Unusual Austrian Post WWII-Passport

Thanks to my fellow collector from Germany who offered this quite unusual document, I can display it’s pictures and tell a bit about the document. Direct after WWII Swastika free documents did not exist so the local governments had to be flexible and creative. The Allies initiated instantly a Denazification of Germany – the Swastika was forbidden and so it is still today in Germany.

So what did the local Austrian government issue here? It’s actually an NS-German Temporary Alien Passport but the Swastika was over-labeled with the DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC AUSTRIA! A very creative version. From time to time such “specialties” show up but they are definitely rare!

Such Alien NS “passports” were issued to stateless or alien persons mainly for a residence permit even when it was stated, “valid for Germany and abroad”. Such documents were most rarely used for traveling abroad. If you find such one – grab it!

Denazification (German: Entnazifizierung) was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of any remnants of the National Socialist ideology (Nazism). It was carried out specifically by removing from positions of power and influencing those who had been Nazi Party members and by disbanding or rendering impotent the organizations associated with Nazism. The program of denazification was launched after the end of the Second World War and was solidified by the Potsdam Agreement. Unusual Austrian Post WWII-Passport

The term denazification was first coined as a legal term in 1943 in the Pentagon, intended to be applied in a narrow sense with reference to the post-war German legal system. Soon afterward, it took on a more general meaning. Unusual Austrian Post WWII-Passport

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