Ernst von Weizsäcker

Ernst Freiherr [German title|Freiherr] von Weizsäcker (25 May 1882 – 4 August 1951) was a German diplomat and convicted war criminal. Weizsäcker was the father of politician Richard von Weizsäcker, who was President of Germany 1984-94, and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker, famous physicist and philosopher. See Weizsäcker for the family tree.

Early life and active naval career

Weizsäcker was born in Stuttgart to Karl Hugo von Weizsäcker, who would become Minister President (Prime Minister) of the Kingdom of Württemberg and raised to personal nobility in 1897, and Paula von Meibom. In 1911 he married Marianne von Graevenitz, who belonged to the old nobility. In 1916 he became a Freiherr (Baron), as his father and his family were raised to the inheritable nobility, less than two years before the fall of the German monarchy.

In 1900, Weizsäcker joined the Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial German Navy) to become an officer, serving mainly in Berlin. In 1917, during the latter portion of WW 1 he earned the Iron Cross (both classes) and was promoted to Korvettenkapitän (equivalent to U.K and U.S. naval officer grades of Lieutenant Commander).

Diplomatic career

Although he did not have a college degree and apparently did not take the standard examinations Fact|date=September 2008 , Weizsäcker's wartime military service was apparently considered sufficient life experience to qualify him to join the German Foreign Service on probationary status in 1920. He then spent the 1930s in Oslo and Bern in minor positions. After having been advised Fact|date=April 2008 to do so, and to further his career, he joined the National Socialist German Workers Party (German - NSDAP) known as the Nazi Party and the SS in 1938, where his friendFact|date=April 2008 Heinrich Himmler awarded him a high honorary rank. On he day he received his honorary rank in the SS, he was made Secretary of State under Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop Fact|date=September 2008.

He was promoted to SS-Brigadeführer on 30 January 1942.

Ambassador to the Vatican

After the German defeat in the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943 and the changing German war fortunes, and following his request, Weizsäcker was appointed German Ambassador to the Holy See, from 1943 to 1945.

Received by Vatican State Secretary Luigi Cardinal Maglione January 6, 1944, Weizsäcker stated:

:"If Germany as a bulwark against communism should fall, all of Europe will become communist."

The cardinal replied:

:"What a misfortune, that Germany with its antireligious policies has stirred up such concerns." [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p.256.] , Similar representations were repeated by Weizsäcker to Monsignore Giovanni Battista Montini (the later Pope Paul VI).

Weizsäcker's record at the Vatican was mixed. While in Berlin, he had refused to accept a Papal note protesting the treatment of occupied Poland. [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p.89-90] During the brutal German occupation in Rome, Weizsäcker did little to stop the deportation of Jews and other brutalities. However, he helped individuals to avoid persecution and helped to free Rome from all German military bases in an effort to discourage Allied bombing of the eternal city. [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p.219-224]

"His messages and documents to Berlin were nothing but lies." said his coworker Albrecht von Kessel later. [Albrecht von Kessel, Der Papst und die Juden, in Summa Injuria oder durfte der Papst schweigen Frankfurt 1963, p.168] In these messages to Berlin, Weizsäcker purposefully painted Pope Pius XII as mild, diplomatic, an indecisive and pro-German pontiff, in order to help the Pope and avoid anti-German sentiment in Italy. [Albrecht von Kessel, Der Papst und die Juden, in Summa Injuria oder durfte der Papst schweigen Frankfurt 1963, p.168] Like the commanding Waffen SS General Karl Wolff, Weizsäcker was clearly opposed to Hitler’s plan to occupy the Vatican, during which, Weizsäcker feared, the Pope could have been shot, "fleeing while avoiding arrest" [Albrecht von Kessel, Der Papst und die Juden, in Summa Injuria oder durfte der Papst schweigen Frankfurt 1963, p.168]

However, some Vatican documents paint a threatening posture of the ambassador. The State Secretariat papers include a February 1944 conversation with Rev. Otto Faller, on the Vatican refugee program, in which Weizsäcker attacked the Papal newspaper "Osservatore Romano" for its protests against the Nazi searches of Church and Convent of St. Paul, and accused Catholic institutions hoarding hams and other food items at the expense of the population. Most importantly, the Nazi ambassador questioned the right of the Vatican to provide asylum to thousands within Rome. Weizsäcker threatened military reprisals and a complete military surveillance not only against the Vatican itself but also against the many off limit Churches and Catholic institutions and other off-limit buildings that housed Jewish, socialist, foreign and domestic anti-fascist refugees. This remarkable threat from a German ambassador, indicates that Weizsäcker was not without power during the German occupation of Rome. [50. Le P. Otto Faller a la Secretairerie d'Etat, Actes et Documents du Daint Siege Relativs a la Seconde guerre Mondiale, Vol.11 152, 153]

To the very end, Weizsäcker 'pestered' the Vatican with anti-communist slogans, threatening either a separate Russian-German peace, [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p.256.] or requesting from Monsignore Domenico Tardini an immediate Papal peace initiative to stop the war in the West, so Germany could finish communism in the East, as late as February 25, 1945. [505 Notes de Mgr.Tardini, Actes et Documents du Daint Siege Relativs a la Seconde guerre Mondiale, Vol.11 505] Tardini saw it as a transparent effort to obtain a military solution. [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p. 269] Like many Nazis, Weizsäcker attempted to negotiate the survival of some segment of the Nazi government and avoid the "unconditional surrender" of Germany Fact|date=September 2008. His efforts to bring up the topic of "a German transition government, and the likelihood of him being a member of it", failed as well. [Pierre Blet, Pius XII and the Second World War, Paulist Press, 1997, p. 257]

Prosecution for war crimes

After the June 1944 liberation of Rome from German occupation, Weizsäcker using diplomatic immunity hid in the Campo SantoFact|date=April 2008. Therefore he could not be included in the first group of Nazi leaders tried at the Nüremberg War Crime Trials by the four allies. This was significant, because after the war, he had to fear the possibilities of being indicted at Nürnberg and possibly sitting in the box with his protector Joachim von Ribbentrop and Hermann Göring.

Weizsäcker was arrested on July 25, 1947, in Nuremberg in connection with the Ministries Trial, also known as the Wilhelmstrasse Trial, after the location of the German Foreign Office in Berlin. These American military tribunal started before and finished during the Berlin blockade confrontation with the Soviets and proceeded without participation of the USSR; they were also much milder in conduct and outcome than the first series of war crimes trials in 1946. Fact|date=September 2008 Weizsäcker was charged with active cooperation with the deportation of French Jews to Auschwitz, as a crime against humanity. Weizsäcker, with the assistance of his son Richard, who appeared as his assistant defence counsel (Richard was a law student during the trial), claimed that he had no knowledge of the purpose for which Auschwitz had been designed and believed that Jewish prisoners would face less danger if deported to the east.

The Court, which did not possess all the incriminating evidence existing today against Ernst von Weizsäcker Fact|date=September 2008, was not convinced, especially when presented with records prepared at the Wannsee Conference by one of his assistants concerning the mass executions of Jews already underway in 1941. Weizsäcker was convicted and sentenced to seven years, later reduced to five.

Weizsäcker was released as part of a general amnesty in December 1950, after which he published his memoirs, in which he portrayed himself as a supporter of the resistance. Some defenders have continued to argue that his record was mixed, that he did, in fact, work against the goals of the Nazi government while serving it, and that his sentence was unjust;Fact|date=February 2007 Winston Churchill allegedly called his trial a "deadly error".Fact|date=February 2007

He died of a stroke in 1951.

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