Otto Dietrich
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Nazi Otto Dietrich
Otto Dietrich was the Third Reich's Press Chief, and Hitler's confidante. He was born in August 1887, and died at the age of 65 in 1952, after serving time in Landberg Prison following the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials, where he was convicted of crimes against humanity in the Ministries Trial and sentenced to seven years' imprisonment.
After his time as a soldier in WW1, he was awarded the Iron Cross (First Class). After this he went to the universities of Munich, Frankfurt am Main and Freiburg, from which he graduated with a doctorate in political science in 1921.
He strongly supported Nazi ideology, and became a member of the NSDAP (Nazi Party) almost immediately after its foundation in 1919. On 1st August 1931 he was appointed Press Chief of the NSDAP, and the following year joined the SS. By 1941 he had risen to the rank of SS-Obergruppenfuher.
His job as Press Chief overlapped with Goebbels' Ministry for Propaganda, and thus many anecdotes exist of their feuds. They were infamous for their disagreements, and both often felt obliged to "repair" the mistakes of the other.
Dietrich retained the confidence of the Fuhrer throughout the regime until Hitler fired him after an argument towards the end of the war. In captivity he wrote a book ("The Hitler I Knew") sharply critical of Hitler personally and strongly denouncing the crimes committed in the name of Nazism.de:Otto Dietrich