BIO - Files
Bach-Zelewski, Erich, von dem
General of Police and of Waffen-SS. Chief of Anti-Partisan Units on the entire Eastern Front, 1943-44; in charge of the defense of Warsaw until liberated by the Red Army; Commanded a Waffen-SS Corps on the Western front. He hailed from a Junker military family in East Prussia, joined the Freikorps after having served during the First World War, was an officer in the Reichswehr during the twenties, and joined the NSDAP in 1930. In 1941 was appointed as General in the Waffen SS and was assigned to the Central Army Group on the Russian front, where he served until the end of 1942.
Bach-Zelewski was largely responsible for masterminding and carrying into operation the massacre of "race and political" enemies during the early months of the military onslaught on the USSR. As Richard Overy has recently noted:
In the last two weeks of July 1941 he was given control of some 11,000 SS troops-almost four times the number originally assigned to the Einsatzgruppen-so that the pace of the killing could be stepped up. Around 6,000 ordinary police were put under [his] authority. By the end of1941 33,000 local auxiliaries had joined them, a total of over 50,000 men whose job was to kill not only Jews, but other race enemies such as gypsies and the mentally and physically disabled. The overwhelming number of victims were Jews." (R Overy, Russia's War. Allen Lane, 1998, p.140)
In July 1943 he was given charge of all anti-partisan activities on the eastern front. In 1944 he commanded the German troops that were responsible for crushing the uprising in Warsaw. In return for turning witness for the prosecution at the Nuremberg trials he was spared being handed over to the USSR authorities for trial. He was convicted in 1961 for his participation in the Röhm purge of 1934 when the senior leaders of the SA were executed, and sentenced to four and a half years imprisonment. A year later he was convicted of the murder of six communists in 1933, during which he commanded SS and Gestapo units in East Prussia and Pomerania. For this he was sentenced to life imprisonment. As Wistrich notes, in neither case was he charged with the massacre of Jews, "thereby suggesting that only the murder of ethnic Germans was perceived as an unpardonable crime." (R Wistrich, Who's Who in Nazi Germany, Routledge, 1995) Died in prison in 1972
Berger, Gottlieb
Chief of the Central Office of the SS; SS-Obergrupenfuehrer; General in the Waffen-SS; Inspector-General of Prisoners of War; head of Policy Division of Reich Ministry for Eastern Territories.
Best, Dr Werner Karl
German Plenipotentiary in Denmark.
Bormann, Martin
Secretary of the Führer and Head of the Party Chancery. Member of Hitler's Cabinet with powers of Reich Minister. Reichsleiter. SS Gruppenführer. Executive head of the Volkssturm. SS-Grupenfuehrer.
Bouhler, Philipp
Chief of the Chancery of the Führer. Reichsleiter.
Brandt, Dr. Karl
Personal physician to AdoIf Hitler; Gruppenfuehrer in the SS and Generalleutnant (Major General) in the Waffen SS; Reich Commissioner for Health and Medical Services (Reichskommissar fuer Sanitaets- und Gesundheitswesen); and member of the Reich Research Council (Reichsforschungsrat). Appointed Plenipotentiary for Health and Medical Services in July 1942, his task was to coordinate certain aspects of the requirements of the civilian branch of the medical service, which Dr Leonardo Conti was responsible for, and the military medical services, which were under the control of Dr Siegfried Handloser. In September Hitler appointed him General Commissioner for Sanitation and Health and empowered him to coordinate and direct the problems and activities of the entire administration for sanitation and health. "Finally, in August 1944, Hitler appointed Dr. Brandt Reich Commissioner for Sanitation and Health, and stated that in this capacity Brandt's office ranked as the "highest Reich authority." (N0-082) Brandt was authorized to issue instructions to the medical offices and organizations of the government, to the party, and the armed forces, in the field of sanitation and health."
Brauchitsch, Walter von
Field-Marshal and Commander-in-Chief of the German Army between 1938 and December 1941, at which time Hitler assumed that position.
Buch, Walter
Reichsleiter; Supreme Party Judge; Adviser on Population and Racial Policy; SS Obergruppenfuehrer.
Canaris, Wilhelm
Joined the German Navy in 1905 and served as a submarine commander in the First World War During the war he also took part in espionage activities in Spain and Italy. In 1935 appointed as head of the Abwehr, the intelligence unit of the high command of the Wehrmacht (OKW), in which capacity he served until 1944. According to Wistrich (Who's Who in Nazi Germany, Routledge, 1995) he proved to be "an incompetent diletantte whose judgement was consistently unsound and whose military and political information about the enemy was minimal." He was dismissed from this post in February 1944 and his association with those involved in the Hitler bomb plot later that year led eventually to his execution in April 1945.
