Kurt Weigelt

{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2022}}

{{Short description|German businessman (1884–1968)}}

Kurt Weigelt (5 June 1884 – 5 August 1968) was a German business manager of Lufthansa and Deutsche Bank, and a Nazi war criminal sentenced to two years in prison for being a supporting member of the SS.{{cite news |last=Schlautmann |first=Christoph |date=4 May 2016 |title=World War II: A Turbulent Legacy |url=https://www.handelsblatt.com/english/companies/world-war-ii-a-turbulent-legacy/23536960.html |work=Handelsblatt Today |access-date=24 December 2020 |archive-date=9 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220309172056/https://www.handelsblatt.com/english/companies/world-war-ii-a-turbulent-legacy/23536960.html |url-status=dead }}{{Cite web |last=Hofmann |first=Sarah Judith |title=Why Lufthansa reduces its Nazi past to a sidenote |url=https://www.dw.com/en/why-lufthansa-reduces-its-nazi-past-to-a-sidenote/a-19115716 |access-date=25 December 2020 |publisher=Deutsche Welle |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210526145707/https://www.dw.com/en/why-lufthansa-reduces-its-nazi-past-to-a-sidenote/a-19115716 |archive-date=26 May 2021}}

From after World War I, Weigelt was in Deutsche Bank management becoming a deputy director in 1922. He was also involved in commercial aviation, he was instrumental in the founding of Deutsche Luft Hansa by the merger of several existing German airlines.

Weigelt was a Förderndes Mitglied der SS from 1934, financially supporting the SS. He led the Nazi Reichsgruppe Deutscher Kolonialwirtschaftlicher Unternehmungen (Reich Group of German Colonial Economic Enterprises) from its establishment in 1936. From 1937 he was a member of the Nazi Party.{{cite book |last1=Linne |first1=Karsten |title=Deutschland jenseits des Äquators?: Die NS-Kolonialplanungen für Afrika |date=2008 |publisher=Ch. Links Verlag GmbH |pages=32–33 |isbn=978-3-86153-500-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tX7wmQTunQcC&q=+Kamerun+Weigelt}}

Weigelt officially was the head of the economic department of NSDAP Office of Colonial Policy.{{cite journal |last1=Linne |first1=Karsten |title=Afrika als "wirtschaftlicher Ergänzungsraum": Kurt Weigelt und die kolonialwirtschaftlichen Planungen im "Dritten Reich" |journal=Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte / Economic History Yearbook |date=2006 |volume=47 |issue=2 |doi=10.1524/jbwg.2006.47.2.141 |s2cid=201119505 |url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1524/jbwg.2006.47.2.141/html|url-access=subscription }} Unofficially, Weigelt was regarded as "secret minister of Colonies". He prepared the Wirtschaftspolitische Denkschrift des Kolonialpolitischen Amtes der NSDAP (Economic policy memorandum of the Colonial Political Office of the NSDAP) memorandum with plans on how to plunder Africa.[https://www.freiburg-postkolonial.de/Seiten/Nazi-Kolonialplaene.htm From »Unsere Opfer zählen nicht« – Die Dritte Welt im Zweiten Weltkrieg] Scholar Werner Ustorf describes Weigelt's colonial plans as amounting to compulsory labour and camp settlements.{{cite journal |last1=Ustoff |first1=Werner |title='Survival of the Fittest': German Protestant Missions, Nazism and Neocolonialism, 1933–1945 |journal=Journal of Religion in Africa |date=1998 |volume=28 |issue=1 |pages=93–114 |doi=10.2307/1581828 |jstor=1581828 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1581828|url-access=subscription }}

After the end of the Second World War, he was placed on a list of 42 people from industry who were wanted as war criminals. He was arrested and sentenced to two years in prison and a fine of 50,000 Reichsmark.

Due to his role in the Nazi administration and war crimes, Deutsche Bank was unable to employ him directly after the war, however he was given a key role{{why?|date=May 2022}} in the reestablishment of Lufthansa, with which the bank had a close business relationship, becoming chairman.{{cite book |last1=Nützenadel |first1=Alexander |title=Deutsche Bank: The Global Hausbank, 1870 – 2020 |date=2020 |publisher=Bloomsbury |pages=338–352 |isbn=978-1-4729-7729-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wZrYDwAAQBAJ}}

Weigelt was chairman of Lufthansa's supervisory board from its reestablishment in 1953 (as Luftag, renamed Lufthansa in 1954) and until 1960, and served as honorary president of Lufthansa until his death in 1968.{{cite web |title=AS TIME FLIES BY The History of Lufthansa – The chronicle of events |url=https://www.lufthansagroup.com/en/chronicle |website=lufthansagroup.com |access-date=10 May 2022}}