Zersetzung is a German word which translates to “decomposition”. This is the most perfect way to put the idea the East German secret police operated against real and perceived dissidents.
The German Democratic Republic (GDR) was established in October 1949 as a de facto communist state as part of the Soviet occupied East-Germany after WWII.
The “Staatssicherheitsdienst”, commonly known as the “Stasi” were the enforcers of the GDR. They ruled through intense surveillance, the scale of which, we now know is unrivaled in history. Though they were separate from the KGB they worked in unison, as equals to one another in their respective areas.
The techniques and power of the Stasi’ surveillance machine became the envy of every evil regime on the planet. Upon request, Stasi chief Markus Wolf instructed Fidel Castro on how to create a similar program in Cuba.
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Rod Dreher writes about the stories of Soviet-era communism oppression and the future of “soft totalitarianism” in Live Not By Lies. View the book on Amazon here.
Who Were The Stasi?
Their files created over years of surveillance were finally declassified in 1992. Millions requested to see their files out of curiosity.
But why did the Stasi collect all this information in its archives? The main purpose was to control the society. In nearly every speech, the Stasi minister gave the order to find out who is who, which meant who thinks what. He didn’t want to wait until somebody tried to act against the regime. He wanted to know in advance what people were thinking and planning. The East Germans knew, of course, that they were surrounded by informers, in a totalitarian regime that created mistrust and a state of widespread fear, the most important tools to oppress people in any dictatorship.
Hurburtus Knabe
The Stasi used “Zersetzung” to “switch off” dissidents, meaning they were so overwhelmed by the troubles in their personal lives they had no will left to resist the state. Any threat to the Communist Party, headquartered in East Berlin, became the target of brutal nonstop psychological warfare designed to ruin the subject’s life.
The Stasi didn’t have to torture anyone, in fact they chose to use a stealthier practice to wear down their victims slowly and personally. They spread rumors of adultery, arrested people for crimes they didn’t commit, and intimated their targets until they gave up on resisting.
Stasi Psych Warfare “Zersetzung”
The Nazis used the tickled torture to sadistically torture victims, the Hussein family forced theirs to drink gasoline and then shot at their bellies, and the North Koreans visit punishment upon generations of a target’s family.
The Stasi secret police decided on a more subtle approach, one that was similar to the Soviet KGB’s style of attacking a population through leveraging surveillance data against them.
As applied by the Stasi, Zersetzung is a technique to subvert and undermine an opponent. The aim was to disrupt the target’s private or family life so they are unable to continue their “hostile-negative” activities towards the state. Typically, the Stasi would use collaborators to garner details from a victim’s private life. They would then devise a strategy to “disintegrate” the target’s personal circumstances – their career, their relationship with their spouse, their reputation in the community. They would even seek to alienate them from their children.
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The scale of East Germany’s Stasi is staggering. They employed 300,000 people, way more than the Soviet KGB or the American CIA. During its existence, the Stasi arrested 250,000 political prisoners
For a great book on the Stasi, try “Stasi: The Untold Story Of The East German Secret Police”, view on Amazon.
Stasi Used Disguises
German photographer Simon Stenner compiled his research into the East German Stasi Archives in “Top Secret: Images from the Stasi Archives”, check the price on Amazon.
Using disguises was an extension of the psychological warfare tactic of subverting and disrupting the life of the individual target. Practically speaking, it helped them slip in and out undetected into people’s homes.
Once inside a home the Stasi would do all kinds of diabolically-inspired things like hide the radio, rearrange the furniture, and plant evidence for future crimes. This practice could be short lived or it could be carried out repeatedly for years.
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