Conti, Dr. Leonardo
Staatssekretaer [State Secretary] and Chief of Health Divisions (Abteilungen III & IV), Reich Ministry of the Interior. Head of Public Health Department of Party Reichsleitung.
Daleuge, Kurt
Chef der Ordnungspolizei (Chief of the Ordinary Police). Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia (after Reinhard Heydrich's assassination). SS-Obserstgruppenführer.
Doenitz, Karl
Commander and Chief of the German Navy after 1943. Served in the Navy during World War One where he was successively in the Air Naval Arm and the U-boat section. In September 1935 he was charged with establishing and developing the U-boat arm of the navy. Promoted to Vice-Admiral in 1940, Admiral in 1942, and Grand Admiral in 1943 when he took over command of the navy from Erich Raeder. Tried at the IMT trial of the major German war criminals, he was convicted of crimes against the peace and war crimes and sentenced to ten years imprisonment.
Eichmann, Adolf
Head of Department IV A4 of the RSHA, and Chief of Sub-section "b", with overall coordinating responsibility for the liquidation of Jewry in areas of Third Reich hegemony. Executed in Israel following his abduction from Argentina and trial in Jerusalem.
Frank, Dr Hans
Governor-General of Poland. Reich Minister without portfolio. Leader of the National Socialist Lawyers Bund (1933-1942). Member of the Reichstag. President of the International Chamber of Law (1941-42) and of the Academy of German Law. SS-Obergruppenführer. Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946.
Freisler, Dr. Roland
President of the People's Court. Member of the Academy of German Law.
Frick, Wilhelm
Minister of the Interior (1933-43). Reichsprotector of Bohemia and Moravia. SS-Obergruppenführer. Reichsleiter. Head of Nazi Reichstag delegation. General Plenipotentiary for the Administration of the Reich (1935-1943). Reichsminister without Portfolio (1943-1945). Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946.
Funk, Dr. Walter
Reich Minister of Economics. President of the Reichsbank. Plenipotentiary for Economics.
Genzken, Dr Karl
Gruppenfuehrer in the SS and Generalleutnant (Major General) in the Waffen SS; Chief of the Medical Department of the Waffen SS (Chef des Sanitaetsamts der Waffen SS) .
Gluecks, Richard
Chief of "Amtsgruppe D" in the Economic and Administrative Main Office (WVHA) of the SS. Inspector of Concentration Camps. SS-Gruppenführer. General-leutnant in the Waffen-SS.
His introduction to work associated with the concentration camps was under the tutelage of Theodor Eicke, who in 1933 was appointed as Commandant of Dachau concentration camp. Eicke was appointed by Himmler to the post of the first Inspector of Concentration camps in 1934. Gluecks joined him in 1936 where he was in charge of Eicke's staff at the headquarters of the concentration camps at Oranienburg. Gluecks succeeded Eicke when the latter took over command of the first SS-Totenkopf Division in November 1939.
Administratively, the concentration camps were managed by Amtsgruppe(bureau) D of the WVHA, the SS Economic and Administrative Head Office, which was commanded by Oswald Pohl. As head of the concentrastion camp inspectorate he was directly involved in management of the extermination, slave labour, medical experimentation and terror programmes overseen by these institutions. He was never captured, presumed either dead by suicide, or the victim of assassination by Jewish revenge groups.
Goebbels, Dr. Paul Josef
Reich Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Reichspropagandaleiter of the NSDAP. President of the Reich Chamber of Culture. Reich Plenipotentiary for Total War Effort.
Göring, Hermann
Reich Minister for Air. Commander-in-Chief of the Airforce. Prime Minister of Prussia. President of the Ministerial Council for the Defense of the Reich. President of the Prussian State Council. Plenipotentiary for the Four Year Plan. Head of the Reichswerke Hermann Göring. Reichsmarshall. Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946. Committed suicide before the sentence could be carried out.
Gross, Dr. Walter
Head of the Racial Policy Department of the NSDAP. Senior official in the NSDAP Chancery. Head of the Science Division in the Ideology Department.
Halder, Franz
Chief of Staff of the OKH (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht) until the summer of 1942.
Handloser, Dr Siegfried
Generaloberstabsarzt (Lieutenant General, Medical Service); Medical Inspector of the Army (Heeressanitaetsinspekteur); and Chief of the Medical Services of the Armed Forces (Chef des Wehrmachtsanitaetswesens), as of July 1942.
