HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The ''Sicherheitspolizei'' ( en, Security Police), often abbreviated as SiPo, was a term used in
Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...
for security police. In the
Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
era, it referred to the state political and criminal investigation security agencies. It was made up by the combined forces of the
Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...
(secret state police) and the '' Kriminalpolizei'' (criminal police; Kripo) between 1936 and 1939. As a formal agency, the SiPo was incorporated into the
Reich Security Main Office The Reich Security Main Office (german: Reichssicherheitshauptamt or RSHA) was an organization under Heinrich Himmler in his dual capacity as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police) and '' Reichsführer-SS'', the head of the Naz ...
(RSHA) in 1939, but the term continued to be used informally until the end of World War II in Europe.


Origins

The term originated in August 1919 when the ''
Reichswehr ''Reichswehr'' () was the official name of the German armed forces during the Weimar Republic and the first years of the Third Reich. After Germany was defeated in World War I, the Imperial German Army () was dissolved in order to be reshape ...
'' set up the ''Sicherheitswehr'' as a militarised police force to take action during times of riots or strikes. Owing to limitations in army numbers, it was renamed the ''Sicherheitspolizei'' to avoid attention. They wore a green uniform, and were sometimes called the "Green Police". It was a military body, recruiting largely from the ''
Freikorps (, "Free Corps" or "Volunteer Corps") were irregular German and other European military volunteer units, or paramilitary, that existed from the 18th to the early 20th centuries. They effectively fought as mercenary or private armies, rega ...
'', with NCOs and officers from the old
German Imperial Army The Imperial German Army (1871–1919), officially referred to as the German Army (german: Deutsches Heer), was the unified ground and air force of the German Empire. It was established in 1871 with the political unification of Germany under the l ...
.


Nazi era

When the Nazis came to national power in 1933, Germany, as a federal state, had myriad local and centralized police agencies, which often were un-coordinated and had overlapping jurisdictions. Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich's plan was to fully absorb all the police and security apparatus into the structure of the ''
Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe ...
'' (SS). To this end, Himmler took command first of the
Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...
(itself developed from the Prussian Secret Police). Then on 17 June 1936 all police forces throughout Germany were united, following
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...
's appointment of Himmler as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police). As such he was nominally subordinate to Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick, but in practice Himmler answered only to Hitler. Himmler immediately reorganised the police, with the state agencies statutorily divided into two groups: the ''
Ordnungspolizei The ''Ordnungspolizei'' (), abbreviated ''Orpo'', meaning "Order Police", were the uniformed police force in Nazi Germany from 1936 to 1945. The Orpo organisation was absorbed into the Nazi monopoly on power after regional police jurisdiction ...
'' (Order Police; Orpo), consisting of both the national uniformed police and the municipal police, and the ''Sicherheitspolizei'' (Security Police; SiPo), consisting of the Kripo and Gestapo. Heydrich was appointed chief of the SiPo and was already head of the party '' Sicherheitsdienst'' (Security Service; SD) and the Gestapo. The two police branches were commonly known as the Orpo and SiPo (Kripo and Gestapo combined), respectively. The idea was to fully identify and integrate the party agency (SD) with the state agency (SiPo). Most of the SiPo members were encouraged or volunteered to become members of the SS and many held a rank in both organisations. Nevertheless, in practice there was jurisdictional overlap and operational conflict between the SD and Gestapo. The Kripo kept a level of independence since its structure was longer-established. Himmler founded the ''
Hauptamt Sicherheitspolizei ''Hauptamt Sicherheitspolizei'' (Main Office of the Security Police) was a central state police agency command office in Nazi Germany entrusted with overseeing the ''Kriminalpolizei'' (Criminal Police; Kripo) and the ''Geheime Staatspolizei'' (Se ...
'' in order to create a centralized main office under Heydrich's overall command of the SiPo. The ''
Einsatzgruppen (, ; also ' task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the im ...
'' were formed under the direction of Heydrich and operated by the SS under the SiPo and SD. The ''Einsatzgruppen'' had its origins in the ad hoc ''Einsatzkommando'' formed by Heydrich to secure government buildings and documents following the ''
Anschluss The (, or , ), also known as the (, en, Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the German Reich on 13 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a " Greater Germa ...
'' in
Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
in March 1938. Originally part of the SiPo, two units of ''Einsatzgruppen'' were stationed in the Sudetenland in October 1938. When military action turned out not to be necessary because of the
Munich Agreement The Munich Agreement ( cs, Mnichovská dohoda; sk, Mníchovská dohoda; german: Münchner Abkommen) was an agreement concluded at Munich on 30 September 1938, by Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy. It provided "cession to Germany ...
, the ''Einsatzgruppen'' were assigned to confiscate government papers and police documents. They also secured government buildings, questioned senior civil servants, and arrested as many as 10,000 Czech communists and German citizens.


Merger

In September 1939, with the founding of the
Reich Security Main Office The Reich Security Main Office (german: Reichssicherheitshauptamt or RSHA) was an organization under Heinrich Himmler in his dual capacity as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police) and '' Reichsführer-SS'', the head of the Naz ...
(''Reichssicherheitshauptamt''; RSHA), the ''Sicherheitspolizei'' as a functioning state agency ceased to exist as the department was merged into the RSHA. Further, the RSHA obtained overall command of the ''Einsatzgruppen'' units from that time forward. Members of the ''Einsatzgruppen'' units at this point were drawn from the SS, the SD and the police. They were used during the
invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week af ...
to forcefully de-politicise the Polish people and murder members of groups most clearly identified with Polish national identity: the intelligentsia, members of the clergy, teachers, and members of the nobility. When the units were re-formed prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the men of the ''Einsatzgruppen'' were recruited from the SD, Gestapo, Kripo, Orpo and Waffen-SS. These mobile death squads were active in the implementation of the Final Solution in the territories overrun by the Nazi forces.


Organizational structure


See also

* Glossary of Nazi Germany


References


Citations


Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * {{Authority control Police forces of Nazi Germany Terrorism in Germany The Holocaust in Germany Gestapo Nazi German intelligence agencies German words and phrases Reinhard Heydrich Reich Security Main Office