Dienstleiter (Service Leader) was a high-ranking Nazi Party political rank of Nazi Germany which existed between 1933 and 1945. The rank was first created after the Nazi assumption of power and served as the second highest rank of the Reichsleitung Nazi Party organizational level, subordinate to the Reichsleiter. [1]
The rank of Dienstleiter was created in the year 1933 after Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. Almost immediately, the Nazis began the process of Gleichschaltung to eliminate local government and merge government and civil positions with the political structure of the Nazi Party. The rank of Dienstleiter was the highest promotable rank of the National Party level, although a higher rank of Reichsleiter also existed by direct appointment from Hitler.
The original version of Dienstleiter was divided into two separate ranks: the standard Dienstleiter rank and a higher rank of Hauptdienstleiter. Duties of the rank primary entailed leadership of top national party offices, and many holding the rank of Dienstleiter also held top governmental and civil positions in the German government.
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party, was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945, that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor, the German Workers' Party, existed from 1919 to 1920. The Nazi Party emerged from the German nationalist, racist and populist Freikorps paramilitary culture, which fought against the communist uprisings in post-World War I Germany. The party was created to draw workers away from communism and into völkisch nationalism. Initially, Nazi political strategy focused on anti-big business, anti-bourgeois, and anti-capitalist rhetoric. This was later downplayed to gain the support of business leaders, and in the 1930s the party's main focus shifted to antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes.
Baldur Benedikt von Schirach was a Nazi German politician who is best known for his role as the Nazi Party national youth leader and head of the Hitler Youth from 1931 to 1940. He later served as Gauleiter and Reichsstatthalter of Vienna. After World War II, he was convicted of crimes against humanity in the Nuremberg trials and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Wilhelm Frick was a prominent German politician of the Nazi Party (NSDAP), who served as Reich Minister of the Interior in Adolf Hitler's cabinet from 1933 to 1943 and as the last governor of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.
Führer is a German word meaning "leader" or "guide". As a political title it is associated with the Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Viktor Lutze was a German Nazi Party functionary and the commander of the Sturmabteilung ("SA") who succeeded Ernst Röhm as Stabschef and Reichsleiter. He died from injuries received in a car accident. Lutze was given an elaborate state funeral in Berlin on 7 May 1943.
A Gauleiter was a regional leader of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) who served as the head of a Gau or Reichsgau. Gauleiter was the third-highest rank in the Nazi political leadership, subordinate only to Reichsleiter and to the Führer himself. The position was effectively abolished with the fall of the Nazi regime on 8 May 1945.
Jacob Otto Dietrich was a German SS officer during the Nazi era, who served as the Press Chief of Nazi regime and was a confidant of Adolf Hitler.
The Party Chancellery, was the name of the head office for the German Nazi Party (NSDAP), designated as such on 12 May 1941. The office existed previously as the Staff of the Deputy Führer but was renamed after Rudolf Hess flew to Scotland in an attempt to negotiate a peace agreement without Adolf Hitler's authorization. Hess was denounced by Hitler, his former office was dissolved, and the new Party Chancellery was formed in its place under Hess' former deputy, Martin Bormann.
Ranks and insignia of the Nazi Party were paramilitary titles used by the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) between approximately 1928 and the fall of Nazi Germany in 1945. Such ranks were held within the political leadership corps of the Nazi Party, charged with the overseeing of the regular Nazi Party members.
Reichsleiter was the second-highest political rank of the Nazi Party (NSDAP), next only to the office of Führer. Reichsleiter also served as a paramilitary rank in the Nazi Party and was the highest position attainable in any Nazi organisation.
Konstantin Hierl was a major figure in the administration of Nazi Germany. He was the head of the Reich Labour Service a Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party and an associate of Adolf Hitler before he came to national power.
Franz Xaver Schwarz was a high ranking German Nazi Party official who served as Reichsschatzmeister of the Party throughout most of its existence. He was also one of the highest ranking members of the Schutzstaffel (SS).
Karl Fiehler was a German Nazi Party (NSDAP) official and Mayor of Munich from 1933 until 1945. He was an early member of the Nazi Party having joined in 1920. In 1933, he became a Reichsleiter in the party and was a member of the Reichstag. In March of 1933, he was appointed Mayor of Munich and held that post until the end of World War II in Europe. During his time as mayor, Fiehler was zealously anti-Semitic and saw to it that the Jewish population of the city was persecuted. After the war in January 1949, Fiehler was sentenced to two years in a labour camp, but the sentence was suspended given the previous three-and-a-half years of detention he had already served.
Franz Ritter von Epp was a German general and politician who started his military career in the Bavarian Army. Successful wartime military service earned him a knighthood in 1916. After the end of World War I and the dissolution of the German Empire, von Epp was a commanding officer in the Freikorps and the Reichswehr. He was a member of Bavarian People's Party, before joining the Nazi Party in 1928, when he was elected as a member of the German parliament or Reichstag, a position he held until the fall of Nazi Germany. He was the Reichskommissar, later Reichsstatthalter, for Bavaria, and a Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party.
The Government of Nazi Germany was a dictatorship run according to the Führerprinzip. As the successor to the government of the Weimar Republic, it inherited the government structure and institutions of the previous state. Although the Weimar Constitution technically remained in effect until Germany's surrender in 1945, there were no actual restraints on the exercise of state power. In addition to the already extant government of the Weimar Republic, the Nazi leadership created a large number of different organizations for the purpose of helping them govern and remain in power. They rearmed and strengthened the military, set up an extensive state security apparatus and created their own personal party army, which in 1940 became known as the Waffen-SS.
Zellenleiter was a Nazi Party political title which existed between the years of 1930 and 1945. A Zellenleiter was higher in rank than a Blockleiter and was in charge of a "Nazi Cell", composed of eight to twelve city blocks.
Paul Wegener was a German Nazi Party official and politician who served as the Gauleiter of Gau Weser-Ems as well as the Reichsstatthalter of both Bremen and the Free State of Oldenburg.
Kreisleiter was a Nazi Party political rank and title which existed as a political rank between 1930 and 1945 and as a Nazi Party title from as early as 1928. The position of Kreisleiter was first formed to provide German election district coordination and, after the Nazi assumption of power, the position became one of county municipal government, effectively replacing the traditional German government establishment.
Befehlsleiter was a Nazi Party political rank of Nazi Germany.
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