1939
The supervisory board chairman of Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG, Fritz Thyssen, rejects the German invasion of Poland and flees to Switzerland.
August Thyssen's eldest son Fritz did not wish to become chief executive of Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG when it was founded. Instead, as the biggest single private shareholder (26%) he is elected chairman of the supervisory board. On May 1, 1933 he joins the NSDAP with great hopes of organizing the party's economic policy along corporatist lines. However these ideas are soon no longer in line with those of the party. After the state murders committed in the so-called Röhm putsch Fritz Thyssen distances himself more and more from the NSDAP and its aims, even if Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG continues to play an important role in the Nazi's autarky and armaments economy. He does not leave the NSDAP or the Reichstag but shows his rejection of the regime through small gestures (borrowing from the "Jewish" banker Simon Hirschland, Essen; financial support for the family of the imprisoned Martin Niemöller, etc.). He breaks openly with the regime after the German attack on Poland.
In an open telegram to Hermann Göring, Fritz Thyssen refuses to appear at a Reichstag session in Berlin on September 1, 1939 to ratify the German invasion of Poland. Pushed by his family he flees with them first to Switzerland, later to France. There he is overtaken by the events of the war and is unable to emigrate to Argentina as planned. Unoccupied Vichy France hands him and his wife Amélie over to the German Reich at the end of 1940. The state confiscates his assets, thus gaining control over the business policy of Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG.