Gestapo reports

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As Gestapo reports , the documents in to the Gestapo called in which events and mood reports were summarized from the districts. They were mostly made monthly from 1933 to 1936 and forwarded to the Prussian Prime Minister or at the same time Prussian Interior Minister Hermann Göring .

Origin and purpose

As early as February, the political departments of the Prussian State Criminal Police Office had been asked to report important political observations of supra-local importance to a department of the State Criminal Police Office, from which the Secret State Police Office emerged a short time later. The situation reports, which usually had to be submitted monthly, were supplemented by event reports in which attacks on the NSDAP and incidents involving the injured were to be reported.

When Heinrich Himmler took over the command of the Secret State Police in April 1934, Reinhard Heydrich, as his deputy , requested daily reports from the departments. In addition, a general overview of the mood in the population had to be submitted every month.

Information for these situation reports was collected by informants who overheard conversations in public places such as restaurants and public transport. The reports contain a lot of information on anti-Semitic actions by party members. The reaction of the population to the Nuremberg Laws is discussed in detail.

Since the public opinion was no longer immediately recognizable because of the controlled press and conformity , the political leadership tried to explore the "popular opinion" in this way. The situation reports were also sent to the Prussian upper presidents and regional presidents and their content was often incorporated into their reports.

Decision to hire

Two years later, on April 8, 1936, Heydrich had this reporting stopped. Goering had complained that the reports generalized and unnecessarily exaggerated individual local difficulties and critical individual comments. The mood in the population is exaggerated, the party itself can better judge the "unshakable trust in the leader". The Gestapo reports were accessible to a larger group of people and the overrated criticism could contribute to the deterioration of the mood.

Source value

In fact, the informative value of the Gestapo reports cannot be equated with the demoscopic survey results that are common today. The information was not collected in a representative manner, but listened in randomly. It must also be taken into account that publicly expressed opinions in the Third Reich were often filtered through careful self-censorship (cf. Flüsterwitz ). The editorial selection and compilation of information can be guided by self-interest, for example in order to emphasize the indispensability of one's own agency in the defense against dangers or to present one's own objectives as a demand of popular opinion. While the information in individual reports is sometimes assessed as subjective and distorted, the situation reports compiled between 1934 and 1936 are considered to be of good informative value.

The Gestapo reports have been almost completely preserved for the individual states and provinces such as Pomerania , Hessen-Nassau , Baden , Brandenburg (Potsdam) , Karlsruhe , Hanover , Flensburg , Saxony , Osnabrück , Münster and Oldenburg . They are available in printed form.

Comparable records

Up to 1936 there were also the “Reports of the Oberpräsident und Regionalpräsident”, some of which are based on material from the Gestapo reports. The “situation reports of the judiciary” for the years 1940 to 1944 have been preserved, some of which criticize very bluntly actions in which party members acted arbitrarily against Jews. From 1937 the security service SS (SD) delivered regular reports, which from December 1939 were referred to as " reports from the Reich ". In addition, there was a regular reporting system by the NSDAP, in which the Gauleitungen were supposed to describe the mood of the population every month. None of the compiled compilations that were praised as an important source in Goebbels' diary have survived.

Regional situation reports (selection)

  • W. Ribbe (Hrsg.): The situation reports of the secret state police about the province Brandenburg and the Reich capital Berlin 1933 to 1936, part volume I: The administrative region Potsdam, Cologne 1998, ISBN 3-412-12096-0 .
  • T. Klein (ed.): The situation reports of the secret state police on the province of Hessen-Nassau I: A and B as well as part II: C, Cologne and Vienna 1986, ISBN 3-412-05984-6 .
  • Hermann-Josef Rupieper / Alexander Sperk (eds.): The situation reports of the secret state police for the province of Saxony 1933-1936. Volume 1: Administrative region Magdeburg, ISBN 3-89812-200-X / Volume 2: Administrative region Merseburg, ISBN 3-89812-214-X / Volume 3: Administrative region Erfurt, ISBN 3-89812-215-8 , both in Halle an der Saale 2003, 2004 and 2006.
  • B. Vollmer (ed.): People's opposition in the police state, Gestapo and government reports 1934–1936, Stuttgart 1957 ( administrative districts of Aachen and Cologne ).
  • Situation reports of the Rhenish Gestapo offices, Volume I: 1934, edit. by Anselm Faust, Bernd-A. Rusinek and Burkhard Dietz, Düsseldorf 2012, ISBN 978-3-7700-7638-3 .
  • Persecution and resistance under National Socialism in Baden . The situation reports of GESTAPO and the Attorney General Karlsruhe , edit. by Jörg Schadt, Stuttgart 1976.
  • Robert Thévoz / Hans Branig / Cécile Lowenthal-Hensel (eds.): Pommern 1934/35 in the mirror of Gestapo reports and factual files, 2 volumes, Cologne 1974.
  • Gerd Steinwascher: "Gestapo Osnabrück reports ..." Police and government reports from the Osnabrück administrative district from 1933 to 1936. From: Osnabrücker Geschichtsquellen und Forschungen Vol. XXXVI, Osnabrück 1995.

See also

literature

  • Peter Longerich : “We didn't know anything about it!” The Germans and the persecution of the Jews 1933–1945. Siedler, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-88680-843-2 , (overview / on source criticism / information on printed sources).
  • Otto Dov Kulka: The Nuremberg Race Laws and the German Population in the Light of Secret Nazi Situation and Mood Reports. In: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 32, 1984, ISSN  0042-5702 , pp. 582-636, (for the critical evaluation of such sources).
  • Rainer Eckert : Gestapo reports. Representations of reality or pure speculation? In: Gerhard Paul , Klaus-Michael Mallmann (ed.): The Gestapo - Myth and Reality . Unchanged special edition. Primus Verlag, Darmstadt 2003, ISBN 3-89678-482-X , pp. 200-215.
  • Rainer Eckert: Reporting under fascism. Outline of the reports by the Gestapo, the security service of the Reichsführer SS, government and senior presidents as well as public prosecutors and higher regional court presidents taking into account the available source editions . In: Bulletin Fascism - Second World War 1990, ZDB -ID 1013878-x , pp. 67–116, (not viewed).
  • Margot Pikarski, Elke Warning (ed.): Gestapo reports on the anti-fascist resistance struggle of the KPD from 1933 to 1945 , Dietz Verlag, Berlin, 1989–1990, Vol. 1–3. ISBN 978-3-320-01338-7 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Longerich, Davon ..., (p. 33).
  2. ^ Rainer Eckert: Gestapo reports - depictions of reality or pure speculation? In: Gerhard Paul, Klaus-Michael Mallmann: The Gestapo ... . Darmstadt 2003, ISBN 3-89678-482-X , p. 214.
  3. ↑ see Longerich, Davon ..., (p. 442).