Robert Corbett (officer)

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Sir Robert John Swan Corbett KCVO CB (born May 16, 1940 in Hove , Sussex ) is a retired British officer and Major General of the Army , historian and author . He was Chief of Staff during the Falklands War in 1984 and Commanding General in the London District in the early 1990s . Between 1989 and 1990 he was the 21st and last commandant of the British Sector of Berlin and thus one of the Allied city ​​commanders . The fall of the Berlin Wall fell during his term of office , as a result of which he acted as an advisor to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on Berlin issues in preparation for German unification . In 1994, Corbett was raised to the nobility by Queen Elizabeth II .

Beginning of the military career

Born in England , he first completed his first degree and in 1953 switched to the Shrewsbury School, founded in 1552 in the West Midlands , which he graduated in 1958. His grandfather and father were Shrewsbury School graduates. In the same year he entered the military at the age of 18 and graduated from the officers' school in Aldershot . Following a family tradition, he was then employed as a member of the Irish Guards , one of the five royal body regiments and, after graduating, as a platoon leader .

During the Cold War , as a young lieutenant , Corbett led a reconnaissance unit from 1961 and was transferred to the Rhine Army in Berlin in this capacity . Shortly after the construction of the Berlin Wall, he and his unit were to reach Berlin via the assigned transit route . There was a confrontation with East German police officers who tried for no reason to arrest one of the soldiers from Corbett's group, which almost led to the use of firearms . Ultimately, Corbett managed to get into town with his men, albeit a 14-hour delay.

As usual for every soldier who was deployed to Berlin for the first time, a visit to the burned-out Reichstag building was one of Corbett's first stops.

Corbett served in an airborne unit for seven more years, serving in France , Cyprus , Kenya , Hong Kong , Gibraltar , Norway , Northern Ireland , the Persian Gulf , Belgium , Canada , Oman and the United States of America . In 1962, Corbett was promoted to captain and in 1968 to major .

Robert Corbett graduated in subsequent years studies at the Royal Military College of Science and the staff College Camberley (1971 to 1973) and the United States Armed Forces Staff College in Norfolk (1980).

After his promotion to Lieutenant Colonel , he was employed as a staff officer in 1980 , before he returned to Germany in 1981 as a battalion commander in the 4th Tank Brigade of the Rhine Army.

In 1984 Robert Corbett was promoted to colonel and in the midst of the Falklands War Chief of Staff and Deputy Commander of the British forces there . A year later he was given command of the 5th Airborne Brigade , with a simultaneous promotion to Brigadier .

1987 followed a two-year assignment in the British Ministry of Defense in London.

City Commander in Berlin

In January 1989 Robert Corbett was promoted to major general and, as successor to Patrick Brooking , the new and now 21st Commander of the British Sector of Berlin. In addition to Major General Raymond Haddock (USA) and Division General François Cann (France), he was one of the three West Allied city commanders of the divided city, which as a body formed the Allied Command . After the Second World War, this represented the highest legal and political authority for Greater Berlin and was subordinate to the Allied Control Council .

As city commander, he assumed one of the most important and outstanding posts that the British military had to fill outside of Great Britain. As such, he was on the one hand the military, but above all the "political leader" of his country and exercised a kind of representative status for Queen Elizabeth II, since Berlin was formally not part of the scope of the Federal Republic of Germany and Great Britain's ambassador residing in Bonn was not responsible.

Like his predecessors, Corbett, as city commander, concentrated mainly on the political and diplomatic representation of his country and his duties as a member of the Allied Command, while the respective brigade commander took over the purely military leadership of the British armed forces in the four-sector city.

With the move to Berlin Corbett moved with his family in the Berlin district Gatow located Villa Lemm . Members of the British royal family resided during their stays in Berlin on the property, which was guarded by members of the 248 German Security Unit , a German company and guard police unit of the British Military Police (RMP) . The function of the host towards the royal family was fulfilled by a British city commander at least once a year when the Royal Birthday Parade ("Queens Birthday Parade") was to be accepted on the Berlin Maifeld at the Olympic Stadium . So Corbett received the Duchess of York in May 1989 .

