Hans von Seeckt

Hans von Seeckt (1866 to 1936) was a German staff officer who rose from the Prussian General Staff to command the German Army of the Weimar Republic. In the First World War he served as chief of staff to August von Mackensen, and the sources credit him with planning the breakthrough at Gorlice-Tarnow in 1915 and the campaign in Serbia later that year, work that earned him the Pour le Merite and its Oak Leaves. He then served in Austro-Hungarian headquarters and, from 1917, as chief of staff of the Ottoman Army. After the Treaty of Versailles he helped build the small Reichswehr, was its chief from 1919 and commander in chief of the army from 1920 until he resigned in 1926, and laid down its doctrine, tactics and training. Late in life he advised Chiang Kai-shek in China. Assessments of him are mixed: he is praised for the doctrine he left and criticised for neglecting trained reserves.