Pantenius, Wilhelm Wilhelm Büchsel

Vom Bürgersohn zum Seestrategen

No naval officer served as Chief of Staff of the Imperial Navy for as long as Wilhelm Büchsel. This deserves special attention in view of the special role played by the German naval forces and their confusing command structure under the rule of Kaiser Wilhelm II. Büchsel found it particularly difficult to deal with the rival Imperial Navy Office and its overpowering State Secretary Alfred von Tirpitz. Both personalities, who began their training as naval cadets together in Crew 65, demonstrate how strongly character traits could influence political and military decisions in the German Empire, which is also evident in the fact that, unlike Tirpitz, Büchsel never received a letter of nobility. Actively supporting his colleague's fleet construction programmes, the reserved and extremely loyal Chief of the Admiralty Staff, with his profound military expertise, later attempted to strengthen the authority entrusted to him so that it could function as an operational command body. Büchsel also wanted to emancipate the Admiralty Staff with regard to the long-term naval strategic planning required for this. This concerned information gathering, financial and personnel resources, and naval officer training. In contrast to Tirpitz, Büchsel's operational plans were more defensive in nature, as evidenced by his prioritisation of small cruisers and his avoidance of a decisive battle with the Grand Fleet in the North Sea. Ultimately, however, Büchsel also failed in the face of his colleague's claim to power ... In his work, the author once again traces historical baselines, this time those of Prussian-German naval history up to the end of the First World War.