This portion of West Prussia was part of the Polish Corridor, ceded to the Second Republic of Poland, following World War I, to provide it access to the Baltic Sea.
After Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Nazi Germany in 1933, Winkler was instrumental in the Gleichschaltung (bringing in line) of the press.
In this function, by order of Joseph Goebbels's Propaganda Ministry, he decreed appointments and instructions which curtailed the industry's entrepreneurial freedom.
[2] Between 1939 and 1945, Winkler was leader of the Main Trusteeship Office East (Haupttreuhandstelle Ost), responsible for the administration of seized industrial and property assets in Poland during World War II.
Under orders from the new West German government, Winkler was involved in the attempted Denazification of the Universum Film AG company—whose product was so associated with the Third Reich that reissues of its non-political catalogue were proving difficult to market.