Josef Selmayr (General)

Josef Selmayr (born July 7, 1905 in Straubing ; † November 11, 2005 ) was a German army officer , most recently a brigadier general in the Bundeswehr . From September 1957 to March 1963 he was the second head of the Military Counterintelligence Service (MAD).

Life

In 1924 Josef Selmayr graduated from the Wilhelmsgymnasium in Munich . He joined the Reichswehr in 1924 as an officer candidate for the 19th Infantry Regiment in Landshut . From 1935 to 1937 he was trained as a general staff officer at the War Academy in Berlin . During the Second World War , Selmayr was among other things first general staff officer (Ia) of the 11th Panzer Division and the 31st Infantry Division in the Russian campaign. Most recently he was Colonel i. G. First General Staff Officer of Army Group F (Commander in Chief Southeast) in the Balkans. He received the Iron Cross  1st and 2nd Class and in July 1943 the German Cross in Gold.

At the end of the war he was taken prisoner , was extradited to Yugoslavia by the United Kingdom in 1946 and, after two years of pre-trial detention in Belgrade, was sentenced to 15 years of forced labor by the Supreme Military Court in 1948 as a war criminal . Selmayr was able to return to Germany due to an amnesty in October 1950. From 1951 he had been a member of the Gehlen Organization , where he headed the military espionage in Southeast Europe, before he was hired as a colonel in the newly founded Bundeswehr in June 1956 and became the first head of the MAD department in Military Command VI in Munich . This department later became MAD Group VI. In September 1957 Selmayr took over the MAD from Gerhard Wessel and became the first head of the Office for Security of the Federal Armed Forces (ASBw), which was founded on October 1, 1957 and was at the top of the MAD. In this capacity he was promoted to brigadier general. He headed the ASBw and thus the MAD until 1964, when he took temporary retirement at the age of 58 . This was not justified with a disturbed relationship of trust, but rather the measure should give way to a younger generation.

family

Josef Selmayr was the son of the pharmacist and reserve officer Josef Selmayr (1877–1927) and his wife Josefine, née Betz (1879–1938). His grandfather Georg Selmayr (1852–1920) was the brother of the last mayor of Bogenhausen, Josef Selmayr . Josef Selmayr is the father of the lawyer Gerhard Selmayr and the grandfather of the EU civil servant Martin Selmayr .

Publications

• One hundred years of the Selmayr family in Schloßgut Erching. Self-published, 1998.
• Josef Selmayr (author); Gerhard Selmayr (Ed.): The big break. German soldiers in Tito's power. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2014. ISBN 978-3-738-60004-9
• Josef Selmayr (author); Gerhard Selmayr (Ed.): A grain of sand in the storm: Notes of a soldier 1905-1945. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2016. ISBN 978-3-741-20999-4

Individual evidence

1. ^ Annual report of the Wilhelms-Gymnasium in Munich 1923/24.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Helmut R. Hammerich : Better than his reputation: The military shield service (MAD) 1956 until today . In: Military history: Journal for historical education . No. 2 , 2016, ISSN  0940-4163 , p. 5 .
3. ↑ Helmut R. Hammerich : "Always on the enemy!" - The Military Counter-Intelligence Service (MAD) 1956–1990 . 1st edition. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , Göttingen 2019, ISBN 978-3-525-36392-8 , pp. 208 .
4. ↑ ^{a b} Josef Selmayr (author); Gerhard Selmayr (Ed.): The big break. German soldiers in Tito's power. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2014. ISBN 978-3-738-60004-9
5. ↑ ^{a b} Dieter Krüger (Ed.): Conspiracy as a profession. German intelligence chiefs in the Cold War. Links, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-86153-287-5 , p. 312.
6. ↑ Helmut R. Hammerich : "Always on the enemy!" - The Military Counter-Intelligence Service (MAD) 1956–1990 . 1st edition. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , Göttingen 2019, ISBN 978-3-525-36392-8 , pp. 128 f .; 208 .
7. ↑ Lock cracked , Der Spiegel No. 13, 1966.