Friedrich Ruge

Friedrich Ruge   (mariner)
Born	24 December 1894 Leipzig, German Empire
Died	3 July 1985 (Age 90) Tübingen, West Germany
Nationality	German
Alma mater	Technical University of Berlin, University of Kiel
Relatives	Peter von Zahn
Attended Bilderberg/1961 as outgoing Commander of the West-German Navy.  Inspector of the Navy In office June 1956 - August 1961 Employer Germany/Military Attended Bilderberg/1961 as outgoing Commander of the West-German Navy.

Friedrich Oskar Ruge was a German naval officer and military writer. He served in the German navy under four different government types.

After World War 2 he was a member of the US Navy-sponsored Naval Historical Team, and co-author of the 1950 Himmerod memorandum calling West-German rearmament. He was of the founding fathers of the new German Armed Forces and the West German Navy, whose first commander he became in 1956. From 1962 to 1965 he was President of the Association of Reservists in the German Armed Forces.

Early career

Friedrich Ruge was the son and grandson of German educators. Joining the Imperial German Navy as a cadet in March 1914, he was soon a participant in the 1914, 1915, and 1916 Baltic Sea operations. After the armistice, Ruge was an officer aboard the destroyer SMS B112, interned at Scapa Flow and in June 1919, he played a role in the scuttling of the Imperial German Fleet.

Returning to Germany to continue his naval career in the service of the new Weimar Republic, for the next two decades he concentrated on mines and mine warfare. From 1921 to 1923, he commanded a minesweeper. From October 1924 to September 1926 he was one of the first naval officers in the Reichsmarine to study the fundamentals of natural science at the Berlin Institute of Technology. At the same time completed language studies in Turkish, Swedish, Russian and Italian, which he completed in 1927 at the University of Kiel with the interpreter exam in English, hinting at some sort of intelligence role.

Ruge was appointed to the minesweeper M136. From 1928 to 1932, he had staff roles associated with mine and torpedo warfare, and in September 1932 became commanding officer of the 1st Half-Flotilla of minesweepers.

World War 2

In August 1939, on the eve of the outbreak of World War II, Ruge's command was split into two parts, FdM West covering the North Sea and FdM Ost operating in the Baltic Sea. Ruge took command of FdM Ost, which provided minesweeping and escort support to the German Invasion of Poland in September–October 1939. On 17 October 1939, with naval operations against Poland complete, Ruge transferred to command of FDM West. He was a part of the North Sea-English Channel operations during 1940. From 1940 to 1943, he was stationed in France, rising through the upper ranks to become Vice Admiral in 1943. Sent to Italy in 1943, he served as Senior German Naval Officer until mid-summer and the Italian capitulation. He was appointed as Naval Advisor to Field Marshal Erwin Rommel in November 1943 to supervise the defense of northern France from the predicted Allied invasion. In August 1944, he became the Kriegsmarine's Director of Ship Construction, a position in which he served till the end of World War II.

Post-war career

At the end of World War II, Ruge became a POW, serving as camp interpreter. Released from captivity on November 30, 1946, Ruge ran a writing and translation office in Cuxhaven until 1948. During the denazification process, he was first classified as a Mitläufer (fellow traveler) and then as an unincriminated person.

From 1949 to 1952 he was a member of the Naval Historical Team in Bremerhaven, which, under US navy supervision, worked on the wartime experiences of the German Navy, especially in the fight against the Soviet Union.

He was a member of the group of experts on security issues set up by the federal government to advise Chancellor Adenauer in his negotiations with the Western Allies. In October 1950, in this capacity, he was one of the co-authors of the Himmerod memorandum, that contributed to the creation of the myth of the "clean Wehrmacht", which laid the essential conceptual foundations for the future West German armed forces.

During this time he also became a member of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Demokratischer Kreise, a semi-official outfit headed by Hans Edgar Jahn making propaganda for the recreation of a German army and strong transatlantic ties to the West through NATO. He was also member of the Association of German Soldiers lobbying for a general amnesty of former Wehrmacht soldiers.

From 1952 to 1954 Ruge was a non-party member of the Cuxhaven city council. Politically he was close to the CDU, FDP and the Deutsche Partei. He was also a member of the school board and the board of directors.

Called out of retirement when Germany became a part of NATO, Ruge was appointed Inspector of the Navy (a position similar to the U.S. Chief of Naval Operations), a post he occupied until 1961.

Afterward, he became a member of the faculty at the University of Tübingen, eventually becoming an associate professor on 21 July 1967 there. He was a guest lecturer at many universities, including the U.S. Naval War College at Newport.

 

Event Participated in

Event	Start	End	Location(s)	Description
Bilderberg/1961	21 April 1961	23 April 1961	Canada Quebec St-Castin	The 10th Bilderberg, the first in Canada and the 2nd outside Europe.

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