Karl Fiebinger

Karl Emil Franz Fiebinger (born January 20, 1913 in Vienna , Austria ; † November 27, 2014 in Vienna) was an Austrian engineer who played a key role in several major construction sites for the armaments industry during National Socialism .

His engineering office was involved in the planning and implementation of the B8 Bergkristall underground tunnels at the Gusen concentration camp , the Quarz project at the Melk concentration camp , and the cement project at the Ebensee concentration camp , during the construction of which thousands of prisoners from the Mauthausen concentration camp were murdered. His office was also involved in the relocation of a V2 rocket production facility to Wiener Neustadt , and in the final phase of the Second World War he was planning a bunker in the Jonastal near Gotha . After the war he was brought to the USA and worked there for the War Department and later on construction projects with his own company, including in Mexico .

Training and company formation

Karl Fiebinger was born on January 20, 1913 as the son of Karoline Fiebinger and the civil servant Karl Fiebinger. From 1931 to 1938 he studied civil engineering at the Vienna University of Technology, specializing in tunnel and underground construction. In his thesis he dealt with static problems in tunnel construction. After completing his studies, he became a university assistant at the Austrian pioneer of reinforced concrete construction Rudolf Saliger , who played an important role in the Nazification of the university. He took part in the planning of the Perlmooser cement works in Kirchbichl and thus gave up his work at the university. In April 1939, one year after the so-called annexation of Austria to the German Reich, Fiebinger opened the "Office for Construction" in Moroccanergasse 22 in the third district of Vienna. In 1942 he already had 30 employees in his company. At the end of 1944, his office employed around 500 people.

Fiebinger was married to Hertha Fiebinger, nee Weinrank, who was three years her junior.

In 1938 Fiebinger applied for membership in the NSDAP . However, his application was denied. In 1941 he became a member of the NS Association of German Technology and in 1941 of the NS Lecturer Association . He had good contacts with Hans Kammler , the head of the SS construction industry, and with many other important National Socialists and industrialists.

Career in the time of National Socialism

Fiebinger's office was involved in the planning of the Ostmark aircraft engine works in Wiener Neudorf , Marburg and Brno as well as the Heinkel works in Schwechat . In the spring of 1943 Fiebinger was involved in the relocation of a V2 rocket production facility to the Rax plant near Wiener Neustadt . Concentration camp prisoners from Mauthausen concentration camp were also used in the construction of the “Serbenhalle” he had planned near Wiener Neustadt. This project was likely to have been decisive for the choice of his architectural office for the planning of the tunnels for the underground relocation of armaments production in the Ostmark .

In autumn 1943, his office received orders for the expansion of the brewery cellar in the Redl-Zipf subcamp , where the V2 rocket combustion chambers were tested, and for the cement tunnel system in Ebensee . Sub-camps of the Mauthausen concentration camp were set up at both locations in order to be able to use the labor of concentration camp inmates when building the facilities.

Shortly afterwards, Fiebinger was also commissioned with the planning of the large Bergkristall tunnels at Gusen concentration camp in St. Georgen an der Gusen and Quarz at Melk concentration camp . The tunnels were built in different ways due to the geological conditions. In Ebensee, for example, prefabricated concrete parts were partially used for the lining, whereas in St. Georgen and Melk concrete was poured using the formwork method. In St. Georgen by the Bergkristall gallery and in Ebensee, Fiebinger's office not only took on the planning, but also the construction management. Architecturally, there were no models for these tunnels and the underground relocation of the armaments industry brought various problems, such as the supply of energy and water, ventilation of the tunnels and the infrastructural possibilities for the deployment of thousands of concentration camp prisoners. Prisoners from the specially built concentration camps were also used in the construction of the tunnels themselves. Thousands of prisoners from all over Europe died during this work and while working in the excavated tunnels.

At the end of the war, Fiebinger was entrusted with the planning of a Führerbunker in the Jonastal in Thuringia due to his good contacts . Fiebinger himself said about this project that he wanted to reject it, but that he had been forced to take over. He waited for the war to end in Strobl on Lake Wolfgang. Due to the overview of the armaments construction sites, Fiebinger's office in the person of the architect Hermann de Verrette was used after the war as an expert advisory board for the completion of the construction sites in St. Georgen and Ebensee. Fiebinger's office received the salary for his staff.

Career after the war

In autumn 1945 Fiebinger founded a new company in Salzburg, but was arrested in March 1946 by American soldiers of the Counter Intelligence Corps (CIC) for planning SS buildings . He was released in April 1947, but had to stay in Salzburg and was monitored there. In the fall of 1947, Fiebinger was brought to the USA as part of the Paperclip campaign , where he had to complete at least two orders for the War Department . He gave the US military detailed information on the tunnels planned and built by his office. In the USA, Fiebinger worked in an engineering office in New York . Presumably he was still involved in secret projects, including a. in the construction of underground launchers for ICBMs .

In the 1960s and 1970s, Fiebinger implemented its own residential construction projects in Mexico . He financed this with cheap Austrian development aid loans. In 1968 Fiebinger founded the company "Austrobau" for his plans. As managing director he chose Hermann de Verrette, the architect with whom he already worked on the construction of the tunnel systems during World War II.

His role in the Nazi regime was not an issue for a long time. It was not until the 1990s, when the history of the Melk and Ebensee camps was reviewed, that its role was examined more closely. Fiebinger spent the last years of his life in Steinbach am Attersee and in Vienna, where he died in November 2014.

literature

• Robert Bouchal, Johannes Sachslehner : Underground Austria - forgotten tunnels, secret projects. Verl.-Gruppe Styria, Vienna 2013, ISBN 978-3-222-13390-9
• Bertrand Perz: "We have a project near Linz using concentration camp men". On the genesis of the Bergkristall project , In: Mauthausen Memorial Yearbook 2009 ( pdf [accessed on May 16, 2020])
• Wolfgang Quatember: Karl Fiebinger (1913–2014) - civil engineer on behalf of the SS . In: concerns resistance . No. 133, 2019 (memorial-ebensee.at [PDF, accessed on May 16, 2020])

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Markus Schmitzberger: Dipl.-Ing. Karl Fiebinger. In: Secret projects. At | Contemporary Austria 1938 - 1945. Retrieved on May 16, 2020 . 
2. ↑ ^{a b c d} Bertrand Perz: "We have a project near Linz using concentration camp men". On the genesis of the Bergkristall project , In: Mauthausen Memorial Yearbook 2009 ( pdf [accessed on April 16, 2017])
3. ^ ^{A b c d e} Jan-Ruth Mills: Karl Emil Franz Fiebinger. Retrieved on May 16, 2020 (English). 
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Wolfgang Quatember: Karl Fiebinger (1913-2014) - civil engineer on behalf of the SS . In: concerns resistance . No. 133 , 2019 ( memorial-ebensee.at [PDF]).
5. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j} Bouchal, Robert .: Underground Austria: forgotten tunnels - secret projects . Styria Premium, 2013, ISBN 978-3-222-13390-9 ( worldcat.org [accessed May 16, 2020]).
6. ^ Street names in Vienna since 1860 as “Political Places of Remembrance” (PDF; 4.4 MB), p. 168ff, final research project report, Vienna, July 2013
7. ↑ ^{a b} The satellite camps. In: Mauthausen Concentration Camp Memorial. Retrieved May 16, 2020 .