Introduction : before success -- March 29, 1945 : between the no longer and the not yet : peace breaks out gradually in Central Europe -- May 7, 1945 : malevolent rectangles of spectral horror : a photographer and his subject -- June 23, 1945 : after Dachau : of private vengeance, collective guilt, life in ruins, population transfers, and displaced persons -- October 4, 1945 : dilemmas of denazification : Karl Loewenstein, Carl Schmitt, military occupation, and militant democracy -- January 8, 1946 : are you occupied territory? : black G.I.s in fiction of the occupation -- April 24, 1946 : the race problem in the house on Lilac Road : occupation children and the film Toxi -- August 20, 1948 -- May 6, 1977 : Heil, Johnny : Billy Wilder's A foreign affair, or, The denazification of Erika von Schlutow -- Coda : comic relief? -- Afterword