The maritime idea gets an institute

An audience of around 50 listened with fascination to the lecture by Captain (ret.) Rolf Martens, the last surviving of the seven founding members of the German Naval Institute at the German Armed Forces Command and Staff College. The retrospective on the 50th anniversary

The story of the 50th anniversary year is very exciting. It is an eyewitness account, so you can read the original version here in an abridged version.

It is quite moving for me, as the last surviving founding member (of seven), to give a lecture in the 50th anniversary year on how the German Marine Institute came to be founded, a foundation that was not based on spontaneous inspiration, but was the result of years of development. I will try to be brief, but I cannot do without mentioning a few details by way of introduction in order to understand the form and content of the DMI's origins.