Robert Corbett took up his new position amid an era of change in Berlin. On the one hand, the city flourished as a cultural metropolis, on the other hand, it had hit the headlines due to constant unrest and squatting . The relationship with the governing mayor Eberhard Diepgen (CDU) was not always free of conflict, who already at the time of Patrick Brookings directed more and more petitions and demands to the Allied command. Only a few years earlier, Diepgen had rejected Diepgen's application for approval of a helicopter for the Berlin police because the Allies did not want to relinquish their air sovereignty . The only exception was initially the new rescue helicopter , which was provided by the ADAC and was allowed to fly with special conditions in the western sectors of the city.

After the elections to the Berlin House of Representatives in January 1989 , the CDU lost its majority , as a result, the SPD - politician Walter Momper , a coalition of SPD and Alternative list could form. On March 16, Momper was elected as the new Governing Mayor.

Corbett's tenure has not always been a lucky one. In the summer of 1989 a young couple, including a pregnant woman, tried to swim from the east side of Berlin to the west. The woman was not able to climb the embankment and was discovered by a member of the GDR border troops who patrolled the area with a boat . He first tried to ram the young woman with his watercraft. A patrol from the British military police rushed to the woman's aid and pulled her completely exhausted from the water, while the man reached the west bank independently.

As a first reaction to this and other incidents, Corbett had ropes attached to the banks of the Spree in order to help refugees. However, this approach earned him criticism from within his own ranks - especially from the Allied Control Council and the British Embassy in Bonn, which in turn feared a backlash from the GDR government .

The Soviet side promptly ordered Corbett to remove the ropes again, but this was ignored by the British city commander.

Robert Corbett stayed regularly in the eastern part of Berlin and took part in the farewell mass of Joachim Cardinal Meisner on February 4, 1989 in St. Hedwig's Cathedral . Meisner had previously been appointed the new Archbishop of Cologne by Pope John Paul II . As they walked out of the church, Corbett and his wife Susan were surrounded by nearly 2,000 people in the presence of the National Security Service , who handed them letters asking for help and assistance.

During his time as city commander in Berlin, the British armed forces were attacked and threatened worldwide by the so-called Irish Republican Army . Robert Corbett and his family were personally threatened with death and were subject to special protective measures . However, there have been no attacks on the life of the major general or any of his family members.

Events on November 9th and 10th, 1989

On the evening of November 9, 1989, Robert Corbett and other guests stayed in the house of the director and media entrepreneur Ulrich Schamoni , who was celebrating his 50th birthday.

At the same time, the GDR secretary for information, Günter Schabowski , held a press conference in East Berlin on the planned travel facilitation for GDR citizens, in which the famous Schabowski slip of the tongue came in front of the numerous journalists from home and abroad announced the immediate possibility of leaving the country for GDR citizens.

Completely surprised by the events, Corbett was briefly informed over the car phone by his deputy , the Minister of the British Military Government in Berlin, Michael St. Edmund Burton . In his memoirs, Corbett said that the first thing he learned from Burton was that "the barriers were up and people could get from east to west unhindered . " The major general then summoned his staff at headquarters and immediately went with his staff to the headquarters of the Allied command in the Berlin district of Zehlendorf .

In November 1989, economic tensions had also escalated in the southern industrial cities of the GDR, which is why the Western Allies had drawn up appropriate emergency plans. They assumed that GDR citizens could try to flee to the West under fire. Together with his fellow commanders Haddock and Cann, Corbett first decided to give the officers of the Berlin police permission to post themselves directly on the marking strips of the Berlin Wall, above all in order to better control and assess the behavior of the West Berlin population can.

After the first decisions, Corbett informed the Governing Mayor Walter Momper and went straight to various inner-city crossing points in order to be able to form his own picture. Here he met with Momper to assess the new situation. These unplanned encounters were initially subject to great reservations about Momper, as the first Berlin head of government of a red-green senate . In retrospect, Corbett said repeatedly that he encountered a "very calm, composed and situationally prudent mayor" .

