Josef Schütz (communist)

Josef Schütz (born July 23, 1910 in Bärringen , Bohemia ; † March 17, 1989 ) was a German communist , diplomat and senior employee of the German People's Police and the Ministry of National Defense of the GDR .

Life

Schütz, the son of a leather glove maker and later KPTsch functionary, also completed an apprenticeship as a leather glove maker after attending primary and community school. In 1924 he joined the Communist Youth Association of Czechoslovakia. In 1931/1932 he attended the International Lenin School of the Comintern in Moscow . After his return he joined the KPTsch in 1932. In 1932 he was charged with desertion from the Czechoslovak Army and was imprisoned in Eger until 1933 . He then worked as a functionary of the KPTsch and in the profession. In 1938 he was drafted into the Czechoslovak Army again.

In March 1939, after participating in the resistance against the German occupation, he emigrated to the Soviet Union , worked in various companies as a milling cutter and from 1943 attended special schools of the Red Army in Ufa and Moscow to prepare for his partisan activities . In 1944 he took part in the Slovak National Uprising and after the suppression of the uprising was political commissar of a partisan unit.

In 1945/1946 he was for a short time district mayor in Abertham and Schönlind (Czechoslovakia), then he moved to the SBZ , where he was accepted into the SED . Since November 1946 a member of the German People's Police , he was first as VP Commissioner Police President in Merseburg , then from 1947 to 1949 as chief inspector, head of the main border police department in the German Interior Administration .

tomb

From 1949 to 1956 he was head of the consular department of the diplomatic mission and the embassy of the GDR in Moscow. From 1956 to 1959 he headed the Department for International Relations in the Ministry for National Defense of the GDR. In 1959/1960 he attended the military academy "Friedrich Engels" in Dresden as an officer auditor . From 1961 until his retirement in 1971, he was head of the Department of International Relations in the Ministry of National Defense. He then worked as a member of the central management of the Committee of Antifascist Resistance Fighters in the GDR. On July 14, 1979 he was appointed major general ( retired ) of the NVA . He last lived as a veteran in Berlin-Karlshorst and died as a result of a traffic accident.

Josef Schütz is buried in the "Pergolenweg" grave complex of the Socialist Memorial at the Friedrichsfelde Central Cemetery in Berlin-Lichtenberg .

Awards

• Patriotic Order of Merit in bronze (1955), in silver (1960) and in gold (1975)
• Dukla Medal of the ČSSR (1961)
• Order " Banner of Labor " (1970)
• Karl Marx Order (1980)
• Gold medal for the Patriotic Order of Merit (1985)

literature

• Thomas Manfred Forster: NVA. The Army of the Soviet Zone . 3. Edition. Markus-Verlag, Cologne 1967, p. 283.
• Jan Foitzik: Management transfer. The organized deployment of Sudeten German communists in the Soviet occupation zone 1945/46 (PDF; 1.3 MB). In: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 31 (1983), pp. 308–334 (short biography of Schütz, p. 332).
• Martin Broszat et al. (Ed.): SBZ manual: State administrations, parties, social organizations and their executives in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany 1945–1949 . 2nd Edition. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, Munich 1993, ISBN 3-486-55262-7 , p. 215ff. and 1023.
• Gabriele Baumgartner, Dieter Hebig (Hrsg.): Biographisches Handbuch der SBZ / DDR. 1945–1990 . Volume 2: Maassen - Zylla . KG Saur, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-598-11177-0 , p. 834.
• Heike van Hoorn : New home in socialism. The resettlement and integration of Sudeten German Antifa resettlers in the Soviet Zone / GDR . Klartext, Essen 2004, ISBN 3-89861-241-4 , p. 344.
• Klaus Froh, Rüdiger Wenzke : The generals and admirals of the NVA. A biographical manual . 5th revised edition. Ch. Links Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-86153-438-9 , p. 176.

Individual evidence

1. ^ New Germany of August 24, 1979.
2. ^ Obituary in Neues Deutschland, March 21, 1989.