Alexander Lohr

Alexander Löhr (1939)

Alexander Loehr (* 20th May 1885 in Turnu Severin , Kingdom of Romania ; † 26. February 1947 in Belgrade , Republic of Yugoslavia ) was an Austrian officer in the Imperial Army , the army of the First Republic and in the Air Force of the German Wehrmacht . Under his command, war crimes were perpetrated by bombing Belgrade without a declaration of war and then in the Balkans , for which he was convicted and executed in Belgrade after the end of World War II .

Löhr was considered the initiator of the Austro-Hungarian aviation troops and, in republican Austria, the driving force behind the Austrian air forces, which were initially secretly prepared in breach of the Treaty of St. Germain .

April 1, 1938, shortly after the "annexation" of Austria , he was in the Air Force of the Armed Forces adopted. He was promoted to General der Flieger in March 1939 .

Lohr commanded during the invasion of Poland , the Air Force 4 , the first serious "terrorist attack" on the 25 September 1939 Warsaw flew. During the Balkan campaign , he was responsible for the illegal air raid on Belgrade on April 6, 1941.

Subsequently, his air fleet secured air supremacy over the Aegean Sea , which enabled the occupation of Crete by German troops. German paratroopers and mountain fighters from Austria committed numerous massacres there .

During the eastern campaign , his air fleet supported Army Group South . From July 1942 served Loehr as commander of the 12th Army and then from 1943 as commander Southeast and also as commander of the Army Group E . After the war he was taken prisoner of war in Yugoslavia . There he was convicted of war crimes in the Balkans and the air raid on Belgrade under his command and executed in 1947.

Along with Erhard Raus and Lothar Rendulic, Löhr was one of three Austrians who rose to the rank of Colonel General in the Wehrmacht . For decades his work in Austria was viewed uncritically by military circles, although historians and officers, such as General Hubertus Trauttenberg , have long pointed out that the criminal side of Löhr can hardly be separated from the professional side, because these are mainly directed against the civilian population Air war theory and practice existed.

family

Alexander was the youngest of three sons of the Löhr couple. His father Friedrich Johann Löhr (1850-1915) came from a fishing family from Mainz . In the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878) he was 2nd captain on a hospital ship on the Black Sea . On one of his trips, Friedrich Löhr met the nurse Katherina Heimann (also Heyman † 1928). She was the daughter of the Russian military doctor Mihail Alexandrovich Heimann from Odessa . They married and moved to the Romanian city of Turnu Severin. The couple had three sons: Friedrich (1880–1940), Michael (* 1882) and Alexander. Because of his mother's faith, Alexander belonged to the Eastern Orthodox Church. Löhr's maternal grandfather was the future Russian general Wasilij Alexandrowitsch Geiman.

All three sons fought in World War I and survived it. After the war, Friedrich served in the Royal Hungarian Army , rose to the rank of colonel and died in 1940 during the unrest in Transylvania . The brother Michael ended the First World War as a captain in southern Russia. He later served in the Danube Steamship Company (DDSG). He then worked in the management of the DDSG in Vienna until his retirement.

Alexander Löhr later married his wife Christine. Their daughter Gertrud emerged from their marriage in 1916.

Childhood and military education

The Theresian Military Academy around 1896

Like his two brothers, Alexander first attended the German Protestant elementary school in Turnu Severin. This taught according to the Prussian model. Due to the numerous nationalities in the multi-ethnic Danube Monarchy and for family reasons, Alexander grew up speaking four languages. In addition to German , he spoke Russian , French and Romanian . Since his father spoke hardly any Russian and his mother spoke poorly German, everyone in the Löhr house spoke in French. After his father was transferred to Vienna on business, Alexander attended an elementary school there. After completing it, he aimed for a career in the Austro-Hungarian Navy . But for health reasons he was denied this path. In January 1896 Alexander came to the military lower secondary school in Kosice , where he remained until 1900. There he learned his fifth language, Hungarian . The school served as preparation for the upper secondary school .

