The German Navy is part of the unified Bundeswehr, the German Armed Forces. The German Navy was originally known as the Bundesmarine from 1956 to 1995, when Deutsche Marine became the official name with respect to the 1990 incorporation of the East German Volksmarine. It is deeply integrated into the NATO alliance. Its primary mission is protection of Germany's territorial waters and maritime infrastructure as well as sea lines of communication. Apart from this, the German Navy participates in peacekeeping operations, and renders humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. It also participates in anti-piracy operations.
The Federal Ministry of Defence, abbreviated BMVg, is a top-level federal agency, headed by the Federal Minister of Defence as a member of the Cabinet of Germany. The ministry is headquartered at the Hardthöhe district in Bonn and has a second office in the Bendlerblock building in Berlin, which is occasionally used as a metonym to denote the entire Ministry.
The Military Counterintelligence Service is one of the three federal intelligence agencies in Germany, and is responsible for military counterintelligence within Bundeswehr. The MAD is subordinate to the Federal Ministry of Defense.
The Joint Support and Enabling Service is a branch of the German Bundeswehr established in October 2000 as a result of major reforms of the Bundeswehr. It handles various logistic and organisational tasks of the Bundeswehr. The SKB is one of six components of the Bundeswehr, the other five being the Army, Navy, Air Force, the Joint Medical Service, and the Cyber and Information Domain Service. As of April 2020, the force is composed of 27,840 personnel. In May 2021 the minister of defense Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer together with inspector general Eberhard Zorn published a plan to dissolve the Joint Support and Enabling Service and to reintegrate its units into the army, navy, airforce and cyber command.
The Inspector General of the Bundeswehr, is the highest-ranking military position held by a commissioned officer on active duty in the Bundeswehr, the present-day armed forces of Germany.
Wolfram Kühn is a retired German Navy Vizeadmiral. He served as Deputy Inspector General of the Bundeswehr and Inspector of the Joint Support Service from 2006 to his retirement in 2012.
The Army Staff, in the meaning of the Army general staff, of the German Army was a department of the Federal Ministry of Defence and one of the five staff headquarters in the military command of the Bundeswehr. The Army Staff was thus at the same time a ministerial division and the highest level of military command within the German Army. It was merged with the other high command authorities of the German Army to form the Army Command in 2012.
The Inspector of the Army is the title held by the commander and highest ranking officer of the German Army of the modern-day German Armed Forces or Bundeswehr. The Inspector is the most senior officer to serve in the German Army and is a military adviser to the Government of Germany as well as the Ministry of Defence.
Günter Luther was a German admiral who became Inspector of the Navy and Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe for NATO. During World War II, he served as a military pilot in the Kriegsmarine and a paratrooper in the Luftwaffe. After the war, he joined the newly founded West German Bundesmarine in 1956.
The Inspector of the Air Force is the commander of the Air Force of the modern-day German Armed Forces, the Bundeswehr. The Inspector is responsible for the readiness of personnel and materiel in the German Air Force, in that function reports directly to the Federal Minister of Defence. The current Inspector is Ingo Gerhartz, appointed on 29 May 2018.
The Navy Command is the high command of the German Navy of the Bundeswehr as well as the staff of the Inspector of the Navy, the Navy's highest commander. It was formed in 2012, as a merger of the Navy Office (Marineamt), Naval Staff, and Fleet Command (Flottenkommando), as part of a larger reorganization of the Bundeswehr. It is based in Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
Andreas Krause is a Vizeadmiral of the German Navy of the Bundeswehr, and he served as Inspector of the Navy. He previously served as a U-boat officer, as a staff officer in the Bundeswehr and NATO, as commander of the German Navy's 1st Flotilla and the Maritime Task Force for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, and as Deputy Inspector of the Navy.
U-36 (S186) is a Type 212A submarine of the German Navy. She is the sixth ship of the class to enter service.
Rainer Maria Brinkmann is a Vizeadmiral of the German Navy, and the current Deputy Inspector of the Navy. He previously served in fast attack craft units, and in staff positions, and has a degree in education from the University of the Bundeswehr Hamburg.
Ansgar Bethge was Inspector of the Navy from 1980 to 1985.
The Armed Forces Staff, in the meaning of General staff, of the German Bundeswehr was the central department of the Federal Ministry of Defence (MOD) in direct subordination to the Inspector General of the Bundeswehr and one of the five staff headquarters in the military command of the German Bundeswehr.
Jan Christian Kaack is a Vizeadmiral of the German Navy and as of March 11th, 2022 Inspector of the Navy.
Einsatzflottille 2 is one of the three brigade-level units of the German Navy, in addition to Einsatzflottille 1 and the Naval Air Command. It is based in Wilhelmshaven, Lower Saxony, and is subordinated to Navy Command, based in Rostock.
The Einsatzausbildungszentrum Schadensabwehr Marine is a naval school of the German Navy in Neustadt in Holstein. It is subordinate to the department head operations in the naval command in Rostock.
Kay-Achim Schönbach is a retired German vice admiral who served as the Inspector of the Navy of the German Navy from 24 March 2021 to 22 January 2022. Schönbach resigned his position after his political remarks regarding the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian crisis and prospects of Ukraine and Georgia joining NATO sparked intense opposition from the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry.
