Page 514 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo I

514 XXXIX Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

with Eisenhower’s acquiescence. 65
Even so, the work of the EAC was not wasted. By establishing the European Adviso-
ry Commission, the Allies were forced to make up their minds about their objectives and
goals for both post war Europe and Germany. Condensing the different vague and, in
some cases not feasible, plans into the official policy of every single Allied Nation was
the biggest and by far the most import- ant achievement of the EAC. Therefore the an-
swer to the question whether or not “Hour Zero” was an event, which could be planned,
must be no. Planning “Hour Zero” implied that the Allies knew what they were facing
when they entered Germany and took control of it. Although there were many plans on
what to do with Germany and the Germans when the war was over, none of these plans
survived first contact with the realities in the devastated, destroyed and defeated enemy
nation, responsible for the most horrible war crimes in human history.
However, “Hour Zero” was – in Germany – executed as a combined operation,
based on the “principal Allied objective [...] to prevent Germany from ever again
66
becoming a threat to the peace of the world” . Accepting the surrender of the enemy al-
lowed the Allies and later on Germany to rebuild this nation. The “Hour Zero” imposed
by the victorious nations of World War II was necessary to help Germany to grow into a
prosperous and stable democratic state.

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65 See D. K. R. Crosswell, Beetle: The life of General Walter Bedell Smith, American warriors (Lexington:

University Press of Kentucky, 2010)., p. 916 – 917
66 Directive JCS 1067 to Commander-in-Chief of United States Forces of Occupation Regarding the Military

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Documents (Washington, D.C: United States Government Printing Office, 1950)., p. 21 – 33