In January 1900 he transferred to the infantry cadet school in Temesvár , where Alexander received the preparation for military service in the sphere of activity of a subaltern officer until 1903 . In 1901 he suffered from a serious illness there. In 1903 Alexander moved to Vienna, where he attended the Theresian Military Academy in Wiener Neustadt until 1906 . At that time, the military academy was the cadre forge for future infantry or cavalry officers . During the summer vacation, Alexander and his two brothers toured the Russian Empire , the Ottoman Empire , Greece and Egypt . While visiting relatives in Odessa, Alexander witnessed the uprising on the battleship Potjomkin . He graduated on August 18, 1906 with the rating "very good". On the same day, the “Emperor's Birthday”, Löhr was retired as a lieutenant and at the same time joined the Austro-Hungarian Infantry Regiment No. 85 “von Gaudernak” as a volunteer . There he was used as a platoon commander. This marked the beginning of his military life.

First military years

The Austro-Hungarian Infantry Regiment No. 85 "von Gaudernak" was in the process of disbanding when Löhr took up service. His assignment within the regiment took place in the 3rd Battalion based in Leutschau . During his first deployment, the young lieutenant experienced the nationality dispute when Hungarian authorities prohibited the consecration of a Slovak church. The dispute finally ended the gendarmerie . Löhr's regiment was assigned to security tasks. In the end there were thirteen dead women and the church remained unconsecrated. Löhr's period of service until 1907 passed without further events. The lieutenant spent his free time improving his language skills and getting to know the country and people of his garrison area. In October 1908 there was the Bosnian annexation crisis . In this context, Löhr's regiment was transferred to the Bosnian-Serbian border near Višegrad . There he was responsible as a pioneer for the construction of a bridgehead . There was no fighting. From July 1909, Löhr acted as platoon commander and from April 1910 at the same time as a station officer in Vardište . On November 1, 1909, he had already been promoted to lieutenant. He later rose to become the interim commander of MG Division III in his regiment. With the train of his unit, Löhr was under the most primitive conditions on the Serbian border. He spent most of his time on duty with lonely patrols and raft trips on the Drina . Löhr used the so-called “General Staff Trips on Foot” to explore in order to familiarize himself with the customs and characteristics of the Balkan peoples. Löhr also used this lonely time to train himself for his career. In 1910, the MG department was back at Vardište.

After successfully completing the preliminary examination for an upcoming general staff training course in Sarajevo , Löhr was ordered to take the entrance examination to the Vienna War School in September 1910 . After its existence, he was posted to the military school as a lieutenant on October 1st. There he received training as a general staff officer until September 1913 . He graduated with the rating “very good”. The end of this training was an army maneuver in Bohemia . There, Löhr was assigned to the referees of the 44th Landwehr Infantry Division as an orderly officer .

After completing the war school on October 31, Löhr was assigned to the General Staff on November 1, 1913 while being promoted to first lieutenant and was assigned to the command of the Kuk Transport Troop Brigade in Vienna as a general staff officer . The railroad regiments , the telegraph regiment as well as the infantry and cavalry telegraph courses, the automobile cadre and the airship department were under the command of the transport troop brigade . During his work there, Löhr first came into contact with the beginning Austrian military aviation, in which he participated until the beginning of the First World War.

First World War

1914

In the course of the mobilization, Löhr was assigned to the Operations Department of Army High Command 5 (AOK 5) as General Staff Officer on July 26th . In this he also acted as an aerial observer until September 22nd. AOK 5 marched into Serbia in August 1914. This was the second time Löhr stepped onto Serbian soil in his still young military career. In the role of observer, Löhr flew his first reconnaissance flight on August 31 in the area of ​​the Drina estuary - Šabac - Zavlaka - Loznica . Further reconnaissance flights followed on September 1, 2 and 9, 1914. During this time, Löhr took part in a bombing for the first time when Serbian troops were attacked near Valjevo .

