Reconstruction efforts in Japan and Germany are examples of nation- building at its best. The nation-building in the two countries was an "unambiguous successes" that "set a standard" that "has not since been matched."

Germany

In May 1945, Nazi Germany unconditionally surrendered after a long and destructive war. The victorious American, British, French, and Soviet allies each occupied a zone in Germany and set up military governments.

In 1947, as Cold War tensions grew with the Soviet Union, the United States initiated the multi-billion dollar Marshall Plan to rebuild and strengthen the democracies of Western Europe. The United States included the American, British, and French occupation zones of Germany in the Marshall Plan. Americans also took the lead in transforming Germany from a dictatorship to a democracy.

American nation-building in Germany included first outlawing the Nazi Party, firing all government officials, and disbanding the military. After such a devastating war, Germans had little will to resist the occupation. So by the end of 1946, the United States had reduced its occupation troops from 1.6 million to 200,000. The U.S. military trained a new German police force to take over most law-enforcement functions. But American occupation authorities were forced to bring back many former low and mid-level Nazi government officials because they possessed the needed expertise to run the country.

Germany had some experience with democracy before Hitler took power in 1933. Therefore, the American occupation government decided to hold local elections in 1946. But the first national elections in the combined American, British, and French zones did not take place until 1949.

The 1949 elections formed the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany). But West Germany did not regain full sovereignty (supreme power) from the occupiers until 1955, 10 years after the occupation began. Since then, Germany has remained a strong democratic nation. (West and East Germany were unified in 1990 when the Cold War ended.)

Japan

Japan unconditionally surrendered following the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. Unlike in Germany, the United States alone occupied Japan. U.S. General Douglas MacArthur served as supreme commander of the reconstruction efforts.

Gen. MacArthur decided to keep Japanese government officials, except war criminals, in office from the beginning of the occupation. MacArthur generally issued broad decrees to the Japanese officials and then monitored them to make sure they carried out his orders.

MacArthur believed he would need up to 600,000 occupation troops to pacify the home islands of Japan. But no resistance emerged, and he ended up needing less than half that number.

During the American occupation of Japan, MacArthur oversaw efforts to help the country's starving and homeless people. He also distributed millions of dollars in U.S. aid for Japan's economic reconstruction.

Japan had never been a democracy with western-style freedoms. Japan did have a constitution, but it placed sovereignty in the hands of the emperor rather than the people. Fortunately, the emperor supported MacArthur's actions.

MacArthur wrote a new democratic constitution, which the Japanese government adopted in March 1946. One of the unique features of this constitution is that Japan renounced war forever.

The first national parliamentary elections, which included women voting for the first time, took place in April 1946. Japan never received the tremendous amount of economic aid that the United States provided Europe under the Marshall Plan. But during the Korean War (1950-53), Japan served as a staging area for U.S. forces and benefited economically. In 1953, a little more than seven years after the occupation began, Japan regained full sovereignty. Since then, democracy has become firmly rooted in Japan.