Karl Emil August Rasche (23 August 1892 – 13 September 1951) was an
SS-Obersturmbannführer and a
Ph.D.
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...
in
law as well as a board member and banker, later spokesman, of the
Dresdner Bank
Dresdner Bank AG was a German bank and was based in Frankfurt. It was one of Germany's largest banking corporations and was acquired by competitor Commerzbank in May 2009.
History
19th century
The Dresdner Bank was established on 12 Novemb ...
during the
Third Reich. On 11 April 1949 he was sentenced in a
Ministries Trial
__NOTOC__
The Ministries Trial (or, officially, the ''United States of America vs. Ernst von Weizsäcker, et al.'') was the eleventh of the twelve trials for war crimes the U.S. authorities held in their occupation zone in Germany in Nuremberg af ...
to seven years in prison for his activities under the
Nazis
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 Na ...
.
Biography
Early career
Rasche studied economics and law in
Münster
Münster (; nds, Mönster) is an independent city (''Kreisfreie Stadt'') in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also a state distr ...
,
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...
,
Leipzig
Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...
,
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, and
Bonn
The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr r ...
. At the outbreak of the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, he joined the army and fought on the
Western Front Western Front or West Front may refer to:
Military frontiers
*Western Front (World War I), a military frontier to the west of Germany
*Western Front (World War II), a military frontier to the west of Germany
*Western Front (Russian Empire), a majo ...
. After being wounded in 1917 he wrote a dissertation with the title "The police concept in today's Prussian law with special attention to special laws" whilst in hospital. After the war he became involved in the
Baltische Landeswehr, fundraising and recruiting volunteers. From July 1919 Rasche served as a court clerk in
Hamm
Hamm (, Latin: ''Hammona'') is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northeastern part of the Ruhr area. As of 2016 its population was 179,397. The city is situated between the A1 motorway and A2 motorway. Hamm railwa ...
, but moved in 1921 to work at the Barmer Bank Corporation, where he became a rehabilitation specialist. From the beginning of 1933 he was a board member of the Bochum Westfalenbank AG, where he worked with
Paul Pleiger
Paul Pleiger (28 September 1899, in Buchholz, now part of Witten, Westphalia – 22 July 1985, in Hattingen) was a German state adviser and corporate general director.
The miner's son underwent training as an engineer and soon afterwards establis ...
.
During the Nazi period
In 1934 Rasche was appointed a deputy, and from August 1935, a full board member of the
Dresdner Bank
Dresdner Bank AG was a German bank and was based in Frankfurt. It was one of Germany's largest banking corporations and was acquired by competitor Commerzbank in May 2009.
History
19th century
The Dresdner Bank was established on 12 Novemb ...
. His employment with Dresdner Bank had partly come through the intervention of
Wilhelm Keppler
Wilhelm Karl Keppler (14 December 1882 – 13 June 1960) was a German businessman and one of Adolf Hitler's early financial backers. Introduced to Hitler by Heinrich Himmler, Keppler helped to finance the Nazi Party and later served as one of Hi ...
. Together with another board member,
Emil Heinrich Meyer
Emil Heinrich Meyer (6 May 1886 in Wiesbaden – 9 May 1945 in Berlin) was a German business executive. Meyer was a board member at the ITT Corporation's Germany-based subsidiaries Standard Elektrik Lorenz and Mix & Genest as well as AEG.
Meyer wa ...
, Rasche was considered a trusted banker of the
SS. Though Rasche joined the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
in May 1933, his membership was not considered valid, as no membership card was issued or any membership fees paid. In August 1939 Rasche was retroactively awarded party membership from May 1937 and was given membership number 2,207,508. From 1933, Rasche was also a member of the
German Labor Front
The German Labour Front (german: Deutsche Arbeitsfront, ; DAF) was the labour organisation under the Nazi Party which replaced the various independent trade unions in Germany during Adolf Hitler's rise to power.
History
As early as March 1933, ...