One of the first major decisions of the Allied Command ordered Corbett Momper, which volunteer Police Reserve mobilize the 1961 as a response to the conditions laid down in the GDR workers' militia was formed, in Berlin (West). Momper then passed this Allied order on to Interior Senator Erich Pätzold . In any case, in the event of a state of emergency, the forces of the Berlin police, including the Voluntary Police Reserve, were included in the strength of the Allied brigades in the respective sector. This was based on the fact that Berlin police officers were trained in war weapons until the completion of German unification .

Corbett then went to the Brandenburg Gate , in front of which thousands of people have now gathered.

In the early morning hours of November 10, Corbett had himself driven to the Soviet memorial on Straße des 17. Juni in Berlin- Tiergarten , which, like the Brandenburg Gate, was in the British sector . A regulation of the four-power status stipulated that the memorial, which commemorates the more than 80,000 Red Army soldiers who died during the battle for Berlin, was guarded by Soviet soldiers.

Corbett feared possible riots against the guards who, as members of the Soviet army, were becoming increasingly unpopular among the broad GDR population. 19 years earlier, on November 7, 1970, there was an attack at the same place when the nurse Ekkehard Weil fired two shots at a Soviet soldier, seriously injuring him.

The major general contacted Berlin police chief Georg Schertz while he was still on the way and ordered a hundred to be deployed to protect the soldiers and the spacious property . He then ordered the regimental commander of the British military police RMP, Lieutenant Colonel Ronald Tilston, to immediately send forces to the memorial and to ensure protection until the Berlin police arrive.

For the first time in the history of the Cold War, Robert Corbett, a British city commander, went unannounced to the Soviet Memorial. In his memoirs, Corbett noted that he was first greeted with a salute by a young soldier and his superior officer, a Soviet captain , and invited into the main hall of the memorial.

Corbett explained the current situation to the Soviet soldiers in detail, indicating that arrangements had been made for their protection by the British and German authorities. It is said that before the British city commander left the hall, the young soldiers stood in two rows with their rifles at their arms to bid the general farewell with dignity and respect.

After Corbett returned to the British headquarters at Berlin's Olympic Stadium, he received an urgent message from the head of the British Military Mission , Ian Freer, that a personal message by name from the Soviets had been received for the city commander. This was transmitted via a connection that has not been used since the departure of the Soviet city commandant Alexander Kotikow and the Berlin blockade in June 1948.

When Robert Corbett walked into his office, he found an envelope with two sentences in English. “Thank you for what you did. It will not be forgotten. ” The sender was Soviet Army General Boris Snetkov , the commander in chief of the Western Group of Troops .

Role during the unification process

Robert Corbett advised Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Foreign Minister Douglas Hurd on Berlin issues as part of the two-plus-four negotiations . He played an important diplomatic role and met the most important politicians of the Federal Republic of Germany, especially those who had a direct connection to Berlin. They included Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker , Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl , Federal Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and former Federal Chancellor Willy Brandt , who was the Governing Mayor of Berlin when the Wall was built.

Foreign politicians were also among his interlocutors, including Foreign Ministers James Baker (USA), Roland Dumas (France) and Eduard Shevardnadze (Soviet Union). He also met with Hurd on November 16, 1989 during his visit to Berlin. Corbett was also one of the advisors when the ambassadors of the USA, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union met in West Berlin on December 11, 1989.

The main focus of the Allied Command in Berlin, however, was primarily to transfer city sovereignty to the Berlin Senate in a suitable form and at the same time to create an orderly plan for the remaining contingents of the Allied Brigades in Berlin. This included the repatriation of military inventories, measures to dissolve barracks and properties, as well as the incipient labor law measures of the numerous civil employees .

The demolition of the control house at the previous Allied checkpoint on Kochstrasse was visible to the general public . Robert Corbett stopped, in his

Capacity as the rotating chairman of the Allied Command, the speech on the occasion of the dismantling of the security systems of the popularly known Checkpoint Charlie . The two city commanders Raymond Haddock (USA) and François Cann (France) as well as the foreign ministers of the USA, Great Britain, France and the Soviet Union as well as Hans-Dietrich Genscher (Federal Republic of Germany) and Markus Meckel (GDR) took part in the ceremony.

