Obergruppenführer Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Obergruppenführer was an SS rank which translated as “Senior Group Leader” and was first created in 1932 due to the growth and expansion of the SS under Heinrich Himmler. Himmler was one of the first SS officers appointed to the rank of Obergruppenführer, and held the rank while simultaneously serving as the Reichsführer-SS. At the time Himmler held the rank of Obergruppenführer, however, Reichsführer was simply a title and not yet an actual rank.
In the early days of the SS, the rank of Obergruppenführer was occasionally used to make two SS leaders equal in seniority, so as to prevent a power struggle within the Nazi Party. Such was the case with Kurt Daluege, who commanded most of the SS in the Berlin region between 1930 and 1934. To avoid having the SS split into two separate entities, one based in Northern Germany and the other in Bavaria, Adolf Hitler promoted Daluege to the new rank of Obergruppenführer making him equal in rank to Himmler.
By 1934, with the Nazi Party in power and the SS a state agency of Germany, Obergruppenführer was considered the highest rank of the SS, with the exception of Himmler’s special rank of Reichsführer-SS. Within the Waffen-SS, the rank came to be considered the equivalent of a full General. The rank would remain the highest General rank until 1942, when the SS created the rank of Oberstgruppenführer.
The rank of Obergruppenführer was held by some of the most notorious figures in the SS, with Reinhard Heydrich and Ernst Kaltenbrunner both claiming title to the rank. Karl Wolff was another holder of the rank and was the highest ranking SS officer who was taken alive by the Allies after the close of Second World War. Obergruppenführer was also the standard rank for SS and Police Leaders as well as Division commanders of the Waffen-SS.
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