Ribbentrop, Joachim von, << RIHB uhn `trohp, YOH ah khihm fuhn` >> (1893-1946), was Adolf Hitler’s top diplomatic agent. He served as foreign minister of Germany from 1938 to 1945. He helped engineer the seizure of Austria, the partition of Czechoslovakia, and alliances with Italy and Japan. In August 1939, he made a deal with Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union in which Germany and the Soviet Union agreed to divide Poland and much of the rest of Eastern Europe between them. After World War II ended in 1945, Ribbentrop was tried. On Oct. 16, 1946, he hanged for war crimes and crimes against humanity and peace.
Ribbentrop was born in Wesel, Germany, on April 30, 1893. His familiarity with different languages helped him greatly in diplomacy. In 1935, he gained from England a naval treaty that gave Germany equality in submarines and the right to expand its fleet of surface ships to 35 percent the size of the United Kingdom’s surface fleet.
