Nazi Career
In May 1933, Steinbrinck joined the National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP) and soon became a Standartenführer in the SS, later becoming an SS Oberführer in April 1935. Soon after that, he was a member in the so-called Freundeskreis der Reichsführer SS, a rather exclusive circle whose leader was Wilhelm Keppler.
Between 1937 and 1939, Steinbrinck functioned as a general plenipotentiary for the Flick conglomerate. Moreover, he carried out various other functions, becoming in April 1938 a Wehrwirtschaftsführer – a title given industrialists who were important to Germany's armament industry – and as of January 1939 an SS Brigadeführer.
In the summer of 1939, he resigned from Flick and as of December of the same year began work as a trustee at ThyssenKrupp. Shortly before this, he had also been remobilized as a frigate captain. From May 1940 until March 1942, Steinbrinck worked as a "general plenipotentiary for the steel industry in Luxembourg, Belgium and France, and functioned in April 1941 as an associate in the presidium of the Reichsvereinigung Kohle (Reich Coal Association).
From March 1942 until the evacuation of the western occupation zones in the autumn of 1944, Steinbrinck was also general plenipotentiary for the Reichsvereinigung Kohle for mining and coal economy in the Netherlands, Belgium and France, the so-called Beko (Befehlskommando) West. In April 1945 – World War II had by now long ago been lost – Steinbrinck operated as a link between Ruhr industry and Army Group B under Generalfeldmarschall Walter Model.
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