Gewalt und Zärtlichkeit

The German Democratic Republic (GDR) prides itself in its military education and readiness program for all citizens from pre-school age to sixty. Through a program of socialist military art propaganda the government seeks to convince the people how important it is for them to stand up and defend their country and their socialist system.
Military fiction about the GDR armed forces began developing in the fifties with the official founding of the National People's Army. Today socialist military literature may soon become a recognized branch of the literature of the GDR, a role it has not played during the thirty years since its creation.