The Detlev-Rohwedder-Haus was constructed between 1935 and 1936 as a headquarters of the German Ministry of Aviation headed by Hermann Göring. It was designed by Ernst Sagebiel, who also rebuilt the Tempelhof Airport during the Nazi era. Its square consisted of 112,000 m2 with nearly 2,100 offices inside. Despite being one of the largest government office buildings in Berlin, it did not receive serious damages during the Allied bombings of Berlin.

During the Battle of Berlin, the building was used, along with the Reich Chancellery, as a command post for the central defence sector Z (Zitadelle, Citadel) and later for the Panzer-Division Müncheberg. Additionally, on the evening of 25 April 1945, the SS-Panzergrenadier-Division Nordland under SS-Brigadeführer Gustav Krukenberg established its headquarters in the building as well, finding some inactive Luftwaffe personnel in the cellars. On 30 April 1945, the building was bombarded by the Soviet artillery, but its ferro-concrete constructions resisted adequately. The garrison of the Ministry of Aviation consisted at this moment of various kind of troops, from Luftwaffe personnel to the Volkssturm units recruited from the First World War veterans in old Prussian uniforms and international Waffen-SS volunteers.

The building was captured by the 2nd and 3rd battalions of the Soviet 1050th Rifle Regiment at 2 p.m., 2 May 1945. After the war, the house was occupied by the House of Ministries of East Germany and became the focal point during the East German uprising on 17 June 1953. Following the German reunification, it has been used by the Federal Ministry of Finances since 1999. The house is named after a German government official Detlev Rohwedder. As a president of the German trust agency, which had its seat in the building in the 1990s and was responsible for the re-privatization in the former East Germany, Rohwedder was killed by the left-wing terrorist Red Army Faction in 1991.