The proclamation of the Republic on 9 November 1918 marked the end of the German Empire and the birth of the Weimar Republic. The following year, Germany's first democratic constitution was enacted. In January 1933, after a decade of political, economic and cultural tensions, Reich President Paul von Hindenburg appointed Adolf Hitler, chairman of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) and “leader” of the strongest parliamentary group in the Reichstag, as Reich Chancellor. Immediately and permanently, the NSDAP suspended essential parts of the Weimar Reich Constitution by means of the Enabling Act, including the separation of powers, parliamentary control of the government and basic civil rights.
By invading Poland, National Socialist Germany caused the Second World War and committed crimes against humanity on an unprecedented scale. The war claimed at least 60 million lives, more than half of them civilians. At the end of the war, the four occupying powers - the Soviet Union, the USA, Great Britain and France - could not agree on a common post-war order. The escalating conflicts culminated in 1949 in the founding of two German states - the Federal Republic of Germany on the territory of the three Western occupation zones and the GDR on Soviet-occupied territory.
As early as April 1946, pressure from the Soviet occupying power led to the founding of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) through the forced unification of the Communist (KPD) and Social Democratic (SPD) Parties of Germany. By repression and indoctrination, the SED was able to assert its claim to leadership and subsequently maintained its sole rule until autumn 1989. The basic democratic rights provided for in the constitution were thereby undermined, and free elections did not take place. In 1953, uprisings broke out in Berlin and spread throughout the entire GDR. They were bloodily suppressed by the Soviet military.
It was illegal for GDR citizens to travel to western countries. Nevertheless, escape was still possible in the 1950s, but became a deadly danger after the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961 due to the tightening of the inner-German border installations. Nevertheless, almost 5 million people fled from the Soviet occupation zone or GDR to the Federal Republic of Germany between 1945 and 1989. 72,000 were imprisoned between 1961 and 1989 for attempted escapes. At least 270 people were shot dead or killed by mines on the western GDR border. In addition, GDR refugees died on the border of other Eastern Bloc states or while fleeing, and GDR soldiers who died while serving on the inner-German border - a total of at least 1,393 people lost their lives. In February 1989, Christ Gueffroy was the last person to be shot while trying to escape.
After the local elections in May 1989, the obvious electoral fraud was proven, further undermining the credibility of the SED leadership. The hope for a reform of the system triggered by Mikhail Gorbachev's reform policy in the Soviet Union was thus shattered. After the opening of the border fence between Hungary and Austria in the summer of 1989, over 50,000 people left the GDR. Parallel to this development, demonstrations began in numerous cities of the GDR, with hundreds of thousands of participants. Besides demanding freedom of travel, people demonstrated above all for the granting of basic democratic rights. The collapse of the SED regime could no longer be stopped after the opening of the border crossings to West Berlin on 9 November 1989. On 3 October 1990, the GDR joined the Federal Republic of Germany. This reunited the two German states.
