Hans Kehrl

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Hans Kehrl (1942)

Hans Kehrl (born September 8, 1900 in Brandenburg an der Havel , † April 26, 1984 in Grafenau ) was a German economic functionary during the Nazi era and an NSDAP regional economic consultant .

Childhood, education

Hans Kehrl was born on September 8, 1900 in Brandenburg an der Havel. His father Richard Kehrl was a cloth manufacturer, a partner in the cloth factory Rudolph Kehrl, his uncle Gustav Kehrl died in 1931. After graduating from high school in Cottbus , Kehrl volunteered in this factory. After a short course at the “State Technical Center for the Textile Industry” in Reutlingen and Aachen, he went to the USA from 1922 to 1924.

Career

In 1926, Kehrl himself became a partner in the Rudolph Kehrl cloth factory. He joined Gustav Stresemann's national liberal German People's Party (DVP) .

After Hitler came to power, Kehrl became a member of the NSDAP on May 1, 1933 ( membership number 1,878,921). Since 1933, Kehrl was as Gau Economics Adviser, the Nazi Party in Gau Kurmark operates; at the same time, from May 1933 to 1935, he was President of the Niederlausitz Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Cottbus . In 1934 he worked as an employee of Wilhelm Keppler as economic representative of the Führer and Reich Chancellor . Kehrl focused on promoting textile substitutes , which enabled the German economy to save foreign currency and reduce its dependence on imports. In 1936/37 four new pulp plants were built under his direction .

After 1934, Kehrl sat on the supervisory board of 19 stock corporations, mainly in the heavy and textile industries, including the Reichswerke AG for ore mining and ironworks "Hermann Göring" , the Brüxer Kohlenbergbaugesellschaft , the Kurmärkische Zellwolle u. Zellulose AG and the North Bohemian Coal Works Company in Brüx, also in the Rheinische Kunstseide AG in Krefeld , the Rheinische Zellwolle AG in Siegburg , in the Spinnstoffwerk Glauchau AG , the Sudetenländische Bergbau AG and the Sudetenländische Treibswerke AG in Brüx; he was also the chairman of the foreign trade office for East Brandenburg .

In 1936, Kehrl became the main consultant for the four-year plan in the “Office for German Raw Materials” of the Reich Ministry of Economics . On September 13, 1936, Kehrl became a member of the SS (SS No. 276.899) and joined the Reichsführer SS Friends Group, encouraged by his mentor Keppler, for "pragmatic reasons [...] with a sense of power accumulation".

From 1938 to 1942 he was general advisor for special tasks , who became the most important decision-making body for banking policy in the Sudetenland . In 1938 he was deputy to the "Reich Commissioner for Austria", and in 1939 "Plenipotentiary of the Reich Ministry of Economics for the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia ". On November 9, 1939 he became SS-Oberführer at the staff of the SS main office . On November 14, 1939, he introduced the Reich clothing cards , from which Jews were excluded from February 6, 1940.

In autumn 1941 the Ost-fiber company was founded in Berlin with Kehrl as chairman of the board of directors. The Ost fiber GmbH was the "most important monopoly company for the textile industry in the east", which with its Riga subsidiary Ostland fiber GmbH had the order to re-operate all the textile, paper and pulp industries confiscated by the German occupiers. Most of the production went to the Wehrmacht and at times comprised around 300 companies and 30,000 employees. which is why he was also referred to as the "textile pope".

In 1942, Kehrl became the driving force behind the founding of important steering associations for the economy: the Reichsvereinigung Eisen , RV Bast fibers , RV chemical fibers and RV textile finishing were set up to solve urgent supply problems . Rolf Dieter Müller described Kehrl as the “general of civil economy”.

From September 16, 1943, Kehrl headed the planning office , from November 1, 1943 the raw materials office in the Reich Ministry of Economics, and later he became president of the armaments office of Albert Speer, the general agent for armaments . From January 30, 1944, Kehrl was SS Brigade Leader .

Kehrl was responsible for "illegal property transactions within the framework of the National Socialist resettlement policy ".

