Secret Field Police (Wehrmacht)

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The Geheime Feldpolizei ( GFP ) belonged to the order troops within the Wehrmacht during the Nazi era . The first GFP groups were set up shortly before the attack on Poland on August 2, 1939 as part of the field army . With the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union in 1941, most of these orderly troops were concentrated on the occupied territory of the Soviet Union to fight partisans . The Feldgendarmerie and the Feldjägerkommandos were responsible for the immediate military order in the area of ​​operations , their members being referred to as chain dogs, alluding to the metal plaque with the inscription Feldgendarmerie or Feldjägerkommando, which was worn on a chain around the neck.

Leadership and staff

Until 1944, the leadership of the GFP was in the hands of the Abwehr at the High Command of the Wehrmacht (OKW), to which the respective commander of the GFP was subordinate. In February 1944 the defense was taken over by the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), but the leadership of the GFP remained with the OKW.

The operational units of the GFP were groups with a nominal strength of 50 men, which was increased to 95 before the attack on the Soviet Union. In 1939 there were 15 groups in the field army, in 1942/1943 there were 83, in 1944 there were 68.

The groups were led by field police officers who came exclusively from the security police , i.e. from the Gestapo or the criminal police , and were assigned to the Wehrmacht. They led the ranks of the security police. Wehrmacht members who were accepted into the GFP retained their military rank.

On the territory of the Soviet Union , the GFP was reinforced by local volunteers , Soviet prisoners of war and other collaborators of the most varied of sentiments. In 1943 there were around 25 volunteers in each GFP group.

Mission and commitment

The area of ​​operation of the GFP was the area of ​​operations of the field army with the rear army area and the occupied areas, which was under the command of a Wehrmacht commander or other military commanders . In contrast to this, their tasks in the occupied territories such as the Generalgouvernement , which were under the regime of a civil administration, or in the homeland war area were carried out by the Gestapo .

The GFP groups were motorized and had light infantry weapons.

The CFP should control the morale of the troops and fight internal tendencies towards decomposition. Disintegration phenomena such as the Kiel sailors' uprising at the end of the First World War , culminating in the November Revolution in 1918, were terrifying for the Wehrmacht and the Nazi rulers and should be prevented at all costs. For this purpose, a separate police force was to be set up, which could move freely within the Wehrmacht in order to enable additional control.

In addition to monitoring the troops, the CFP's area of ​​responsibility also included protecting against external enemies such as partisans and saboteurs . She was also responsible for defending against enemy espionage . Their relatives had access to uniforms of all branches of service and were allowed to wear civilian clothes if this was deemed necessary. Like the agents of a secret service , they could access all types of ID. The CFP had linguists who could translate the interrogations and get in touch with the population of the occupied territories.

According to the " Regulations for the Secret Field Police", the tasks of the Secret Field Police included : Researching and combating all efforts that endanger the people and the state, in particular espionage , treason , sabotage , enemy propaganda and disintegration in the operational area. This included, for example, the monitoring of the press and the news traffic of the civilian population or also measures to stop the enemy intelligence service or the monitoring of the civilian population, exploring moods and attitudes, acquiring confidants and other suitable sources.

Even before 1939, however, it was clear that in a future war the GFP should no longer only serve to ward off espionage and sabotage in the operational area, but should continue the work of the Secret State Police within the framework of the Wehrmacht in all areas. Logically, the Secret Field Police recruited staff from the Gestapo and the political departments of the criminal police from the start. They were assigned to the Wehrmacht as civil servants for the duration of the war, but retained the ranks of the police with the addition of "field police". Members of the Wehrmacht who appeared suitable for secret police operations due to special knowledge or skills were appointed as auxiliary field police officers, but retained their military rank. Even after returning to the troops, they were obliged to maintain absolute silence about all events at the GFP.

In the Spanish Civil War from 1936 to 1939, a unit consisting of 30 men with the designation "S / 88 / Ic" was used for the first time as part of the Condor Legion . This unit worked closely with the intelligence service of the Franco forces (Servicio Informacion Policia Militar). One of the focal points of the work in Spain was the persecution of Germans who fought in the international brigades . An agreement with Franco regulated the transfer of captured German fighters to the GFP. Some of these captured German fighters of the International Brigades have already been murdered in Spain, most of them were deported to the German Reich with the consent of Spain in order to either be tried before the People's Court or immediately taken to a concentration camp .

During the partial mobilization of the Wehrmacht as part of the Anschluss of Austria in March 1938, Military District VII (Munich) set up GFP Group 570 for a few days.