On September 23, Löhr was withdrawn from his previous command and assigned as a General Staff Officer to the 29th Infantry Troop Division (29th ITD). There he was used in the 58th Infantry Brigade (58th IBrig). When he was assigned to a field unit, Löhr's career in the air force was over for the time being. The 29th ITD had already suffered the heaviest losses when Löhr started work on September 23. By September 29, the division strength had fallen from 17,000 to 6,500 men. During these days, the rest of them forced the crossing over the Sava . The subsequent counterattack by the Serbs could only be intercepted in October. Löhr's division then counterattacked and advanced into the Mistar area by early November . Löhr was wounded in the forehead by a shrapnel. Then he marched with his unit via Belgrade to Požarevac . At the beginning of December 1914, the unit reached Topola and moved on to Sespin . There, Löhr was wounded for the second time by a shrapnel ball on the ankle. The next day he was wounded again in the arm. The skirmishes between the Austro-Hungarian and Serbian troops increased until mid-December. On December 15, the 58th Infantry Division was pushed back onto Hungarian soil. Both sides had suffered such high losses that there was a ten-month break in combat in this fighting area.

1915

At the beginning of the year the 29 ITD became the 58th IBrig. removed from their previous combat mission and relocated to the Russian theater of war in the Carpathian Mountains . There Löhr took part in the first offensive , which had to be canceled on January 25th due to ice and snow. Subsequently, Löhr's brigade was temporarily subordinated to the 43rd Infantry Troop Division (43rd ITD) and deployed in the Jablonka- Radziejowa area. For Löhr's missions in the front line, Major General Joseph Poleschensky applied for the Military Merit Cross III for him . Class. In February Löhr took part in the 2nd Carpathian Offensive. The primary goal was to relieve the Przemyśl Fortress , which failed. The following March, Löhr's brigade, he had been a captain since March 1, was involved in violent defensive and positional battles in this area. The kuk troops recorded very high losses. In April Löhr took part in the "Easter Battle in the Carpathian Mountains" (April 2nd to 20th). In these battles, which remained without a victor, the Central Powers lost 600,000 to 800,000 men.

The following month the 58th IBrig took off. together with troops of the German army took part in the May offensive. This led to the breakthrough on the Russian front. Löhr's brigade advanced from the Beskid ridge via Hoczew and reached the Larovice area by May 16 . Then there was the Battle of Lemberg , which ended victorious for the Central Powers. After the battle, Löhr was awarded the Military Merit Medal on July 18 . At this time, Löhr's brigade perceived the pursuit of the Russian troops in night and forced marches. This led to rearguard skirmishes and artillery raids. The completely exhausted troops suffered heavy losses as a result and Löhr was wounded on June 23 by a grazing shot in the thigh. Löhr's father died on June 30, 1915 at the age of 66 in Vienna. In July Löhr's brigade was subordinate to the 2nd Army and lay on the bow . She then supported the Mackensen Army on their advance to Warsaw . In the months of August and September, Löhr's brigade took part in further advance marches. At the beginning of September it reached the Jasionów area . After an attack on September 3, Löhr's brigade was on Russian soil for the first time. After that, the summer campaign gradually turned into a positional war. The following time in the trench warfare was connected with the replacement of battalions. Löhr's front service ended at the end of November. He changed from December 1 as a trainee in the Department 5 / M (Luftfahrtruppe) into the Austro-Hungarian Ministry of War in Vienna.

Aviation troops 1916/17

In the war ministry, Löhr worked for the next few years in building up the organization of the Austro-Hungarian aviation troops . On May 1, the command of the aviation troops in the War Ministry became a separate department. The designation was Department 5 / L. In this, Löhr rose to the position of deputy board member. In this position, Löhr was entrusted with setting up the organization of the aviation troops (LFT). His tasks included the establishment of an aircraft defense service and the reorganization of the LFT. He was also responsible for the correspondence with external central offices, laid down the basics of future aviation training and wrote numerous regulations. In particular, the air defense service, also known as homeland security, devoured a large part of Löhr's commitment in 1916. On August 18, 1916, he was awarded the Silver Military Merit Medal with War Decoration for his services to date . The further development and reinforcement of the domestic airspace fell from the summer of 1916 in Löhr's area of ​​responsibility.

By the second half of 1917, Löhr's work enabled the number of defense aircraft to be increased. To ensure better organization of these flying formations, they were organized into squadrons and squadrons . In addition to organizing the aviation troops, Löhr devoted himself to setting up the (aviation) ground organization. Löhr's third major main task was the creation of aviation centers for flying training. For his work and his part in the development of the aviation troops, Löhr was awarded the Order of the Iron Crown III in October 1917 . Awarded class with war decorations.

