From Surf Wiki (app.surf) — the open knowledge base

Obersturmbannführer

Paramilitary officer's rank in Nazi Germany

Field	Value
name	Obersturmbannführer
image	[[File:SS-Obersturmbannführer.svg	center	150px]]
country	Nazi Germany
service branch	Flag of the Schutzstaffel.svg Schutzstaffel
Flag of the SA (Sturmabteilung).svg Sturmabteilung
NSKK Hausflagge.svg National Socialist Motor Corps
NSFK Wimpel Fördernde Mitglieder.svg National Socialist Flyers Corps
abbreviation	Ostubaf
NATO rank	OF-4
formation	1933
abolished	1945
higher rank	Standartenführer
lower rank	Sturmbannführer
equivalents	*Oberstleutnant
(Lieutenant Colonel)*

NOTOC Flag of the SA (Sturmabteilung).svg Sturmabteilung NSKK Hausflagge.svg National Socialist Motor Corps NSFK Wimpel Fördernde Mitglieder.svg National Socialist Flyers Corps | Non-NATO rank = (Lieutenant Colonel)*

Obersturmbannführer (, , short: Ostubaf) was a paramilitary rank in the German Nazi Party (NSDAP) which was used by the SA (Sturmabteilung) and the SS (Schutzstaffel). The rank of Obersturmbannführer was junior to the rank of Standartenführer, and was equivalent to the military rank of Oberstleutnant (lieutenant colonel) in the German Army.

As the SA expanded, the rank of Ostubaf was created in May 1933 to provide a rank above Sturmbannführer; likewise, the Ostubaf was an SS rank. The Obersturmbannführer rank insignia was composed of four silver pips and a black stripe on a silver background, all elements are centered in the left wing of the collar of the tunic of an SS or of an SA uniform. The rank also was worn on the shoulder boards of an Oberstleutnant and was the highest rank in the SS and the SA to display SS unit insignia on the collar wing opposite the rank insignia.

Various Waffen-SS units composed of foreign recruits were considered distinct from the German SS, and thus they were not permitted to wear SS runes on their collar tabs but had their divisional insignia instead. Their ranks were also prepended with "Waffen" instead of "SS", as in, *Waffen-*Obersturmbannführer.

Adolf Eichmann

In 1940, Adolf Eichmann was promoted to Obersturmbannführer, and was listed as such in the minutes of the Wannsee Conference held in January 1942. In 1961, during the Eichmann trial for Lt. Col. Eichmann's crimes against humanity, the chief prosecutor, Gideon Hausner, drew attention to the executive significance and command responsibility of the rank of Obersturmbannführer, in response to Eichmann's claim that he was merely a clerk obeying orders; Hausner asked, "Were you an Obersturmbannführer or an office girl?"

In the book Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963) the political theoretician Hannah Arendt said that Obersturmbannführer was not a rank of significance, because Eichmann whiled away the war time awaiting promotion to the rank of Standartenführer. That "people like Eichmann, who had risen from the ranks, were never permitted to advance beyond a lieutenant colonel [i.e. Obersturmbannführer] except at the front", in combat with the enemy.

In fiction

In the 2014 action-adventure video game Wolfenstein: The New Order, the secondary antagonist Irene Engel enters her debut role as a Obersturmbannführer.

Rank insignia

Flag of the Schutzstaffel.svg
Schutzstaffel (SS)	SA-Logo.svg
Sturmabteilung (SA)	NSKK Hausflagge.svg
NS Motor Corps (NSKK)	NSFK Wimpel Fördernde Mitglieder.svg
NS Flyers Corps (NSFK)
[[File:WSS Inf OF4 Ostubaf 1945.png	50px]]	[[File:OTL Ostubaf OF4 cam slv 1945.svg	60px]]
[[File:SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer collar.jpg	100px]]	[[File:SA-Obersturmbannführer.svg	100px]]
Waffen-SS		collar insignia

Junior Rank
Sturmbannführer	SS rank and SA rank
Obersturmbannführer	Senior Rank
Standartenführer

Notes

Bibliography

References

(2016). "Ethics of Evil: Psychoanalytic Investigations". Karnac Books.
AFGuidesHD. (2020-09-06). "The Breitspurbahn to Germania - Wolfenstein The New Order Scene HD".

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

ss-ranks lieutenant-colonels

Want to explore this topic further?

Ask Mako anything about Obersturmbannführer — get instant answers, deeper analysis, and related topics.

Research with Mako

Free with your Surf account

Content sourced from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This content may have been generated or modified by AI. CloudSurf Software LLC is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of AI-generated content. Always verify important information from primary sources.

Report