The Kyffhäuserbund is an umbrella organization

Umbrella organization

An umbrella organization is an association of institutions, who work together formally to coordinate activities or pool resources. In business, political, or other environments, one group, the umbrella organization, provides resources and often an identity to the smaller organizations...

 for War Veterans' and Reservist

Reservist

A reservist is a person who is a member of a military reserve force. They are otherwise civilians, and in peacetime have careers outside the military. Reservists usually go for training on an annual basis to refresh their skills. This person is usually a former active-duty member of the armed...

s' Associations in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. It owes its name to the Kyffhäuser Monument

Kyffhäuser Monument

The Kyffhäuser Monument , also known as the Barbarossa Monument or the Kaiser Wilhelm Monument , is a monument on the summit of the Kyffhäuser Mountain near Bad Frankenhausen in the state of Thuringia in central Germany.The monument, which totals 81 metres tall, was built in...

 , a memorial built on the summit of the 473 m high Kyffhäuser

Kyffhäuser

The Kyffhäuser is a range of hills located on the border of the German state of Thuringia with Saxony-Anhalt. It stands on the southern edge of the Harz. The range has a length of and a width of . It reaches its highest point at the Kulpenberg , situated in Thuringia...

 Mountain near Bad Frankenhausen

Bad Frankenhausen

Bad Frankenhausen is a spa town in the German state of Thuringia. It is located at the southern slope of the Kyffhäuser mountain range, on an artificial arm of the Wipper river, a tributary of the Saale. Because of the nearby Kyffhäuser monument dedicated to Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, it is...

 in the state of Thuringia

Thuringia

The Free State of Thuringia is a state of Germany, located in the central part of the country.It has an area of and 2.29 million inhabitants, making it the sixth smallest by area and the fifth smallest by population of Germany's sixteen states....

 in central Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

.

History

The Kyffhäuserbund's origins lie in a section of the Deutscher Kriegerbund

Deutscher Kriegerbund

Deutscher Kriegerbund was a War Veterans' and reservists' Association in Germany. It was established in April 1873 in Weißenfels....

 (German Warrior League) that established a league in 1900 that would unite the formerly scattered German war veterans' associations. Some of these organizations had been already administrating the maintenance of the memorial together. The league was initially named "Kyffhäuserbund der deutschen Landeskriegerverbände" (Kyffhäuser League of the German Countries' Warriors Associations), a name that became later abbreviated to "Kyffhäuserbund".

By 1913 this umbrella organization had already 2.8 million war veterans as its members and it had become one of the largest societies in Germany. During the time of the German Empire

German Empire

The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...

 the Kyffhäuserbund was instrumentalized against the growing social democratic

Social democracy

Social democracy is a political ideology of the center-left on the political spectrum. Social democracy is officially a form of evolutionary reformist socialism. It supports class collaboration as the course to achieve socialism...

 movement in Germany.

The difficult circumstances of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

's postwar years led to a significant shrinking of the veterans' associations and their role.
In 1921, during the Weimar Republic

Weimar Republic

The Weimar Republic is the name given by historians to the parliamentary republic established in 1919 in Germany to replace the imperial form of government...

, this organization shed its federal structure and centralized itself under a common leadership. Following this step it changed its name to "Deutscher Reichskriegerbund 'Kyffhäuser' e.V." (German Warriors Association 'Kyffhäuser').

In the name of Gleichschaltung

Gleichschaltung

Gleichschaltung , meaning "coordination", "making the same", "bringing into line", is a Nazi term for the process by which the Nazi regime successively established a system of totalitarian control and tight coordination over all aspects of society. The historian Richard J...

, the Kyffhäuserbund was nazified after the Nazi takeover of power

Machtergreifung

Machtergreifung is a German word meaning "seizure of power". It is normally used specifically to refer to the Nazi takeover of power in the democratic Weimar Republic on 30 January 1933, the day Hitler was sworn in as Chancellor of Germany, turning it into the Nazi German dictatorship.-Term:The...

 in 1933. Five years later, its name was altered to "NS-Reichskriegerbund 'Kyffhäuser' e.V." (Nationalsocialist Reich Warriors Association 'Kyffhäuser'), becoming the sole and exclusive organization representing the Veterans' interests in the Third Reich.

The Kyffhäuserbund was swiftly and unceremoniously disbanded during the Second World War, in March 1943, by Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...

 himself. Apparently the reason was the German defeat in the Battle of Stalingrad

Battle of Stalingrad

The Battle of Stalingrad was a major battle of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in southwestern Russia. The battle took place between 23 August 1942 and 2 February 1943...

.

Its assets in the whole Reich were transferred to the NSDAP. All its surviving local associations, which in the last phase of the war effort became the breeding ground for Volkssturm

Volkssturm

The Volkssturm was a German national militia of the last months of World War II. It was founded on Adolf Hitler's orders on October 18, 1944 and conscripted males between the ages of 16 to 60 years who were not already serving in some military unit as part of a German Home Guard.-Origins and...

 units, were also placed under the direct orders of the Nazi Party.

After Nazi Germany's defeat in World War II

Aftermath of World War II

After World War II a new era of tensions emerged based on opposing ideologies, mutual distrust between nations, and a nuclear arms race. This emerged into an environment dominated by a international balance of power that had changed significantly from the status quo before the war...

, the Allied Military Governments

Allied Occupation Zones in Germany

The Allied powers who defeated Nazi Germany in World War II divided the country west of the Oder-Neisse line into four occupation zones for administrative purposes during 1945–49. In the closing weeks of fighting in Europe, US forces had pushed beyond the previously agreed boundaries for the...

 issued a special law, Kontrollratsgesetz Nr. 2

Allied Control Council

The Allied Control Council or Allied Control Authority, known in the German language as the Alliierter Kontrollrat and also referred to as the Four Powers , was a military occupation governing body of the Allied Occupation Zones in Germany after the end of World War II in Europe...

, for the disbandment and liquidation of the Nazi organizations (Auflösung und Liquidierung der Naziorganisationen) on the 10th Oktober 1945. This Denazification

Denazification

Denazification was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of any remnants of the National Socialist ideology. It was carried out specifically by removing those involved from positions of influence and by disbanding or rendering...

 decree outlawed the Nazi party and all of its branches, effectively disbanding the Kyffhäuserbund's avatar that had been established during the Third Reich.

The disbandment of the Kyffhäuserbund meant that it had to be established anew during the postwar reconstruction of both West Germany

West Germany

West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....

 and the DDR.

The reestablishment of the Kyffhäuser organization with federal state branches began in 1952 in the German Federal Republic. The present-day Kyffhäuserbund emphasizes its role as a shooting sports

Shooting sports

A shooting sport is a competitive sport involving tests of proficiency using various types of guns such as firearms and airguns . Hunting is also a shooting sport, and indeed shooting live pigeons was an Olympic event...

association.