(DAF), the Rechtswahrerbund (Lawyer's association), and the
Nationalsozialistischer Reichsbund für Leibesübungen, the umbrella organisation for sports. During the
1936 Summer Olympics
The 1936 Summer Olympics (German: ''Olympische Sommerspiele 1936''), officially known as the Games of the XI Olympiad (German: ''Spiele der XI. Olympiade'') and commonly known as Berlin 1936 or the Nazi Olympics, were an international multi-sp ...
Rasche was deputy head of the Reich Office for professional athletics. Because of this role, he was introduced as a guest of honour to
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
, the leader of the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that crea ...
, and was introduced into the
Freundeskreis Himmler by
Fritz Kranefuss
Friedrich Carl Arthur Kranefuß (19 October 1900 in Herford – 1945), known as Fritz Kranefuß, was a German industrialist and a ''Wehrwirtschaftsführer'' (Military Economy Leader) in the Third Reich.
Kranefuss was on the board of Braunekohle-Be ...
in the autumn of 1936. Rasche joined the SS (membership number 323,879) in May 1939 with membership retroactive to November 1938 as a
Hauptsturmführer (SS Captain). After 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 Germany ...
of Austria in 1938, Rasche became involved in the expansion of the banking business in Austria and later in the
Sudetenland
The Sudetenland ( , ; Czech and sk, Sudety) is the historical German name for the northern, southern, and western areas of former Czechoslovakia which were inhabited primarily by Sudeten Germans. These German speakers had predominated in the ...
and
Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia
The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; cs, Protektorát Čechy a Morava; its territory was called by the Nazis ("the rest of Czechia"). was a partially annexed territory of Nazi Germany established on 16 March 1939 following the German oc ...
. From the mid-1930s, he served as Chairman or Board member in the war effort and also led the business departments of the subsidiaries Handelstrust West NV (Amsterdam) and Continentale Bank SA (Brussels).
Towards the end of December 1942 he was promoted to CEO of the Dresdner Bank after a restructuring of the bank, together with . In December 1943, he joined the Executive Group West in
Bad Nauheim.
Rasche was involved in the negotiation of credit to the SS, which operated Nazi forced labor camps and
concentration camps and financed the
Germanisation
Germanisation, or Germanization, is the spread of the German language, German people, people and German culture, culture. It was a central idea of German conservative thought in the 19th and the 20th centuries, when conservatism and ethnic nationa ...
programmes in occupied Eastern Europe. In banking, Rasche was also involved in
Aryanization in the Netherlands and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. His participation in the Nazi regime is also demonstrated in the transfer of Czech arms factories to the
Reichswerke Hermann Göring
Reichswerke Hermann Göring was an industrial conglomerate in Nazi Germany from 1937 until 1945. It was established to extract and process domestic iron ores from Salzgitter that were deemed uneconomical by the privately held steel mills. The st ...
, which he carried out together with .
After the war
In April 1945 Rasche was arrested at Bad Nauheim and was placed in French captivity. He was questioned in Paris. Rasche was confined to the
French occupation zone and his activity was limited to the "promotion of cross-border economic relations" for the French military government. In November 1945 Rasche was appointed to exchange information with the
Office of Military Government, United States
The Office of Military Government, United States (OMGUS; german: Amt der Militärregierung für Deutschland (U.S.)) was the United States military-established government created shortly after the end of hostilities in Allied-occupied Germany, occup ...
investigators in the
American occupation zone. He was arrested immediately after his arrival in
Frankfurt
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...
. He was imprisoned in
Darmstadt
Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it th ...
after a stay in the prison in Frankfurt and in the 74th Ludwigsburg camp. From there he was transferred to the
Dachau concentration camp
,
, commandant = List of commandants
, known for =
, location = Upper Bavaria, Southern Germany
, built by = Germany
, operated by = ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS)
, original use = Political prison
, construction ...
, and finally was called to trial in April 1947 in the
Nuremberg Trials
The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies of World War II, Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany, for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries, and other crimes, in World War II.
Between 1939 and 1945 ...
.
As the only banker on trial from the private sector, Rasche was indicted on 4 November 1947 at the
Ministries Trial
__NOTOC__
The Ministries Trial (or, officially, the ''United States of America vs. Ernst von Weizsäcker, et al.'') was the eleventh of the twelve trials for war crimes the U.S. authorities held in their occupation zone in Germany in Nuremberg af ...
