Theodor Busse

Theodor Busse (Frankfurt an der Oder, 1897 - Wallerstein, 1986) was a German officer who served in the Imperial Army, the Reichswehr and the Wehrmacht. His career spans two world wars, and he is best known for his role in the final months of the conflict on the Eastern Front, when he commanded the Ninth Army during the defence of Berlin.

He entered the Imperial German Army as a cadet in 1915 and, after the armistice, was accepted into the Reichswehr, where he rose steadily through the ranks. During the Second World War he worked as a General Staff officer alongside Erich von Manstein, first in the Eleventh Army and later in Army Groups Don and South. He had already prepared a training programme for the General Staff in 1939. In January 1945 he took command of the Ninth Army, an appointment that was never formally confirmed, since the war ended before his probationary period was over.

During the Oder-Neisse offensive his army was encircled in the Spree Forest. General Gotthard Heinrici urged him several times to withdraw, but Busse would not consider it without a specific order from Hitler. His forces were almost annihilated in the Battle of Halbe. The remnants broke out to the west, linked up with Walther Wenck's Twelfth Army and surrendered to the Americans at the Elbe, disobeying Hitler's orders. As a prisoner, he told the Nuremberg trials that he had aimed to give German civilians time to escape the Soviets, a justification historians have treated with caution.

After his release he served in West Germany as director of civil defence and wrote and edited works on the military history of the Second World War. His legacy lies mainly in his firsthand account of German military command in the war's final phase.