The German Reich
With the death of Adolf Hitler in 1947 from a drug-induced seizure, ironically at the very height of his and Germany's triumph, many outsiders expected his empire to collapse with no leader and nowhere left to conquer, but the Wehrmacht had other ideas. Seizing the opportunity, the army occupied Berlin, declaring martial law, and overseeing a mass purge of the Party, bureaucracy and Schutzstaffel (SS) in a second 'Night of the Long Knives'.
The ever-popular Erwin Rommel was chosen as a figurehead
Fuhrer by the conspirators, but the 'Desert Fox' was not see himself as a politician, and after four unsteady years of rule, he handed power to the Reichsminister and armaments wizard, Albert Speer.
In 1955, Speer made his 'secret speech' to a select group of allies and officials, expressing a desire for moving away from Hitlerian principles (such as abolishing the title of
Fuhrer one month later), re-opening diplomatic ties with the West and weaning Germany off its unsustainable war economy. He even oversaw the quiet military withdrawal from Reichskommisariat Moskau and the transfer of Ukraine to local rule, reforming the Eastern Territories into a state of economic vassalage instead of outright extermination and colonization (though population transfers and deliberate famine were still carried out in the former Poland and Ostland).
Speer engaged in the dismantling of the bloated, outdated Nazi war machine, investing in a vast and generous welfare state, paid for by the states under his economic control, aka the 'European Economic Confederation', and the millions under serfdom in the East. Access to the American markets was re-opened, in a deal with the unscrupulous Wallace administration. This was not enough to reverse the stagnant state of the German economy, but it likely delayed total economic collapse.
To the surprise of the world, Speer resigned his position in 1968. To succeed him was Kurt Waldheim, an Austrian-born Wehrmacht officer and Minister of War, chosen for his lack of ties to any political faction. Waldheim was primarily a military man who did not choose to identify himself closely with Nazi ideology. His keystone policy was 'Offenheit', an attempt to increase transparency, permitting of a freer, albeit regulated press, and the opening up of important party documents to the public (although it was years before the true extent of German war crimes would be revealed). Waldheim even repealed the Enabling Act of 1933, appointing a new chancellor and retaining the position of
Reichsprasident, as well as ending persecution of the Catholic Church (himself a devout member).
But with both these roles largely honorary, this new Germany was rather dominated by a cabal of industrialists, bureaucrats and military officers, and while racial discrimination is still widely perpetrated, the state is closer to an authoritarian oligarchy (increasingly fragile as economic malaise and separatist terrorism rises) than Hitler's totalitarian regime.
One product of the Waldheim era was the wholly original flag of the German Reich, retiring the banner of the Nazi Party (a meaningless entity by this point). The new flag, a break from Germany's recent history, references the Second Reich and Germany's Christian heritage.
