Richard Glücks

Infobox Military Person
name= Richard Glücks
lived= April 22, 1889 – May 10, 1945
placeofbirth= Odenkirchen, Germany
placeofdeath= Flensburg, Germany


caption= Richard Glücks in his SS-Brigadeführer uniform.
nickname=
allegiance=flagicon|Nazi Germany Nazi Germany
serviceyears=
rank= Brigadeführer
branch= Schutzstaffel
commands=
unit=
battles= World War I
World War II
awards= |laterwork=

Richard Glücks (April 22, 1889 – May 10, 1945) was a high-ranking Nazi official. He attained the rank of a SS-"Gruppenführer" and a "Generalleutnant" of the Waffen-SS and was from 1939 until the end of World War II as the head of "Amt D: Konzentrationslagerwesen" of the WVHA the highest-ranking "Inspector of Concentration Camps" in Nazi Germany. Close to Himmler, he was directly responsible for the forced labour of the camp inmates, and was also the supervisor for the medical practices in the camps, ranging from human experimentation to the implementation of the "Endlösung", in particular the mass murder of the inmates by gassing with Zyklon-B. When the Nazi regime fell and Germany capitulated, Glücks committed suicide by swallowing a potassium cyanide capsule.

Early life

Glücks was born 1889 in Odenkirchen, in the Rhineland near Mönchengladbach. Having completed the gymnasium in Düsseldorf, he worked in his father's business, a fire insurance agency. In 1909, Glücks joined the army for one year as a volunteer, serving in the artillery. In 1913, he was in England, and later moved to Argentina as a trader. When World War I broke out, Glücks returned to Germany under a false identity as a sailor on a Norwegian ship in January 1915 and promptly joined the army again. During the war, he eventually became the commander of a motorized artillery squad and was awarded the Iron Cross I and II. After the war, he became a liaison officer between the German forces and the Military Inter-Allied Commission of Control, the allied body for controlling the restrictions placed upon Germany in the Treaty of Versailles regarding re-armament and strength of their armed forces. Until 1924, he stayed in that position, before joining the staff of the 6th Prussian Division. He also served in the Freikorps.

Rise under the Nazi regime

Glücks joined the NSDAP in 1930 and two years later also the Schutzstaffeln. In the SS, he was from September 6, 1933 to June 20, 1935 a member of the staff of the SS-Group "West" and rose to the rank of an SS-"Sturmbannführer". Subsequently, he became the commander of the 77th SS-"Standarte" of the "Allgemeine" SS with the rank of an SS-"Obersturmbannführer". On April 1, 1936, he became the head of staff of Theodor Eicke, then Inspector of Concentration Camps and the head of the SS-"Wachverbände", first with the rank of a "Standartenführer" and later rising to "Oberführer". When Eicke became field commander of the SS-Division "Totenkopf", which had been created following his instigation, Glücks was promoted and named Eicke's successor as Inspector of Concentration Camps by Heinrich Himmler on November 18, 1939. On April 20, 1941, Glücks was promoted to the rank of an SS-"Brigadeführer", and on March 29, 1942, he became the head of "Amt D: Konzentrationslagerwesen" of the newly formed "SS-Wirtschafts-Verwaltungshauptamt" (WVHA), the Economics and Administrative Department of the SS. On July 23, 1943, Glücks was made SS-"Gruppenführer" and a "Generalleutnant" of the Waffen-SS.

Inspector of concentration camps

Glücks has been described by Rudolf Höss as a static administrator and bureaucrat, afraid of Himmler and mostly occupied with maintaining the concentration camps as Eicke had put them in place. At the same time, Höss described Glücks as a man unable to grasp the consequences of his directives, and claimed Glücks had risen to his high position (and stayed there) only as a "protégé" of Eicke and Oswald Pohl, the head of the WVHA.

Glücks's responsibilities at first mainly covered the use of concentration camp inmates for forced labour. In this phase, he urged camp commanders to lower the death rate in the camps, as it went counter to the economic objectives his department was to fulfill. Other orders of his were to ask for the inmates to be made to work continuously. At the same time, it was Glücks who recommended on February 21, 1940, Auschwitz, a former Austrian cavalry barracks, as a suitable site for a new concentration camp to Himmler, Pohl, and Heydrich. The camp opened on June 14, 1940, and Glücks was quick to provide slave labor from the camp to the new coal-oil and rubber plant erected nearby by I.G. Farben.

