Helmut Sündermann

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Sündermann's inflammatory leading article from 1942 in the Völkischer Beobachter

Helmut Sündermann (born February 19, 1911 in Munich , † August 25, 1972 in Leoni ) was a National Socialist journalist and one of the most important representatives of Nazi propaganda . In the Nazi state he held the rank of SS-Obersturmbannführer and, as Deputy Reich Press Chief of the NSDAP and the Reich government, was close to Adolf Hitler . After the end of the war he worked as a publicist in right-wing extremist circles, founded the right-wing extremist Druffel Verlag in 1952 and remained a Holocaust denier until the end of his life .

He also used the pseudonyms Heinrich L. Sanden , Heinrich Sanden and Hermann Schild .

Life

Sündermann began studying modern history and newspaper science at the University of Munich in May 1930 . On June 1, 1930 he joined the NSDAP ( membership number 257.492) and in 1931 the SS (SS number 16.296). In the Starnberg district he appeared from August 1930 as a district speaker for the NSDAP and was deputy district leader there from February 1931 to January 1933. In July 1931 he became the NSDAP speaker in the Gau Munich-Upper Bavaria and in August 1931 he was head of the NSDAP Reich Press Office in Munich as an assistant to Otto Dietrich . On January 1, 1933, he took over the main editorial office of the NSK , which on May 15, 1934, was subordinate to Otto Dietrich as Reich Press Chief of the NSDAP.

From September 1, 1934, Sündermann headed the press policy office under Otto Dietrich within the Reich leadership of the NSDAP . He became a member of the Munich Association of Newspapers and the Press Court . In the meantime he was promoted to SS-Hauptsturmführer , and in 1937 he was appointed staff leader of the NSDAP Reich Press Chief. From March 1938 to the end of April 1939 he worked as a press officer for the Reich Commissioner for the reunification of Austria with the German Reich .

Journalism and National Socialism were directly related to him. He wrote in 1938 in Der Weg zum Deutschen Journalismus:

“It was not by chance that a large number of leading party men emerged from the ranks of the press. [...] Anyone who claims to enter the public forum and speak to the people every day can and must be asked to earn the right to such a profession in the ranks of the movement. "

After the German invasion of Poland , Sündermann made a contribution to the book On the Streets of Victory - With the Führer in Poland in 1939 . Sündermann was drafted into the Wehrmacht on February 1, 1940 and transferred to the Western Front on May 10, 1940 as a member of Infantry Regiment 167 . On June 3, 1940, he was released from the Wehrmacht. In 1941 Sündermann was appointed SS-Obersturmbannführer in the SS . After he had been unsuccessfully proposed for the Reichstag election in 1936 and 1938, Sündermann received a mandate from Hitler in the Reichstag in February 1942 (the award was a support for deserving NSDAP members). Also in 1942, Sündermann became deputy press chief of the Reich government and chief service officer of the NSDAP. In June 1943 he was executive president of the II. Meeting of the Union of National Journalists' Associations in Vienna, founded by Maximilian du Prel . On April 3, 1945 Sündermann was dismissed from all functions by Reichsleiter Martin Bormann at the urging of Joseph Goebbels .

Sündermann's writings are almost always pervaded by “aggressive anti-Semitism” combined with charges against the Soviet Union, England, France and the USA. In the autumn of 1940 he wrote in the NSK that the "twilight of the Jews in Europe" had dawned.

At the end of the war, Sündermann was captured by the Allies and was in the Dachau internment camp until September 1948 . In the Soviet Zone , all of his writings were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out. Even after the lost war, Sündermann remained a supporter of National Socialism. He basically considered persecution of the Jews to be necessary. He subsequently explained the National Socialist "measures against the Jews as security measures in the war" that were necessary. He also doubted the figure of 6 million murdered after 1945. In his opinion the death toll ranged from 6,000 to 6 million, and he saw no evidence whatsoever as to who caused the murder of the Jews. According to his account, the resistance fighters of July 20th caused the defeat of the war. In 1951 he was one of the co-founders of the right-wing extremist monthly Nation und Europa .

Together with his wife, Sündermann founded the Druffel publishing house in 1952, in which leading National Socialists published their memoirs. Sündermann was one of the founders of the right-wing extremist society for free journalism . He was chairman of the right-wing extremist German cultural organization European Spirit .

When Sündermann died in 1972, his foster son Gert Sudholt took over the publishing house. Druffel-Verlag awards a Helmut Sündermann medal.

Editor and editor

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich . Who was what before and after 1945 . Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, second updated edition, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 , p. 615.
  2. ↑ a b c Ernst Klee : The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-10-039326-5 , p. 604.
  3. ^ Quotation from Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-596-16048-0 , p. 615.
  4. ↑ Gideon Botsch : Sünderman, Helmut. In: Wolfgang Benz (Hrsg.): Handbuch des Antisemitismus . Vol. 2: People LZ . De Gruyter Saur, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-3-598-44159-2 , pp. 812f.
  5. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1946-nslit-s.html
  6. ↑ Gideon Botsch: Sünderman, Helmut . In: Wolfgang Benz (Hrsg.): Handbuch des Antisemitismus . Vol. 2: People LZ . De Gruyter Saur, Berlin 2009.
  7. ↑ S. Helmut Sündermann: Here I stand ... German memories 1914-45 , ed. von Gert Sudholt, Leoni 1975, p. 253. Sündermann had not yet tackled the memoirs during his lifetime, but were compiled by Sudholt from partially already existing text passages. See also literature.
  8. ↑ S. Helmut Sündermann: Here I stand ... German memories 1914-45 , ed. Gert Sudholt, Leoni 1975, p. 250.
personal data
SURNAME Sinner man, Helmut
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist and Nazi propagandist, founder of the far-right Druffel publishing house
DATE OF BIRTH February 19, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH August 25, 1972
Place of death Leoni