Nuremberg Trials, prison, 1945–1951

After the end of the war, Kehrl was initially in the Heilbronn internment camp . In the negotiations from January 6 to November 18, 1948, Kehrl sat in the dock in the Wilhelmstrasse trial ("The Ministries Case", case 11 of the Nuremberg Trials ). He was accused of war crimes and "crimes against humanity" because of looting of the occupied territories in the west by the "Kehrl Plan" and by the East Fiber Society in the east, as well as membership in a criminal organization, the SS. His defense lawyer argued that Kehrl was a member of the SS Ehrenführer was a member that he did not belong to the Freundeskreis Reichsführer SS ("Circle of Friends"), and played down his function to "occasionally giving a short impromptu speech at the dinner on the government organization of economy", to whom the prosecution however contradicted. On April 14, 1949, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison.

On February 3, 1951, like the other 20 Reich Ministers, he was pardoned and released from the Landsberg War Crimes Prison . Kehrl never accepted his condemnation and saw himself innocent, more like a scapegoat for the Reich Ministry of Economics.

1951-1984

After his release, Kehrl u. a. Economic advisor in Leverkusen . He was a "sought-after consultant and arbitrator in the industry", but was also invited to a Bundestag commission.

Politically, he was oriented towards the SPD and maintained an exchange of letters with Helmut Schmidt , u. a. in the context of the economic crisis of 1966/67 and the oil crisis . His memoirs appeared in 1973. His ideas about state investments were criticized at the time as those of a socialist planning ideologist.

On April 26, 1984, Kehrl died in Grafenau (Württemberg) in the Boeblingen district.

Awards (selection)

He received u. a. the War Merit Cross I and II Class and on November 2, 1944 the Knight's Cross of the War Merit Cross with Swords.

Works

  • The tasks of the economy after the war ( Chamber of Commerce , Vienna 1941)
  • Reorganization of iron management (mechanical engineering group, Berlin 1942)
  • Lecture on tasks and goals of the Reich associations (Reich Association of Chemical Fibers, Berlin 1942)
The above writings were placed on the list of literature to be segregated in the Soviet zone of occupation .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kehrl, Gustav. In: Robert Volz: Reich manual of the German society . The handbook of personalities in words and pictures. Volume 1: A-K. Deutscher Wirtschaftsverlag, Berlin 1930, DNB 453960286 , p. 899.
  2. ↑ Gustav Kehrl , Lausitz Rundschau, October 10, 2001
  3. ↑ Reutlingen Polytechnic Innvovationsreportinnovations-report.de
  4. ^ Brandenburgisches Biographisches Lexikon, ed. by Friedrich Beck and Eckhart Henning, Verlag für Berlin-Brandenburg, Potsdam 2002; Page 216.
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h Rolf-Dieter Müller: Hans Kehrl - A Party Book Industrialist in the "Third Reich"? Pp. 195–213 in: Yearbook for Economic History 1999/2, Akademie Verlag, Berlin 1999, pp. 195–213, 3.0 MB; 204-213 ; 3.3 MB
  6. ^ Klaus-Dietmar Henke: The Dresdner Bank in the Third Reich: The Expansion of the Dresdner Bank in Europe . Oldenbourg, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-486-57782-4 , pp. 635-636.
  7. ↑ Hermann Weiß (Ed.): Biographisches Lexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main, 1998, p. 259.
  8. ^ Kehrl, p. 243.
  9. ↑ a b Final plea for Hans Kehrl. Military Tribunal IV, 11-12-1948 Nuremberg Military Tribunal 11, Ministries Case, pp. 1-77
  10. ↑ Taylor, Telford. Prosecution Brief on the Asserted Defense of "Honorary" Membership in the SS: Reply to Defenses Presented on Behalf of Keppler, Kehrl, and Rasche (1948) Nuremberg Military Tribunal 11 - Ministries Case. Paper 34. The University of Georgia School of Law
  11. ^ Nuremberg Military Tribunal 11 - Ministries Case The University of Georgia School of Law
  12. ^ Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 302.
  13. ^ German administration for popular education in the Soviet occupation zone, list of literature to be sorted out 1946
  14. ^ German administration for popular education in the Soviet occupation zone, list of literature to be sorted out 1947 www.polunbi.de
  15. ^ German administration for popular education in the Soviet occupation zone, list of the literature to be sorted out 1948 www.polunbi.de

Web links

Commons : Hans Kehrl  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Kehrl, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Nazi business leader
DATE OF BIRTH September 8, 1900
PLACE OF BIRTH Brandenburg on the Havel
DATE OF DEATH April 26, 1984
Place of death Grafenau