Wörner

Manfred Wörner

Manfred Hermann Wörner (born September 24, 1934 in Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt; died August 13, 1994 in Brussels) was a German politician and diplomat. He served as the defense minister of West Germany between 1982 and 1988. He then served as the Secretary General of NATO from 1988 to 1994. His term as Secretary General saw the end of the Cold War and the German reunification. Whilst serving in that position, he was diagnosed with cancer, but, in spite of his illness, continued serving until his final days.

Family

Wörner was the grandson of Hermann Aldinger, Commanding officer for the 1st. Heavy Air Defense Battery of the Legion Condor, who became General for the Luftwaffe after 1945. He grew up in his grandfather's house in Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt and visited the Johannes-Kepler-Gymnasium there. He was married to Elfie Wörner, who was supporting several German army related humanitarian agencies, and who died due to a tumor at 4 July 2006.

Education

After graduation in 1953 he studied Law at Heidelberg, Paris, and Munich. He closed his studies 1957 with the first and 1961 the second Staatsexamen. He got his Dr. jur. in 1961 writing about International law. Afterwards he worked for the administration of Baden-Württemberg. He was a county official for Oehringen until 1962, for the Baden-Württemberg Landtag until 1965 and the County Göppingen.

Wörner was a jet pilot and reserve officer of the Luftwaffe.

Political career

Wörner was a member of the German CDU and was an elected member of the German parliament. When first joining parliament in 1965, he was the youngest member of a German parliament ever. On October 14, 1982 he was appointed Federal Minister of Defense in Helmut Kohl's government. In his time he became involved in the Kießling-Affair. On May 18, 1988, he resigned from his office and became Secretary General of NATO on July 1, 1988. He died in office of cancer.

Manfred Wörner Medal

Since 1996, the Ministry of Defense has awarded the Manfred Wörner Medal on an annual basis to honour public figures who have rendered "special meritorious service to peace and freedom in Europe".

Since then it was given to:

1996, Richard Holbrooke, US diplomate and Special Envoy in Bosnia and Kosovo
1997, Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist-Schmenzin, publisher and initiator of the Munich Conference on Security Policy
1998, Dr. Gerd Wagner (postmortem), for the implementation of the Dayton Agreement
1999 Dr. Janusz Onyszkiewicz, Minister of Defense of Poland
2000 Elizabeth Pond, American Journalist
2001 Karsten D. Voigt, Co-ordinator at the German State Department for the German-American Cooperation
2002 Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief and former Secretary General of NATO
2003 Prof. Dr. Catherine McArdle Kelleher, U.S. Naval War College and former Head of the Aspen Institute Berlin

Honours

Wörner Gap on Livingston Island in the South Shetland Islands, Antarctica is named after Dr. Wörner in recognition of his contribution to European unification.