Wolfgang Reinhold

Wolfgang Reinhold (16 April 1923 - 2 September 2012) was a German Colonel General. He was a Deputy Minister of Defence and, between 1972 and 1989, head of the Kommando LSK/LV (Airforce branch) of the National People's Army in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

Life Wolfgang Reinhold was born the eldest of five children in Friedrichshagen on the southeastern side of Berlin. His father worked at one stage as a chauffeur but also experienced lengthy periods of unemployment, and in 1927 the family relocated to Dresden in search of work. On leaving school, between 1938 and 1940 Reinhold worked as a salesman, before moving to Dresden where he started a traineeship with a bank. 1941 was the year of his eighteenth birthday. War had begun in 1939, and from 1941 till 1945 Reinhold served in the German Luftwaffe (airforce), which he survived, ending up as a Feldwebel, a non-commissioned officer rank. War ended in defeat for Germany in May 1945: from then until July 1949, he was held by the Soviets as a Prisoner of War. During his imprisonment he faced an "Anti-Fascist Education" programme that included a period in Moscow. now, with the entire zone under Soviet Administration, a state owned operation. He then moved to Zschorna and became a teacher and head at the regional Leadership Training establishment for Saxony of the Free German Youth (FDJ / Freie Deutsche Jugend) organisation. In October 1949 the Soviet occupation zone was formally refounded as the Soviet sponsored German Democratic Republic. The FDJ was in many respects the youth wing of what had become the new country's ruling Socialist Unity Party (SED / Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands), and in 1950 Wolfgang Reinhold, now aged 27, joined the SED itself. At the end of the year, in December 1972, Reinhold received an additional appointment as a Deputy Minister of Defence. He was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant general and then, in 1979 as part of celebrations of the thirtieth anniversary of the country's foundation, to that of Colonel General. Between 1981 and 1989 he was also a candidate for membership of the powerful Party Central Committee.