Hess, Rudolf
(1894-1987) Served in the army and airforce during World War I. An early recruit to the Nazi Party in 1920 he had served also in the Freikorps during the period of social unrest that immediately followed the German surrender. Hess took part in the Beer-Hall Putsch of 1923 and was imprisoned with Hitler and other participants in Landsberg prison. During that period Hitler wrote Mein Kampf and Hess assisted him in this task, taking down his dictation and contributing certain key ideas relating to the notion of Lebensraum (living space), which later was to justify expansionism eastward.
Hess had very limited political, organisational or creative potential. For the most part he served Hitler as an entirely uncritical follower. Despite the fact that he played very little part in the internal politics of the Party, nor made any substantial contribution to its attainment of power, he was appointed by Hitler deputy leader in 1933. Given his total subservience to the will of his leader and his failure to display over the years any substantial independence of thought or action, the Nazi elite, including Hitler, were taken by surprise when in May 1941 he piloted a fighter aircraft from Germany to Scotland, bailing out in the vicinity of the estate of the Duke of Hamilton whom he was intent on negotiating with. His objective was to convince the British government that Germany was not intent on its destruction, that the geo-political interests of Britain and Germany were sufficiently disparate to permit each to pursue them without coming into conflict with the other. Imprisoned by the British, the Propaganda machine of the Third Reich explained his behaviour as a lapse into insantity.
Rudolf Hess was tried and convicted at Nuremberg in 1946, and sentenced to life imprisonment. Unlike virtually all other Nazis convicted by allied military and civilian tribunals Hess served a life term, despite the fact that his `crimes' were hardly any more serious than those of many others who received similar sentences. Interned in Berlin's Spandau prison, Hess died there is 1987 at the age of ninety-two.
Heydrich, Reinhard
Second most powerful SS leader after Himmler. Chief of the RSHA (Reichssicherheithauptampt). Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia. Assassinated by Czech partisans in 1942.
Himmler, Heinrich
Reichsführer SS und Chef der Deutschen Polizei. Reich Commissar for the Strengthening of German Folkdom. Reich Minister of the Interior (1943-45).
Born in Munich, Germany, 1900. After an uneventful upbringing and schooling and a brief period in the army at the tail end of the First World War, he obtained a diploma in agriculture in 1922. Along with many others who had served in the armed forces during the War, the defeat and subsequent social turmoil in early phases of the Wiemar Republic drew him to involvement with right-wing nationalist groups. He joined the NSDAP in 1925. His power base in the party, and the source of his subsequent influence in the Third Reich derived from his appointment as leader of the SS.
Jodl, Alfred
POSITIONS HELD BY JODL.
Operations Department of the Army (Heer), 1932-35.
Chief of the National Defense Section in the High Command of the Armed Forces (Abteilung Landesverteidigung im OKW), 1935-Oct. 1938.
Artillery Commander ("Artillerie Kommundeur") of the 44th Divison. Vienna and Brno, Oct 1938-27 Aug. 1939.
Chief of Operation Staff of the High Command of the Armed Forces (Chef des Wehrmachtsfuhrungstabes in Oberkommando der Wehrmacht), August 1939-1945.Dates of Promotion: 1932-Major and Oberstleutnant
1936-Oberst
1939-Generalmajor
1940-General der Artillerie
1944 Generaloberst (2865-PS) .Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946.
Kaltenbrunner, Dr. Ernst
Chief of the SS RSHA (Reichssicherheithauptampt) after the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich. Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946.
Keitel, Wilhelm
Chief of the Armed Forces Department in the Reichs Ministry of War ( Wehrmachtsamt in Reichskriegsministerium), 1 October 1935 to 4 February 1938. (3019-PS)
Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces (Chief of OKW), equal in rank to a Reichs Minister. (1915-PS)
Member of the Secret Cabinet Council, 4 February 1938 to 1945. (2031-PS)
Member of Ministerial Council for the defense of the Reich, 30 August 1939 to 1945. (2018-PS)
Member of Reichs Defense Council, 4 September 1938 to 1945. (2194-PS)
Field Marshal, July 1940 to 1945. (3020-PS) [Numbers in brackets refer to documents in the Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression Series]
Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946; carried out October 16.
Keitel was the most senior officer of the OKW and served as Chief of the High Command for the period 1938 to 1945. During the First World War he served as an artillery officer, joining the Freikorps in 1919. Between 1929 and his appointment as Chief of the High Command he served successively as head of the Army Organization Department and head of the Armed Forces Office at the War Ministry.
