By December 1945, within six months of the end of the Second World War, each of the five states in the Soviet Zone of Occupation had new police forces in clear violation of the Yalta and Potsdam agreements. In early January 1946, the name "Volkspolizei" (People's Police) was publicly applied to the new police forces in the Soviet Zone, and in August these forces were placed under the centralized control of the newly created German Administration of the Interior, headed by Erich Reschke. On 1 December 1946, the "Deutsche Grenzpolizei" (German Border Police) was organized by the Soviet Military Administration in Germany ("Sowjetische Militäradministration in Deutschland", SMAD) as a paramilitary to defend the borders of the Soviet Zone. The initial 3,000 recruits of the "Grenzpolizei" were organized and trained from "Volkspolizei" resources, and by April 1948 numbered 10,000 personnel before rising to 18,000 in 1950. The "Grenzpolizei" were armed and organized like a police force, and were subordinate to the Main Administration of the Border Police and Alert Units of the German Administration of the Interior. The Soviet Zone was formed into the German Democratic Republic (GDR or East Germany) in October 1949 and led by the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) under Soviet influence. The SED reorganized the "Grenzpolizei" along military lines, similar to the USSR Border Troops, and briefly transferred them from the Ministry of the Interior ("Ministerium des Innern") to the Ministry of State Security (MfS or "Stasi") from May 1952 to June 1953.