ABSTRACT
After the Potsdam Conference, the control commission was set up in Berlin. The military commanders for the four zones of occupation, who governed their own zones according to the directives of their respective governments, met periodically to determine, by their unanimous agreement, policy for Germany as a whole. The permanent four-power control committee was charged with codifying this policy. The commis sion, each level of which was staffed by represen tatives of all the Allies, supervised twelve direc tories, which were analogous to the German government ministries. Real authority, however, was vested in the military commanders of the individual zones. Though the commission issued many directives, it failed to take the fundamen tal steps authorized at Potsdam toward the estab lishment of all-German agencies.