He was Hitler's most important and closest military adviser and, in the opinion of many other senior officers, entirely subservient to his wishes and an enthusiastic implementer of his strategic vision. This subservience, as well as a shared conservative and nationalist Weltanschauung, led him to unreflectingly pursue the war on the Eastern fronts as a war of extermination (Vernichtungskreig), implicating himself in the decisions to exterminate the Polish intelligentsia, cooperate with the SS in their carrying out of a programme of massacres directed at Jews, Commissars, Partisans and USSR civilians, and similar.
Lahousen, Erwin
Born in Vienna,1897. Professional soldier, sereved as a junior infantry officer in the First World War.
Entered Austrian War School for General Staff training. After graduating served as an intelligence
officer with the Second Austrian Division. In 1936 promoted to lieutenant colonel of the Austrian
General Staff, where he served in the Intelligence Division. After the Anschluss served in the Abwehr,
the intelligence organisation of the High Command of the German Armed Forces (OKW), Division I .
Belonged to what he characterised as the Canaris circle, composed of a number of senior Abwehr
officers who were opposed to Hitler's policies of aggressive expansion, war crimes, and crimes against
humanity, some of whom were executed following the failed 20 July (1944) bomb plot. He was an
important witness to meetings with senior OKW officers (Keitel, Jodl, Reinecke) at which major
strategic issues relating to the handling of certain aspects of the war, particularly relating to war crimes
and crimes against humanity, were discussed, and he provided evidence for the prosecution at
Nuremberg.
Koch, Erich
Oberpraesident and Gauleiter of Ostpreussen (East Prussia). SS-Grupenführer. Reich Commissioner of Ukraine.
Lammers, Dr. Hans Heinrich
Reichsminister. Chief of the Reich Chancery. SS-Obergruppenführer. Member of and Secretary to the Secret Cabinet. Member of the Academy of German Law.
Ley, Robert
Reichsleiter. Chief, Party Organization. Leader of the German Labour Front. Reich Housing Commissioner. Indicted before the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg. Committed suicide in prison on 25 October 1945, one week after the indictment had been lodged.
Lohse, Heinrich
Gauleiter, Oberpraesident and Reich Defense Commissioner Schlesswig-Holstein. Reich Commissioner "Ostland". President of the Nordic Society.
Mueller, Heinrich
Head of Amt IV of the RSHA, the Gestapo. Generalleutnant der Polizei.
Naumann, Erich
Brigadefuehrer (brigadier general) in the SS ; member of the SD ; Commanding Officer of Einsatzgruppe B
Ohlendorf, Otto
Head of AMT III SD (Sicherheitsdienst des RfSS) of the SS. Einsatzgruppen Commander. Gruppenfuehrer (major general) in the Schutzstaffeln der Nationalsozialistischen Deutschen Arbeiterpartei (commonly known as the "SS") ; member of the Reichssicherheitsdienst des Reichsfuehrer SS (commonly known as the "SD") ; Commanding Officer of Einsatzgruppe D
Pohl, Oswald
Chief of the Administration and Economic Main Office of the SS (Wirtschafts-und Verwaltungshauptamt). General der Waffen-SS.
Raeder, Erich
Joined the navy in 1894 and served as an officer in staff and fleet operations during the First World War. Promoted to Vice-Admiral in 1925 and Admiral and Chief of Naval Command in 1928. In 1935 Hitler promoted him to Generaladmiral and charged him with rebuilding German naval power. In 1939 promoted again, this time to Grand Admiral. Raeder was responsible for adoption of the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare which his successor used very effectively by deploying submarines in wolf packs. Although a believer in National Socialism, and an admirer of Hitler, their were important strategic differences between the two, most notably on the two-front issue, which led to his being retired in 1943. Like his successor, Karl Doenitz, he was tried by the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg with the other major German war criminals. The charges were crimes against the peace and war crimes and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Rasch, Otto
Brigadefuehrer (brigadier general) in the SS ; member of the SD ; member of the Geheime Staatspolizei (commonly known as the "Gestapo") ; Commanding Officer of Einsatzgruppe C
Roehm (Röhm), Ernst
Chief of Staff of the SA.