1918

An Albatros D.III of a kuk flying company

In mid-January 1918, Löhr was assigned to the 74 Infantry Regiment as a battalion commander for troop service . The regiment was part of Löhr's old 57th Infantry Brigade on the south-western front along the Piave and was busy building positions there. In the second half of February the regiment was detached from the front and transferred to the reserve. Thereupon Löhr was instructed to return to the War Ministry. From March 1918 he was again employed as deputy board member of Department 5 / L. In 1918, however, the war situation between the Austro-Hungarian aviation troops and the Italian air forces had deteriorated. Exposed to a superior force, Innsbruck was the target of an Italian air raid on February 20, 1918. Department 5 / L around Löhr, for its part, now used all means to further expand the protection. To this end, the existing flight information network was expanded, new air watch stations were set up and an air watch chain was created.

On the other hand, after Russia left the First World War as part of the peace treaty of Brest-Litovsk Löhr's department was faced with new tasks. Airline and airmail lines to Odessa , Kiev and Budapest should be set up as soon as possible. However, these ideas were rejected again due to the further development of the situation. From August 1918, the dwindling forces of the Austro-Hungarian Defense Service made themselves felt. For example, on August 9, Italian planes dropped propaganda leaflets over Vienna. On August 31st and September 8th, 1918, the railways of Franzensfeste and Lienz were bombed. This represented failure across the board for the defense under Löhr.

From September 1918, the decline of the Danube Monarchy could no longer be stopped due to the political and economic aggravation. During this time, Löhr received the Franz Joseph Order with war decorations on September 23 . By mid-September and again at the beginning of October 1918, Charles I's calls for peace had gone unheeded. Armistice negotiations began on October 30th. In these last weeks Löhr was responsible for the relocation of all units back home, which was completed by October 30th. The next day the Entente decided that Austria would have to dissolve all aviation departments. On November 3, 1918, Undersecretary Julius Deutsch ordered the formation of the German-Austrian People's Army . A corresponding installation order followed on November 18. The Löhrs department in the former War Ministry was also affected by the associated changes in the new State Office for Army Affairs. In November and December 1918 he was responsible for the repatriation and seizure of the equipment of the former aviation troops in order to withhold this from the victorious powers, which represented a serious, international breach of law and massively endangered the new republic.

People's Army

After the incorporation of Department 5 / L into Section IV “Transport Troops” under its head, Colonel Theodor Körner , Löhr was immediately entrusted with setting up a new air force. Their strength was estimated at 10 squadrons. In early 1919 the department was given a new name. Löhr was now assigned to the department “Organization of Military Aviation Affairs” as a trainee. The department was part of Department 11 of the State Office for Army (StA.f.Hw.). Over the next few months a small air force consisting of two air groups and six air bases was created with his assistance. The Treaty of Saint-Germain negotiated in September put an end to the aspirations of the young republic for its own air force. Already in the run-up to the contract, the terms of which were recognizable, Löhr was entrusted with reducing the existing air force. According to the terms of the treaty, after the dissolution of the aviation division, Austria remained only the Thalerhof police flight squadron . This consisted of three officers and seven other people. At the end of April 1920 this was then also dissolved.

Federal Army

Giulio Douhet is considered to be the founder of the modern air war theory , the content of which Löhr implemented

To September 1, 1920 Lohr was July 1, the rank of major in the out of the people's militia newly formed army adopted. His promotion to the higher service was associated with the change . In this career he was in the newly created Federal Ministry for Army III. Section (war material) assigned to Division 11. In mid-February 1921, the Inter-Allied Control Commission took the decision to completely dismantle the Austrian aviation force. The republic had only one aircraft left for meteorological purposes. Löhr later stated about the years 1919/20 that the victorious powers were not sure whether “the German cow should now be milked to the limit or slaughtered”.