In autumn 1938 with the annexation of the Sudetenland and in spring 1939 with the annexation of Bohemia and Moravia , cooperation with the Einsatzkommandos (later Einsatzgruppen ) of the Security Service (SD) was developed and rehearsed. The GFP exercised a secret police function in the Wehrmacht, while the Einsatzkommandos carried out mass arrests of potential opponents in order to eliminate any resistance.

In countries such as Norway or Denmark , the CFP mainly carried out military police tasks, while in partisan struggles in the Soviet Union and the Balkans, together with Wehrmacht, SS and police associations, it often carried out so-called "retaliatory measures" against the partisan movement and the population.

From the summer of 1943, with the withdrawal of the Wehrmacht, the break-up of their troops and their internal disintegration, the search for deserters became one of the most important areas of activity of the GFP. In July 1944 alone, no less than 16,000 dispersed German soldiers were checked in the area of Army Group Center , who retreated westwards during the chaotic retreat movements in the course of the Soviet summer offensive, Operation Bagration .

crime

Despite its involvement in war crimes , the CFP was not classified as a criminal organization in the Nuremberg trials . The troops deployed to fight partisans were assigned GFP commandos to interrogate captured partisans. Their mission was not limited to interrogations. In the Nuremberg trial against the Wehrmacht High Command , a corresponding order from the General Staff was quoted: “Civilians who are sufficiently suspected of espionage, sabotage or partisanism are to be shot after being questioned by the CFP . [...] Boys and young girls who are preferred by the enemy cannot be ruled out. ”If the“ partisan suspects ”were not liquidated by the GFP immediately after the interrogation, they were often sent to the SD task force for“ further treatment ” passed on.

When interrogating suspects, the CFP used brutal methods such as kicks and blows with fists, clubs, couplings , rubber hoses and whips to obtain confessions. Executions were initially requested from the IC officer of the relevant Army High Command of the Wehrmacht and, after confirmation, usually immediately thereafter, carried out by a shot in the neck or in the back.

The extent of the crimes of the Secret Field Police on Soviet territory has not yet been statistically investigated. On April 10, 1943, the Army Field Police Chief published an overview in which he stated that around 21,000 people from the GFP in the period from July 1, 1942 to March 31, 1943 had "acted and favored gangs, espionage and sabotage [...] People, some in combat and some after being questioned, were [were] shot. "

At the end of April 1944, the head of GFP Group 570, Field Police Commissioner Heinz Riedel, had a truck converted into a gassing vehicle. Thanks to a special construction, the exhaust gases from the engine were directed into the interior of the closed box structure. The car drove two to three kilometers around Mogilev ; those who were suffocated by the exhaust fumes were buried in pits.

literature

  • Klaus Geßner: Secret field police. On the function and organization of the secret police executive body of the fascist armed forces. Military Publishing House of the German Democratic Republic, Berlin 1986 ( Military History Studies NF 24, ZDB -ID 530624-3 ), (Unchanged reprint. Military Publishing House , Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-360-02701-6 ).
  • Klaus Geßner: Secret field police - the Gestapo of the Wehrmacht. In: Hannes Heer, Klaus Naumann (ed.): Destruction War - Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941–1944, Hamburg 1995, ISBN 3-930908-04-2 , pp. 343–358. (According to the author, updated summary of his book from 1986 from the military publishing house)
  • Heinz Höhne : Canaris - Patriot in Twilight. Bertelsmann , Munich 1984, ISBN 3-570-01608-0 .
  • Paul B. Brown: The Senior Leadership Cadre of the Geheime Feldpolizei 1939-1945. In: Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 17, 2003, ISSN  8756-6583 , pp. 278-304.
  • Wilhelm Krichbaum , Antonio J. Munoz: The Secret Field Police. Wehrmacht Geheime Feldpolizei Forces in World War II, 1939–1945. Europa Box Inc., Bayside NY 2008, ISBN 978-1-891227-75-2 .
  • Peter Lutz Kalmbach: Police investigative organs of the armed forces justice, in: Kriminalistik. Independent journal for criminal science and practice, 2/2013, 67th year, pp. 118–122.
  • secret regulation H.Dv.g. 150, M.Dv.Nr. 4, L.Dv. 150, Regulations for the Secret Field Police, 1939.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Federal Archives, Nuremberg Follow-Up Trials , Case XII, Vol. 134, Bl. 153
  2. ↑ quoted from: Hannes Heer, Klaus Naumann: Destruction War. Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941 to 1944, Hamburg 1995, ISBN 3-930908-04-2 , p. 355.
  3. ↑ Klaus Geßner: Secret field police - the Gestapo of the Wehrmacht. In: Hannes Heer, Klaus Naumann (eds.): Destruction War - Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941-1944, Hamburg 1995, ISBN 3-930908-04-2 , p. 351.