Rendulic was called to the
German Army, as part of the
Wehrmacht, in 1938, after the
annexation of Austria to Germany. He commanded the
14th Infantry Division (23 June – 10 October 1940); the
52nd Infantry Division (1940–1942); and the
XXXV Corps (1942–1943), with which he participated in the
Battle of Kursk. From 1943 to 1944, Rendulic commanded the
2nd Panzer Army during
World War II in Yugoslavia. Early in 1944,
Adolf Hitler ordered Rendulic to devise a plan to capture
Yugoslav partisan leader
Josip Broz Tito. In the resultant
raid on Drvar on 25 May 1944,
German paratroopers stormed partisan
Supreme Headquarters in
Drvar (western
Bosnia) looking for Tito but ultimately failed to capture him, suffering heavy casualties. From June 1944, Rendulic commanded the
20th Mountain Army and all German troops stationed in
Finland and
Norway. Following the war, Rendulic was accused of ordering the destruction of the Finnish town of
Rovaniemi in October 1944, allegedly as revenge against the Finns for making a separate peace with the
Soviet Union. In 1945, Rendulic served as the commander-in-chief of
Army Group Courland cut off in the
Courland Pocket on the
Eastern Front;
Army Group North in Northern Germany; and
Army Group Ostmark, in Austria and Czechoslovakia. While commanding Army Group North and trying to prevent the loss of
East Prussia, he issued orders that any unwounded soldier found in a rear area outside his unit area was to receive a
court-martial on the spot and be shot. Also, a battalion commander was shot for retreating his unit. ==War crimes trial==