Born 1893 in Estonia, of parents of German extraction. Studied at the universities of Riga (engineering) and Moscow (architecture). Left Russia in 1917 after the revolution. His contacts with extreme nationalist groupings in France and Germany "reinforced his obsession with the nefarious role of Jews, Bolsheviks and Freemasons" (Wistrich) He was one of the earliest members of the German Workers National Socialist Party, having joined in 1919. In 1923 he took over as editor of party newspaper, the Völkische Beobachter. Rosenberg readily gained the attention and support of Hitler through his detailed `mastery' of anti-semitic, anti-Bolshevik, ultra-nationalist and racial theorizing.' This scholarship found expression in books, articles and pamphlets on these subject, drawing inspiration from the anti-Semitic tract The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the works of Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Comte de Gobineau, and other racist literati. His early works included The Tracks of the Jews Through the Ages, Immorality in the Talmud and The Crime of Freemasonry.
When Hitler was imprisoned following the failure of the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923, Rosenberg took over leadership of the NSDAP temporarily. In 1927 his The Future Direction of German Foreign Policy advocated the conquest of Poland and Russia in order to defend and preserve German racial purity in the face of the expansionist designs of the Bolshevik regime. In 1934 his Myth of the Twentieth Century, following the path trodden by de Gobineau and Chamberlain, provided an interpretation of historical development in terms of race and race conflict. The Germans were part of the Nordic group of races who were superior to all others, entitled thereby to dominate lesser races, particularly Semites and Slavs. Although few could or bothered to follow Rosenberg's tortuous arguments, it was one of the most important tablets of the Nazi movement in terms of "theoretical" influence and copies sold.
In 1941 he was appointed Reichsminister for the Eastern Territories. In practice he had little influence in the face of competition for the exercise of power, particularly from Himmler and the SS, but also from the military and some of his nominal subordinates. Although his theoretical discourse placed him at the most radical end of Nazi ideological plans for the restructuring of conquered living space in the east, in practice he was less inclined to adopt ruthless and brutal measures than were many of the numerous Nazi agencies active in these territories. Despite this, he was included among the senior Nazi leaders tried at Nuremberg and hanged in 1946.
Saukel, Fritz
Reichstatthalter, Reich Defense Commissioner and Gauleiter of Thuringia; Plenipotentiary-general for Manpower (Four Year Plan); SS-Obergruppenfuehrer; SA-Obergruppenfuehrer; Member of the Reichstag.
Schellenberg, Walter
Chief of Security Service, Occupied Terriroties (Amt VI) in Reich Main Security Office; Chief of Military Office RSHA; SS-Brigadefuehrer.
Seyss-Inquart, Dr Artur
(a) Member of the NSDAP (Nazi Party), 13 March 1938 to 8 May 1945.
(b) General in the SS, 15 March 1938 to 8 May 1945.
(c) State Councillor of Austria, May 1937 to 12 February 1938.
(d) Minister of Interior and Security of Austria, 16 February 1938 to 11 March 1938.
(e) Chancellor of Austria, 11 March 1938 to 15 March 1938.
(f) Member of the Reichstag, April 1938 to 8 May 1945.
(g) Member of the Reich Cabinet, 1 May 1939 to 1945.
(h) Reich Minister without Portfolio, 1 May 1939 to September 1939.
(i) Chief of the Civil Administration of South Poland, early September 1939.
(j) Deputy Governor-General of the Polish Occupied Territory, 12 October 1939 to 18 May 1940.
(k) Reich Commissar for Occupied Netherlands 18 May 1940 to 8 May 1945. (2910-PS)
Speer, Albert
Reichsleiter; Reichminister for Armaments and War Production; head of the Organization Todt; General Plenipotentiary for Armaments in the Four Year plan; head of Armaments Office of German High Command; Member of Reichstag; member of Central Planning Board.
Strasser, Gregor
Leader of Sturmabteilung (SA-Storm Troops) in Lower Bavaria; Reich Organization Leader until 1932. Executed along with Ernst Roehm and other senior SA leaders on June 30, 1934, known as the "night of the long knives".
Chief of the Personnel Office of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA)
Streicher, Julius
Gauleiter of Franconia; Editor and Publisher of Der Stuermer; SS-Obergruppenfuehrer; Member of Reichstag. Sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, on October 1, 1946.
Thierack, Otto
Minister of Justice
Hauptsturmfuehrer in Slovakia; Specialist on Jewish matters in Slovakia with Amt IV A4, RSHA, 1940-1944
Wolff, Karl
Supreme SS and Police Commander in Italy; Commander of the Italian SS Legion; General of the Waffen-SS at the Fuehrer's headquarters; chief of the personal staff of the Reichssfuehrung SS; SS-Obergruppenfuehrer.
DOCUMENT COMPILED BY Dr. STUART D. STEIN
Stuart.Stein@uwe.ac.uk
© S.D.Stein