Karl Kowarik

This article deals with the National Socialist politician. For the musician of the same name, cf. Karl Kowarik (musician) .

Karl Kowarik

Karl Josef Kowarik (born April 22, 1907 in Vienna ; † May 6, 1987 there ) was an Austrian politician ( NSDAP ). He was a leading member of the Austrian Hitler Youth during the 1930s and became involved in the FPÖ after 1945 .

Live and act

Youth and Education (1907 to 1926)

Kowarik graduated from elementary school and secondary school. He passed the Matura and studied forest engineering at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences at the University of Vienna . During his secondary school days, he was the organizational manager of the German Association of Middle Schools . In 1919 he belonged to the League of Eagles and Falcons for one year and from 1919 to the German-Völkisch German Gymnastics Federation , in which he later became youth, women and men gymnastics supervisor as well as dietwart and military gymnastics director. During his student days, he headed the physical exercise office of the German student body , in which he also worked as an organizational leader and second speaker. Until 1925, Kowarik was also a member of the Wandervogel ; then he switched to the German Socialist Workers' Youth . As an Artamane he was active against Polish seasonal workers in Saxony and East Prussia.

Political career (1926 to 1945)

In April 1926 Kowarik was one of the founders of the Hitler Youth (HJ) in Upper Danube and was a member of the HJ from October 1926. As a member of the Patriotic Protection Association , from 1926 he was in command of the Student Freikorps , the German Academic Legion and a member of the Freikorps Roßbach . He participated in the suppression of "Marxist unrest" and in the "organization of university riots against foreign infiltration of Austrian universities by Eastern Jews".

Kowarik completed training in the Austrian armed forces. Even before he became a member of the NSDAP on October 6, 1930 ( membership number 300.735), he was block warden of the NSDAP district group Währing in the Parteigau in Vienna in 1929/30 . He then became head of the NSDAP district group and deputy head of propaganda in Währing. From January 1931 he acted as a sports advisor in the HJ ban Vienna, was promoted to Bannführer in April 1931 and took over the management of the HJ ban Vienna in June 1932. Promoted to Oberbannführer in November 1933, he was also commissioned to manage the HJ ban in Lower Austria. In April 1934 he became deputy Gaubannführer for the entire Ostmark and a member of the Austrian national leadership of the NSDAP as well as youth advisor in the NSDAP district and the SA group in Vienna. In May 1934 he became the area inspector of the HJ area Austria with all the powers of the Reich Youth Leader to lead the HJ.

In connection with the July coup of the National Socialists in 1934, Kowarik was ordered to report and instruct in the German Reich and was deployed in the Reich after all Austrian HJ service posts had been closed by the police. So in October 1934 he became the area inspector of the HJ area in Baden and leader of the Lörrach border ban, and from November 1935 leader of the Hitler Youth ban in Mannheim .

In October 1936, Kowarik went illegally to Austria to rebuild the banned Hitler Youth there. He acted as the "responsible leader for the entire National Socialist youth in Austria" and fulfilled "special tasks for the Southeast". After the "Anschluss" of Austria , Kowarik was dismissed as the Austrian Hitler Youth leader in March 1938 and was appointed to the Gauinspection of the NSDAP Gauleitung Wien as well as deputy Gausinspector for political and economic questions. From February 1939 he also sat on the council and advisory board of the city of Vienna.

In April 1940, Josef Bürckel appointed Kowarik as NSDAP district leader and Gauredner . Baldur von Schirach also appointed him in October 1940 as acting and in April 1941 as regular leader of the Hitler Youth area in Vienna. At the same time, Kowarik took over the management of the district youth welfare office in Vienna. In March 1942 he joined the National Socialist Reichstag as a member of the National Socialist Reichstag , to which he was a member until the end of the Nazi regime, in the replacement process for the fallen Max Hölzel . At the same time he acted until April 1944 as senior division manager of district 8 in the NSDAP district of Vienna.

Kowarik joined the SS in April 1939 (membership number 340.701). In the rank of SS-Sturmbannführer he completed training in the SS-Leibstandarte "Adolf Hitler" in Lublin from April to October 1940 and was then made "indispensable". From August 1941 he belonged to an SS war reporting company. From November 1943 he was an instructor and head of ideological training at SS Panzer Grenadier Training and Replacement Battalion 2 in Prague and from May to September 1944 at the SS Panzer Grenadier School in Kienschlag . He was promoted to SS-Obersturmbannführer in November 1944 and attended a war-disabled course.

Later years (1945 to 1987)

After 1945, Kowarik was a central figure in Austrian post-war fascism.

1949/1949 headed Kowarik together with Wilhelm Höttl , Erich Kernmayer and a Hungarian SS man a great anti-Communist spy business on behalf of the US Secret Service Counter Intelligence Corps (CIC, forerunner of the CIA ).

From 1957 to 1960 he served as general secretary of the FPÖ , and he also organized various youth leagues which, among other things, took part in the fight against the mass strike of 1950 . In 1975 he tried to found an Austrian- Rhodesian Society, which was forbidden by the then Interior Minister Otto Rösch . There was also an ardent activity in the World Anti-Communist League (WACL).

Kowarik's son Helmut Kowarik (* 1943) was a member of the FPÖ in Vienna's municipal council.

literature

• Michael Buddrus : Total education for total war. Hitler Youth and National Socialist Youth Policy. Saur, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-598-11615-2 .
• Joachim Lilla , Martin Döring, Andreas Schulz: extras in uniform. The members of the Reichstag 1933–1945. A biographical manual. Including the ethnic and National Socialist members of the Reichstag from May 1924. Droste, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-7700-5254-4 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Michael Buddrus: Total education for total war. Hitler Youth and National Socialist Youth Policy. Saur, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-598-11615-2 , p. 1170.
2. ↑ Michael Buddrus: Total education for total war. Hitler Youth and National Socialist Youth Policy. Saur, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-598-11615-2 , p. 1171.
3. ^ How the US secret service hired ex-Nazis and thus promoted the founding of the FPÖ Profil , December 4, 2013; Markus Sulzbacher: How the CIA helped the FPÖ on its feet Der Standard , August 3, 2019