Herman Fredrik Zeiner-Gundersen

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General Herman Fredrik Zeiner-Gundersen (1979)

Herman Fredrik Zeiner-Gundersen (born July 4, 1915 in Helsingfors , Finland , Russian Empire ; † October 13, 2002 in Bærum , Akershus , Norway ) was a Norwegian general of the army (Den Norske Hær) , who was last in command from 1972 to 1977 of the Norwegian Armed Forces (Forsvarssjef) and between 1977 and 1980 chairman of the NATO Military Committee .

Life

Zeiner-Gundersen, son of the shipbroker Herman Gundersen and his Annette Zeiner-Henriksen, grew up in Helsingfors before his family moved to Kristiania . After attending the Hegdehaugen skole , he began an officer training at the Army Artillery School in 1933 and then at the War School ( Krigsskolen ) . In 1936 he was promoted to lieutenant and graduated from the military college (Den militære høyskole) in 1938 . After graduation, he returned to the Army Artillery School as an inspection officer and lecture hall director, where he experienced the attack by the German Wehrmacht on Norway on April 9, 1940 as an officer in the staff of the Hegstad Artillery Battalion . With this battalion he actively participated in combat operations in southern Norway and fled to Canada via Sweden , the Soviet Union and China in 1941 . After a subsequent activity at the Norwegian military mission in New York City , he went to Great Britain in April 1942 , where he was used as a captain in the artillery battery of the Norwegian Brigade in Scotland .

After the end of the Second World War , Zeiner-Gundersen worked as an artillery officer and staff officer in the High Command of the Army HOK (Hærens overkommando) and NATO . He was also involved in the Oslo Military Society (Oslo Militære Samfund) , of which he was chairman from 1956 to 1962. In 1957 he was seconded to the Army Staff as a colonel and, after his promotion to Major General in 1963, took over from Major General Leif C. Rolstad as head of the Defense District Command in Trøndelag DKT (Trøndelag District Command ) . In this post as the commander of the armed forces in Central Norway, however, he only stayed one year and was replaced in 1964 by Major General Ole Paus . He was then Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces from 1964 to 1967 and from 1967 to 1972 Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces in Northern Norway (Forsvarskommando Nord-Norge) . As such, he was promoted to Lieutenant General (Generalløytnant) in 1970 . On February 1, 1972 he was promoted to general and, as the successor to Vice Admiral Folke Hauger Johannessen, Commander in Chief of the Norwegian Armed Forces (Forsvarssjef) . He stayed in this post until March 20, 1977 and was replaced the next day by General Sverre B. Hamre . In 1974, he was by King Haakon VII. And Olav V. the third honorary member of the Oslo Military Samfund . In 1977 he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Saint Olav Order .

In 1977, Zeiner-Gundersen succeeded British Naval Admiral Peter Hill-Norton as chairman of the NATO military committee . He held this position until he retired in 1980, after which the Canadian General Robert H. Falls became his successor.

He was married to Marit Pedersen since 1948.

Publications

  • Norsk artilleri gjennom 300 år , Arendal 1986
  • NATO's maritime flanks. Problems and prospects. Special report , Washington, DC 1987

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Chairman of the NATO Military Committee