Hans von Seeckt

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Hans von Seeckt (1930)
Signature Hans von Seeckt.JPG

Johannes Friedrich Leopold von Seeckt (born April 22, 1866 in Schleswig ; † December 27, 1936 in Berlin ) was a German colonel general and from 1920 to 1926 chief of the army command of the Reichswehr . He was also a member of the Reichstag from 1930 to 1932 and stayed several times in the Republic of China between 1933 and 1935 as military advisor to General Chiang Kai-shek .

Early years

Hans was the third child of the later Prussian infantry general Richard von Seeckt (1833–1909) and his wife Auguste.

After graduating from high school, Seeckt joined the Emperor Alexander Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 1 of the Prussian Army in 1885 and went through a steep military career. From 1893 to 1896 he completed general staff training at the War Academy , which he graduated as one of the best in his class.

First World War

Seeckt during the First World War

At the beginning of the First World War he was Lieutenant Colonel and Chief of the General Staff of the III. Army Corps , with which he was initially deployed on the Western Front . In March 1915 he became Chief of the General Staff of the 11th Army, which was newly established on the Eastern Front, and is - together with his Commander-in-Chief August von Mackensen  - the architect of the strategically important victory of Gorlice-Tarnów , for which he was awarded the Order of Pour le Mérite . In June 1915, at the instigation of Mackensen, Wilhelm II was promoted out of turn to major general, he remained his chief of staff in the army group formed under this and during his campaign against Serbia in the autumn of 1915. For his services, he then received the oak leaves for pour le Mérite.

During the Russian Brusilov offensive in 1916 he served temporarily as chief of staff of the Austro- Hungarian 7th Army under Karl von Pflanzer-Baltin and later on the Austro-Hungarian Army Front Archduke Karl and Archduke Joseph. In December 1917 he succeeded Friedrich Bronsart von Schellendorf as the highest German adviser and de facto chief of staff of the Ottoman army under War Minister Enver Pascha , which he remained until the Moudros armistice .

Reichswehr

Hans von Seeckt (left) and Reichswehr Minister Otto Geßler , 1926

After the war Seeckt was temporarily chief of the general staff of the Army High Command North in the Eastern Border Guard and from April 1919 head of the military expert commission at the German peace delegation for the Treaty of Versailles . On October 1, 1919, he became the first chief of the newly formed troop office (a code name for the general staff prohibited in the Versailles Peace Treaty ). During the Kapp Putsch in 1920, Seeckt advised against using the Reichswehr to crush the putsch against the democratic Weimar Republic (“Reichswehr does not shoot at Reichswehr” / “Troops do not shoot at troops”). Nevertheless, after the failure of the coup attempt and the resignation of Walther Reinhardt , he was appointed as his successor as head of the army command.

In view of the chaotic political conditions of the Weimar Republic, Seeckt developed the concept of bipartisanism for the Reichswehr. He was thus decisively responsible for the formation of the function of the Reichswehr as a state within a state . Seeckts' attitude is illustrated by a conversation between President Friedrich Ebert and Seeckt. When Ebert asked where the Reichswehr was, Seeckt replied: "The Reichswehr is behind me." When asked whether the Reichswehr was reliable: "I don't know whether it is reliable, but it obeys me!" In terms of foreign policy, Seeckt advocated an alliance with the Soviet Union to divide Poland again and initiate a revenge against France.

