Central Court of the Army

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The Central Court of the Army (partly abbreviated to ZdH and ZGH) was a court of armed forces justice that existed from April 11, 1944 until the end of the war . It emerged from the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur in Berlin , but did not replace it. It had its headquarters in Berlin, a branch in Vienna and investigation offices in various cities in the Reich territory .

Important proceedings were those against Matthias Lackas , Karl Heinz Moldt and Eberhard Ritter. One of the last trials that took place in court was that against Wehrmacht member, author and cabaret artist Wolfgang Borchert .

history

The Central Court of the Army was set up by decree on April 11, 1944, whereby it was assigned essential powers of the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur Berlin. The judge also remained the same, namely Paul von Hase until July 1944 . The chief of the army armaments and commander of the reserve army acted as superior court lord , from the establishment until July 20, 1944 that was Friedrich Fromm , then Heinrich Himmler . The judge was considered to be the “holder of the judiciary”, who assigned the individual cases to the various judicial military judicial officers (judges) for investigation, prosecution or defense. Court lords could confirm or change the legal opinion drawn up by the responsible investigating judge, except for death sentences or officers, where requests for changes had to be passed up.

The branch in Vienna and the investigation centers in Gera , Danzig , Vienna and Strasbourg were also taken over by the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur in Berlin and continued if they were responsible.

Tasks and responsibilities

On April 11, 1944, the Central Court of the Army took over the following responsibilities from the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur in Berlin:

  • Political criminal matters,
  • Criminal cases against unnatural fornication,
  • Corruption cases of particular importance
  • Wanted items,
  • items assigned by special arrangement and
  • Retrial decisions.

It had thus been given the essential and central competencies, in particular those relating to statements and deeds that “degrade military strength”. The court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur Berlin was transformed from a court with special jurisdiction to a normal court of a Wehrmacht Commandantur as in Hamburg or Vienna.

On September 20, 1944, the jurisdiction changed again in that “political criminal matters of all Germans including the Wehrmacht members (...) which are directed against the trust in the political and military leadership” had to be punished by the People's Court and its special courts.

The central court can be understood and designated as a special court , whereby this should not be confused with the special courts of civil jurisdiction set up in each higher regional court district. Since the armed forces justice was in itself a special judiciary, it is not necessary to classify each individual military court - regardless of the level - as a special court. The central court of the army was also not a supreme court.

Procedural statistics

At this military court, too, the rate of file transfer is very low, statistical conclusions or projections are only possible to a limited extent.

In 1992, Manfred Messerschmidt evaluated a closed inventory of 146 cases of proceedings conducted in Vienna in 1944 by the respective branch offices (court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur Berlin, branch office Vienna, then central court of the army, branch office Vienna). Of the 146 proceedings, 128 resulted in judgments and 18 otherwise. Among the 146 cases, there was one case of self-mutilation and one case of desertion, both of which were punished with death sentences. The remaining trials ended with another death sentence, 100 prison terms, 18 penitentiary sentences, etc. Among the 128 soldiers convicted were 83 workers, 22 salaried employees, 7 civil servants, 7 self-employed, 2 students, 2 pupils and 5 professional soldiers. The “disruptive” remarks were made in 69 cases during home leave, in 36 cases in the service area (barracks, transport, etc.) and in 7 cases in the hospital.

Ela Hornung carried out this in 2010 with 199 cases from the Vienna branch and confirmed most of the results. The convicts had the following ranks: 78% team ranks, 14% NCOs, 3% officers, 1% Wehrmacht detachments, 4% others. The most common offenses were degradation of military strength (149 cases, 75%), unauthorized removal (8 cases, 4%), theft (6 cases, 3%), desertion and bribery (4 cases each, 2%), etc.

Starting point: proceedings against Lackas and others

From March 14 to April 22, 1944 court martial panel of the Wehrmacht headquarters in Berlin took place before the trial of the book publisher Matthias Lackas , Karlheinz Moldt and Eberhard Ritter von Riewel place bribed the Wehrmacht points against several paragraphs of the war economy regulation violated and According to the prosecution, they were also guilty of disrupting military strength .

After the establishment of the Central Court on April 11, 1944, the new court immediately began to continue the trial of Lackas and the co-defendants. The staffing remained that of the previous court that had started the process. The trial against Matthias Lackas led, as was foreseeable in the last few days of the trial, to follow-up trials within the Wehrmacht . For April 12, 1944, Hans Paul Graf von Monts, a witness of important relations with the Propaganda Ministry, was summoned. The ongoing corruption investigations were expanded to include the witness, and the proceedings now threatened to involve government agencies.

Reception of the transformation

The reasons for and significance of the conversion of the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur in Berlin to the Central Court of the Army are controversial and are put in connection with Hitler's distrust of the Wehrmacht and Wehrmacht justice. According to Manfred Messerschmidt , a mistrust of the Wehrmacht justice system is unlikely, as indicated by the competences taken over by the court of the Wehrmacht Commandantur in Berlin and the unchanged judge. Messerschmidt cites as the reason for the introduction of the Central Court of the Army the “concentration of jurisdiction in political criminal matters that Hitler wanted”.

