Franz von papen biography examples

SUBJECT

Nuremberg (Germany)--history, Nazis--Germany--history--20th Century, Nuremberg Trial of Major German War Criminals 1945-1946, Franz von Papen Jr., Defense Counsel, Franz von Papen,

DESCRIPTION

Franz von Papen, Jr. was part of his father's defense counsel. Franz von Papen was a German nobleman, Roman Catholic monarchist politician, General Staff officer, and diplomat, who served as Chancellor of Germany in 1932 and as Vice-Chancellor under Adolf Hitler in 1933-1934. Papen was captured along with his son Franz Jr. by the U.S. Army near the end of the war. He was one of the defendants at the first Nuremberg War Crimes Trial. The court acquitted him, stating that he had committed a number of "political immoralities," but these actions were not punishable under the "conspiracy to commit crimes against peace." His son, Franz von Papen, Jr. helped his father with his defense at the trial.

COVERAGE

20th Century, Nuremberg Germany, 1945-1946

PUBLISHER

The Robert H. Jackson Center

CREATOR

Ray D'Addario, U.S. Army Pictorial Service, World War II

RIGHTS MANAGEMENT

This Digital Image may be used for educational fair use purposes only. Prior written permission is required for other use.

A. POSITIONS HELD BY VON PAPEN.

(1) Awarded the Golden Party Badge by Hitler, thereby becoming member of NSDAP (2902-PS; Das Archiv vol. 48, p. 1614).

(2) Member of Reichstag, 1933-1945 (2902-PS).

(3) Reich Chancellor, 1 June 1942 to 2 December 1942, acting pro-tem between 17 November and 2 December (2902-PS).

(4) Vice Chancellor, 30 January 1933 to August 1934 ( ?) Papen admits holding office only to 30 June 1934; he also admits that decrees published on 1 August 1934 and 2 August 1934 carry his signature as Vice-Chancellor, but claims this was either mistake or forgery) (2902-PS).

(5) Special Plenipotentiary for the Saar (13 November 1933 to 30 June 1934) (2902-PS).

(6) Negotiator of Concordat with Vatican (concluded 20 July 1933) (2655-PS).

(7) German Ambassador at Vienna (26 July 1934 to 4 February 1938), continuing thereafter to arrange Berchtesgaden meeting between Hitler and Schuschnigg and to participate in meeting itself (2902-PS).

B. AS EX-REICH CHANCELLOR AND PROMINENT POLITICAL LEADER, VON PAPEN USED HIS PERSONAL INFLUENCE TO PROMOTE THE ACCESSION OF THE NAZIS TO POWER.

(1) When von Papen began these efforts he was well aware of the Nazi program and Nazi methods. The official NSDAP program was open and notorious. For many years it had been published and republished in the Yearbook of the NSDAP and elsewhere. The Nazis made no secret of their intention to make it the fundamental law of the State. The first three points of this program forecast a foreign policy predicated upon the absorption of "Germanic" populations outside the boundaries of the Reich, the abrogation of Versailles treaty limitations, and the acquisition of "Lebensraum." Points 4 to 8 foretold the ruthless elimination of the Jews, and the 25th point demanded "unlimited authority" of the central regime over the entire Reich as a means "for the execution of all this" (1708-PS).

On 18 and 19 June, the Nuremberg Tribunal began the cross-examination of Franz von Papen, former chancellor, vice-chancellor, and ambassador of Nazi Germany to Austria and Turkey. In all his 67 years, this defendant at the Nuremberg Trials had managed to betray everything he believed in and was proud of.

The honour of an aristocrat, the dignity of an officer, the patriotism of a chancellor, the principles of a diplomat. He was one of those who allowed Hitler’s rise to power, and those who personified Nazi Germany across the globe. Having honestly earned military honours in World War I, in World War II he displayed unprecedented cowardice and weakness. The noblest of the Nuremberg defendants was even despised by his fellow prisoners in the dock.

Many years later he of course wrote his memoirs - a temptation that almost none of the survivors of the Nuremberg Tribunal avoided. But perhaps no one in this field demonstrated such imagination and particularly the art of flirtatious self-justification.

"My own life seems to a very large extent to have been written for me (…). I have been represented as a master spy and mystery man, a political intriguer and plotter, and a two-faced diplomat. I have been called a stupid muddler and a naïve gentleman rider, incapable of grasping the true implications of a political situation. I am written off as a black-hearted reactionary who deliberately plotted Hitler's rise to power and supported the Nazi regime with all the influence at his command. I have been arraigned as the architect of the rape of Austria, and the exponent of Hitler’s aggressive policy when I was German ambassador in Turkey during the second world war. (…) I realise what a splendid subject I must have been for the propaganda machines. I have run the whole gamut, from being chancellor of my country to appearing as a war criminal in the Nuremberg dock on a capital charge. I served my country for almost fifty years and have spent h

Franz von Papen (1879-1969) was one of the conservative German politicians whose fear of social unrest and hostility toward the democratic Weimar Republic led them to support the rise of Hitler. Although never a believer in the more extreme doctrines of National Socialism, he helped prepare the way for the Third Reich.

Von Papen came from a landowning Westphalian Catholic family which belonged to the lower nobility. Like many young men of his social class he entered the officer corps, and in 1914 he became the German military attaché in Washington. He was recalled late the following year, however, because of his involvement in secret sabotage activities. He then fought on the Turkish front, but left military service in 1918, unable to accept the new republican regime. Entering politics, he assumed leadership of the conservative, monarchist wing of the Catholic Center Party. The onset of the Depression in 1929 convinced him that the time had come to replace the democratic government with an authoritarian, hierarchical system. Leaving the Center Party, he became one of the leaders of the right-wing politicians who plotted the downfall of the hapless Weimar Republic.

His big chance came in July 1932 when President Hindenburg, whose confidence he enjoyed, made him chancellor. He had hoped that the disastrous state of the economy would produce popular support for his program of elite rule and conservative policy. But he completely misjudged the country's political mood. The chief beneficiaries of the economic crisis were the parties of the radical right and left, the National Socialists and the Communists. Two elections, one in July and the other in November, failed to win any significant support for him in the Reichstag, and early in December he was replaced as chancellor by Kurt von Schleicher, an ambitious army officer whose tactics may have been different, but whose political principles were essentially the same. Von Papen now decided to wo