Henning from Ondarza

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General v. Ondarza in Hungary (1992)

Henning von Ondarza (born November 17, 1933 in Güstrow ) is a German officer. He was Army Inspector from 1987 to 1991 and then Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Forces Central Europe until his retirement in 1994 .

family

The Ondarza family is an old noble Spanish family (infanzona), whose name is already mentioned in connection with the battle of the Río Guadalete (July 19–26, 711), which marked the fall of the Visigothic Empire with the death of the Gothic king Roderich .

In the Cantabrian Mountains , part of the Visigoth found nobility , including the Ondarza refuge. The family's original ancestral home is in the Basque town of Gipuzkoa (Bergara, Spanish: Vergara) near the Deba River . The name Ondarza, which means “sandy area” in the Basque language, also refers to this. Another head office was in the town of Zualda in Biscaya , from where the family founded further head offices in other places in Navarre and the Basque provinces . The golden cross on a green background in the coat of arms of the Ondarza family was awarded to them in recognition of the military achievements of two brothers from the family during the conquest of Granada . At the turn of the 17th century, Miguel de Ondarza deserves special mention, secretary and troop commander under King Philip III. (1598-1621).

The tracks to Germany were laid by Ulpiano de Ondarza (1832-1893). Don Ulpiano was a shipowner , first in Bilbao then in Hamburg , and married to the German merchant's daughter Augusta Melosch. His son Herbert de Ondarza (1878–1971), the grandfather of Henning vO, had entered the Imperial Army as a flag junior and, as a lieutenant in the Grand Ducal Mecklenburg region, was included in the imperial nobility register as "von Ondarza" in 1907 . Herbert von Ondarza took part in both world wars and retired from active service as lieutenant general in 1943 . His son Leon von Ondarza (1903–1945) had joined the artillery force of the Reichswehr and in the last phase of World War II as colonel commander of an armored artillery regiment, with which he took part in the heavy defensive battles in Courland . In March 1945 he gave up his regiment , but on April 21, 1945 he got into a British low-flying attack during a relocation march with his staff group near Meyenburg (Ostpriegnitz) and fell at the age of only 42 when his son Henning von Ondarza was eleven years old.

Henning von Ondarza has been married to Christiane Freiin von Reitzenstein since 1959 (daughter of Hubertus Freiherr von Reitzenstein and Elisabeth Countess von Spee ) and has three daughters: Emanuela (married to Alexander von Erdmannsdorff ), Nikola (married to Alexander Roehreke) and Beatrix ( married to Raphael Graf von Deym ).

Life

Ondarza joined the Bundeswehr in 1956 as an officer candidate for the tank troops and, after completing his officer training, was employed as a platoon leader and company commander. From 1964 to 1967 he completed the general staff course at the command academy of the German Armed Forces in Hamburg and general staff training at the US Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth . He then served in various positions until 1976: as General Staff Officer for Planning and Training ( G3 ) in the staff of the 4th Jägerdivision in Regensburg; as adjutant to the inspector of the army; as a battalion commander in Amberg, as well as a staff officer in the German part of the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE).

In 1977 he completed a course at the Royal College of Defense Studies in London and then served until 1979 as Colonel and Commander of the 20 Panzer Brigade in Iserlohn. In October 1979 he was promoted to Brigadier General and transferred to the German Embassy in Washington, DC . There he served as a defense attaché to the ambassadors Berndt von Staden and Peter Hermes . He returned to Germany and took over the 1st Panzer Division in Hanover as major general from April 1, 1983 to April 30, 1985 .

Appointed Lieutenant General on May 1, 1985 , v. Ondarza as COMLANDJUT the headquarters of the Allied Land Forces Schleswig-Holstein and Jutland in Rendsburg. On September 26, 1987, he was transferred to the Federal Ministry of Defense in Bonn. As inspector of the army, as a result of German reunification and the détente in the East-West conflict, he had to implement Army Structure V to downsize the Bundeswehr and organize the dissolution and partial takeover of the GDR's National People's Army . The core elements of his leadership in this assignment were the strengthening and further development of the army's internal command structure and a clear external representation of the interests of the soldiers. On September 26, 1991, he handed these tasks over to Jörg Schönbohm , who succeeded him on the post of inspector of the army. On October 1, 1991, he took over the supreme command of NATO's Allied Forces Central Europe (AFCENT) from Hans-Henning von Sandrart , from whom he had already taken over the post of inspector four years earlier in Brunssum, the Netherlands . On March 31, 1994, Ondarza finally retired.

After his retirement he was appointed as a military advisor in 1994 by the Polish Ministry of Defense, which was seeking full membership in NATO after the Warsaw Pact ended . He served as an advisor to two defense ministers. This appointment was probably made because of Ondarza's many contacts with officers from Eastern Europe and his public opinion of rapprochement with the former Eastern Bloc states in terms of security policy . He was also an advisor to Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze from April 1998 to 2001 . Ondarza sat on the supervisory boards of several industrial companies.

Awards

literature

  • Dermot Bradley , Heinz-Peter Würzenthal, Hansgeorg Model : The Generals and Admirals of the Bundeswehr, 1955–1999. The military careers (= Germany's generals and admirals . Part 6b). Volume 3: Laegeler - Quiel . Biblio-Verlag, Osnabrück 2005, ISBN 3-7648-2382-8 , pp. 492-431.
  • Dieter E. Kilian: Elite in the penumbra: Generals and Admirals of the Bundeswehr , Osning-Verlag, Bielefeld 2005, ISBN 978-3-9806268-3-5 , pp. 315-318.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c This and other information about the Ondarza family are taken from the Königl's detailed certificate of nobility . Chip. King's coat of arms and chronicler Don Luis Vilar y Vilar, issued in Madrid on January 2nd, 1895, certified there by the notary Virgilio Guillen y Andres on January 7th, 1895, certified by the Imperial German Consul in Madrid on January 15th, 1895 and officially translated into German in Hamburg on August 28th May 1907
  2. ^ Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels , GHdA Adel B, Volume XXI / 1995, p. 422
  3. ↑ See e.g. B. Süddeutsche Zeitung , March 18, 1988 (Interview): “Inspector of the Army: Bundeswehr needs more money. Ondarza sees 'the moment of truth' coming in the final cabinet consultation on the 1989 budget. ”Or Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung , March 25, 1988:“ Wörner should reprimand Army Inspector ”.
  4. ^ H. von Ondarza, controversial military advisor . In: Berliner Zeitung . July 8, 1994.
  5. ^ History of the Ondarza family
  6. ↑ Focus interview with Eduard Shevardnadze
  7. ↑ Award document of the Federal Minister of Defense, February 27, 1987.
  8. ↑ Award document of the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Richard v. Weizsäcker, April 19, 1989
  9. ↑ Award Deed from the President of the United States, May 4, 1989.
  10. ↑ Decree No. 655 of Juan Carlos, King of Spain, June 6, 1989.
  11. ↑ Award Document of the President of the Republic of France No. 23LHE90, March 26, 1990.
  12. ↑ Award document from Beatrix, Queen of the Netherlands, March 9, 1994.
  13. ↑ Order No. 13 of the President of Georgia, Eduard Shevardnadze, January 7, 2003.
predecessor Office successor
Hans-Henning von Sandrart Commander in Chief, Allied Forces Central Europe
1991–1994 		Helge Hansen
personal data
SURNAME Ondarza, Henning von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German military, General of the Bundeswehr
DATE OF BIRTH November 17, 1933
PLACE OF BIRTH Guestrow