Seeckt took an ambivalent position towards the republic. He expressed clear sympathy for conservative right-wing opponents of the republic, but positioned himself against National Socialism. He first met Adolf Hitler on March 11, 1923 in Munich. He later said: “We agreed on the goal; only in the ways we differed. "

Seeckt's attitude was put to the test when Reich President Friedrich Ebert gave him supreme executive power to secure the Reich against internal unrest on November 8, 1923 in the face of various attempts by left and right-wing extremists. Seeckt now advocated rapid action against the coup attempts. His changed attitude compared to the Kapp Putsch was also related to the role of the Bavarian Reichswehr commander Otto von Lossow , who with his Bavarian Reich Defense units had evaded the orders of the Reich government (Stresemann, von Seeckt) and from the Hitler-Ludendorff Putsch in Munich as new Reichswehr Minister was planned. However, this attempted coup was put down by the Bavarian police after just one day. The Reichswehr was able to put down the left-wing extremist coup attempt in Saxony on November 23. Seeckt held his special powers until February 28, 1924 and had the NSDAP , the KPD and the Deutschvölkische Freedom Party banned.

A detailed armament concept for the Reichswehr up to a troop strength that corresponded to that at the beginning of the Second World War, the so-called "Great Plan" of 1925, was worked out on Seeckt's order under strictest confidentiality precautions. His ironic memorandum of 1925, the so-called “ Hufnagelerlass ” (RH 1/85), in which he opposed the increasing bureaucratization of the army command, is also well known.

The British historian John Wheeler-Bennett characterized Seeckt's work at the head of the Reichswehr as follows:

“The name Hans v. Seeckt is listed in the annals of German military greatness alongside those of Moltkes, Roons and Schlieffens. Like Moltke, he redesigned the military machine in terms of form and casting from very small beginnings. Like Schlieffen, he looked to the future and pondered drafts for the day when he could not exactly foresee when it would come. Like Moltke and Schlieffen, he left the army stronger and more powerful than he had found it. However, while Moltke and Schlieffen could base their calculations on the calm security that victories and general prosperity conferred, Seeckt, like Gneisenau and Scharnhorst, was forced to build from the ashes of defeat. ... His genius was not expressed in the formation of large armies, but in the creation of a military microcosm, which was perfect in itself down to the last detail, but which could be increased indefinitely at the given moment. "

Seeckt planned to run for the office of Reich President himself at the end of Ebert's term of office and had his colleagues, including Kurt von Schleicher , prepare for this. Ebert's untimely death on February 28, 1925, however, prevented this plan because, in Schleicher's opinion, the preparation time had not yet been sufficient. Seeckt was dismissed by Chancellor Wilhelm Marx on October 1, 1926 at the request of Reichswehr Minister Otto Geßler . The occasion was the participation of Prince Wilhelm of Prussia - the eldest son of the Hohenzollern Crown Prince - in a maneuver of Infantry Regiment No. 9 of the Reichswehr , which was authorized by Seeckt without consulting Geßler .

Civil activities

To Seeckt, Walter Simons and Wilhelm Solf in 1922 the cultural circle founded SeSiSo Club , the cultural events on a regular basis for the liberal educated middle in Berlin Hotel Kaiserhof organized. Many of the former members of the SeSiSo Club later formed the Solf Circle , a resistance group against National Socialism.

In addition, Seeckt was a member of the German Society in 1914 , which, under the chairmanship of Solf, had set itself the task of bringing together members of different political directions and cultural and political exchange in the spirit of the Enlightenment and humanism .

Seeckt moved to the Reichstag election on September 14, 1930 for the German People's Party (DVP) in constituency 10 ( Magdeburg ) in the Reichstag one, which he held until July 1932 belonged (see list of members of the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic ).

Later years

The high sarcophagus by Hans von Seeckt
Grave in the Invalidenfriedhof

From 1933 to 1935 Seeckt served several times as military advisor to General Chiang Kai-shek in the Republic of China . After his return to Germany, on April 22, 1936, he became the regiment chief of the newly established 67th Infantry Regiment, which continued the tradition of his Emperor Alexander Guard Grenadier Regiment No. 1 . Seeckt was buried on December 30, 1936 in the Invalidenfriedhof in Berlin.

