Heinz Höhne

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Heinz Höhne (* 1926 in Berlin ; † March 27, 2010 in Großhansdorf ) was a German journalist and non-fiction author.

Life

Höhne grew up in Berlin and was called up for military service towards the end of the Second World War . He was a soldier in the "Greater Germany" tank corps . After the war he studied journalism in Munich and worked as a freelance journalist for various newspapers. In 1955 he got a permanent position in the foreign editorial office of the news magazine Der Spiegel . He later became head of the Anglo-American department there. He was also considered a secret service specialist and meticulous researcher at Spiegel . Following the Spiegel affair , he took two years to prove in detail that the information in the Spiegel article was partially ready for defense , which triggered the affair, had previously been published elsewhere. During this time, he handed over the management of the foreign editorial office to a colleague. During his research he came across documents that exonerated Kurt Georg Kiesinger , who was repeatedly criticized for his National Socialist past. Conrad Ahlers sent the document to Kiesinger, which paved the way for Kiesinger to be elected Chancellor . Höhne was a senior editor at Spiegel until 1991, most recently as head of the series editorial team. He was considered a conservative journalist.

Höhne was best known for his detailed studies on the history of the Third Reich , in particular on the history of the SS , which arose from a series of mirrors in 1966 and for which he viewed over 70,000 documents, for example in the main archive of the NSDAP, for two years. The Höhnes book applies to the SS - although it is z. This was partly revised by later research - to this day as “a standard work on the history of the SS”. The historian Jens Westemeier recognized this in his study of SS leader Joachim Peiper . However, he wrote that Höhne had relied too much on the information provided by SS officers whom he had met personally. Historians Jan Erik Schulte and Karsten Wilke also criticize Höhne's unquestioned rendition of depictions of former SS leaders . Among other things, this explains the mistake, which lies in the assertion that the Waffen SS had nothing to do with the concentration camps, as it was in 1966 in the Spiegel's “house message” at the start of the series about the SS. Books emerged from many of the series that Höhne wrote for Spiegel . The Spiegel series from Höhne include, for example, a series about the Fritsch-Blomberg affair (1984), about corruption affairs in Germany (1984), about Wilhelm Canaris (1976) and about the Red Orchestra (1972). In 1983 he wrote a series on the " Seizure of Power " in the Spiegel, which also resulted in a book.

As Der Spiegel revealed in its article “Bought History” in 2013, referring to the historian Winfried Meyer, Höhne also made use of the information offered by the “ Working Group of Former Defense Members ” (AGEA) and was “systematically supplied with tendentious information and memories” from there. The AGEA succeeded in influencing Höhne's work in addition to the research of other historians, which Meyer based on Höhne's Canaris biography entitled Canaris. Patriot in the twilight proved .

Works (selection)

  • The Order under the Skull - The History of the SS. Verlag Mohn, 1967 (Many editions followed, e.g. 2002, ISBN 3-572-01342-9 ; the last in Bassermann Verlag 2008. None of these editions was revised or found to be incorrect corrected.)
  • Password director. The story of the Red Chapel . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1970.
  • Canaris - Patriot in the Twilight. Bertelsmann, Munich 1984, ISBN 3-570-01608-0 .
  • The war in the dark. Power and influence of the German and Russian secret services. Bertelsmann, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-570-05667-8 .
  • Give me four years. Hitler and the beginnings of the Third Reich. Ullstein, 1996, ISBN 3-550-07095-0 . (as: Time of Illusions - Hitler and the Beginnings of the Third Reich 1933–1936. Econ, 1991, ISBN 3-430-14760-3 )
  • Mordache Röhm - Hitler's breakthrough to sole rule 1933–1934. Rowohlt, Reinbek 1984, ISBN 3-499-33052-0 .
  • with Hermann Zolling: Pullach internally - General Gehlen and the history of the Federal Intelligence Service. Hoffmann and Campe , Hamburg 1971, ISBN 3-455-08760-4 .
  • Seizure of power - Germany's path to the Hitler dictatorship. (= Spiegel Book , No. 39). Rowohlt, Reinbek 1983, ISBN 3-499-33039-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Cover text by Heinz Höhne: Canaris. Patriot in the twilight . C. Bertelsmann Verlag, 1976.
  2. ↑ a b Date: October 10, 1966 Subject: SS . In: Der Spiegel . No. 42 , 1966 ( online - October 10, 1966 , Spiegel in-house announcement at the beginning of the series on the history of the SS).
  3. ↑ History was his pound; On the death of "Spiegel" journalist Heinz Höhne. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , April 6, 2010.
  4. ↑ Heinz Höhne - died . In: Der Spiegel . No. 14 , 2010 ( online ).
  5. ↑ Ulrich Herbert: Best: biographical studies on radicalism, world view and reason. CH Beck, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-406-68859-1 , p. 527.
  6. ^ Jens Westemeier: Himmler's warriors. Joachim Peiper and the Waffen-SS in the war and the post-war period . Edited with the support of the Center for Military History and Social Sciences of the Bundeswehr . Schöningh, Paderborn 2014, ISBN 978-3-506-77241-1 .
  7. ↑ Karsten Wilke: The “Aid Community on Mutuality” (HIAG) 1950–1990. Veterans of the Waffen SS in the Federal Republic . Schöningh, Paderborn 2011, ISBN 978-3-506-77235-0 , p. 387ff .; Wilke refers, among other things, to a lecture by Schultes Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf. Heinz Höhne and the scientific research on SS history , December 6, 2008 in the Wewelsburg district museum.
  8. ↑ Date: October 10, 1966 Subject: SS . In: Der Spiegel . No. 42 , 1966 ( online ).
  9. ↑ Der Spiegel , 1983: Part I , Part II , Part III , Part IV , Part V , Part VI , Part VII
  10. ^ Klaus Wiegrefe : Bought history. The Nazi past of BND boss Reinhard Gehlen was retouched by a historian - on behalf of the Federal Intelligence Service . In: Der Spiegel . No. 3 , 2013, p. 32 ( online ).
  11. ↑ Winfried Meyer: rearguard battles. In: Journal for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies , No. 2/2012.
personal data
SURNAME Höhne, Heinz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist, non-fiction author and historian
DATE OF BIRTH 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH March 27, 2010
Place of death Großhansdorf