Hohenfels military training area

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2014

The Hohenfels Training Area is a training area northwest of Regensburg near Hohenfels in the Upper Palatinate . It is under the administration of the USA and is used today by the US Army .

With an area of ​​160 km², it is one of the largest military training areas in Germany . The Hohenfels military training area is a community-free area on the Upper Palatinate Alb within the Neumarkt district in the Upper Palatinate . The Hohenburg is not open to the public.

The main base is in Albertshof ( 49 ° 14 ′  N , 11 ° 49 ′  E ).

The Hohenfels Army Air Field has the ICAO ETIH ( 49 ° 13 '  N , 11 ° 50'  O )

history

Historical data

The military training area was established in 1938 as part of the armament of the Wehrmacht . To this end, 544 properties and farms were relocated and replaced. The Unterödenhart camp was used to intern 3,000 Polish soldiers and NCOs from 1939 to 1940. At the beginning of the Second World War , a camp for British and American prisoners of war was set up in this part of the military site . In the fall of 1942, an estimated 7,000 British and Americans were housed in Unterödenhart. After the collapse of the German Reich in 1945 , the camp served as a reception point for deported foreigners . The United Nations Emergency Relief and Reconstruction Administration ( UNRRA ) helped homeless people, including many Poles who were waiting to be transported back to their countries. From 1948 the military training area was made available for German refugees and displaced persons .

American paratroopers at the Hohenfels Training Area

In June 1951, the US military government demanded that the Federal Republic of the 7th Army troops stationed in southern Germany cede the area of ​​the military training area. This US demand was granted in August 1951. Use by US troops began after the farms were cleared. The military training area was expanded. Two variants were discussed. The northern extension towards Amberg and the western extension. The western expansion was implemented. The northern expansion was opposed by the unfavorable geography of the Lauterach valley and the valuable and partially cleared trees of the deer forest .

In 1988 the Combat Maneuver Training Center (CMTC) was established, in which the combat of the combined arms with two parties against each other could be practiced relatively realistically .

Laser systems were used for this and fires, hits and failures were recorded and evaluated by computers. In December 2005, the CMTC was renamed the Joint Multinational Readiness Center (JMRC). In a formal property request from the responsible Federal Ministry of Defense in 2016, the US Army applied for a renewed expansion of the Hohenfels training area by around 33 hectares through the transfer of property.

Civilians on the Battlefield

Since 1999, complex exercises with civilian extras ("Civilians on the Battlefield", COB) have been taking place in Hohenfels for about three weeks each. During this time, the extras are constantly on the military training area in order to represent the civilian population of a crisis area (from simple farmers to trained translators to senior government officials). With this scenario, which is as realistic as possible, soldiers practice intercultural, sometimes multilingual communication and social interaction with local residents of a deployment area in order to get to know the peculiarities and problems of the simulated country. In this way, the soldiers are made aware of local and country-specific problems, bottlenecks and conflicts, they train to differentiate between military targets and threats from civilian people / affairs and they practice dealing with and working with other security forces and aid organizations on site.

The working and living conditions were described by some participants as unacceptable. Employment lawyer Peter Wedde describes the employment relationships as “pure exploitation” and assesses the remuneration (approx. 90 euros per day with 24 hour standby) as immoral .

geology

The White Jura (Malm) is the defining geological unit in Hohenfels. The intense karstification phenomena of marl , limestone and dolomite stone of  the Weißjura strata result in a severe drought in the area. Due to karstification, a deserted hill country characterizes the geomorphology of the military training area.

In the karstified areas there are large areas of Rendzina soils. Brown earth and Kolluvisol soils have developed on a small scale in the depressions and valleys .

ecology

Protected areas

The Hohenfels military training area is of very high ecological quality and a hotspot for biodiversity in Bavaria. As an only slightly fragmented habitat complex with extensive limestone grasslands , species-rich grassland and beech forests, the military terrain is of nationwide importance. This is why 14,902 hectares have been reported to the EU Commission as an EU bird sanctuary (Special Protected Areas -  SPA ) and FFH area and thus belong to the European Natura 200 0 system of protected areas . The two Natura 2000 areas have been legally secured since April 1, 2016.

flora

The military use of the area has contributed to the development of diverse habitats and biotopes . The following habitat types occur on the military training area:

  • Lime (semi) dry lawns and their stages of shrubbery with orchids
  • Lean, lowland hay meadows
  • Limestone scree slopes of the colline to montane level
  • Limestone cliffs with crevice vegetation
  • Bedstraw-oak-hornbeam forests
  • Caves (not open to tourists)
  • Woodruff beech forests
  • Orchid-lime-beech forests
  • Base-rich or lime pioneer lawn
  • Natural and near-natural nutrient-rich still waters with spawning or frog-bite communities

The lady's slipper  ( Cypripedium calceolus ) , perhaps the most imposing species of orchid in European flora, occurs on military grounds.

fauna

On the northern edge of the training area, in the High Castle in Lauterachtal, a colony of strictly protected bat species was in 1992. Large Hufeisennas e (Rhinolophus ferrumequinum) discovered. This quarter is the last known nursery for the great horseshoe bat in Germany.

