Oswald Lutz (General)

Oswald Lutz (born November 6, 1876 in Öhringen , † February 26, 1944 in Munich ) was a German officer , most recently a general of the tank troops in World War II .

Life

Bavarian Army

Lutz joined the Bavarian Army on July 3, 1894 as a three-year-old volunteer and flag junior . There he was assigned to the railway battalion and on October 1, 1894, he was promoted to NCO . As this he reached in January 1895 the maturity as Portepeefähnrich . He then attended a teaching course at a war school . On February 5, 1895, he was promoted to ensign with a patent and a day later he was awarded his officer certificate. After being promoted to second lieutenant on February 27, 1896, Lutz was posted to the 1st Engineer Battalion for twelve months. In February 1897 he moved to the Amberg rifle factory . Following this activity, Lutz took a riding course from October to November 1897 with the riding department of the 3rd field artillery regiment "Queen Mother" . He was then transferred back to the railway battalion, in which he remained until January 1901. During this time Lutz attended the artillery and engineering school in Munich from October 1898 to July 1900 . On November 15, 1900 he was promoted to lieutenant there . From February 1901 to August 1903 he served in the Ingolstadt and Metz fortifications and then returned to the railway battalion. Lutz was employed there until 1906 as an adjutant , from May 19 as captain without a patent, and later as company commander. This time was interrupted by another use at the Ulm Fortification . In 1910, Lutz completed an apprenticeship in railway operations at the state railway. On March 3, 1911, the patent was awarded to his rank. In October 1913 he was transferred to inspect the engineering corps. Lutz worked there as an adjutant after the outbreak of World War I.

The former Bavarian War Ministry in Munich.

At the end of March 1915, Lutz was appointed commander of the motorized forces in the 6th Army on the Western Front . In January 1917 he resigned from this position. Lutz , who was promoted to major on April 17, 1917 , then worked again for the inspection in the engineering corps and from April to July 1917 as a staff officer for the railway troops in Army High Command 7 . From July 18 to the end of November 1917 he was temporarily transferred to Military Railway Directorate 2. In December 1917, Lutz was appointed field railway chief at the headquarters , from whose post he resigned on September 25, 1918. During this time he was briefly employed in the Rekodes Zennig staff. In April 1918 he was appointed commander of the motor vehicle troops. But in October of the same year Lutz was posted to the War Ministry in Munich . There he became head of Section IV.

Reichswehr

The Bavarian War Ministry was called the State Ministry for Military Affairs after the November Revolution, was dissolved on August 25, 1919 and finally placed under the Reichswehr as part of the new military sovereignty . In October 1919, Lutz was appointed leader of the motor vehicle troops in Reichswehr Group Command 4. In October 1920 he was appointed commander of the motor vehicle department 21. This department was later renamed the 7th (Bavarian) motor vehicle department, whose commander Lutz, from February 1, 1923 now a lieutenant colonel , remained until mid-February 1924. In March 1924 he was appointed head of the weapons and equipment inspection department. In February 1927 he was transferred to the staff of Group Command 1 in Berlin. There he was promoted to colonel on January 1, 1928 . In October of the same year he was assigned to the Reichswehr Ministry ( RWM), where in November 1928 Lutz was appointed Chief of Staff of the Transport Inspection Department (In 6). On April 1, 1931, Lutz was appointed inspector of the transport troops while at the same time being promoted to major general . Heinz Guderian became his successor as chief of staff .

During this time, Lutz acted as the first director of the secret German tank school in Kazan in the Soviet Union , circumventing the Versailles Treaty . The tank school was succeeded by his foster son Guderian in 1932. Both developed the basis for the future armored weapon in Kazan. On February 1, 1933 Lutz was promoted to lieutenant general and in July 1934 he was appointed commander of the motor troops in the now renamed inspection of the motor troops (formerly the inspection of the traffic troops) in the RWM. In October 1934 his position was renamed the inspector of the motor vehicle troops.

Wehrmacht and World War II

On October 1, 1935, Lutz joined the Wehrmacht , where he was appointed inspector of motor vehicle combat troops and army motorization in the middle of the month. Lutz also acted as the commanding general of the armored forces. In this position on November 1, 1935, he was promoted to the position of first general of the armored force of the Wehrmacht, which was under construction. Here he consolidated his reputation as Guderian's teacher and “father” of the new armored weapon.

On February 15, 1938, in connection with the Blomberg-Fritsch crisis , Lutz was released from his previous positions through Hitler's intervention and was dismissed on February 28, 1938.

But already on November 1, 1938 Lutz was at the III. Army corps "available" reactivated. In the same year he was appointed President of the Reichs-Kraftwagen-Betriebsverband (RKB), whose previous President Wilhelm Scholz had been dismissed from this position by Julius Dorpmüller in October 1938. Under Lutz's leadership, the transport management at the western border fortifications and communication between the RKB and the Wehrmacht was sustainably improved.

