Benedict room

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Benedikt Bernhard Sebastian Zimmer (born October 9, 1961 in Soltau ) is State Secretary for Equipment, Cyber ​​/ Information Technology and Planning in the Federal Ministry of Defense (BMVg). Zimmer is Lieutenant General a. D. of the Army of the German Armed Forces and was in his last employment as a soldier Head of Equipment Department in the BMVg in Berlin.

Military career

Zimmer joined the Bundeswehr on July 1, 1981 at Panzerbataillon 54 in Hessisch Lichtenau . There and at the Combat Force School 2 in Munster , training as a tank officer took place from 1981 to 1982. Zimmer then studied electrical engineering at the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Munich from 1982 to 1986 and graduated with a degree in engineering . After that he was deployed from 1986 to 1989 as platoon leader and intelligence officer ( S2 ) in Panzerlehrbataillon 94 in Munster. Captain Zimmer served as company commander from 1989 to 1992 with the 3rd Company of Panzer Battalion 31 in Neustadt am Rübenberge . From 1992 to 1994 he served as an adjutant to the commander in Defense Area II in Hanover , Hartmut Behrendt .

1994 Room was to Hamburg to the Staff College displaced and completed by 1996 the General Staff Course . When he was promoted to major , from 1996 to 1997 he took on a position as a consultant in the personnel department at the Federal Ministry of Defense in Bonn . Subsequently, he was in 1997 also in Bonn in the Personnel Office of the Bundeswehr added and served there until 1998 as a personnel staff officer in the Division I (army) and was responsible for human resources planning officers in the raceways of troops service, the medical service , the military music service and of the geographic information service of the Bundeswehr up to and including grade A 15 as well as officers of the military technical service (OffzMilFD) of all branches of the armed forces and organizational areas. In 1998, he completed a one-year course at the Joint Services Command and Staff College in Bracknell, UK .

From 1999 to 2001, Zimmer was deployed as an operations general staff officer (G3) in the staff of the 21 Panzer Brigade in Augustdorf under the command of Wolf-Dieter Langheld . During this assignment Zimmer completed a foreign assignment within the framework of KFOR in Kosovo from November 2000 to June 2001 and served in Prizren there as G3 of the Multinational Brigade South, also under the command of Langheld.

Back in Germany, Lieutenant Colonel Zimmer took over command of the 214 tank battalion in Augustdorf from 2001 to 2002. After this troop command, he was transferred to the Bonn Federal Ministry of Defense and served there from 2002 to 2004 as a consultant in the department for central tasks in the command staff of the army (FüH Z) under the command of the chief of staff Hans-Otto Budde . He was then transferred to Cologne and served in the Bundeswehr Personnel Office from 2004 to 2007 as Head of Department in Department I (Army).

In 2007 Zimmer returned to Bonn and took over the management of Section 2 in Staff Department V (Operations) in the Command Staff of the Armed Forces (Fü S V 2) under the command of Staff Department Head Erhard Bühler . After the staff department was hived off and the operations command staff was established , which was directly subordinate to the inspector general , Zimmer remained in the same and served as work area manager 4 until 2009.

On May 4, 2009, Colonel Zimmer from Klaus von Heimendahl took command of the 41st Panzer Grenadier Brigade in Torgelow . In this role, he was appointed Brigadier General in 2009. From May 28, 2009 to December 16, Zimmer was also the commander of the Multinational Task Force South (MNTF S KFOR) and contingent leader of the 23rd German KFOR contingent. He handed this command over to Manfred Hofmeyer . From January 1, 2013 to June 26, 2014, Zimmer was the commander of the Air Mobile Operations Division . From October 1, 2013 to July 31, 2014 he was commander of the Southern Division , which took over parts of the airmobile operations division that was to be dissolved.

From August 1, 2014 to March 2018, Lieutenant General Zimmer was Head of the Equipment, Information Technology and Use (AIN) department at the Federal Ministry of Defense in Berlin and at the same time National Armament Director (NAD).

Career as State Secretary

On April 5, 2018, Zimmer, as the successor to Katrin Suder , was appointed State Secretary for Equipment and Cyber ​​/ Information Technology in the Federal Ministry of Defense.He is also responsible for the matters of the Planning Department, which is not directly related to him, but to the Inspector General of Bundeswehr is subordinated.

Controversy

In his role as head of department, Zimmer was involved in the irregularities in the decision to renovate the Gorch Fock . Experts in the ministry, for example, demanded in a submission that the Gorch Fock repair work should be canceled and that a successor solution should be implemented as quickly as possible. Zimmer deleted crucial paragraphs of the original, in the end the proposed decision was contrary to “continue the repair”. Based on this, too, Minister Ursula von der Leyen decided to continue the repair work despite considerable cost increases. Representatives of the FDP then demanded his resignation.

Private

Zimmer is married and has two sons.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. New Secretary of State for Armaments to ensure continuity in reforms. (PDF; 84.9 kB) BMVg Press and Information Office, March 16, 2018, accessed on March 16, 2018 .
  2. BMVg press and information staff: BMVg press release of July 16, 2014. www.bmvg.de, July 16, 2014, accessed on August 1, 2014 .
  3. E-Mails indicate fraud against the Navy (video, from minute 2:00). In: tagesschau.de. May 24, 2019, accessed May 24, 2019 .
  4. ^ FDP demands the resignation of State Secretary. In: welt.de. April 11, 2019, accessed May 24, 2019 .