Chancellery of the Führer
The Chancellery of the Führer of the NSDAP ( KdF ) was a party organization of the NSDAP . She was directly subordinate to Adolf Hitler and was responsible in particular for petitions and pardons directed to the Führer .
Foundation and areas of responsibility
The founding of the KdF was decided at the Nazi Party Congress of 1933. The new chancellery was intended to emphasize the leadership role of Hitler, to whom three other offices were subordinate:
- the presidential chancellery in Berlin as the chancellery of the head of state under the direction of Otto Meissner
- the Reich Chancellery as the Chancellor's office, headed by Hans Heinrich Lammers
- the party chancellery in the Munich party headquarters of the NSDAP under Martin Bormann , until 1941 the "Staff of the Deputy Leader" under Rudolf Hess
Philipp Bouhler took over the management of the KdF on November 17, 1934. It was initially located in Berlin on Lützowufer and then later moved to the New Reich Chancellery at Vossstrasse 4. In 1939, 195 employees worked for the KdF. The applications processed in the KdF concerned three areas of work:
- The most important area were requests for mercy. From 1938, the KdF had a say in requests for clemency from party members. However, the intended takeover of the entire right of grace from the jurisdiction of the judiciary was not achieved.
- Further submissions concerned the allocation of foreign currency, the granting of economic aid or the granting of concessions.
- In addition, requests for exemptions from marriage bans under the Nuremberg Laws and compulsory sterilizations under the “ Law for the Prevention of Hereditary Offspring ” were processed.
The responsibility of the KdF for the murder of the disabled, the so-called Action T4 , developed from the third task area . From April 1939 at the earliest, Hans Hefelmann was entrusted with the organization of the so-called child “euthanasia” . From around the end of July 1939, planning began for the mass killing of the mentally ill and disabled. A letter from Hitler, dated September 1, 1939, but probably not written until October, names Philipp Bouhler and Hitler's attending doctor Karl Brandt as "euthanasia" officers. Bouhler largely transferred the management of Aktion T4 to Viktor Brack . To conceal the responsibility of the KdF, several sham organizations were founded, including the Gemeinnützige Krankentransport GmbH , whose managing director Reinhold Vorberg became. As far as employees of the KdF were active for the front organizations, they used code names: Viktor Brack Jennerwein was called , Werner Blankenburg used the name Brenner and Reinhold Vorberg appeared as Hintertal . From April 1940 the bogus organizations were located at Tiergartenstrasse 4 , from this address the name Central Office T4 arose .
organization
The KdF was divided into five main offices. Hauptamt II gained special importance under Viktor Brack, who was also Bouhler's deputy:
| Office | Jurisdiction | ladder | ||
| Chancellery of the Führer | Reichsleiter Philipp Bouhler (Adjutant: Karl Michel von Tüßling ) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I. | Private law firm | Head of Service Albert Bormann | ||
| II | State and party affairs | Head of Service Viktor Brack | ||
| IIa | Deputy Head of the Main Office II | Head of Department Werner Blankenburg | ||
| IIb | Affairs concerning the Reich ministries; also requests for mercy | Head of Office Hans Hefelmann , Deputy Richard von Hegener | ||
| IIc | Matters concerning the armed forces , police and SD ; churches too | Office manager Reinhold Vorberg | ||
| IId | Party affairs | Office manager Buchholz, from 1942 Brümmel | ||
| III | Grace office for party affairs | Head of Service Hubert Berkenkamp , from 1941 Kurt Giese | ||
| IV | Social and economic affairs | Head of the office Heinrich Cnyrim | ||
| V | Internal and staff | Head of Service Herbert Jaensch | ||
Loss of meaning
From around 1942 the KdF lost its importance. The office lost access to the common inbox of the Reich Chancellery. She was only responsible for appeals for clemency if individual decisions were necessary, while fundamental decisions were made by the Bormanns party office. Due to the war, the number of employees was reduced to 137 in 1942. Philipp Bouhler, who was considered weak-willed and hesitant to make decisions, had already looked for a new area of responsibility in colonial policy in 1940 and was striving - in vain in view of the further course of the war - the office of governor of East Africa.
The central office T4 continued to exist even after the so-called euthanasia freeze in August 1941, but was able to become independent. There is evidence that 92 people who had previously worked as "proven euthanasia helpers" were transferred to the East from September 1941. Many were significantly involved in the extermination camps of Aktion Reinhardt in the murder of around 1.7 to 1.9 million predominantly Polish Jews, but were still looked after and paid for by the "Chancellery of the Führer". The KdF retained responsibility for personnel issues, even if Odilo Globocnik was the military superior of the T4 employees.
With the Control Council Act No. 2 of October 10, 1945, the Fuehrer's Chancellery was banned by the Allied Control Council and its property was confiscated.
literature
- Hans-Walter Schmuhl : Philipp Bouhler - A pioneer of mass murder. in: Ronald Smelser , Enrico Syring and Rainer Zitelmann: The brown elite. Volume 2. Darmstadt, 1993.
- Henry Friedlander : The Road to Nazi Genocide. From euthanasia to the final solution. Berlin, Berlin-Verlag, 1997. ISBN 3-8270-0265-6 .
Remarks
- ↑ Hitler's letter in a facsimile (Nuremberg Document PS-630).
- ↑ compiled after investigations by the public prosecutor against those responsible for action T4 in: Henry Friedlander, p. 86f.
- ^ Ernst Klee : Euthanasia in the Nazi state. Frankfurt a. M. 1985, p. 374, ISBN 3-596-24326-9 .
- ^ Raul Hilberg : The Reinhard Action. In: Eberhard Jäckel, Jürgen Rohwer: The murder of the Jews in World War II. Frankfurt a. M. 1987, p. 130, ISBN 3-596-24380-7 / Sara Berger: Experts of Destruction. The T4 Reinhardt network in the Belzec, Sobibor and Treblinka camps. Hamburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-86854-268-4 , p. 217.