On February 22, 1941, Lutz was appointed commander of the Transnistria Liaison Staff; a position he held until his mobilization regulations were repealed at the end of May 1942. His successor in this post was Lieutenant General Friedrich-Wilhelm von Rothkirch and Panthen . On December 31, 1943, his "zV" position was also canceled.

A little later Lutz died in Munich on February 26, 1944.

family

Lutz's son Hans was Colonel i in the Wehrmacht. G., member of the Gehlen Organization since 1946 and of the Federal Intelligence Service since 1956 . He carried the service name "Roth".

Awards

• Iron Cross (1914) 2nd and 1st class
• Bavarian Order of Military Merit IV class with swords and crown
• Bavarian Service Award Cross II. Class
• Knight's Cross 1st Class of the Order of Albrecht with Swords
• Knight's Cross 1st Class of the Order of Frederick with Swords
• Hanseatic Cross Hamburg
• Friedrich Cross

Post-war honor

The Bundeswehr honored the first general of the tank troop by naming the barracks in Munster Lutz-Kaserne. The name was later changed to Schulz-Lutz-Kaserne Munster . In September 2019, the barracks lost their name when they were renamed Örtzetal-Kaserne.

estate

Oswald Lutz's estate was brought to the United States after the end of the war . In 1962 these documents were returned to the Federal Archives in Koblenz . Among the documents are his notes on the development of the tank weapon as well as various military correspondence.

literature

• Dermot Bradley : The Generals of the Army 1921–1945. The military careers of the generals, as well as the doctors, veterinarians, intendants, judges and ministerial officials with the rank of general. Volume 7: Knabe – Luz. Biblio-Verlag 2004. ISBN 3-7648-2902-8 .
• Dermot Bradley: Colonel General Heinz Guderian and the genesis of the modern Blitzkrieg. Biblio-Verlag 1978. ISBN 978-3-7648-1113-6 .
• Olaf Groehler : Suicidal alliance: German-Russian military relations 1920–1941. Vision-Verlag Berlin 1992. ISBN 978-3-928787-01-7 .
• Helmut R. Hammerich, Michael Poppe, Dieter H. Kollmer, Martin Rink , Rudolf J. Schlaffer: The Army 1950 to 1970: conception, organization, installation. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 2006. ISBN 978-3-486-57974-1 .
• Jakob Knab: False Glory. The Bundeswehr's understanding of tradition. Links-Verlag 1995. ISBN 978-3-86153-089-3 .
• Walther Nehring : The history of the German tank weapon 1916–1945. Propylaea Verlag 1969.
• Karl-Volker Neugebauer : The Age of World Wars: Nations in Arms. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 2009. ISBN 978-3-486-59010-4 .
• Wolfgang A. Mommsen: The bequests in the German archives. Boppard am Rhein Boldt 1983. ISBN 978-3-7646-1816-2 .
• Hans Christoph Graf von Seherr-Thoß:  Lutz, Oswald. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 15, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-428-00196-6 , p. 571 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Richard Vahrenkamp : The logistic revolution. The rise of logistics in the mass consumer society. Campus-Verlag 2011. ISBN 978-3-593-39215-8 .
• Ekkehard Völkl: Transnistria and Odessa (1941–1944). (= Series of publications of the East European Institute Regensburg-Passau 14) Lassleben. Regensburg 1996. ISBN 3-7847-3164-3 .

Web link

• Oswald Lutz's estate database in the Federal Archives

Individual evidence

1. ^ Bradley p. 271.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Bradley p. 672.
3. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Bradley p. 673.
4. ↑ Hammerich / Poppe p. 327.
5. ↑ Groehler p. 51.
6. ↑ Neugebauer p. 266.
7. ↑ ^{a b} Knab p. 84.
8. ↑ Nehring p. 90.
9. ^ Bradley II p. 210 Elevation google.books
10. ↑ Vahrenkamp p. 114.
11. ↑ Völkl. P. 41.
12. ↑ Thomas Wolf: The emergence of the BND. Structure, financing, control (=  Jost Dülffer , Klaus-Dietmar Henke , Wolfgang Krieger , Rolf-Dieter Müller [eds.]): Publications of the Independent Commission of Historians for Research into the History of the Federal Intelligence Service 1945–1968 . Volume 9 ). 1st edition. Ch. Links Verlag, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-96289-022-3 , pp. 54, 559 .
13. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} Ranking list of the German Imperial Army. Ed .: Reichswehr Ministry . ES Mittler & Sohn . Berlin 1925. p. 120.
14. ↑ Renaming of the Schulz-Lutz barracks and laying of the foundation stone for the medical support center in MUNSTER. Retrieved October 24, 2019 . 
15. ↑ Mommsen p. 948.