Changing Enemies: The Defeat and Regeneration of Germany

by Noel Annan

In January 1941, Noel Annan was assigned to Military Intelligence in Whitehall, where he was to be involved for the next four years, at the center of Britain's secret war planning, in the crucial work of interpreting information supplied by a network of agents throughout occupied Europe.
When the war in Europe ended, Annan was seconded to the British Zone in defeated Germany to help rebuild its ruined cities.
Annan got to know the new generation of German politicians who were to bring about the economic miracle that led from the ashes of defeat to Germany's renaissance as the most powerful nation in Europe. When the future chancellor Konrad Adenauer was placed under house arrest and banned from taking part in politics, Annan helped to get him released.
Annan's riveting account of this pivotal period of European history is both fascinating in itself and of considerable importance to our understanding of Europe today.

Genres: History, Germany

265 pages, Hardcover

First published November 6, 1995

Reviews

[Ed Crutchley · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this remarkably insightful and enjoyable book, Noel Annan brings to life the complex realities of decision making during the Second World War in Europe and the subsequent occupation of Germany. He recounts key events in which he played a role as a young intelligence officer. He discusses reactions and policies, and describes the clashes between a vast array of colourful characters and myriad of opposing views concerning any matter at all. Churchill, for one, had his endless petty schemes that had to be constantly anticipated. Battles of opinions raged between the Allies as well as between and within British services. The timing of Overlord remains a matter of discussion now as it was then (should it have been launched instead in 1943?) as Churchill dragged his feet in favour of operations further south. Annan reminds us that it was never simple, that plenty of mistaken views belonged to all sides including his own. He gives his verdict on the serious intelligence failure over the German Ardennes initiative which even led Eisenhower to barricade himself at Versailles in fear of German troops sneaking through disguised as Americans.
It is a measure of the great man that Annan was that he managed to read French poetry in his billet at Versailles while working at SHAEF. His memory and analyses of so many different high-grade players trying to agree how to react, and increasingly what initiatives to take, could reflect on any organisation and environment. In coming to a better decision, a key advantageous attribute that the Western Allies had was the absence of anyone with absolute power. In an exciting but often unpredictable and chaotic circus ride of opposing and sometimes myopic views, personal competition, and vested interest, final actions came about.
Halfway through the book, at war’s end, Annan joined the political division of the British Control Commission in Germany. He notably played a key role in the political rescue of Adenauer after his British sacking as mayor of Cologne. He describes the complexities of returning Germany to normality and democracy, the attempt to impose British political and civil service organisation on a country long before nurtured more towards the Napoleonic system. He discusses the shortcomings of the British military commanders in their excessively inflexible attempts to maintain absolute stability. He describes the lack of understanding of German society and the resulting holding back of desperately needed national resuscitation in order not to be a burden on an economically broken Britain. Then, in late 1945, the Russians started political manoeuvres in Berlin to force the merger between the SPD and their KPD in order to a Communist takeover of Berlin. The enemy had changed, and the challenges and contradictions of denazification started to take second place. Annan analyses the origins and main causes of the Cold War and ends with a very personal account of three visits to Germany before and after reunification. Adenauer visited Cambridge in 1952, but Noel Annan was not invited. This must have hurt, but Annan’s modesty prevents him from railing here at this shameful omission.