ABSTRACT
Soviet armies had penetrated into Austria as part of their offensive operation to take Vienna and had begun to liberate the country from National Socialism. At the head of the provisional federal government formed on 27 April 1945 was Karl Renner, a man who had been one of the co-founders of the Republic of German Austria after World War I. In Austria, there seems to have traditionally been a greater readiness to join organizations. In the postwar period, there was the additional problem of de-Nazification. For decades, the past had been dismissed merely as events that had taken place. In doing so, Austria had most certainly not proceeded in lockstep with Germany, but had endeavored to navigate its own independent course. Austria was increasingly called upon to elaborate on the political course it had been pursuing since 1945, to explain and justify itself. It did this by repeatedly evoking 1938 and the occupation period, the State Treaty and neutrality.
