Gerhard Franke (MfS employee)

Gerhard Franke (born July 17, 1920 in Einsiedel (today a district of Chemnitz ), † August 19, 1984 ) was a colonel in the Ministry for State Security (MfS) of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). From 1959 to 1984 he was a senior employee of the Enlightenment Headquarters (HVA) in East Berlin , the GDR's foreign intelligence service.

Life

Franke, the son of a worker, learned the profession of iron former after elementary school and worked this until the beginning of the Second World War in 1939. Until 1943 he was obliged to serve in the Reich Labor Service (RAD), was drafted into the German Wehrmacht in 1943 and transferred to the Eastern Front. In 1944 he deserted and went over to the Soviet Red Army , which took him prisoner of war . In captivity Franke became a member of the anti-fascist National Committee Free Germany (NKFD).

After the end of the war, Franke returned to Chemnitz in Saxony in August 1945 and became an employee of the German People's Police (DVP). In 1945 Franke joined the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and became a member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) after the forced unification of the KPD and SPD in the Soviet-occupied zone of Germany .

In 1948 Franke was transferred to the border police for several months and in October became deputy post manager of the police in Chemnitz-Einsiedel. At the beginning of 1949 he moved to the administration for the protection of the Saxon economy in Chemnitz, which in February 1950 became the state administration of Saxony of the Ministry for State Security (MfS). In 1950 Franke was briefly a liaison officer of the MfS at the Pirna Police School , then he was transferred to the MfS headquarters in East Berlin.

After working in MfS Department VII (responsible for safeguarding the People's Police and the Ministry of the Interior ), Franke became a department head in Main Department III in 1951, responsible for economics. After a brief activity in the control inspection, Franke switched to the Central Enlightenment Administration (HVA), the GDR's foreign intelligence service, in 1956.

Until 1959 Franke was department head within the HVA main department IV, responsible for industrial espionage , and was then deputy head of main department IV until 1971. 1958/59 he completed a course at the district party school of the SED in Potsdam .

From 1971 to 1984 Franke was head of the HVA department XV, responsible for defense technology, aerospace, was promoted to colonel in 1972 and in 1981 to officer for special tasks with the head of the HVA science and technology sector. He retired in 1984 and died in the same year.

literature

• Jens Gieseke :  Gerhard Franke . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
• Jens Gieseke: Who was who in the Ministry for State Security (MfS manual) . BStU. Berlin 2012. ( Online )