Awards

Fonts

  • A soldier's thoughts. Verlag für Kulturpolitik , Berlin 1929.
  • The future of the empire. Judgments and demands. Verlag für Kulturpolitik, Berlin 1929.
  • National defense. Verlag für Kulturpolitik, Berlin 1930.
  • Moltke. An example. Verlag für Kulturpolitik, Berlin 1931.
  • Ways of German foreign policy. Quelle & Meyer, Leipzig 1931.
  • Germany between West and East. Hanseatic Publishing House Hamburg, 1933.

swell

  • Karl Dietrich Bracher (Ed.): The crisis year 1923. Military and domestic policy 1922–1924. Sources on the history of parliamentarism and political parties. Edited by Heinz Hürten. Droste, Düsseldorf 1980, ISBN 3-7700-5110-6 .
  • Karl Dietrich Bracher, Erich Matthias , Hans Meier-Welcker (eds.): The beginnings of the Seeckt era. Military and domestic politics 1920–1922. Sources on the history of parliamentarism and political parties. edited by Heinz Hürten. Droste, Düsseldorf 1979, ISBN 3-7700-5107-6 .
  • Friedrich von Rabenau : Seeckt. From my life 1866–1918. with the participation of Hans von Seeckt, Leipzig 1941.
  • Friedrich von Rabenau: Seeckt. From his life 1918–1936. using the written estate on behalf of Dorothee von Seeckt, Hase & Koehler, Leipzig 1940.

literature

Web links

Commons : Hans von Seeckt  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikiquote: Hans von Seeckt  - Quotes

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Theo Schwarzmüller: Between Emperor and Leader. Field Marshal General August von Mackensen. Ferdinand Schöningh, Paderborn 1995, p. 114.
  2. ^ Raimund Pretzel "Sebastian Haffner": Comments on Hitler in the Sunday conversation with Guido Knopp. 13:04 min. In: YouTube. Retrieved March 14, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Peter Bachmann, Kurt Zeisler: The German Militarism: From Wilhelmine to Fascist Militarism . Pahl-Rugenstein, 1971 ( google.de [accessed October 24, 2019]).
  4. ^ Arthur Rosenberg: History of the Weimar Republic ISBN 3434000038 ; from page 148
  5. ↑ Hans-Werner Klausen: The "German October" did not take place . In: Berliner Umschau. January 5, 2004.
  6. ^ Karl-Heinz Janßen : The big plan. In: The time . 11/1997
  7. ^ Carl Dirks, Karl-Heinz Janßen : The war of the generals. Hitler as a tool of the Wehrmacht. Berlin 1999
  8. ↑ Seeckt: Memorandum of December 5, 1925 for a de-bureaucratization of the army command. In it, he satirically exaggerated the bureaucratic effort to introduce a new Hufnagel in the Reichswehr or to keep the old one after careful examination, and concludes with an appeal to the commanders to understand this Hufnagel as a symbol and to help reduce the bureaucracy that is not closed fit a professional army.
  9. ↑ Translated by Hans Steinsdorff, quoted from Siegfried Thomaschki : Memoirs. Part I, p. 78, Hamburg 1962.
  10. ↑ Martha Schad: Women against Hitler - Fates under National Socialism. P. 170
  11. ↑ Eberhard von Vietsch: Wilhelm Solf - Ambassador between the times.
  12. ^ Heinrich Schlegel: Funeral service for Colonel General von Seeckt, Chief d. Infantry Rgts 67 .
  13. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Ranking list of the German Reichsheeres. ES Mittler & Sohn . Berlin 1930. p. 37.
  14. ↑ John W. Wheeler-Bennett in the English language Wikipedia
personal data
SURNAME Seeckt, Hans von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Seeckt, Johannes Friedrich Leopold von (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Colonel General, Head of the Army Command of the Reichswehr, Politician (DVP), MdR
DATE OF BIRTH April 22, 1866
PLACE OF BIRTH Schleswig , Schleswig
DATE OF DEATH December 27, 1936
Place of death Berlin , German Empire