Independent East Prussia after World War II?

[Iggies]

What if, instead of dividing its territory up amongst Poland and Russian SFSR, an independent East Prussian state was established and brought into the USSR's sphere of influence?

The state remains majority German, instead of being subject to large scale Polonization and Russification.

Or maybe, instead of an independent (well, independent in name, actually a puppet of Moscow), it would be an SSR?

Would this have any significant effects on history from 1945 onwards?

I'm thinking something like this;

 

[Gog (♀)]

A large majority of East Prussians had already fled the advancing red army and they weren't planning on going back, so it was really a question of wether it would be Polish or Russian

 

[Eivind]

A large majority of East Prussians had already fled the advancing red army and they weren't planning on going back, so it was really a question of wether it would be Polish or Russian

Did the same thing happen in other ex-German areas that later became part of Poland? And if so, why did it not happen in what later became the German Democratic Republic?

 

[ghappy1000]

Did the same thing happen in other ex-German areas that later became part of Poland? And if so, why did it not happen in what later became the German Democratic Republic?

Because the Soviets wanted to set up their own communist German republic as an acceptable puppet. And, the lands of East Germany [up to the Oder Neisse Line] weren't formerly occupied by Russians until WW2, plus the Polish People's Republic would be too big with many Germans. Don't discredit the German resistance, including the Communist even if you're Stalin [the dictator himself].

 

[AussieHawker]

A large majority of East Prussians had already fled the advancing red army and they weren't planning on going back, so it was really a question of wether it would be Polish or Russian

Moving the Germans in Russia like the Volga Germans and POWs could work.

 

[Eivind]

Because the Soviets wanted to set up their own communist German republic as an acceptable puppet. And, the lands of East Germany [up to the Oder Neisse Line] weren't formerly occupied by Russians until WW2, plus the Polish People's Republic would be too big with many Germans. Don't discredit the German resistance, including the Communist even if you're Stalin [the dictator himself].

I´m no expert on this, but according to Gog3451, a large majority of East Prussians fled the advancing red army. If I understand him correctly, they were not directly forced, but fled, as they feared bad treatment by the red army. Then, why did not people in the later GDR flee in the same way?

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

I´m no expert on this, but according to Gog3451, a large majority of East Prussians fled the advancing red army. If I understand him correctly, they were not directly forced, but fled, as they feared bad treatment by the red army. Then, why did not people in the later GDR flee in the same way?

Nearly every 'German' in the path of the Red Army fled. There were a large number of 'settlers' who had acquired farms or businesses in occupied Poland. Several hundred thousand IIRC. Long term German residents of 'Poland' fled as well. the eastern regions of Germany were depopulated by Germans as well in the spring of 1945. The nazi leaders had mixed reactions to this & some interefered with evacuation, claiming the population should remain in place & resist as a militia & guerillias.

In the west some nazi fanatics did resist or evacuate. The majority of the population choose to let the Allied armies 'roll over' them in the hope of escaping further bombing & other misery.

 

[Eivind]

Nearly every 'German' in the path of the Red Army fled. There were a large number of 'settlers' who had acquired farms or businesses in occupied Poland. Several hundred thousand IIRC. Long term German residents of 'Poland' fled as well. the eastern regions of Germany were depopulated by Germans as well in the spring of 1945. The nazi leaders had mixed reactions to this & some interefered with evacuation, claiming the population should remain in place & resist as a militia & guerillias.

In the west some nazi fanatics did resist or evacuate. The majority of the population choose to let the Allied armies 'roll over' them in the hope of escaping further bombing & other misery.

But what about the area that became the GDR? Did people here escape and later returned ot did they never escape? What areas of Germany were liberated by the Western allies and in what areas did the Red Army come first? Did this correspeond to the border between what were to become the GDR and the FRG?

 

[chris N]

It is interesting to speculate what an East Prussian Socialist Republic would look like. It is quite true that the majority of the population of East Prussia fled westward to Germany. So where would Stalin get the Germans to Populate such a Socialist Republic? The answer would probably from the USSR where he would want to ride it of any ethnic Germans. He might also round up German people from lands given to Poland and force them to relocate there . The same could be true of all of the lands that were occupied by the Red Army A great deal of Ethnic cleansing took place as ethnic Germans were forces out of Hungary and Romania. It might have been possible that they would be transported to East Prussia to help populate it.
As to why would Stalin do it perhaps just because it would annoy the Poles. Stalin had a deep grudge against Poland that dated back to the Russo-Polish War. For that reason alone he might do it.
The East Prussian Social Democratic Republic would probably be similar to the East German Democrat Socialist Peoples Republic. It would follow Russia's orders. Contact would be limited to its fellow Communist states. But with such a long border with Poland eventually it too would start to crumble.
The question is would it rejoin Germany or remain as an independent state.

 

[chris N]

Assuming that the Republic lasted until the collapse of the Soviet Empire it might appear like this in the 1990s

 

[ragnarokalok]

Instead of having it remain ethnically German, what about turning East Prussia into a Jewish state? An East Prussian Israel would be the ultimate middle finger to the Nazis, would butterfly a lot of long term issues in the middle east, as well as a lot of short term issues for the british in palestine, and whatever form it took, SSR or independent, would be pretty friendly with the soviets to start out.

 

[Eivind]

Instead of having it remain ethnically German, what about turning East Prussia into a Jewish state? An East Prussian Israel would be the ultimate middle finger to the Nazis, would butterfly a lot of long term issues in the middle east, as well as a lot of short term issues for the british in palestine, and whatever form it took, SSR or independent, would be pretty friendly with the soviets to start out.

