Willi Dickhut

Willi Dickhut (born April 29, 1904 in Schalksmühle ; † May 8, 1992 in Solingen ) was a German KPD functionary and co-founder of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany (MLPD).

Life

Dickhut was the son of a trucking company and trained as a locksmith and lathe operator . He became involved in the labor movement early on , for example in 1920 he participated in the general strike against the Kapp Putsch . In 1921 he joined the German Metalworkers' Association (DMV) and in 1926 the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). After the split in the Solingen DMV, Dickhut became a member of the communist union of metal workers . In 1928/1929 he spent eight months in the Soviet Union as a skilled worker in a factory for hair clippers. After his return he was increasingly active for the KPD and was elected city councilor of Solingen in March 1933.

In 1933 he was arrested and taken into “ protective custody ” until 1935 , which is why he was interned in the Börgermoor and Esterwegen concentration camps for a while, in addition to being in prison. During the “protective custody” he was subjected to severe abuse by the Gestapo for months . After his release, he resumed his illegal work for the KPD in Solingen, which had been weakened by the ban imposed in 1933. In 1938 he was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison by the Hamm Special Court. This sentence was not carried out due to his “protective custody” and nine months of pre-trial detention. In August 1944, Dickhut was arrested again and subsequently faced a death sentence. During a heavy bombing raid on Solingen in November 1944, he managed to escape from prison.

After the end of the Second World War , Dickhut became a functionary of the KPD again and was, among other things, deputy cadre leader in the party executive committee. When the Stalin supporter refused to receive informational materials supplied from China on Mao Zedong's criticism of the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union since the 20th To cancel the CPSU party convention , he came into conflict with the party and was expelled in 1966 when he criticized these changes. In his 1971 book Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union , he criticized the de-Stalinization in the Soviet Union after Khrushchev came to power , which he viewed as a betrayal of socialism and the cause of the failure of the Soviet Union.

After being expelled from the KPD, he became involved in the KPD / ML and, after its split in 1970, promoted the unification of the KPD / ML (Revolutionary Way) with the Communist Workers 'Union (ML) to form the Communist Workers' Union of Germany (KABD) in 1972 who prepared the foundation of the MLPD in 1982. Dickhut was responsible for the theoretical organ Revolutionary Path from 1969 until 1991 .

Dickhut enjoys cult status in the MLPD. His contributions to the party organ Revolutionary Way were stylized as "classics of Marxism-Leninism". The party considers two autobiographical publications by Dickhut to be important sources of a blunt and correct view of the 20th century. Writings that he produced during the National Socialist era are posthumously considered to have "enormous impact until the end of Hitler's fascism". In 2002 the MLPD organized a memorial event in his honor. Its aim was to make Dickhut's “life's work and teachings” accessible to more and more people for the struggle today and in the future. ”A foundation (based in Gelsenkirchen ) that bears his name also pursues this aim . It also functions as the sponsor of a museum named after Dickhut. Overall, the MLPD created “its very personal myth and hero” in the person of Dickhut. The admiration for Dickhut in the ranks of the MLPD was also expressed in 2012. According to this party, Dickhut “developed into a workers theorist and visionary champion for real socialism. His fundamental analyzes of state monopoly capitalism and the restoration of capitalism have been translated into numerous languages ​​and inspired the international revolutionary movement. "

Fonts

• That's how it was back then. Verlag Neuer Weg, Stuttgart 1979, ISBN 3-88021-042-X (first volume of the biography).
• State monopoly capitalism in the FRG. 2 volumes, Verlag Neuer Weg, Stuttgart 1979, ISBN 3-88021-041-1 .
• Lenin, the brilliant leader of the proletariat. Verlag Neuer Weg, Stuttgart 1984 (reprint of an article from the Rote Fahne 2/1982).
• War and Peace and the Socialist Revolution. Verlag Neuer Weg, Stuttgart 1983, ISBN 3-88021-059-4 .
• Exchange of letters on questions of theory and practice of party building. Neuer Weg publishing house, Stuttgart 1984, ISBN 3-88021-141-8 .
• Crises and class struggle. Verlag Neuer Weg, Stuttgart 1985, ISBN 3-88021-136-1 .
• Proletarian resistance against fascism and war. 2 volumes, Verlag Neuer Weg, Düsseldorf 1987, ISBN 3-88021-059-4 .
• Materialistic dialectics and bourgeois science. Verlag Neuer Weg, Verlag Neuer Weg, Düsseldorf 1987, ISBN 3-88021-161-2 .
• The restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union. Verlag Neuer Weg, Düsseldorf 1988, ISBN 3-88021-166-3 .
• The dialectical unity of theory and practice. Neuer Weg publishing house, Essen 1988, ISBN 3-88021-163-9 .
• Unions and class struggle. Verlag Neuer Weg, Essen 1988, ISBN 3-88021-169-8 .
• What happened after that. Verlag Neuer Weg, Essen 1990, ISBN 3-88021-205-8 (second volume of the biography).
• Socialism at the end? Verlag Neuer Weg, Essen 1992, ISBN 3-88021-220-1 .
• Documentation “I've fought all my life” - on Willi Dickhut's life's work. Verlag Neuer Weg, Essen 2002, ISBN 3-88021-328-3 .

literature

• Big hat, Willi . In: Hermann Weber , Andreas Herbst : German Communists. Biographisches Handbuch 1918 to 1945. 2nd, revised and greatly expanded edition. Dietz, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-320-02130-6 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Willi Dickhut in the catalog of the German National Library
• Detailed curriculum vitae

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Willi Dickhut in baseportal.de
2. ^ Sascha Dietze: The Ideology of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany (MLPD) . Lit Verlag, Berlin 2010, pp. 34–37, ISBN 3-643-10838-9 . The quotations can be found there on p. 35 and p. 36 f.
3. ↑ Dietze: The Ideology of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany (MLPD) , p. 37.
4. ↑ 20th anniversary of the death of Willi Dickhut - antifascist, communist and co-founder of the MLPD ( Memento of the original from January 18, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Contribution to the party organ “Rote Fahne” on May 5, 2012.