What genre defines my novel plot?

I think it's primarily romance, but I'm posting the synopsis here so you guys can clearly define it.

And also, a question, do I have to follow some genre tropes such as happy ever after ending, in case of romance? Because I read somewhere that people create expectations based on the genre, but such a thing is not really what I desire. Anyway, the synopsis:

May 1945. Germany has surrendered to the allies. U.S. Army Corporal Alex Hoffman is tasked keep order in the American Quarter of Berlin, where he meets a charming german lady named Hertha that lives in the soviet side. When tensions between the western allies and soviet union starts to clearly divide west and east Germany, Hoffman decides to help her and her father slip to the american occupation zone. When evidence surfaces that Hertha's father is an infamous war criminal fearing a harsh sentence at the Nuremberg Trials, Hoffman must decide whether to return to his home and country and leave everything behind to escape with her, and find out if she really loves him, or is using him as an expendable tool to helping her father.

Thank you!

 

If you want to market your book as a Romance novel, than yes, you will need a Happily Ever After or Happy For Now ending. So says the RWA (Romance Writers of America) and every major genre romance publisher in existence. There are a bunch of threads that cover this; just do a search on the forum for "RWA" or "the romance covenant" and they'll probably all show up.

However, you can still have a book with a romance as part of or most of the plot (like The Notebook) - just don't call it a Romance novel if it has an unhappy or ambiguous ending. I'm no expert in genres outside my own, but your book sounds like Historical Fiction to me.

 

Seconding historical fiction. You could sell it as that alone if there's no HEA/HFN, probably.

 

Another vote for historical.