On June 12, 1944, Hitler reaffirmed the structural measures he had taken by means of a Führer decree, instructing Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel to take action "to ensure an effective fight against corruption [...] with the greatest speed, ruthless severity and without regard to the person." At any time, Keitel should be able to determine which court would be heard before. Keitel stipulated on the spot in the detailed execution orders that all more complex cases should be heard before the central court of the army. The close temporal connection between the decisions reveals that Keitel had previously presented Hitler with the results of the work of the Central Court and thus the proceedings against Matthias Lackas and his entourage, and that Hitler had shown satisfaction with the work done and the judgments passed by this court.

literature

  • Manfred Messerschmidt: The Wehrmacht Justice 1933-1945. Paderborn 2005.
  • Roland Kopp: Paul von Hase. From the Alexander barracks to Plötzensee. A German soldier biography 1885–1944. Berlin 2001.
  • Fritz Wüllner: The Nazi military justice and the misery of historiography. Baden-Baden 1991.
  • Manfred Messerschmidt, Fritz Wüllner: The Wehrmacht Justice in the Service of National Socialism. Destroying a legend. Baden-Baden 1987.
  • Rudolf Absolon: The Wehrmacht Criminal Law in World War II: Collection of the basic laws, ordinances and decrees. Printed as a manuscript. Federal Archives Department Central Evidence Office, Kornelimünster 1958.

Literature on Austria

  • Hornung, Ela: Denunciation as a social practice. Cases from the Nazi military justice. Vienna, 2010.
  • Manoschek, Walter (ed.): Victims of Nazi military justice. Judgment practice, prison system, compensation policy in Austria. Vienna, 2003.
  • Messerschmidt, Manfred: The "decomposer" and his informer. Judgment of the Central Court of the Army in Vienna. In: Wolfram Wette (ed.), The Little Man's War. A military history from below, Munich, 1992. pp. 255–278.

Literature on Matthias Lackas et al.

  • Bühler, Hans-Eugen and Simons, Olaf: The dazzling business of Matthias Lackas. Corruption investigations in the publishing world of the Third Reich. Cologne, 2004. ISBN 978-3000133435 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Messerschmidt, Manfred: Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945. Paderborn, 2005. p. 141.
  2. ↑ Messerschmidt, Manfred: The "Zersetzer" and his informer. Judgment of the Central Court of the Army in Vienna. In: Wolfram Wette (ed.), The Little Man's War. A military history from below, Munich, 1992. pp. 255–278, here p. 257.
  3. ↑ Dietz, Heinrich: Wehrmacht Disciplinary Order of June 6, 1942 with supplementary war regulations. Leipzig, 1943. pp. 27 f.
  4. ↑ See Dietz, Heinrich: Wehrmacht Disciplinary Ordinance of June 6, 1942 with supplementary war regulations. Leipzig, 1943. pp. 27f. And: Messerschmidt, Manfred: The judge. In: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft, 52nd vol., H. 6, 2004. pp. 493–504, here p. 493.
  5. ↑ See Messerschmidt, Manfred: Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945. Paderborn, 2005. p. 136.
  6. ↑ Cf. Wüllner, Fritz: The Nazi military justice and the misery of historiography. Baden-Baden, 1991. p. 95. And: Cf. Messerschmidt, Manfred: Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945. Paderborn, 2005. pp. 134f.
  7. ↑ See Messerschmidt, Manfred: Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945. Paderborn, 2005. p. 141.
  8. ↑ See the Fuehrer's decree on the prosecution of political crimes by members of the Wehrmacht, Waffen-SS and police from August 1943. Printed in full in: Moll, Martin: "Führer-Erasse" 1939–1945. Edition of all surviving directives in the fields of state, party, economy, occupation policy and military administration issued by Hitler in writing during the Second World War, not printed in the Reichsgesetzblatt. Stuttgart, 1997. pp. 458 f.
  9. ↑ Messerschmidt, Manfred: The "Zersetzer" and his informer. Judgment of the Central Court of the Army in Vienna. In: Wolfram Wette (ed.), The Little Man's War. A military history from below, Munich, 1992. pp. 255–278, here pp. 258–260.
  10. ↑ Hornung, Ela: Denunciation as a social practice. Cases from the Nazi military justice. Vienna, 2010. p. 87.
  11. ↑ See Messerschmidt, Manfred: Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945. Paderborn, 2005. P. 135. And: Wüllner, Fritz: The Nazi military justice and the misery of historiography. Baden-Baden, 1991. pp. 139-141.
  12. ↑ Messerschmidt, Manfred: The "Zersetzer" and his informer. Judgment of the Central Court of the Army in Vienna. In: Wolfram Wette (ed.), The Little Man's War. A military history from below, Munich, 1992. pp. 255–278, here p. 257.
  13. ↑ Hitler's decree and Keitel's “execution orders” for the Fuehrer's decree of June 12, 1944 appeared together in Heeresmitteilungen 1944 , No. 321, reprinted in Absolon (Lit.), p. 83, IE33.