Despite the ban on military aviation in Austria, Löhr remained convinced that the future belonged to aviation. With this in mind, the reconstruction of the Austrian air force began in secret, circumventing the Treaty of St. Germain. This work was initially limited to planning and preparation under the utmost secrecy. The military nature of Löhr's unit in 1923 meant that it was assigned to the presidential section (Department 2 National Defense) on June 1, 1923. Löhr's task during these years was to first convince other affected central offices of the existence of Austrian air sovereignty . Once this has been done, air protection and the establishment of military aviation should take place in further steps. The importance of Löhr's work became clear in 1925 when there were 30 reported airspace violations by foreign military aircraft. In the following years there was a phase of relaxation with regard to the regulation of air traffic over Austrian airspace. Austria's air sovereignty gained in importance. Soon there were other state treaties on air transport: 1925 with the German Reich , 1926 with the Kingdom of Hungary . In 1928 Czechoslovakia and in 1930 Italy signed such treaties. From 1924, Löhr had worked continuously on setting up the flight reporting system and air protection. In the years from 1928 onwards, Löhr appeared offensively in public to recruit personnel for his rearmament plans. In particular, the former kuk field pilots from the police force. He succeeded in doing this easily because Austria saw itself as a “defeated nation”. Due to the tight budget situation, Löhr's rearmament was limited to passive defense.

Development of the theory of aerial warfare

During the same period, Löhr devoted himself to studying new aerial warfare methods in a future war. Studies of this kind were developed by a large number of the countries involved in World War I. Löhr specialized in methods of modern air warfare by the Italian Giulio Douhet . This represented u. a. ruthless crackdown on the civilian population, particularly the bombing of residential areas, which involved massive war crimes.

According to his theory, the Luftwaffe should receive the most important and only blow with the greatest possible margin. From these lessons, Löhr developed his own theory of aerial warfare over the years, which he did not complete until 1943. Their title was: Ways of Air War . In principle, his strategy included the principle of a decapitation blow against institutions of government. A statement on this read: "But the state organism, like the body of a living being, has places where a relatively small injury causes an extraordinary effect, the more the higher living beings or states are organized." According to his further strategy, Löhr measured The air force was given a decisive role in the battle, but by no means a decisive role in the war - he rejected extensive attacks on the hinterland of an enemy because he wanted to lay the big cities in ruins anyway, in order to force the enemy to surrender through this extreme terror.

Terror was the basic principle of his warfare. In 1938 Löhr reformulated his theory of air warfare. Any target can be attacked using aerial bombs. If one study the organism of the enemy state from an anatomical and biological point of view, one will find points which, when hit by a short blow, paralyze the entire organism. Through his numerous publications on air forces, air warfare and air protection, Löhr became known in the neighboring countries.

Secret structure of the air force

Italian Fiat-Ansaldo A.120 served Löhr as training aircraft from 1931

The years 1927 to 1929 mark Löhr's completely illegal efforts to gradually set up a new air force under the guise of secrecy. This also included establishing pilot training. Löhr's efforts were eased to the extent that Austria experienced the same relief in the creation of civil aviation in 1927 as the German Reich in the previous year. However, the ban on training military personnel to become pilots remained in place. Nevertheless, the Entente Austria allowed twelve officers to be trained in aviation over the next six years. Entire air fleets have already been set up in neighboring Italy during these years. In order not to fall completely behind, the armed forces were now intensely looking for ways to start building the air force. Löhr ran open doors in the further proceeding in this matter. He found support from the relevant departments in which former flight officers served. And in the armed forces there were also young officers who were enthusiastic about flying and could hardly wait to form the future core of an air force. The civil Austrian Air Transport Company (Ö.LAG) played an important role in this . The lifting of international military control on January 31, 1928 finally granted Löhr the freedom he had hoped for to put his plans into practice. This primarily included the training of pilots, observers and technicians. For camouflage reasons, the group of people remained assigned to the army. In 1928 the training of sports pilots began with the help of the Ö.LAG. The aircraft control room was scheduled to run by spring 1929. In the same year Loehr began to build a anti-aircraft troops by creating a Flak - battery and the training of future Flakoffiziere. In the further course of the year the structures for the training of flight and ground personnel were consolidated. From December 1928 there were officially advertised courses on this. In the spring of 1929, Löhr's work enabled the first public flying school in Aspern to begin its service. The machines were provided by the Ö.LAG In the spring of 1929, 11 army officers and 12 batches had already been trained in aviation . After the flight school was moved from Aspern to Graz , the future cadre of young pilots gathered there. Against all organizational difficulties, Löhr was able to get the flight crew training up and running by autumn 1929.

