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Revision as of 01:49, 26 June 2006
Sydney Robert Leibbrandt, known as "Robey", was a South African Boer . He was also an Olympic boxer and was a would-be assassin for Nazi Germany.
A prize winning boxer at the 1934 Empire Games, Leibbrandt, went to the Berlin Olympics in 1936. While there the Abwehr contacted him. At first he was not interested, but he quickly changed his mind when he met Hitler. He was presented with a signed copy of "Mein Kampf".
Leibbrandt, returned to Berlin in 1938 to study at the Reich Academy for Gymnastics, and stayed on when war broke out. He joined the German Army where he qualified as a glider pilot, and was awarded his paratrooper wings after completing the course (allegedly the first ever South African to do so.
Adolf Hitler ordered Admiral Canaris to implement Operation Weissdorn, a plan for the assassination of General Smuts. Leibbrandt, was dropped on the Namwakaland coast in June 1941 by a Kriegsmarine vessel the Kyloe from were he proceeded to South-Africa. Once here he formed the Nasionaal Sosialistiese Rebelle who had contacts with another pro-German movement , the Ossewa Brandwag.
Leibbrandt was arrested on the grounds of General Smuts' house outside Pretoria with a German sniper's rifle.
In 1943 he was sentenced to death for High Treason. Although Leibbrandt refused to give evidence at any stage in the trial, he claimed that he had acted for Volk and Fuhrer and gave the Nazi salute when he first entered the court, to which several spectators responded. After being sentenced to death Liebbrandt shouted loudly and clearly "I greet death". His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by General Smuts on 11th March 1943.
In 1948, Leibbrandt was released in an amnesty of war offenders by the newly victorious Nationalist Government. He died in 1966.
References
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