Background
Hans Oster was born in Dresden on 9 August 1888. The son of a Protestant churchman.
Hans Oster was born in Dresden on 9 August 1888. The son of a Protestant churchman.
Oster had fought in World War I as a General Staff officer and later joined the Reichswehr. From 1933 Oster served in the War Ministry, becoming head of Department 2 of the Abwehr which dealt with financial and administrative questions and kept the central list of agents.
A central organizer of the German Resistance, Oster also unofficially extended help to Jews through various ‘front organizations' under the protection of the Abwehr abroad. This was one of the factors which caused his dismissal from the Abwehr in April 1943. Under observation by the Gestapo for some time, he was arrested on 21 July 1944 after the abortive plot against Hitler.
He was hanged on 9 April 1945 in Flossenbiirg concentration camp for his participation in the conspiracy.
A conservative by inclination and an early opponent of Hitler, whom he regarded as the ‘destroyer of Germany’, Major General Oster was strongly against Nazi war preparations, passing on to the Allies warnings concerning German plans for aggression against Holland, Belgium and Denmark in 1939-40.