The beginning of the new decade was characterized by the further gradual expansion of the air force and the expansion of the previous airfield facilities. Due to political circumstances, Austria orientated itself with its secret rearmament on the former war opponent Italy. The kingdom supplied the young republic with equipment and technology in the following years. The first year of training for future fighter pilots was overshadowed by aircraft accidents and skills difficulties. These and other sensational incidents in the public caused a displeasure with Löhr, as he feared that the secrecy of the still banned airmen would be lost. In response to the numerous aircraft accidents, Löhr issued stricter regulations for the next training year 1930/1931. In the autumn of 1930 his air force had 10 machines, three of which were Hopfer training machines . On October 1, 1930, the Austrian air traffic regulations came into force. In November Löhr visited Hungary as well as the German Reich to visit the Siemens & Halske aircraft engine plant . The visit to the Ernst Heinkel Flugzeugwerke in Warnemünde was the conclusion .

Wehrmacht

Takeover in the German Air Force

After the " Anschluss of Austria " to the German Reich, Löhr was taken over into the Wehrmacht and appointed commander of the Austrian Air Force Command, now the " Danube and Alpine Reichsgaue ".

Second World War

In March 1939 he was promoted to General of the Airmen and Commander in Chief of the newly established Air Fleet 4, with which he took part in the attack on Poland and the Balkan campaign. On April 6th and 7th, 1941, under the command of General Löhr, the air raid on Belgrade took place, in which thousands of people were killed. The attack on Yugoslavia took place on April 6, 1941 without a declaration of war. Belgrade was bombed on the same day, even though Yugoslavia had declared it an " open city ". Löhr had developed the plan for bombing the city, which provided for large fires to be caused by high explosive and incendiary bombs in order to "make it easier to find the target" for the second attack at night.

The high by such an attack victim rate among the population of the city were taken quite consciously and planned buying what the second to Warsaw air terror attack in an unprecedented scale was thus an extreme war crimes of the Wehrmacht, the later in air strikes on German cities should bitterly avenge them.

During the planning and implementation of the airborne battle for Crete in May 1941, Löhr was chief planner and, together with Kurt Student, commander in chief . Löhr, who in addition to Russian spoke all the important languages ​​of the Balkan Peninsula except Greek , was on the one hand a particularly educated officer of the “old Austrian school” and, on the other hand, a loyal supporter of the National Socialist idea .

Promoted to Colonel General in May 1941 , Löhr was deployed in the southern section of the Eastern Front until June 1942 . On August 1, 1942, Löhr was finally appointed Wehrmacht Commander Southeast and Commander in Chief of the 12th Army stationed on the Balkan Peninsula . From January 1 to August 26, 1943 and from March 25, 1945 to the German surrender , he was 'Commander in Chief Southeast'. From August 26, 1943 to March 25, 1945, General Field Marshal Maximilian von Weichs was Commander in Chief Southeast. Löhr himself was only commander in chief of Army Group E at this time . Among other things, he was responsible for the deportations of more than 60,000 Jews from Greece and Albania. Löhr's “criminal responsibility” for the deportations, especially from the Greek islands , has been proven.

On May 8, 1945, the day the German Wehrmacht surrendered, 150,000 men from Army Group Löhr were still in Yugoslavia. The last German rearguards were only 72 hours away from Carinthia. Colonel-General Löhr negotiated in Griffen near Völkermarkt with the British about the transfer of the parts of the Army Group still on Yugoslav territory to Carinthia into British custody, which the British refused. Thereupon Löhr gave the order to surrender to the Yugoslavs. He himself was extradited to Yugoslavia by the British and therefore had to go to Maribor (Marburg) in Yugoslavia on May 15 with his closest staff .

