Volker Bescht

Volker Bescht (born February 14, 1951 in Bevensen ) is retired Brigadier General . D. of the army of the Bundeswehr . In his last assignment he was Deputy Commander of the Special Operations Division in Stadtallendorf from January 2010 to May 2013 .

Military career

Bescht joined the Bundeswehr in 1972 with the 3rd Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion in Lüneburg . From 1973 to 1976 he studied at the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Munich . He then returned to the Lüneburg Battalion and was employed there as a platoon leader until 1978 . From 1978 to 1981, Bescht served in Neuhausen ob Eck as a training manager in the remote surveillance training center / international remote surveillance school.

From 1981 to 1983 Hauptmann Bescht was a company commander in the 11th Panzer Reconnaissance Training Battalion in Munster . It was used abroad. From 1983 to 1987 he served at NATO headquarters in Brussels , first as head of department and then as adjutant to the German military representative Hans-Peter Tandecki in the NATO military committee .

Back in Germany, Bescht took over the post of operations and training officer as well as deputy commander ( S3 ) in the staff of the 11th Panzer Reconnaissance Training Battalion in Munster from 1987 to 1989 . From 1989 to 1991 he was G3 with the Chief of Staff Northern Army Group (NORTHAG) in Mönchengladbach.

In 1991 he took over command of the 3rd Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion in Lüneburg, where his service time had started. After this troop command, Bescht completed a post-graduate course in 1994 at the Institut Universitaire des Hautes Études Internationales (IUHEI) in Geneva . In 1995 he was transferred to the Federal Ministry of Defense in Bonn , where he served until 1997 as a consultant in the command staff of the armed forces (FüS III 5) and in the Foreign Office as a consultant for peace-keeping measures of the United Nations . In 1997 he was involved in the preparation and coordination of the German Presidency in the Western European Union in Brussels. From 1998 to 2000 he was Director of the International Coordination Center (ICC) for the SFOR missions in Bosnia and Herzegovina and KFOR in Kosovo at NATO's European Headquarters ( SHAPE ) in Brussels .

Back in Germany, Bescht took over the post of Deputy Brigade Commander of Airborne Brigade 31 in Oldenburg from 2000 to 2003 under the command of Carl-Hubertus von Butler . He was then transferred to Altenstadt and was school commander of the airborne and air transport school from 2003 to 2005 .

On August 29, 2005, Colonel Bescht finally took over command of Airborne Brigade 26 in Saarlouis from Hans-Werner Fritz . In this employment he was promoted to brigadier general. He handed this command over to Eberhard Zorn on January 14, 2010 and in the same month took over from Henning Glawatz the post of Deputy Commander of the Special Operations Division in Regensburg under the command of Hans-Werner Fritz.

In March 2011 he was in charge of "Operation Pegasus" in which 262 people, 125 of whom were Germans, were evacuated from the contested areas in Libya.

The general also shows courage in politics and society. In 2009, for example, he provocatively called for more solidarity in the Afghanistan mission: his soldiers had the impression "that in Germany you can live with it more if one of our soldiers is killed than if you kill your opponent," he said as the outgoing commander of the airborne brigade 26 public to the horror of the Department of Defense. Until then, the brigade had suffered eight dead and twelve seriously wounded during the operations. At the same time, Bescht founded an association to support the wounded and their relatives.

Private

Besht is married and has three children.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Rheinische Post dated March 7, 2011, page A2: Portrait Archived copy ( memento of the original dated March 14, 2011 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. 
2. ^ Rheinische Post dated March 7, 2011: Archived copy ( memento of the original dated March 14, 2011 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. 

Web links

• "The troops are insecure" (Interview in the Saarbrücker Zeitung from January 3, 2010)