The Nazi directly responsible for the hundreds of thousands killed in German concentration camps was deservedly hanged. At the scaffold, Ernst K altenbrunner, before they threw a suicide cap on him, said: "Be happy Germany!" To the last, he stubbornly denied any involvement in the crimes committed by his subordinates at the trial for war criminals in Nuremberg.
Lawyer's son and grandson of a lawyer
Ernst K altenbrunner was born on October 4, 1903 in the urban community of Ried, Austria-Hungary. His distant ancestors were blacksmiths, but his grandfather had already trained as a lawyer, and then for more than twenty years he worked as mayor of the small Austrian town of Eferding. His father also chose the profession of a lawyer, so in theory he had no choice but to follow in the footsteps of his ancestors.
However, after completing his secondary education, he entered the Faculty of Chemistry at the Technische Hochschule in Graz. According to his fellow students, K altenbrunner was not distinguished by any special diligence orindustriousness, did not bother himself with studies. He behaved aggressively, often participating in then-fashionable student duels. And he had good physical data for this: a height of ninety meters with broad shoulders and thin but strong brushes. As a memento of his turbulent youth, he had deep scars on his face, which, according to Heinrich Heine, "the idlers wore as evidence of their masculinity." Having settled down by the age of twenty, he entered the law faculty of the University of Salzburg, after which he received a doctorate in jurisprudence back in 1926.
Beginning of labor and party activities
After a brief stint at the Salzburg City Court, Ernst K altenbrunner opened his own law office in Linz. As the Soviet participants in the Nuremberg Trials later wrote, he was the most difficult defendant, because he skillfully used his skills as a "bourgeois lawyer", deftly applying various legal tricks.
After six years as a lawyer, he joined the National Socialist Party and became an active member of the SS guards. Due to his physical strength and ability to manipulate people, Ernst K altenbrunner stood out among the militants, who were mostly illiterate youth and unemployed veterans of the First World War. He was arrested many times for participating in violent actions, but he managed to avoid more or less serious punishment each time.
Career takeoff
In 1934, SS fighters broke into the chancellor's officeAustrian Dollfuss, was wounded in the throat in a shootout. One and a half hundred Austrian SS men, among whom was Ernst K altenbrunner, were not allowed to provide medical assistance to the bleeding Dollfus. After this assassination, his career went up sharply, he becomes the leader of the Austrian SS.
Almost every published biography of Ernst K altenbrunner describes the first meeting with Heinrich Himmler, when he melodramatically said: "Reischführer, the Austrian SS are waiting for your instructions!". In early June 1941, he was promoted to the rank of SS Brigadeführer and appointed commander of the SS and police in Vienna. Unable to withstand the burden of power that fell on him and the nervous tension associated with the desire to stay at the top of power, he began to drink. First, small glasses of cognac to maintain tone, then from morning to evening, and sometimes until morning. He constantly smoked, and cheap cigarettes, because they are stronger, but officially, to be closer to the nation.
During the war years
Despite his apparent alcoholism, in 1943 he was appointed head of the RSHA (Reich Security Main Directorate). It is believed that the decisive factor was that he was Himmler's loyal man, reliable and repeatedly tested. In addition, Ernst K altenbrunner was considered the best specialist in the organization and actions of special detachments. There were legends about his incredible ability to work, as well as about rabid anti-Semitism.
The directorate handled covert operations around the world, including support for the strugglemountain tribes of Iran, India, Iraq with the British, the creation of a "fifth column" in Latin America, sabotage in the Soviet Union, the introduction of provocateurs into the detachments of Yugoslav and French partisans. Special teams engaged in sabotage and political assassinations.
Ernst K altenbrunner personally supervised the construction of concentration camps and the operation of the methods used to destroy prisoners. In the Mauthausen camp, a demonstration execution was specially organized for him in various ways: by a shot in the back of the head, in a gas chamber and by hanging. At the end of the war, he ordered the destruction of all concentration camp prisoners.
Deserved award
K altenbruner was arrested in 1945 in Austria. In the same year, he appeared at the trial of war criminals in Nuremberg. A photo of Ernst K altenbrunner with American guards, above whom he was a head taller, went around the world press.
At court hearings, the former head of the RSHA repeatedly stated that he was engaged only in the management of intelligence activities and knew nothing about concentration camps. Ernst K altenbrunner was executed in October 1946.