On October 2, 1990, the day before German reunification, the Allied city commanders were officially adopted by the Berlin Senate and the Berlin House of Representatives .

Again as scheduled, Robert Corbett was given the honor of delivering the city commanders' farewell speech in German before parliament. This is still considered to be one of the most important with regard to the end of the Cold War. In this, Corbett referred to a quote from former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill from the early post-war period, in which he declared, "The division of Germany is a tragedy that will not last" . Corbett explained to Alluding to the Berlin House of Representatives: "But the tragedy is over, the tragedy is over!" . Contemporary witnesses often describe the situation when the former Governing Mayor Willy Brandt, sitting in the front row, beamed at Corbett while tears ran down his face with emotion.

Afterwards, Corbett presented the Governing Mayor Walter Momper with a multi-page letter with which the sovereignty of the city was symbolically transferred back to the legitimate state government.

After that, Corbett and the other two city commanders contributed to the Golden Book one of Berlin and were Momper and the President of the Berlin House, Juergen Rabe well , with the country's Merit Award.

In the evening, Corbett was Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker's guest of honor and took part in the official celebrations on the occasion of German unity. Corbett was present at the ceremony at the Reichstag building on the night of October 3rd. Previously, he had already been adopted by members of the 248 German Security Unit at Villa Lemm, his previous residence.

The term of office of the city commanders ended on October 2, 1990 at midnight.

A few days later, Corbett and his family left Berlin via the Gatow military airport . The British contingent, which existed until 1994, was henceforth commanded by the brigade commander.

Last command in London

In January 1991, Queen Elizabeth II awarded him the “Companion” level of the Order of the Bath .

After his time in Berlin, Robert Corbett was transferred to London in 1991, where he took over the post of Commanding General for the London District and the Household Division , which, in constant rotation of the regiments involved, provide the body and house guard of Queen Elizabeth II. In the same year he was elected to the advisory board of Deutsche Bank Berlin , an office that gave him the opportunity to return to Berlin regularly. He remained a member of the advisory board until 2000.

From 1993 to 2000 he was also Colonel of Honor of the Irish Rifles Infantry Regiment (Army Reserve) .

Shortly before his retirement, in June 1994, Queen Elizabeth II honored him with one of the highest honors in the country and made him Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order . Since then he has had the suffix "Sir".

In August 1994, Corbett came after 35 years of service as a major general in retirement .

Working in retirement

After retiring from active service, Corbett devoted himself to a charitable cause, following an old tradition for officers in the rank of general. From 1994 to 2004 he chaired the organization The Dulverton Trust , which advocates for the needs of disadvantaged young people and supports their qualified promotion and training.

At the same time, Corbett was active as a historian, particularly in connection with the processing of his experiences as a British city commander in Berlin. The first edition of his 1991 book "Berlin and the British Ally 1945–1990" was quickly sold out. As a recognized contemporary witness , he also gives lectures worldwide, primarily in the Commonwealth of Nations , and is still in demand today as an interview partner. Corbett always points out that it was an extraordinary coincidence for him to witness the construction and destruction of the Berlin Wall. He was "full of gratitude for the friendship and discipline of the Berlin population," he said in a speech in October 2015.

Robert Corbett visits his old place of work regularly. In 2010 he stayed in Berlin at the invitation of the Allied Museum, together with his two former city commanders colleagues Raymond Haddock and François Cann .

Since May 2012 he has repeatedly been a guest of the Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit, which was formed in Berlin as an association made up of former members of the guard police that was responsible for protecting Corbett as city commander.

In October 2015 he was also the guest of honor at the ceremony "25 years of German unity - Spandau remembers" , which was organized by the Spandau district office of Berlin and the Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit e. V. was aligned on the Spandau Citadel . On the occasion of Corbett's visit, the Spandau district mayor Helmut Kleebank obtained special permission from the Berlin Senate Chancellery and had the town hall flagged with the British " Union Jack " .

The last time Robert Corbett was in Berlin was in July 2016. In addition, he has been participating as a contemporary witness as part of the GSU History project since February 2019.