From 1942 on, Glücks was increasingly involved in the administration of the "Endlösung", along with Oswald Pohl. In July 1942, he participated in a planning meeting with Himmler on the topic of medical experiments on camp inmates. From several visits to the Auschwitz concentration camps, Glücks must have been well aware of the dire conditions, and he certainly was aware of the mass murders and other atrocities committed there. Orders for the extermination went through Glücks' office and hands; and he specifically authorized the purchase of Zyklon B for gassing in Auschwitz.

Death

When the WVHA offices in Berlin were destroyed by Allied bombing on April 16, 1945, the WVHA was moved to Born on Darß in Nordvorpommern on the Baltic sea. Owing to the advances of the Russian forces, Glücks and his wife fled to Flensburg at the end of April. It is known that Glücks met Himmler for the last time there. After the capitulation of Germany, he is believed to have committed suicide on May 10, 1945 by swallowing a capsule of potassium cyanide at the Mürwik naval base in Flensburg. Since there are no official records or photos to confirm Glücks' suicide, some historians believe that he escaped in the same manner as other Nazis such as Friedrich Wilhelm Kruger and Odilo Globocnik (see the article on Odilo Globocnik for reference to historical forgeries regarding this version).

In Popular Culture

Richard Glücks is featured as a minor character in the novel The Odessa File by Frederick Forsyth. The novel is set in post-war Germany at the year 1963. In the novel, it is revealed that Glücks did not commit suicide but instead, manages to evade capture by the Allied forces and flees to Argentina. He changes his name to Ricardo Suertes (Suertes and Glücks means Luck in Spanish and German respectively), obtains Argentinian citizenship and joins the ODESSA (the international network of former SS officers).

He is also reputed to be the number two man in the ODESSA, direct deputy of Martin Bormann on whom the mantle of the Führer had fallen after 1945. To avoid being captured, he does not return to Germany but instead, operates out of his lavish apartment in Buenos Aires, issuing orders and dictating policies to be implemented by his subordinate, codenamed "Werewolf" at West Germany.

During the time period set in the novel, Glücks is said to be in his early sixties. However, given his year of birth as 1889, he would have been 74 in 1963 had he survived the war. He has been portrayed as having become immensely rich as a result of his wartime activities which includes widespread looting of Jews, communists, and other political prisoners under his supervision as head of the Reich Economic Administration Main Office of the SS.

During a meeting in Madrid with Werewolf, Glücks tells him to hasten the research operation aimed at developing a tele-guidance system for the Egyptian rockets, Al Kahira and Al Zafira. Since the research is being headed by ODESSA man codenamed "Vulkan", Glücks also orders him to protect Vulkan until the end of the operation.

After the meeting has taken place, he returns to Buenos Aires and is not mentioned again in the novel.

See also

*Pohl Trial

References

*Friedman, T.: [http://motlc.specialcol.wiesenthal.com/instdoc/d02c02/pol1z3.html Pohl und Glücks] ; Institute of Documentation in Israel, Haifa, Israel, 1996. The documentation on Richard Glücks begins on [http://motlc.specialcol.wiesenthal.com/instdoc/d02c02/pol100z3.html page 100] . In German.
*Prenger, K.: [http://www.go2war2.nl/artikel/1299 Glücks, Richard] , in Dutch; based on Friedman.
* [http://www.zeit.de/2005/19/A-Flensburg?page=all "Der letzte Spuk"] , an article from the German newspaper "Die Zeit" from May 4, 2005 on the last days of the Nazi regime. In German.
* [http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=83833 Axis History Forum] : thread where Prenger had asked for help with his article (referenced above); contains biographical information and a photograph of Glücks.
*Hamilton, Charles: Leaders and Personalities of the Third Reich, Vol.2, Bender, San Jose, CA, 1996.
*Snyder, Louis L.: Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, Paragon House, NY, 1989.
*Wistrich, Robert S.: Who's Who in Nazi Germany, Routledge, London, 1995.Richard Glücks hat kein Selbstmord begangenEr lebte Dank der Kath.Kirche bis 1969 in Südamerika