, the eleventh set of trials to take place under the Nuremberg Trials. His counsel was .
Regarding the seventh indictment of ''collaborating in slave labour'', the prosecution could not prove conclusively whether Rasche had visited concentration camps or taken loans to pay for their building.
Rasche was released (early) in August 1950 from the
Landsberg Prison
Landsberg Prison is a penal facility in the town of Landsberg am Lech in the southwest of the German state of Bavaria, about west-southwest of Munich and south of Augsburg. It is best known as the prison where Adolf Hitler was held in 1924, a ...
for war criminals. In October/November 1950 Rasche was declared to have completed the
denazification
Denazification (german: link=yes, Entnazifizierung) was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of the Nazi ideology following the Second World War. It was carried out by remov ...
process. He was unable to resume work at the Dresdner Bank. In May 1951 representatives of the Bank agreed on a settlement for compensation and pension claims. Rasche continued working as a consultant and died as a result of a heart attack on a commuter train to Basel in September 1951.
Work in supervisory boards
;Chairman of the Supervisory Board
* 1938–1945: Perlmooser Cement AG, Vienna
* 1939–1944: Bohemian Escompte Bank, Prague (banking subsidiary Dresdner Bank)
* 1939–1944: Poldi Hütte AG, Prague
* 1941–1945: Commercial Credit Bank Ltd., Riga
* 1943–1945: West German Bodenkreditanstalt, Cologne
* 1943–1945: Tatra Werke AG, Prague
* Engelhardt-Brauerei AG Brewery, Berlin
* Hardy & Co. Ltd. Bank, Berlin
;Vice-Chairman of the Supervisory Board
* 1944 Allgemeine Versicherungs AG, Vienna
* 1936–1945: Dyckerhoff Portland Cement AG, Mainz-Amöneburg
* 1939–1945: Rheinische rayon AG, Krefeld
;Member of the Supervisory Board
* 1936–1945: Mülheim mining association
* 1936–1939: Junkers aircraft and engine plants AG
* 1937–1945: Winter Hall AG, Kassel
* 1937–1945: GEA Group AG, Frankfurt
* 1938–1944: Gerling Group Life Insurance AG, Cologne
* 1938–1945: Felten & Guillaume AG, Cologne
* 1938–1945: Coal AG of Essen, Essen
* 1938–1945: Country Bank Wien AG (subsidiary of Dresdner Bank)
* 1938–1945: Iron and Steelworks AG, Cologne-Beckum
* 1939–1945:
Accumulatoren Factory AG, Hagen
* 1939–1945:
Brno Arms Factory AG, Prague
* 1939–1944: Döhrener Werke AG, Hannover
* 1940–1944: Coal-Benzin AG (
Brabag), Berlin
* 1940–1945:
Continental Oil
Conoco Inc. ( ) was an American oil and gas company that operated from 1875 until 2002, when it merged with Phillips Petroleum to form ConocoPhillips. Founded by Isaac Elder Blake in 1875 as the "Continental Oil and Transportation Company". Cur ...
AG, Berlin
* 1940–1945:
Å koda Works
The Škoda Works ( cs, Škodovy závody, ) was one of the largest European industrial conglomerates of the 20th century, founded by Czech engineer Emil Škoda in 1859 in Plzeň, then in the Kingdom of Bohemia, Austrian Empire. It is the predece ...
AG, Hanover
* 1940–1945:
Rheinmetall
Rheinmetall AG is a German automotive and arms manufacturer, headquartered in Düsseldorf, Germany. Its shares are traded on the Frankfurt stock exchange.
History
Rheinmetall was founded in 1889. Banker and investor Lorenz Zuckermandel
L ...
AG, Düsseldorf
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rasche, Karl
1892 births
1951 deaths
People from Iserlohn
German bankers
SS-Obersturmbannführer
Nazi Party politicians
German Army personnel of World War I
Jurists from North Rhine-Westphalia
People convicted by the United States Nuremberg Military Tribunals
People from the Province of Westphalia
Lawyers in the Nazi Party
20th-century Freikorps personnel
Dresdner Bank