Eighty years ago this week denazification and demob

 General George Patton now military governor of Bavaria pursued his gift for public controversy with  an interview in which he said that denazification was wildly overblown and that the political debate over Nazism was equivalent to the that between Democrats and Republicans in the US. He privately admired Germany and saw the nation as the only worthwhile bastion against Soviet domination of Europe. He had also developed a broad dislike of Jews on the basis of what he saw of concentration camp survivors. He was dismissed from his post by Eisenhower.

The Potsdam conference had mandated a Council of Foreign Ministers as a regular forum to settle post war issues. In reality it became an arena for Soviet attempts to dominate the process and its first formal meeting provided ample proof. The dispute focused on major questions of procedure. In particular the  Soviets objected to the inclusion of French and Chinese representatives. The meeting broke up with no significant results.

The British had been handed responsibility for what is now Indonesia and were left to handle how it developed after the end of Japanese rule. They had little appetite to help the Dutch restore colonial power and in practice treated the leader of the independence movement Sukarno as the de facto ruler of the country.

The British government annnounced an acceleration of the pace of demobilization. This necessitated a doubling in output of "demob" civilian clothing issued to servicemen on their release. This had a poor reputation. Decorated special forces soldier and later travel and fashion writer, Eric Newby wrote that his "electric-blue striped suit on which the stripes were only a little out of true and a curious green hat" made him look like an "elderly pederast."