In his free time, he has also been a member of the London winegrowing society The Worshipful Company of Vintners since 1964 .

family

Robert Corbett comes from an Anglo-Irish family. He has both British and Irish citizenship . His father Robert Corbett (1907–1988) was also a British Army officer and served as a captain in World War II.

Corbett has been married to his wife Susan (* 1944) since 1966. She is the daughter of Corbett's former regimental commander, Brigadier Michael O'Cock CBE MC , of which he was an adjutant.

The couple live in the south of England and have three sons, one of whom has also embarked on an officer career but has since established himself as a lawyer .

Susan and Robert Corbett are multiple grandparents .

Trivia

  • His predecessor in the office of Commander in Chief of the British Sector of Berlin, Patrick Brooking, was a school friend of Corbett's.
  • Robert Corbett is still close friends with companions from his time in Berlin, including the former Governing Mayor Walter Momper, former members of the 248 German Security Unit and his fellow commanders Raymond Haddock and François Cann.
  • Coincidentally, during the most important phases of his tenure as city commander, Corbett presided over the Allied Command, for example during the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 and at the time of German reunification in October 1990.
  • Corbett signed twice in the Golden Book of the Berlin Spandau district. He was immortalized for the first time in April 1989 on the occasion of his inaugural visit as city commander; He signed in again on the occasion of the ceremony "25 years of German unity - Spandau remembers" in October 2015.
  • One of Robert Corbett's general uniforms is now on permanent display in the Allied Museum in Berlin.
  • Since the death of Bernard Gordon Lennox on December 27, 2017, Robert Corbett has been the only surviving former British city commander.

Awards (excerpt)

literature

Web links

Commons : Robert Corbett  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Alex Baxter: Talk Given by Major General Sir Robert Corbett. In: Shrewsbury School website. June 20, 2012, accessed January 16, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Robert Corbett: A Commander Recalls: The Incredible Unity . In: Kameradschaft 248 GSU e. V. (Ed.): GUARD REPORT . December 2015, issue 51, 5th year. Berlin December 2015, p. 4-7 .
  3. ^ The commanders of the British sector of Berlin. In: Website of the contemporary witness project GSU History. May 13, 2020, accessed on May 13, 2020 (German).
  4. ^ Landesdenkmalamt Berlin: residence of the city commandant. In: Website of the Landesdenkmalmtes Berlin. Retrieved January 16, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Carsten Schanz: The Villa Lemm is half-mast. In: website of the Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit e. V. August 23, 2013, accessed January 16, 2018 .
  6. ↑ Robert Corbett: A Commander Recalls: One Night Changes the World . In: Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit e. V. (Ed.): GUARD REPORT . Edition November 2015, No. 50 , 5th year. Berlin, S. 5-10 .
  7. ^ Far from women. In: Der Spiegel. November 16, 1970, retrieved January 16, 2018 (number 47/1970).
  8. ↑ Federal Foundation processing: Two-plus-four contract. In: website of the Federal Foundation for Work-Up. Federal Foundation for Work-Up, accessed on January 16, 2018 .
  9. ↑ Berlin Senate Chancellery: Berlin is to celebrate 20 years of unity on the evening before October 3rd. In: Website of the Berlin Senate Chancellery. April 6, 2010, accessed January 16, 2018 .
  10. ↑ Carsten Schanz: The man who helped to change the world . In: Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit e. V. (Ed.): GUARD REPORT . Edition January 2014. Berlin, p. 1 to 3 .
  11. ↑ Court Circula. In: Internet site "INDEPENDENT.co.uk". INDEPENDENT, June 21, 1994, accessed January 16, 2018 .
  12. ↑ "25 years of German unity - Spandau remembers"
  13. ↑ On a special mission: Corbett back in Berlin. In: website of the Kameradschaft 248 German Security Unit e. V. July 22, 2016, accessed on January 17, 2018 (German).
  14. ↑ Contemporary witness Robert Corbett. In: GSU History. December 24, 2019, accessed June 5, 2020 (German).
  15. ^ The Worshipful Company of Vintners
personal data
SURNAME Corbett, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Corbett, Robert John Swan (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British Army officer and major general, historian and author
DATE OF BIRTH May 16, 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH Hove , Sussex