Wolfgang Schwanitz

Politician

1930 –

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Who is Wolfgang Schwanitz?

Wolfgang Schwanitz was the last head of the Stasi, the East German secret police, that was officially renamed the "Office for National Security" on November 17, 1989. Unlike his predecessor, Erich Mielke, he did not hold the title "Minister of State Security", but was "Leader of the Office for National Security".

Schwanitz became a member of the Free German Youth already when the German Democratic Republic was founded. In 1950, he became a member of the Gesellschaft für Deutsch-Sowjetische Freundschaft, and in 1953, of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, the ruling East German communist party. He worked for the Stasi from 1951, and studied at the college of the Stasi, where he earned a doctorate with a dissertion on "combating hostile tendencies among the youth".

Between 1974 and 1986, he was head of Stasi in East Berlin. In 1986, he was appointed Stasi Lieutenant General and deputy of the Minister for State Security Erich Mielke.

During the collapse of the communist regime in the autumn of 1989, both the long-time Head of State of East Germany, Erich Honecker, and the long-time head of the Stasi, Erich Mielke, resigned from their positions. After Hans Modrow formed a new government, Schwanitz was appointed the successor of Mielke as Leader of the Office for National Security and member of the Council of Ministers. The Stasi was dissolved on March 31, 1990.

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Born
Jun 26, 1930
Berlin
Nationality
  • Germany

Submitted
on July 23, 2013

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