page_title: Werner Best
section_title: Administration by the Permanent Secretaries
hierarchical_section_title: Werner Best / Administration by the Permanent Secretaries
caption_attribution_description: English: The photo shows Erik Scavenius Prime Minister of Denmark with Dr. Werner Best, German plenipotentiary in Denmark. Image dates from February 6th 1943 when Werner Best was introduced to the Danish crownprince after on Hitlers orders having ignored the Royal House for his first months in Denmark. Dansk: Fotografiet viser Erik Scavenius, Danmarks statsminister sammen med Dr. Werner Best, repræsentant for den tyske besættelsesmagt. Billedet er taget den 6. februar 1943 da Werner Best blev præsenteret for den danske kronprins efter at han i sine første måneder i Danmark havde ignoreret kongehuset på ordre fra Hitler. Deutsch: Der dänische Ministerpräsident Erik Scavenius und der deutsche Reichsbevollmächtigte Dr. Werner Best fotografiert am 6. Februar 1943 als Werner Best dem Kronprinzen Frederik vorgestellt wurde, nachdem er drei Monate lang auf Befehl Hitlers das Königshaus ignoriert hatte.
context_page_description: Karl Rudolf Werner Best was a German Nazi, jurist, police chief, SS-Obergruppenführer and Nazi Party leader and theoretician from Darmstadt, Hesse. He was the first chief of Department 1 of the Gestapo, Nazi Germany's secret police, and initiated a registry of all Jews in Germany. As a deputy of SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, he organized the World War II SS-Einsatzgruppen paramilitary death squads that were responsible for mass killings.
  Best served in the German military occupation administration of France, and then became the civilian administrator of occupied Denmark. Convicted of war crimes in Denmark, Best was released in 1951. He escaped further prosecution in West Germany in 1972 due to ill health and died in 1989, aged 85.
context_section_description: To avoid deportation of Danes to German concentration camps, the permanent secretary of the ministry of foreign affairs, Nils Svenningsen, in January 1944 proposed establishment of an internment camp within Denmark. Best accepted this proposal, but on condition that the camp be built close to the German border. Frøslev Prison Camp was opened in August 1944.
  In compliance with the Danish cabinet's decision on 9 April 1940 to accept cooperation with German authorities, the Danish police did cooperate with  German occupation forces. This arrangement remained in effect even after the Danish government resigned on 29 August 1943. On 12 May 1944, Best demanded that the Danish police should assume responsibility for protection of 57 enterprises the Germans deemed at risk of sabotage by the Danish resistance movement, which was growing in strength. Should the Danish civil administration not do so, total Danish police strength would be reduced to 3,000 men. Nils Svenningsen, who functioned as "de facto" head of the Danish civil administration in the absence of a Danish government, was inclined to accept this demand, but the organizations of the Danish police opposed it.
  Following rejection of the German request, a state of emergency was declared in Denmark on 29 August 1943. Then on 19 September 1944, the German army began arresting members of the Danish police forces; 1,984 policemen out of 10,000 were arrested and deported to German concentration and prisoner-of-war camps, most of them to Buchenwald.
  In deliberations on 3 May 1945 about preparation for the impending German defeat, Best fought to avoid implementation of a scorched earth policy in Denmark. Best also possibly sabotaged the rounding up of the Jewish population in Denmark in order to avoid agitating the general Danish population. In the Rescue of the Danish Jews, the primary escape route was to cross Øresund to Sweden by boat. At the most critical time, all German patrol boats of the area were ordered into harbor for three weeks for new paint jobs. Best may have tipped off his Jewish tailor about this development—but Danish authorities credit Best's right-hand man, Georg Duckwitz—which contributed to the escape of a number of Jews. During his trial before Danish courts, Best insisted that the Jews were able to escape because he provided the dates to Duckwitz.
caption: Best (right) with Erik Scavenius, Danish PM 1942-43.
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