Hans-Jochen Witthauer

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Hans-Jochen Witthauer (born March 13, 1950 in Eisenach ) is a Vice Admiral a. D. the German Navy and was last from April 2009 to deputy to his retirement commander of the Allied Maritime Command HQ Northwood (MC Northwood) in British Northwood .

Military career

Training and first uses

After graduating from high school in Wilhelmsdorf , Witthauer joined the Bundeswehr in October 1968 and was trained as an officer. After numerous on-board assignments as a telecommunications officer on various frigates and destroyers , he was an instructor on the sailing training ship Gorch Fock . In addition, as an exchange officer, he was also employed as an instructor on board the French training ship Jeanne d'Arc . After returning to Germany, Witthauer completed his specialist training as an operations officer from 1979 to 1980 and was then a locating and operations officer on the destroyers Mölders and Lütjens.

Service as a staff officer

From April 1983 he served as a training staff officer on the sailing training ship Gorch Fock with promotion to corvette captain and finally from January 1984 as first officer on the Lütjens. From 1985 to 1987 Witthauer completed the admiralty staff course at the command and control academy of the Bundeswehr in Hamburg . Subsequently, he was transferred to the Bonn Federal Ministry of Defense , where he was employed as adjutant to the Chief of Staff of the Command Staff of the Armed Forces (FüS), Major General Jürgen Schnell .

In March 1989 Witthauer was transferred to the Standing Naval Force Atlantic of NATO , where he served on the staff as a press and administration officer. Back in Germany, he took command of the destroyer Rommel . He led this command for over three years and took part with the Rommel in 1993 in Operation Sharp Guard , which aimed to enforce economic sanctions and the arms embargo against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia .

After this troop command, Witthauer returned to the command academy and was a marine lecturer there. From 1994 to 1996 he commanded the newly established 6th frigate squadron . From 1996 to 1999 Witthauer was again employed in the Ministry of Defense, this time as head of department for naval strategy and international cooperation, troop planning and naval conception in the naval command staff (FüM).

During the Kosovo War , Witthauer was deployed from January 1999 to September 2001 as Chief NATO Situation Center at NATO headquarters in Brussels . In October 2001 Witthauer moved back to the Ministry of Defense and was deployed in the command staff of the armed forces - after September 11, 2001 in a time of increasing foreign deployments of the Bundeswehr - as deputy head of the Bundeswehr Operations Department (FüS V).

From September 2003 to October 2004 Witthauer took over a NATO command. He led the Standing Naval Force Mediterranean and was involved with this in Operation Active Endeavor , which had the aim of detecting and deterring terrorist activities in the Mediterranean region.

Service as an admiral

In October 2004, Captain Witthauer took over command of the destroyer flotilla in Wilhelmshaven . During this employment he was made a flotilla admiral . He transformed the flotilla and in 2006 finally transferred it to one of the two pillars of the new naval structure, the Operational Flotilla 2 , which he also commanded from June to October 2006.

From December 5, 2006 to 2007, he served as Rear Admiral as commander of the EUFOR troops (European Union Force) in Bosnia-Herzegovina as part of Operation Althea .

Back in Germany, Witthauer took over the post of Deputy Inspector of the Navy from January 2008 to April 2009 and was also Chief of Staff in the Navy under the command of Vice Admiral Wolfgang E. Nolting . He gave this post to Rear Admiral Heinrich Lange in 2009 and took over the NATO post of Deputy Commander in the Maritime Component Command (CC-MAR) in Northwood in April of the same year . In this position he was made a vice admiral. In March 2010, the name was changed to Allied Maritime Command HQ Northwood . On March 15, 2012, after 44 years of service on the Hardthöhe premises in Bonn, he retired with a big tattoo .

Private

Witthauer is married.

Honors

Web links

  • Vita on www.marine.de (PDF; 64 kB)

Individual evidence

  1. ^ BMVg press and information staff (ed.): Personnel changes in top military positions . Press release. Berlin September 21, 2006 ( PDF ( Memento from October 20, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) [accessed on April 3, 2016]).
  2. ^ BMVg press and information staff (ed.): Personnel changes in top military positions . Press release. Berlin November 3, 2006 ( PDF ( Memento of November 17, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) [accessed on April 4, 2016]).
  3. ↑ Bonner General-Anzeiger of March 16, 2012, page 14
personal data
SURNAME Witthauer, Hans-Jochen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German Vice Admiral
DATE OF BIRTH March 13, 1950
PLACE OF BIRTH Eisenach