As far as I remember this scenario was discussed in another thread. An argument that was used against it was that many Jews would be sceptical to a state that was behind the iron curtain. Still, it could be said to have been a fair solution, as the easternmost parts of the old Germany was where the nazis were strongest. Inside what was to become West Germany, the nazis were strongest in Schleswig-Holstein, so this area could have been a possibility that would have been more acceptable to the Jews. Like East Prussia it would also have given them access to the sea.

 

[Driftless]

Changing Patterns of Immigration to (West) Germany 1945-1997

Not specifically about East Prussia, but it seems some of the folks made the move West in a couple of jumps over time.

In the German Democratic Republic in 1950 3.6 out of 18.4 million GDR citizens were postwar refugees and expellees. In the ensuing years, East Germany was confronted with periods of extremely high emigration, and its regime finally collapsed as a result of mass emigration in 1989-90. During this period (1950-94), despite an excess of births over deaths, East Germany's population declined by 2.9 million, numbering 15.5 million in 1994. This was the result of the substantial losses stemming from migration. Between 1950 and 1994 East Germany lost 4.9 million people to West Germany alone.

Since the end of World War II, more than 20 million people have immigrated to the western part of Germany: expellees, ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe (Aussiedler), Germans from the GDR (Übersiedler),....

 

[Athelstane]

I think no one will have any enthusiasm for a restoration of the Polish Corridor situation in any form - least of all the Poles.

And Prussians come in for the least sympathy of all Germans, since the popular assumption was that they were the ones chiefly responsible for German militarism and aggression.

Had the East Prussians not all fled (or nearly so), it might have made for an interesting question - I think it still gets liquidated and the survivors expelled, but the facts on the ground would be a little more adverse, at least. But there's simply NO WAY to butterfly away the fleeing German populations of these territories. They knew what the Red Army had in store for them and they rightly ran for their lives.

I think that there's a far better chance of improving the German eastern border in Silesia and Pomerania (probably the Eastern Niese and Stettin, at most) than there is any hope of a surviving East Prussia.

 

[Abdominalz]

If there was an East Prussian German Speaking State in Europe, German would be even more of an international language.
I wonder what relations would be like between East Prussia and the rest of Europe.

What if the great population movements of Eastern Europe hadn't happened and instead Germany east of the Oder had gone to the GDR, Poland had kept its original shape and East Prussia had become a seperate Warsaw Pact state?

Instead, Stalin decides to settle Ethnic Russians not in East Prussia, but instead in Berlin to make it mutlicultural. East Beriln therefore becomes bilingual.

 

[chris N]

It is unlikely that the western allies would apply any pressure to save East Prussia. It is also true that every East Prussian that could flee did to Germany proper from a justified fear of the Red Army. There is little doubt that the conduct of the German Military in Russia, especially the SS is a reason why there seemed to be an out of control Red Army but then by 1945 a lot of the troops were from Asia and acted more Brutal to begin with.
There were ethnic Germans that could have been sent to East Prussia to repopulate it from Communist Controlled Hungary, Yugoslavia and Romania and even the USSR. Perhaps Stalin might have done it on a whim or to ensure that the Poles did not gain any more lands.

 

[seraphim74]

Probability of independent East Prussia after WW2 is very small. I think nobody actually wanted it to survive, except the Germans, but nobody cared about what they though anyway.
The western allies didn't care. It was German, far away, under Soviet control - let the Soviets and Poles decide what to do.
Practically every political force in Poland (nationalists, communists, democrats etc.) wanted to annex whole East Prussia. It was considered a dagger hanging over Poland's heart, i.e. Warsaw.
However, the decision was to be made by one man only - Stalin, who didn't care what Poles wanted. But he had his own reason to eliminate East Prussia. It was considered a birthplace of Prussian militarism, a symbol of German Drang nach Osten (Push to East), so it had to be destroyed. It also was irritatingly close to USSR newest additions (Lithuania). Besides, giving at least part of East Prussia to Poles might look well to the western public opinion.

Originally posted by chris N

As to why would Stalin do it perhaps just because it would annoy the Poles. Stalin had a deep grudge against Poland that dated back to the Russo-Polish War. For that reason alone he might do it.

True, but he wasn't that fond of Germans either. Since he controlled both East Prussia and OTL GDR, he had no reason to create 2 German states or recreate the pre-war problem with the Corridor (only 400 km bigger).

 

[EarlofChatham]

I think between the flight of Germans in 1945, Stalin's fears of Germans in the east and what happened in OTL - the likelihood of this is very low.

In OTL Kaliningrad "About 200,000 survivors of the Prussian population were deported to Germany at the end of 1947 and the beginning of 1948."

What is more likely is that Kaliningrad is not made part of the Russian SFSR, but as its own SSR. So does it become independent in 1991 - a 4th Baltic state?, but with a Russian flavour (it was 86% ethnically Russian in 2010).

Maybe it becomes a haven for anti-Putin Russians? Maybe Putin demands it be reincorporated into Russia, a la Crimea. Now that would be a dispute, Russia taking a country completely surrounded by NATO states.

 

[Nagisaki]

What about just modern day Kaliningrad? The Southern Part of East Prussia goes to Poland per OTL, and Kaliningrad is made as a new state in the soviet bloc. Highly unlikely but it could work...

 

[chris N]

Stalin's grudge against Poland was a lot deeper than against the Germans. They had embarrassed him and nearly destroyed him as a political force in the Communist state. Another Communist controlled German Entity would give him a toy to play with. He could carry out an even greater threat to any Polish hopes for a free state from the Soviet Block.
Even assuming that it did happen the question is what would happen to it with the collapse of the wall. The Federal German Republic took a deep financial hit when it absorbed East Germany. I am not sure if they could have also have done East Prussia. Without a doubt the communist state would have fallen once east Germany was gone and Poland and Lithuania became independent of Moscow.