“Opponents” within the ranks
Volkspolizisten in Greifswald, around 1950.
“Opponents” within the ranks
Even supporters of the socialist state could find themselves in opposition to the GDR regime or become victims of the internal purges. These included members of SED, members of the People’s Police and other officials. After the terrible experiences of the Nazi era, many of them were initially convinced of the idea of a “workers’ and peasants’ state” on German soil. In the face of the developing dictatorship, however, they increasingly distanced themselves from the communist system in the Soviet Occupation Zone/GDR.
Some disguised their protest stance as conformity and tried to infiltrate the system from within in illegal circles. This also applied to those who had to enlist in the People’s Police in order to be released from Soviet captivity.
After all, even people who were convinced of the GDR could be targeted by the secret services, whether through arbitrariness, coincidence or denunciation. Among those shot in Moscow were 193 SED members.
The SED chairman Walter Ulbricht at the presidium of a general meeting of the party organization of the People’s Police on 20/21 March 1952. / Polizeihistorische Sammlung Berlin / Brombach
“House of Ministries” of the GDR, former Reich Aviation Ministry in Berlin-Mitte, June 1951. / Landesarchiv Berlin / Bert Sass
Bonus proposal for the denouncer of the resistance group around Heini Fritsche and Wolfgang Junker at the People’s Police School in Potsdam. Erich Mielke approved the proposal on August 22, 1951 and had about a month’s salary transferred to the secret MfS employee in recognition of his betrayal.
The RIAS building in Berlin-Schönberg, around 1953. / German Museum of Technology Foundation, Berlin
Kurt Zipper’s release certificate from US captivity with Russian translation, issued on June 6, 1945 in Sonnenberg. With this document, Zipper was able to travel to the Soviet Occupied Zone unbothered.
Horst Zipper (1932)
Kurt Zipper’s son, Horst, was born in Jüterbog on December 13, 1932. He was also sentenced to death for “espionage”. He was pardoned on 27 September 1952 and his sentence was commuted to 25 years in a labor camp, which meant forced labor in Workuta. He returned to the GDR in October 1955, but fled to West Berlin in the same month. He was an employee of the AOK and now lives as a pensioner in Berlin.
