Ernst Thälmann Pioneer Organisation

The Ernst Thälmann Pioneer Organisation (German: Pionierorganisation Ernst Thälmann), consisting of the Young Pioneers and the Thälmann Pioneers, was a youth organisation of schoolchildren aged 6 to 13 in East Germany. They were named after Ernst Thälmann, the former leader of the Communist Party of Germany, who was executed at the Buchenwald concentration camp.

The group was a subdivision of the Freie Deutsche Jugend (FDJ, Free German Youth), East Germany's youth movement. It was founded on 13 December 1948 and disbanded in 1989 on German reunification. In the 1960s and 1970s, nearly all schoolchildren between ages 6 and 13 were organised into Young Pioneer or Thälmann Pioneer groups, with the organisations having "nearly two million children" collectively by 1975.

The pioneer group was loosely based on Scouting, but organised in such a way as to teach schoolchildren aged 6 – 13 about socialist ideology and prepare them for the Freie Deutsche Jugend, the FDJ. Afternoons spent at the pioneer group mainly consisted of a mixture of adventure, myth-like socialist teachings and the upkeep of revolutionary traditions. In the summer, children usually went to pioneer camps similar to the West German Wandervogel groups or the Scouts. International pioneer camps were also common, intended to foster friendship between different nationalities.