Gestapo - what kind of organization is this? Destination of the secret police of the Third Reich

Nazi Germany, like any other country, had its own special services engaged in intelligence, counterintelligence, tracking the level of public trustworthiness, identifying subversive elements. In the conditions of the domination of the fascist ideology, other tasks, hitherto unusual, were added to these tasks. So, it was required to find not only leaders and members of hostile parties and underground organizations, but also to search for hiding Jews, gypsies and homosexuals. Since 1933, issues of state security were overseen by a special structure - the Gestapo. This unit required special personnel and specific methods.

The origin of the service of political investigation

The name of the service originated by accident. The long German name "Geheime Staatspolizei" ("The Secret State Police") was cut by postal workers for convenience. In the spring of 1933, shortly after the arrival of the National Socialist Workers Party to power, in Prussia, on the initiative of Hermann Goering , department 1A was created. The aims of the party body were to conduct secret work to combat political opponents, which there were many in the country at that time. The first chief was R. Diss. Heinrich Himmler at that time led the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Bavaria and had nothing to do with the future Gestapo. This did not prevent the SS Reichsfuhrer from gradually concentrating the organs of political investigation in his hands. The role of Goering in the bodies of the Nazi law and order became more than a year later, he was more concerned with the issues of the German Air Force. He handed over the reins to Heydrich, chief of the SD service. Over time, all the scattered units created in the lands of Germany, go under centralized control from Berlin.

Historical facts

Beginning in 1936, the German police and other services responsible for the internal security of the Reich are being subordinated to Heinrich Himmler. The criminal and political departments form a unified structure. The second branch, led by Henry Muller, is engaged in exposing the enemies of the regime, which now includes racially inferior citizens, homosexuals, asocial types and even the most common sloths, subject to labor re-education. This structure was maintained until 1939, until, shortly after the outbreak of the war, a decision was made to form the RSHA (General Directorate for Imperial Security). His fourth department was the Gestapo. This unit was headed by the same Mueller. The history of the organization ended in 1945. The chief of the German special services searched for the troops of the victorious countries, but they did not find it. According to the official version, he died during the storming of Berlin by the Soviet Army.

Misconceptions about the appearance

In both Soviet and foreign cinematograph, the images of fascist Gestapo are often found. As a rule, they appear in the guise of beastlike humanoid beings dressed in black uniforms with rolled up sleeves, or sophisticated sadists armed with surgical torture instruments. They turn to each other, using the titles accepted in the SS. In part this is true. The SS officers sometimes (for strengthening) were transferred to work in the Gestapo. The photos of Himmler and Mueller in parade uniform could also testify about the appearance of ordinary employees, but in reality everything was not quite so. The main part of the Gestapo was made up of civilians, they dressed in civilian clothes, in ordinary costumes, and preferred to behave as unobtrusively as possible. Service still secret. Only on special occasions SS officers dressed in a black dress or (more often) a mouse-gray uniform. The Gestapo did not provide its own uniforms.

Who fought against the partisans in the occupied lands?

Another mistake often made by filmmakers, or rather by their consultants, lies in the name of the services engaged in combating the forces of popular resistance. It was simpler to call them all the same: "Gestapo." This word is known to the mass audience, in contrast to the "Feldgendarmerie", GUF and even SD (Sicherheitsdienst), actually working in the occupied territories of the USSR and other countries. In the so-called Transnistria, temporarily occupied by Romania, the Sigurans operated (by the way, unlike the royal army, it is quite effective). All the German services that carried out punitive actions and fought with the guerrilla movement, submitted to the Abwehr, the Wehrmacht or SS leadership. To the main administration of the RSHA in Berlin, they had no relationship.

Cinema, Gestapo and SS

In historical terms, films about the Gestapo are not entirely correct. Sometimes the most experienced counterintelligence agents from Germany were actually sent to the regions of the greatest activity of the resistance forces. But since the occupied territories were not part of the Reich (for them even money was printed special), the zone of operation of the secret state police was limited to the borders of Germany as of 1939. The ranks of the staff of this structure corresponded to the police system adopted by the Gestapo. The SS had its own "table of ranks", different from the army.

Methods of work

As you know, if an ordinary person long and painful to beat, he confesses. Another question is how valuable and truthful will the information given to them be. Recognition, obtained through torture, may well prove to be self-incrimination, and from an operational point of view it is devoid of any meaning. The main task confronted by the state secret police was to neutralize the intelligence efforts of the special services of the Soviet Union, Britain, the United States and all other countries hostile to the fascist regime established in Germany in 1933. As far as the employees of this service succeeded, it is difficult to judge, many aspects of the invisible war are still a state secret. The practice of world experience in counterintelligence work shows, however, that truthful and valuable data can be obtained using different methods, chief among them being the belief in the need for voluntary cooperation. There was diversity in methods and the Gestapo. Photo of torture chambers equipped with the most sophisticated devices for suppressing the will and rendering all kinds of influence on persons under investigation (both physical and psychological) constitute a significant part of the materials of the Nuremberg trial, which recognized the majority of the Third Reich executive institutions as criminal (including the Gestapo).

Did the women serve in the organization?

Each special service is strong with its personnel. The higher his qualification, the better the preparation, the more effective the activity. But no number of employees, no matter how well they know applied psychology and methods of underground work, is not enough to control the moods and trustworthiness of a population of tens of millions of people. Staff workers are forced to recruit freelance informants, who supply them with the necessary information. Most of the male population of fascist Germany fought on the fronts. The "informers" were mostly women, the Gestapo used their natural curiosity and ideas about patriotism, inspired by Goebbels propaganda. Of course, there were some freelancers-men, as well as methods of recruitment, did not always presuppose voluntary cooperation. But, as far as the published documents allow, there were practically no women among the regular Gestapo employees.

Routine office

So, in the end, we can conclude that the sinister image created by the means of post-war art does not fully correspond to historical realities. German Nazi counterintelligence did not break into the occupied villages, burning their inhabitants, did not guard the concentration camps, did not spy on the partisans in the occupied cities from Kharkov to Paris. In fact, there were unremarkable men in gray raincoats or suits on the German streets, making acquaintances, enlisting informers, sometimes using special machines with direction finders to determine the location of the transmitters of the anti-Hitler coalition countries' residences. They did not wear spectacular and sinister uniforms with skulls on the caps of caps, and most likely did not have the charm of the actor Leonid Bronevoy, whose talent was created by the famous for the whole Soviet Union hero of anecdotes Müller. The Gestapo, like any other special service, was a bureaucratic organization rustling with reports and memoranda . After the collapse of Nazi Germany, the analysis of the surviving files and archives took a long time. It was not wasted. These documents testified to the inhuman and criminal nature of both Hitler's Nazism and all of its state structures, including the Gestapo.