Treaty on Relations between the USSR and the GDR
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The Treaty on Relations Between the USSR and GDR was a treaty between the Soviet Union and German Democratic Republic, commonly known as East Germany, signed on 20 September 1955. The treaty became the legal basis for the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany, and its successor, the Western Group of Forces to maintain its presence in Germany following the end of the Soviet occupation.
Following the German Instrument of Surrender on 8 May 1945, which formally ended the Second World War in Europe, Germany was split into four occupation zones. The French, American, and British zones would eventually merge to become the Federal Republic of Germany, or West Germany, while the Soviet zone, due to the ensuing Cold War, would eventually become the German Democratic Republic, or East Germany.[1] The Red Army maintained a significant force in its occupation territory for the four years following the end of the war, mostly as a bulwark against the armies of the West stationed in Western Europe, which became increasingly hostile towards each other as the Cold War escalated.
On 7 October 1949, the German Democratic Republic was officially established.[2] The Soviet Union, realizing that a war against NATO would likely be fought in Central Europe, and particularly in Germany, understood that it would need to continue maintaining a large presence in East Germany.
On 9 May 1955, four months before the signing of the treaty, West Germany joined NATO. This was seen as a largely hostile move against the Soviet Union, and consequently the Soviet Union founded its own defense organisation, the Warsaw Pact, along with East Germany, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Albania, on 14 May 1955, in anticipation of the remilitarized West Germany, stating that "a remilitarized Western Germany and the integration of the latter in the North-Atlantic bloc [...] increase the danger of another war and constitutes a threat to the national security of the peaceable states; [...] in these circumstances the peaceable European states must take the necessary measures to safeguard their security".[3]