The Military Tribunal of the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia sentenced him to death by shooting in a trial that took place from February 5 to 16, 1947, for the bombing of Belgrade in 1941, which he ordered without a declaration of war . Löhr did not submit a petition for clemency . The sentence was carried out on February 26, 1947. In the co-accused generals August Schmidhuber , Johann Fortner , Fritz envy Holdt , Joseph Kuebler , Adalbert Lontschar and Colonel Günther Tribukeit the death sentence was amended by train enforced.

Memorial plaques

2015 dismantled memorial plaque for Löhr in the collegiate church

In the Ministry of Defense owned and by the Austrian military diocese used Vienna Collegiate Church is one of the was Austrian and Viennese Aero Club donated plaque commemorating Alexander Loehr. The plaque attached to All Saints' Day in 1955 reminds of the “... because of his modesty and humanity, the military leader of the old Austrian style who was popular ...” The plaque was controversial from the start, which meant that soon after it was installed ... red paint was sprayed over, in fact the removal of which had been requested. In September 2014, the Green Member of the National Council Harald Walser again called for the memorial plaque for the war criminal to be removed . The military chaplain replied that they wanted to redesign the interior of the collegiate church, but the memorial plaques “... by no means served to glorify war crimes”, but “... in the church the prayer for the deceased is in the foreground, especially for those who are guilty. ”Above the plaque for Löhr hangs a large marble Jesus relief with the inscription“ You will be resurrected ”. For the Viennese daily Der Standard it is unclear “… why this board is back. There was such a memorial plaque before, but it was dismantled in 1986 after protests. At that time, she was one of the triggers for the Waldheim affair . Kurt Waldheim was a soldier in Army Group E, which was subordinate to Löhr . ”On February 19, 2015, the plaque was removed from the church. The other panels are checked. and an explanatory board is planned. After 1955, Löhr was also honored with a plaque in the auditorium of the National Defense Academy, which was removed decades later. In 1989 his name was found on a plaque in the Hofburg Chapel with the title “Field of Honor”. It has since been made unrecognizable.

literature

• Löhr Alexander. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 5, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1972, p. 276.
• Karl Glaubauf : The People's Army 1918-20 and the founding of the Republic , Vienna 1993. (With numerous aircraft images).
• Franz Menges:  Löhr, Alexander. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 15, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-428-00196-6 , p. 43 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Jaromir Diakow: Colonel General Alexander Löhr: A picture of life. Herder, Freiburg i. Br. 1964.
• Siegwald Ganglmair : Colonel General Alexander Löhr. In: Gerd R. Ueberschär (ed.): Hitler's military elite. From the beginning of the war to the end of the world war. Volume 2. Primus, Darmstadt 1998, ISBN 3-89678-089-1 , pp. 123-130.

