Following the end of the Second World War, Germany was carved up, to be occupied by the US, UK, France and the Soviet Union. In 1949, the Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic in English) was established in the Soviet-occupied eastern side of Germany.
The DDR, as it was colloquially known, was effectively a satellite state of the Soviet Union, and as the westernmost edge of the Soviet bloc, became the focal point for Cold War tensions until its dissolution in 1990.
Where did the DDR come from?
After the Second World War, Germany was occupied by the Allies. The West had long mistrusted Stalin and Communist Russia. In 1946, under some pressure from Soviet Russia, the two leading and long-standing rival left-wing parties in Germany, the Communist Party of Germany and the Social Democratic Party of Germany united to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED).
