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Friedrich Dickel

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Friedrich Dickel
Dickel in 1983
Minister of the Interior
Head of the Volkspolizei
In office
15 November 1963 – 17 November 1989
Chairman of the
Council of Ministers
Deputy
  • Willi Seifert
  • Rudolf Riss
  • Lothar Ahrendt
Preceded byKarl Maron
Succeeded byLothar Ahrendt
Member of the Volkskammer
for Auerbach, Klingenthal, Oelsnitz, Plauen-Stadt, Plauen-Land
In office
2 July 1967 – 16 November 1989
Preceded bymulti-member district
Succeeded byHans-Ludwig Erlenbeck
Personal details
Born(1913-12-09)9 December 1913
Vohwinkel, Rhine Province, Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire
Died23 October 1993(1993-10-23) (aged 79)
Berlin, Germany
Political partySocialist Unity Party (1946–1989)
Other political
affiliations		Communist Party of Germany (1931–1946)
Occupation
  • Politician
  • Civil Servant
  • Soldier
  • Founder
Central institution membership
Other offices held

Friedrich Dickel (9 December 1913 – 23 October 1993) was a German politician, veteran of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War and law enforcement administrator who served as the interior minister for nearly twenty-six years, the longest-serving individual to hold that post in East Germany.

Early life

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Dickel was born on 9 December 1913 in Wuppertal-Vohwinkel in the Prussian Rhine Province of the German Empire.[1]

Career

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Dickel joined the Communist Party of Germany in 1931.[2] He fought in the international brigades in the civil war of Spain together with others, including future Stasi chief Erich Mielke.[2][3] Dickel commanded a platoon unit in the civil war in Spain.[4]

After the Nazi rule in Germany, he settled in the Soviet Union where he taught at the Soviet General Staff Academy.[4] He returned to East Germany in 1946[1] and served as the commander of the Officers’ School for Political Work in East Berlin from 1950.[4] He was promoted to the rank of major general in 1956.[4] Next year he was named as the deputy national defense minister.[4]

Dickel became a member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) and of its central committee.[5] His tenure in the SED central committee was between 1967 and 1989.[4] He also served as a police chief in East Berlin.[6]

Dickel was appointed interior minister on 14 November 1963, replacing Karl Maron in the post.[7] He also led the Volkspolizei during his tenure.[5][8] During Dickel's time, majority of the East German paramilitary troops organized for territorial defense were also under the interior ministry's control.[9] One of the policies he introduced include the regulation and control of immigration and returnees.[10] Dickel's term ended on 18 November 1989 when he was dismissed as a result of the atmosphere of change and reform in the country which began leading up to German reunification.[6] He was succeeded by Lothar Ahrendt as interior minister.[8] He was a military officer with the rank of colonel general,[3][11] before being promoted to army general in 1984.[citation needed] In December 1989 Dickel retired from politics.[1]

Dickel was also a member of the Volkskammer for Auerbach, Klingenthal, Oelsnitz, Plauen-Stadt, Plauen-Land between 2 July 1967 and 5 April 1990.[12]

Death

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After a long illness Dickel died in Berlin on 23 October 1993.[13] He was 79.[13]

Awards

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Dickel was the recipient of the Order of Karl Marx which was awarded to him in June 1985 on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the German People's Police.[14]

References

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  1. ^ a b c "Friedrich Dickel". Chronik der Wende. Retrieved 7 July 2013.
  2. ^ a b Nessim Ghouas (2004). The Conditions, Means and Methods of the MfS in the GDR: An Analysis of the Post and Telephone Control. Göttingen: Cuvillier Verlag. p. 139. ISBN 978-3-89873-988-7.
  3. ^ a b Arnold Krammer (April 2005). "Sammelrez: Internationale Brigaden in der DDR". H-Soz-u-Kult (in German).
  4. ^ a b c d e f Arnold Krammer (2004). "The Cult of the Spanish Civil War in East Germany". Journal of Contemporary History. 39 (4): 537–539. doi:10.1177/0022009404046753. S2CID 153551151.
  5. ^ a b Gareth M. Winrow (2009). The Foreign Policy of the GDR in Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 124. ISBN 978-0-521-12259-7.
  6. ^ a b Glaeser, Andreas (2000). Divided in Unity: Identity, Germany, and the Berlin Police. London: University of Chicago Press. p. 25. ISBN 978-0-226-29784-2.
  7. ^ Hertle, Hans-Hermann [de]. "The Fall of the Wall: The Unintended Dissolution of East Germany's Ruling Regime". Cold War International History Project Bulletin. No. 12–13. 2001. p. 164.
  8. ^ a b Nancy Travis Wolfe (1992). Policing a Socialist Society: The German Democratic Republic. New York: Greenwood Press. ISBN 978-0-3132-6530-3.
  9. ^ Keefe, Eugene K. (1982). East Germany, a Country Study. Headquarters, Department of the Army. p. 233.
  10. ^ Budde, Heidrun (2024). Schattenmann der Staatssicherheit: Auf den Spuren von Gestapo-Müller (in German). Ahrensburg: tredition GmbH. ISBN 978-3-347-98894-1.
  11. ^ "Bonn Officials are Barred from Traveling to Berlin". St. Petersburg Times. 10 February 1969. Retrieved 7 July 2013.
  12. ^ Arthur Schmidt. "Volkskammer der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik 1986-1990" (PDF). gvoon.de (in German). p. 35. Retrieved 14 September 2023.
  13. ^ a b "Friedrich Dickel". Der Spiegel (in German). No. 44. 1993.
  14. ^ "Friedrich Dickel mit Karl-Marx-Orden geehrt". Neues Deutschland (in German). Berlin. 29 June 1985. Retrieved 16 August 2022.
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