Web links

Commons : Alexander Löhr  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Alexander Löhr in the catalog of the German National Library
• Entry about Alexander Löhr in the Austria-Forum  (biography)
• The German Army Groups Part 2, World War II. bundesarchiv.de (with further links)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Wolfram Wette (Ed.): War crimes in the 20th century. Primus, Darmstadt 2001, ISBN 3-89678-417-X , p. 192.
2. ↑ Jaromir Diakow: Colonel General Alexander Löhr. A picture of life. Herder, Vienna 1964, p. 15.
3. ^ ^{A b c d} Karl Friedrich Hildebrand, Dermot Bradley, Ernest Henriot: The Generals of the German Air Force 1935-1945. Part II, Volume 2: Habermehl – ​​Nuber. Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1991, p. 308.
4. ↑ ^{a b} Jaromir Diakow: Colonel General Alexander Löhr. A picture of life. Herder, Vienna 1964, p. 16.
5. ^ Wolfdieter Bihl : The First World War 1914–1918. Böhlau, Vienna 2010, p. 111.
6. ^ Rolf-Dieter Müller : The bombing war 1939-1945. Links Verlag, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-86153-317-0 , p. 86.
7. ^ Walter Manoschek : "Serbia is free of Jews". Military occupation policy and the extermination of Jews in Serbia 1941/42. (= Volume 38 of articles on military and war history) Oldenbourg, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-486-56137-5 , p. 18.
   Detlef Vogel: Operation “Strafgericht”. The ruthless bombing of Belgrade by the German air force on April 6, 1941. In: Gerd R. Ueberschär , Wolfram Wette (Ed.): War crimes in the 20th century. Primus, Darmstadt 2001, ISBN 3-89678-417-X , pp. 303-308.
8. ^ Diakow:  Löhr Alexander. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 5, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1972, p. 276.
9. ^ Raul Hilberg: The annihilation of the European Jews. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1990, Volume 2, ISBN 3-596-24417-X , p. 749 ff.
10. ^ Walter Manoschek: "Serbia is free of Jews". Military occupation policy and the extermination of Jews in Serbia 1941/42. (= Volume 38 of articles on military and war history ) Oldenbourg, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-486-56137-5 , p. 23.
11. ↑ Kurt W. Böhme: On the history of the German prisoners of war of the Second World War. The German prisoners of war in Yugoslavia 1941–1949. Volume 1/1, Munich 1962, p. 279.
12. ^ Hermann Frank Meyer: Bloody Edelweiss. The 1st Mountain Division in World War II. Links, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-86153-447-1 , p. 667.
13. ↑ ^{a b} Controversial Löhr memorial plaque hung in Vienna collegiate church. In: KathWeb. February 27, 2015, accessed February 27, 2015 . 
14. ^ Helmuth Damerau: German Soldier Yearbook , Volume 35, Schild Verlag, 1987, p. 144.
15. ↑ Greens criticize Nazi memorial plaque for Löhr in Wiener Stiftskirche '' . In: Vienna Online. from September 24, 2014.
16. ↑ Outrage at the memorial plaque for Nazi war criminals in the Viennese collegiate church . In: Der Standard from September 25, 2014.
17. ↑ ^{a b} Stiftskirche: Nazi honor board removed. February 27, 2015, accessed February 27, 2015 . 

• Erwin Pitsch: Alexander Löhr. Volume 1: The major general and creator of the Austrian Air Force. Österreichischer Miliz -Verlag, Salzburg 2004, ISBN 3-901185-21-6 .

1. ↑ ^{a b} p. 53.
2. ↑ ^{a b c} p. 54.
3. ↑ p. 126.
4. ↑ ^{a b c} p. 103.
5. ↑ ^{a b} p. 55.
6. ↑ ^{a b c} p. 56.
7. ↑ ^{a b} p. 57.
8. ↑ p. 58.
9. ↑ p. 59.
10. ↑ p. 60.
11. ↑ ^{a b c} p. 61.
12. ↑ p. 62.
13. ↑ p. 63.
14. ↑ p. 64.
15. ↑ p. 66.
16. ↑ p. 72.
17. ↑ p. 75.
18. ↑ p. 76.
19. ↑ p. 77.
20. ↑ p. 78.
21. ↑ ^{a b} p. 79.
22. ↑ p. 80.
23. ↑ ^{a b} p. 81.
24. ↑ p. 86.
25. ↑ p. 87.
26. ↑ p. 89.
27. ↑ p. 90.
28. ↑ p. 91.
29. ↑ p. 92.
30. ↑ p. 94.
31. ↑ p. 95.
32. ↑ p. 98 f.
33. ↑ p. 100.
34. ↑ p. 102.
35. ↑ p. 104.
36. ↑ ^{a b} p. 106.
37. ↑ p. 108.
38. ↑ ^{a b} p. 112.
39. ↑ p. 111.
40. ↑ p. 109.
41. ↑ p. 113.
42. ↑ p. 114.
43. ↑ p. 115.
44. ↑ p. 116 f.
45. ↑ p. 118.
46. ↑ p. 119.
47. ↑ p. 121.
48. ↑ p. 122.
49. ↑ p. 124.
50. ↑ p. 125.
51. ↑ p. 45.
52. ↑ Armin Scheiderbauer, Erwin Pitsch: Alexander Löhr: The major general and creator of the Austrian air force. Österreichischer Miliz-Verlag, Salzburg 2001, ISBN 978-3-90118521-2 , p. 28.