decisions were apparently made in the course of telephone conversations of which there is no formal documentation. Records of the communication between Stalin and his staff in the Kremlin and his chief ministers in the government (along with those of the Soviet military high command) remain closed. Only with the release of currently closed files, Naimark holds, will researchers be able to determine who ultimately made policy in the Soviet occupation zone.
In summary, there is little doubt that the holdings of Soviet and East German archives offer a new understanding of the threats presented to the West as well as to the oppressive policies imposed on East German citizens. More importantly, we no longer must rely solely on more speculative accounts about events in the former German Democratic Republic and the Soviet Union. Rather, these newly released archival materials provide researchers with documentary evidence of actual intentions, plans, and problems faced by Soviet authorities and their East German counterparts. Therein lies the problem with Naimark's conclusions. Overall, eastern European archives do considerably more than confirm the accuracy of Western analyses of postwar Soviet and east European history. Western sources carry a large dose of speculative analysis combined with a painstaking reconstruction of developments through intelligence reports and second-hand information during the early years of the Cold War. Consequently, these analyses cannot claim the authority offered by the newly released documents. Paraphrasing Naimark, these new resources offer researchers a look into the complexity of relations between Soviet authorities as well as their influence over events in eastern Germany. Additionally, these new resources add a new sophistication to traditional notions of totalitarianism by demanding a more complete review of the complexity of the East German situation. In short, it is time to move beyond earlier studies of Soviet policy in Germany and move towards a more accurate picture of the evolution of postwar eastern Europe under Soviet hegemony generally -- and of eastern Germany in particular. Complementing David Pike's The Politics of Culture in Soviet-Occupied Germany 1945-1949 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), Naimark's research represents another important contribution towards understanding the Soviet Union and Soviet policy in Germany from 1945-1949.