The near-natural forest and open land areas with their structurally rich transition areas ( ecotones ) are ideal hunting habitats for other bat species. The wide range of tree and karst caves are suitable as quarters for these nocturnal mammals. In addition to pug bat  (Barbastella barbastellus) , Bechstein's bat  (Myotis bechsteinii)  and great mouse-  eared bat (Myotis myotis) use the military training area, which is of great importance as a habitat.

The military operations are constantly creating new biotope structures, from which the endangered yellow-bellied toad (Bombina variegata) benefits . As a result of the exercises, furrows and temporary small bodies of water are continuously formed, which represent optimal spawning habitats for the pioneer species.

In 2017, a male was Wolf  (Canis lupus) from the Central European lowland population a proven n the military area. It is the third evidence of a wolf on the military training area.

The large-scale Hohenfels military training area also offers suitable habitats for bird life (avifauna). The following endangered and partly threatened bird species occur on the site and represent conservation goals of the EU bird sanctuary:

Trivia

On April 11, 2016, the 173rd Airborne Brigade held an airborne operation exercise at the military training area that dropped 150 payloads. Three Humvees released themselves from their parachutes and fell from several hundred meters onto a meadow. As a result of an investigation, a US soldier was convicted by a military court in connection with the incident for having sabotaged the parachutes.

Web links

Commons : Hohenfels Training Area  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Press and Information Center Armed Forces Base: Hohenfels Training Area. Federal Ministry of Defense, October 12, 2016, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  2. ↑ No access to the Hohenburg
  3. ↑ a b c About JMRC. (No longer available online.) US Army, archived from the original on March 11, 2018 ; accessed on April 1, 2018 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.eur.army.mil
  4. ↑ a b c d history: Markt Hohenfels - The story. Hohenfels Market, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  5. ↑ Paul Böhm: 50 years ago "Will Hohenfels become a military training area again?" (PDF) Markt Schmidmühlen, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  6. ↑ From the history of the Hohenfels Training Area
  7. ↑ Clearance and use
  8. ^ The minutes of the Bavarian Council of Ministers 1945-1962: Extension of the former Hohenfels military training area. Historical commission at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences., August 13, 1953, accessed on November 29, 2018 .
  9. ↑ CMTC ( Memento of the original from September 18, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hohenfels.army.mil
  10. ↑ Spiegel report on the evaluation of the exercises in the CMTC
  11. ↑ Nicolas Damm: US Army requests expansion of the Hohenfels military training area. Neumarkter Nachrichten, August 24, 2016, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  12. ^ Optronic HR GmbH: Information on Civilans on the Battlefield
  13. ↑ Marco Smedt: Afghanistan in the Upper Palatinate. In: UniSpiegel , No. 04/2005, pp. 12-14.
  14. ↑ As an extra on the American war training area , contribution by Galileo (TV program) , November 9, 2015.
  15. ↑ Serious allegations against the US Army and their German contractual partners for employing civilian workers from Germany - "Immoral pay and exploitation". In: Report Mainz (SWR), April 2, 2013.
  16. ↑ Allegations against service providers - labor lawyer criticizes contract partners of the US Army for "pure exploitation". OberpfalzNetz.de, April 3, 2013.
  17. ↑ The BayernAtlas - the map viewer of the Free State of Bavaria with maps, aerial photos and a variety of themed maps. Bavarian Surveying Administration, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  18. ↑ UmweltAtlas Bayern: Map topic soil. Bavarian State Office for the Environment (LfU), accessed on September 8, 2017 .
  19. ↑ a b c d e f Profiles of the Natura 2000 areas: 6736-302 Hohenfels training area (FFH area and EU bird sanctuary). Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), April 14, 2015, accessed on August 30, 2017 .
  20. ↑ Press office of the government of the Upper Palatinate: Press information: Upper Palatinate Nature Conservation Council visited the Hohenfels military training area. Government of the Upper Palatinate, June 16, 2016, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  21. ↑ Greater horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus ferrumequinum). (No longer available online.) Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), archived from the original on August 31, 2017 ; accessed on August 30, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ffh-anhang4.bfn.de
  22. ↑ Protect the environment. Support the troop. Secure the future. (PDF) USAG Bavaria, Directorate of Public Works, Environmental Division, accessed on August 30, 2017 .
  23. ↑ Our natural heritage in the Upper Palatinate: Implementing Natura 2000 together and successfully. (PDF) Government of the Upper Palatinate, April 2017, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  24. ↑ Press release LfU No. 13/2017 (PDF) Bavarian State Office for the Environment (LfU), April 13, 2017, accessed on August 31, 2017 .
  25. ↑ Kyle Jahner: Army launches investigation into airborne Humvee mishap: Video. In: armytimes.com. April 21, 2016, accessed April 26, 2016 .
  26. ↑ Nancy Montgomery: Sergeant who sent 3 Humvees plummeting from plane found guilty. In: Stars and Stripes. May 9, 2018, accessed November 22, 2019 .

Coordinates: 49 ° 14 ′ 1 ″  N , 11 ° 48 ′ 59.8 ″  E